Denzinger EN 396
[From the letter "Per filium nostrum" to Caesarius of Arles, January 25, 531].
398 Dz 200a 1 . . . To your petition, which you have composed with laudable solicitude for the Faith, we have not delayed to give a Catholic reply. For you point out that some bishops of the Gauls, although they now agree that other goods are born of God's grace, think that faith, by which we believe in Christ, is only of nature, not of grace; and that (faith) has remained in the free will of man from Adam-which it is a sin to say and is not even now conferred on individuals by the bounty of God's mercy; asking that, for the sake of ending the ambiguity, we confirm by the authority of the Apostolic See your confession, in which in the Opposite way you explain that right faith in Christ and the beginning of all good will, according to Catholic truth, is inspired in the minds of individuals by the preceding grace of God.
399 Dz 200b 2. And therefore, since many Fathers, and above all Bishop Augustine of blessed memory, but also our former high priests of the Apostolic See are proved to have discussed this with such detailed reasoning that there should be no further doubt in anyone that faith itself also comes to us from grace, we have thought that we should desist from a complex response, especially since according to these statements from the Apostle which you have arranged, in which he says: I have obtained mercy, that I may be faithful (1Co 7,25), and elsewhere: It has been given to you, for Christ, not only that you may believe in Him, but also that you may suffer for Him (Ph 1,29), it clearly appears that the faith by which we believe in Christ, just as all blessings, comes to each man from the gift of supernal grace, not from the power of human nature. And this, too, we rejoice that your Fraternity, after holding a meeting with certain priests of the Gauls, understood according to the Catholic faith, namely in these matters in which with one accord, as you have indicated, they explained that the faith, by which we believe in Christ, is conferred by the preceding grace of God; adding also that there is no good at all according to God, that anyone can will, or begin, or accomplish without the grace of God, since our Savior Himself says: Without Me you can do nothing" (Jn 15,5). For it is certain and Catholic that in all blessings of which the chief is faith, though we do not will it, the mercy of God precedes us, that we may be steadfast in faith, just as David the prophet says: "My God, his mercy will prevent me" (Ps 58,11); and again: My mercy is with him (Ps 88,25); and elsewhere: His mercy follows me (Ps 22,6). And similarly blessed Paul says: Or did anyone first give to him, and will he be rewarded by him? Since from him, and through him, and in him are all things (Rm 11,35 f.).
400 So we marvel very much that those, who believe the contrary, are oppressed by the remains of an ancient error even to the point that they do not believe that we come to Christ by the favor of God, but by that of nature, and say that the good of that very nature, which is known to have been perverted by Adam's sin, is the author of our faith rather than Christ; and do not perceive that they contradict the statement of the master who said: No one comes to me, except it be given to him by my Father (Jn 6,44); but they also oppose blessed Paul likewise, who exclaims to the Hebrews: Let us run in the contest proposed to us, looking upon the author and finisher of faith, Jesus Christ (He 2,1 f.). Since this is so, we cannot discover what they impute to the human will without the grace of God for belief in Christ, since Christ is the author and consummator of faith.
3. Therefore, we salute [you] with proper affection, and approve your confession written above in agreement with the Catholic rules of the Fathers.
[From epistle (3) "Olim quidem" to the senators of Constantinople, March, 534]
401 Dz 201 [Since] Justinian the Emperor, our son, as you have learned from the tenor or his epistle, has signified that arguments have arisen with regard to these three questions, whether one of the Trinity can be called Christ and our God, that is, one holy person of the three persons of the Holy Trinity whether the God Christ incapable of suffering because of deity endured [suffering in] the flesh; whether properly and truly (the Mother of God and the Mother of God's Word become incarnate from her) the Mother of our Lord God Christ ought to be called Mary ever Virgin. In these matters we have recognized the Catholic faith of the Emperor, and we show that this is clearly so from the examples of the prophets, and of the Apostles, or of the Fathers. For in these examples we clearly point out that one of the Holy Trinity is Christ, that is, one of the three persons of the Holy Trinity is a holy person or substance, which the Greeks call (Greek text deleted) (various witnesses are brought forward, as Gn 3,22 1Co 8,6 the Nicene Creed; Proclus' letter to the Westerners, etc. ); but let us confirm by these examples that God truly endured in the flesh (Dt 28,66 Jn 14,6 Mt 3,8 Ac 3,15, 20, Ac 28 1Co 2,8 Cyrilli anath. 1Co 12 LEO Flavium etc. ).
