The History of Christianity: From the Disciples to the Dawn of the Reformation

Lecture 20: The Distinctive Issues of the Latin West

stood for a sectarian version of Christianity. The church is

authentic only when it is uncompromised, perfectly holy.

•    Both parties appealed to the new emperor, Constantine. In his first

intervention in the affairs of the church, Constantine summoned a

council at Arles in Gaul (314), but when the council decided for the

majority (Catholic) party, the Donatists rejected the decision.

o The controversy contained elements of class conflict. The

Donatists represented elements of the native Punic population

of the countryside rather than the Hellenized and Romanized

Catholic party in the cities.

o Augustine, the bishop of Hippo, wrote extensively against

the Donatists in favor of a Catholic vision of the church—the

same everywhere and in all its

parts—and made a strong effort

at reconciliation in 411. But the

controversy did not end until the

incursion of the Saracens put an

effective end to North African

Christianity in the 5th century.

•    The issues raised by Donatism were

fundamental, involving the nature

of the church and the integrity of

its sacraments.

o Is the church a sect made up

only of the holy—those who

have never failed—or is it

“catholic” in the sense that

it embraces sinners, as well?

Augustine argued that the

Gospel of Matthew’s vision of

grain and weeds growing up

together in the same plot was

In the Donatist controversy,

augustine argued for the

vision of the Gospel of

matthew, which saw, in a

parable of Jesus, grain and

weeds growing together in

the same plot of land; it was

up to God to decide which

ones should be harvested

and which ones burned.

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