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Show TEp CHURCH'S NAME. Objections to the " Term' Roman c Catholic. ... Before the Reformation, 'says the Tablet, Tab-let, of London, the Church was called "Catholic." Before the ' :Reformation-and :Reformation-and potably in EnglanfU-she was very frequently and constantly called "Roman.' "Ro-man.' Sometimes "Catholic and Roman." Ro-man." But after the Reformation we find also the combination "Roman Catholic." Cath-olic." It is not that the pre-Reformation Catholics were in any sense less "Roman:' "Ro-man:' - than we are. On the contrarv, they were, if possible, rather more so, J-or they were, constantly calling the Church by the simple word "Roman." Nor did they mean by the term merely the local Church in Rome. English kings, English bishops. English clergy. Enelish barons, were not domiciled in the Roman local Church. Locally, thev were sons and members of the "Ecclesia Angli-cana." Angli-cana." But they themselves habitually describe themselves as the "faithful and devoted sons of the Roman Church." while the local English Church of Ecclesia Anglicana is described in convocation convo-cation as being itself "a special member of the Roman Church." To them, therefore, there-fore, the Roman Church was not merely the local Church or the diocese of Rome, but the norma, and for all concrete practical prac-tical doctrinal and administrative purposes, pur-poses, the persona and equivalent for the Catholic Church. Hence the dictum of the medieval theologians: "Ecclesia Universalis est virtualiter Ecclesia Ro-mana." Ro-mana." That pre-Reformation Catholics in England, from the king and the archbishop arch-bishop down to the humblest layman, should have professed themselves "sons o fthe Roman Church" or as some peo- pie would say "Romanistswas just as natural and as logical as that thev should have called themselves Catholics. The combination of "Roman ' with "Catholic" is therefore an outcome not only of our faith, . but of our historv. If wc use the name "Roman Catholic," it is only in this sense. -and the words in the mind and mouth of a Catholic always convey their meaning as if a comma stood ' between them. It is virtually vir-tually in this sense that, side by side, with other adjectives, the word "Ro-mau" "Ro-mau" is joined with "Catholic" in the First Constitution of the Vatican Council. Coun-cil. There is. -as we know, another widely wide-ly different sense which certain modern mod-ern Anglicans have imported into the term. We have called in the restrictive or sectional .sense, and in it the word "Roman" would connote one sort or section sec-tion of Catholics, and imply that there-were there-were other Catholics who were not Roman. Ro-man. This is the heretical sense in which ! Catholics can never accept, it. When1 we speak of the Church as Roman Cath-I Cath-I olio, we no more, mean that, there is a I part of the Catholic Church wiiich is I not Roman, than when we say the Holy Catholic Church we imply that there is a part of the Catholic Church which is not holy. In contradistinction to the comma-sense described above, we may call the latter th: hyphen-sense, for, strictly speaking, such a meaning requires re-quires a hyphen between the words "Roman" "Ro-man" and "Catholic." It was this hyphen-sense (Roman-Catholic) which was repudiated by the Relator of the Schema de Fide Catholiea at the Vatican council. coun-cil. Then, to put it practically (always apart . from the lawyer , who comes to make ones will): "What have you drawn with those compasses?" 'A circle." cir-cle." "You mean a round circle with every point in its circumference eeiul-distant eeiul-distant from the centr? " "Of course All circles are round like. that. I do not know of 'any circles that are not." A pari: "Of what religion , -ye you?". "1 am a Catholic." "Yo itian a Roman Catholic." "Of course. All Catholics are Roman, and I do not know and Catholics Cath-olics who are not." That is to say, our noble and historic Catholic name is all-Ftif all-Ftif flcient. But if certain neople people with a purpose-dnsist upon styling us Roman Catholics with an emphasis on the Roman and on thus courting ex-I ex-I planations, we cheerfully accept the name, but in its true and Catholic sense, and they have only themselves to -blame if thsy elicit at the same time our explanations,, ex-planations,, and as abundantly and as expltcity as they are elv to desire thorn. |