Dz 202
We rightly teach that the glorious Holy ever Virgin Mary is acknowledged by Catholic men [to be] both properly and truly the one who bore God, and the Mother of God's Word, become incarnate from her. For He Himself deigned from earliest times properly and truly to become incarnate and likewise to be born of the holy and glorious Virgin Mother. Therefore, because the Son of God was properly and truly made flesh from her and born of her, we confess that she was properly and truly the Mother of God made incarnate and born from her, and (properly indeed), lest it be believed that the Lord Jesus received the name of God through honor or grace, as the foolish Nestorius thinks; but truly for this reason, lest it be believed that He took flesh in a phantasm or some other manner, not true flesh from the virgin, just as the impious Eutyches has asserted.
[From the Book against Origen of the Emperor Justinian, 543]
403 Dz 203 Can. 1. If anyone says or holds that the souls of men pre-existed, as if they were formerly minds and holy powers, but having received a surfeit of beholding the Divinity, and having turned towards the worse, and on this account having shuddered (apopsycheisas) at the love of God, in consequence being called souls (psychae) and being sent down into bodies for the sake of punishment, let him be anathema.
404 Dz 204 Can. 2. If anyone says and holds that the soul of the Lord pre-existed, and was united to God the Word before His incarnation and birth from the Virgin, let him be anathema.
405 Dz 205 Can. 3. If anyone says or holds that the body of our Lord Jesus Christ was first formed in the womb of the holy Virgin, and that after this God, the Word, and the soul, since it had pre-existed, were united to it, let him be anathema.
406 Dz 206 Can. 4. If anyone says or holds that the Word of God was made like all the heavenly orders, having become a Cherubim for the Cherubim, a Seraphim for the Seraphim, and evidently having been made like all the powers above, let him be anathema.
407 Dz 207 Can. 5. If anyone says or maintains that in resurrection the bodies of men are raised up from sleep spherical, and does not agree that we are raised up from sleep upright, let him be anathema.
408 Dz 208 Can. 6. If anyone says that the sky, and the sun, and the moon and the stars, and the waters above the heavens are certain living and material * powers, let him be anathema.
409 Dz 209 Can. 7. If anyone says or holds that the Lord Christ in the future age will be crucified in behalf of the demons, just as (He was) for the sake of men, let him be anathema.
410 Dz 210 Can. 8. If anyone says or holds that the power of God is limited, and that He has accomplished as much as He has comprehended, let him be anathema.
411 Dz 211 Can. 9. If anyone says or holds that the punishment of the demons and of impious men is temporary, and that it will have an end at some time, that is to say, there will be a complete restoration of the demons or of impious men, let him be anathema.
Dz 212
We confess that (we) hold and declare the faith given from the beginning by the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ to the Holy Apostles, and preached by them in the whole world; which the sacred Fathers both confessed and explained, and handed down to the holy churches, and especially [those Fathers] who assembled in the four sacred Synods, whom we follow and accept through all things and in all things . . . judging as at odds with piety all things, indeed, which are not in accord with what has been defined as right faith by the same four holy Councils, we condemn and anathematize them.
[In part identical with "Homologia" of the Emperor, in the year 551]
421 Dz 213 Can. 1. If anyone does not confess that (there is) one nature or substance of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and one power and one might, and that the Trinity is consubstantial, one Godhead being worshipped in three subsistences, or persons, let such a one be anathema. For there is one God and Father, from whom are all things, and one Lord Jesus Christ, through whom are all things, and one Holy Spirit, in whom are all things.
422 Dz 214 Can. 2. If anyone does not confess that there are two generations of the Word of God, the one from the Father before the ages, without time and incorporeally, the other in the last days, when the same came down from heaven, and was incarnate of the holy and glorious Mother of God and ever Virgin Mary, and was born of her, let such a one be anathema.
423 Dz 215 Can. 3. If anyone says that one [person] is the Word of God who performed miracles, and another the Christ who suffered, or says that God the Word was with Christ when Ile was born of a woman, or was with Him as one in another, but not that the same [person] is our Lord Jesus Christ, the Word of God, incarnate and made man, and that both the miracles and the sufferings which He voluntarily endured in the flesh were of the same person, let such a one be anathema.
424 Dz 216 Can. 4. If anyone says that the union of the Word of was made according to grace, or according to operation, dignity, or according to equality of honor, or according relation, or temperament, or power, or according to good was pleasing to God the Word because it seemed well to Himself, as [mad] Theodore declares; or according to which the Nestorians who call God the Word Jesus and Christ, and name the man separately Christ and the Son, and, though plainly speaking of two persons, pretend to speak of one person and one Christ according to name only, and honor, and dignity, and worship, but does not confess that the union of the Word of God to a body animated with a rational and intellectual soul, took place according to composition or according to subsistence, as the Holy Fathers have taught, and on this account one subsistence of Him, who is the Lord Jesus Christ, one of the Holy Trinity, let such a one be anathema.
425 For, since the union is thought of in many ways, some following the impiety of Appollinaris and Eutyches, consenting to the disappearance of those who have come together, worship the union according to confusion; others thinking like Theodore and Nestorius, rejoicing in the division, introduce the accidental union. But the Holy Church of God, rejecting the impiety of each heresy, confesses the union of God's Word to the body according to composition, that is according to subsistence. For the union through composition in the mystery about Christ not only preserves unconfused what have come together but besides does not admit a division.
426 Dz 217 Can. 5. If anyone accepts the one subsistence of our Lord Jesus Christ as admitting the significance of many subsistences, and on this account attempts to introduce in the mystery about Christ two subsistences or two persons, and of the two persons introduced by him, he speaks of one person according to dignity, and honor, and adoration, just as mad Theodore and Nestorius have written, and he falsely accuses the sacred synod of Chalcedon of using the expression "of one subsistence" according to this impious conception, but does not confess that the word of God was united to a body according to subsistence, and on this account one subsistence of Him, that is one person, and that thus, too, the holy Council of Chalcedon confessed one subsistence of our Lord Jesus Christ, let such a one be anathema. For, the Holy Trinity did not receive the addition of a person or of a subsistence when one of the Holy Trinity, God the Word, became incarnate.
427 Dz 218 Can. 6. If anyone says that the holy glorious ever-virgin Mary is falsely but not truly the Mother of God; or (is the Mother of God) according to relation, as if a mere man were born, but not as if the Word of God became incarnate [and of her] from her, but the birth of the man according to them being referred to the Word of God as being with the man when he was born, and falsely accuses the holy synod of Chalcedon of proclaiming the Virgin Mother of God according to this impious conception which was invented by Theodore; or, if anyone calls her the mother of the man or the mother of the Christ, as if the Christ were not God, but does not confess that she is exactly and truly the Mother of God, because God the Word, born of the Father before the ages, was made flesh from her in the last days, and that thus the holy Synod of Chalcedon confessed her (to be), let such a one be anathema.
428 Dz 219 Can. 7. If anyone speaking on the two natures does not confess that our Lord Jesus Christ is acknowledged as in His Divinity as well as in His Manhood, in order that by this he may signify the difference of the natures in which without confusion the marvelous union was born, and that the nature of the Word was not changed into that of the flesh, nor was the nature of the flesh changed into that of the Word (for each remains exactly as it is by nature, and the union has been made according to subsistence) but with a view to division by part; if he accepts such an expression as this with regard to the mystery of Christ, or, acknowledging a number of natures in the same one Lord our Jesus Christ the Word of God made flesh, but does not accept the difference of these [natures] of which He is also composed, but which is not destroyed by the union (for one is from both, and through one both), but in this uses number in such a way, as if each nature had its own subsistence separately, let such a one be anathema.
429 Dz 220 Can. 8. If anyone who agrees that a union has been born of the two natures of divinity and humanity, or who says that one nature of the Word of God has been made flesh, does not accept these (expressions) as the holy Fathers have taught, namely, that of the nature of God and of that of man, the union having taken place according to subsistence, one Christ was produced; but from such words attempts to introduce one nature or substance of Godhead and humanity of Christ, let such be anathema.
430 For, while asserting that the only-begotten Word is united according to subsistence, we do not say that any confusion of the natures with each other has been produced; but rather we believe that while each remains exactly as it is, the Word has been united to the flesh. Therefore, there is one Christ, God and man, the same [person being] consubstantial with the Father according to the Divinity, and the same consubstantial with us according to the humanity, for the Church of God equally detests and anathematizes those who divide or cut part by part, and those who confuse the mystery of the divine dispensation of Christ.
431 Dz 221 Can. 9. If anyone says that Christ is adored in two natures and as a result of this two (forms of) adoration are introduced, a special one for God the Word, and a special one for the man; or, if anyone with a view to the destruction of the humanity, or to the confusing of Divinity and the humanity, talking of one nature or substance of those who have come together, thus adores Christ but does not adore with one worship God the Word incarnate with His own flesh, just as the Church of God has accepted from the beginning, let such a one be anathema.
432 Dz 222 Can. 10. If anyone does not confess that Jesus Christ, our Lord, who was crucified in the flesh is true God, and Lord of glory, and one of the Holy Trinity, let such a one be anathema.
433 Dz 223 Can. 11. If anyone does not anathematize Arius, Eunomius, Macedonius, Apollinarius, Nestorius, Eutyches, and Origen, in company with their sinful works, and all other heretics, who have been condemned by the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church and by the four holy synods above-mentioned, and those of the above-mentioned heretics who have thought or think likewise, and have remained in their impiety until the end, let such a one be anathema.
434 Dz 224
Can. 12. If anyone defends the impious Theodore of Mopsuestia, who said that one was God the Word, and another the Christ, who was troubled by the sufferings of the soul and the longings of the flesh, and who gradually separated Himself from worse things, and was improved by the progress of His works, and rendered blameless by this life, so as to be baptized as mere man in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, and on account of the baptism received the grace of the Holy Spirit, and was deemed worthy of adoption as a son, and according to the likeness of the royal image is worshipped in the person of God the Word, and after the resurrection became unchangeable in thoughts and absolutely unerring, and again the same impious Theodore having said that the union of God the Word with the Christ was such as the Apostle (spoke of) with reference to man and woman: "They shall be two in one flesh" (Ep 5,31); and in addition to his other innumerable blasphemies, dared to say that after the resurrection, the Lord when He breathed on His disciples and said:"Receive ye the holy ghost" (Jn 20,22), did not give them the Holy Spirit, but breathed only figuratively. But this one, too, said that the confession of Thomas on touching the hands and the side of the Lord, after the resurrection, " My Lord and my God" (Jn 20,28), was not said by Thomas concerning Christ, but that Thomas, astounded by the marvel of the resurrection, praised God for raising Christ from the dead;
435 Dz 225 and what is worse, even in the interpretation of the Acts of the Apostles made by him, the same Theodore comparing Christ to Plato and Manichaeus, and Epicurus, and Marcion, says that, just as each of those after inventing his own doctrine caused his disciples to be called Platonists, and Manichaeans, and Epicureans, and Marcionites, and Christ invented His own way of life and His own doctrines [caused His disciples] to be called Christians from Him; if, then, anyone defends the aforementioned most impious Theodore and his impious writings, in which he sets forth the aforesaid and other innumerable blasphemies against the great God and our Savior Jesus Christ, but does not anathematize him and his impious writings, and all those who accept or even justify him, or say that he preached in an orthodox manner, and those who wrote in his defense or in defense of his wicked writings, and those who think the same things, or have thought them up to this time and acquiesced in such heresy until their deaths, let such a one be anathema.
436 Dz 226 Can. 13. If anyone defends the impious writings of Theodoritus, which are against the true faith and the first holy synod (held) in Ephesus, and (against) Cyril in the number of the saints, and his twelve chapters [see note 113ff.], and defends all that he has written on behalf of the impious Theodore and Nestorius, and on behalf of others who think the same as the above-mentioned Theodore and Nestorius, and accepts them and their godlessness; and because of them calls the teachers of the Church impious, who believe in the union of the Word of God according to subsistence; and if he does not anathematize the said impious writings, and those who have thought or think similarly with these, and all those who have written against the true faith, or against Cyril among the saints and his twelve chapters, and have died in such impiety, let such a one be anathema.
437 Dz 227 Can. 14. If anyone defends the epistle which Ibas is said to have written to Maris the Persian, which denied that God the Word became incarnate of the holy Mother of God and ever virgin Mary, was made man, but which said that a mere man was born of her, whom he calls a temple, so that God the Word is one, and the man another; and which slandered as a heretic Cyril in the number of the saints for having proclaimed the right faith of the Christians; and as one who wrote in a manner like that of the wicked Apollinaris, and blamed the first holy synod (held) in Ephesus, because it condemned Nestorius without an inquiry; and the same impious letter stigmatizes the twelve chapters of Cyril [see n. 113ff.] in the number of the saints as wicked and opposed to the true faith, and justifies Theodore and Nestorius and their impious doctrines and writings; if anyone then defends the said letter, and does not anathematize it, and those who defend it, and say that it is true, or part of it is, and those who have written and are writing in its defense, or in defense of the wicked (ideas) included in it, and dare to justify it or the impiety included in it in the name of the holy Fathers, or of the holy synod (held) in Chalcedon, and have persisted in these (actions) until death, let such a one be anathema.
438 Dz 228 When then these things have been so confessed, which we have received from Holy Scripture, and from the teaching of the Holy Fathers, and from what was defined with regard to one and the same faith by the aforesaid four holy synods, and from that condemnation formulated by us against the heretics and their impiety, and besides, that against those who have defended or are defending the aforementioned three chapters, and who have persisted or do persist in their own error; if anyone should attempt to transmit [doctrines] opposed to those piously molded by us, or to teach or to write [them] if indeed he be a bishop, or belongs to the clergy, such a one, because he acts in a manner foreign to the sacred and ecclesiastical constitutions, shall be stripped of the office of bishop or cleric, but if he be a monk or a layman, he shall be anathematized.
[From Fide PELAGII in the letter "Humani generis" to Childebert I, April, 557]
443 Dz 228a For I confess that all men from Adam, even to the consummation of the world, having been born and having died with Adam himself and his wife, who were not born of other parents, but were created, the one from the earth, the other [al.: altera], however, from the rib of the man (cf. Gn 2,7), Will then rise again and stand before the Judgment seat of Christ, that every one may receive the proper things of the body, according as he has done, whether it be good or bad (Rm 14,10 2Co 5,10); and indeed by the very bountiful grace of God he will present the just, as vessels of mercy prepared beforehand for glory (Rm 9,23), with the rewards of eternal life; namely, they will live without end in the society of the angels without any fear now of their own fall; the wicked, however, remaining by choice of their own with vessels of wrath fit for destruction (Rm 9,22), who either did not know the way of the Lord, or knowing it left it when seized by various transgressions, He will give over by a very just judgment to the punishment of eternal and inextinguishable fire, that they may burn without end. This, then, is my faith and hope, which is in me by the gift of the mercy of God, in defense of which blessed PETER taught (cf. 1P 3,15) that we ought to be especially ready to answer everyone who asks us for an accounting.
[From the epistle "Admonemus ut" to Gaudentius, Bishop of Volterra, about the year 560]
445 Dz 229 There are many who assert that they are baptized in the name of Christ alone with only one immersion. But the evangelical precept which the very God, our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, handed down warns us to give each one holy baptism in the name of the Trinity and with a triple immersion also, since our Lord Jesus Christ said to his disciples: Go, baptize all nations in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit (Mt 28,19). If, in fact, those of the heretics, who are said to remain in places near your love, confess perchance that they have been baptized only in the name of the Lord, without any uncertainty of doubt you will baptize them in the name of the Holy Trinity, if they come to the Catholic faith. But if . . . by a clear confession it becomes evident that they have been baptized in the name of the Trinity, you will hasten to unite them to the Catholic faith, employing only the grace of reconciliation, in order that nothing other than what the evangelical authority orders may seem to be accomplished.
[From epistle (26) "Adeone te" to a certain bishop (John ?), about the year 560]
446 Dz 230 Has the truth of your Catholic mother so failed you, who have been placed in the highest office of the priesthood, that you have not at once recognized yourself as a schismatic, when you withdrew from the apostolic sees? Being appointed to preach the Gospel to the people, had you not even read that the Church was founded by Christ our Lord upon the chief of the Apostles, so that the gates of hell might not be able to prevail against it (cf. Mt 16,18) ? If you had read this, where did you believe the Church to be outside of him in whom alone are clearly all the apostolic sees? To whom in like measure as to him, who had received the keys, has the power of binding and of loosing been granted (cf. Mt 16,19)? But for this reason he gave first to him alone, what he was about to give also to (in) all, so that, according to the opinion of blessed Cyprian the martyr who explains this very thing, the Church might be shown to be one. Why, therefore, did you, already dearest in Christ, wander away from your portion, or what hope did you have for your salvation?
451 Dz 231 1. If anyone does not confess that the Father, and the Son, and the Holy Spirit (are) three persons of one substance, and virtue, and power) just as the Catholic and apostolic Church teaches, but says there is only one and a solitary person, so that He Himself is the Father who is the Son, and also He Himself is the Paraclete, the Spirit, just as Sabellius and Priscillian have asserted, let him be anathema.
452 Dz 232 2. If anyone introduces some other names of the Godhead in addition to the Holy Trinity, because, as he says, there is in the Godhead himself a Trinity of the Trinity, just as the Gnostics and Priscillians have stated, let him be anathema.
453 Dz 233 3. If anyone says that the Son of God our Lord did not exist before He was born of the Virgin, just as Paul of Samosata and Photinus and Priscillian have said, let him be anathema,
454 Dz 234 4. If anyone does not truly honor the birthday of Christ according to the flesh, but pretends that he honors (it), fasting on the very day and on the Lord's Day, because, like Cerdon, Marcion, Manichaeus, and Priscillian, he does not believe that Christ was born in the nature of man, let him be anathema.
455 Dz 235 5. If anyone believes, as Manichaeus and Priscillian have said, that human souls or angels have arisen from the substance of God, let him be anathema.
456 Dz 236 6. If anyone says that human souls first sinned in the heavenly habitation and in view of this were hurled down into human bodies on earth, as Priscillian has affirmed, let him be anathema.
457 Dz 237 7. If anyone says that the devil was not first a good angel made by God, and that his nature was not a work of God, but says that he came forth from darkness, and does not have any author of himself, but is himself the origin and substance of evil, as Manichaeus and Priscillian have said, let him be anathema.
458 Dz 238 8. If anyone believes that the devil made some creatures in the world and by his own authority the devil himself causes thunder and lightning, and storms and spells of dryness, just as Priscillian has asserted, let him be anathema.
459 Dz 239 9. If anyone believes that human souls [al. souls and human bodies] are bound by a fatal sign [al. by fatal stars], just as the pagans and Priscillian have affirmed, let him be anathema.
460 Dz 240 10. If anyone believes that the twelve signs or stars, which the astrologers are accustomed to observe, have been scattered through single members of the soul or body, and say that they have been attributed to the names of the Patriarchs, just as Priscillian has asserted, let him be anathema.
461 Dz 241 11. If anyone condemns human marriage and has a horror of the procreation of living bodies, as Manichaeus and Priscillian have said, let him be anathema.
462 Dz 242 12. If anyone says that the formation of the human body is a creation of the devil, and says that conceptions in the wombs of mothers are formed by the works of demons, and for this reason does not believe in the resurrection of the body, just as Manichaeus and Priscillian have said, let him be anathema.
463 Dz 243 13. If anyone says that the creation of all flesh is not the work of God, but belongs to the wicked angels, just as Priscillian has said, let him be anathema.
464 Dz 244 14. If anyone considers the foods of the flesh unclean, which God has given for the use of men; and, not for the affliction of his body, but as if he thought it unclean, so abstains from these that he does not taste vegetables cooked with meats, just as Manichaeus and Priscillian have said, let him be anathema.
[15 and 16 consider only ecclesiastical discipline].
Dz 245
17. If anyone reads the Scriptures, which Priscillian has distorted according to his own error, or Dictinius's treatises, which Dictinius himself wrote before he was converted- or whatsoever writings of the heretics under the name of the Patriarchs, of the Prophets, or of the Apostles they have devised in agreement with their own error, and follows or defends their impious creations, let him be anathema.
[From epistle (1) "Quod ad dilectionem" to the schismatic bishops of Istria, about 585]
Dz 246
(For) you know that the Lord proclaims in the Gospel: Simon, Simon, behold Satan has desired to have you, that he might sift you as wheat: but I have asked the Father for thee, that thy faith fail not; and thou being once converted, confirm thy brethren (Lc 22,31 f.).
Consider, most dear ones, that the Truth could not have lied, nor will the faith of PETER be able to be shaken or changed forever. For although the devil desired to sift all the disciples, the Lord testifies that He Himself asked for PETER alone and wished the others to be confirmed by him; and to him also, in consideration of a greater love which he showed the Lord before the rest, was committed the care of feeding the sheep (cf. Jn 21,15 ff.); and to him also He handed over the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and upon him He promised to build his Church, and He testified that the gates of hell would not prevail against it (cf. Mt 16,16 ff.). But, because the enemy of the human race even until the end of the world does not abstain from sowing cockle (Mt 13,25) over the good seed in the Church of the Lord, and therefore, lest perchance anyone with malignant zeal should by the instigation of the devil presume to make some alterations in and to draw conclusions regarding the integrity of the faith- and (lest) by reason of this your minds perhaps may seem to be disturbed, we have judged it necessary through our present epistle to exhort with tears that you should return to the heart of your mother the Church, and to send you satisfaction with regard to the integrity of faith. . . .
[ The faith of the Synods of NICEA, CONSTANTINOPLE I, EPHESUS I, and especially of CHALCEDON, and likewise of the dogmatic epistle of LEO to Flavian having been confirmed, he proceeds thus: ]
If anyone, however, either suggests or believes or presumes to teach contrary to this faith, let him know that he is condemned and also anathematized according to the opinion of the same Fathers. . . . Consider (therefore) the fact that whoever has not been in the peace and unity of the Church, cannot have the Lord (Ga 3,7). . . .
[From epistle (2) "Dilectionis vestrae" to the schismatic bishops of Istria, about 585]
Denzinger EN 396