John Mark Hicks: Just as Zurich (“Zwinglianism”) and Geneva (“Calvinianism”) found sacramental common ground in the Consensus Tigurinus, my paper at the 2009 Christian Scholar’s Conference explored whether such a rapprochement is possible between Southern Baptists and Churches of Christ who, in many ways, are the credobaptistic heirs of Zurich and Geneva. Since there is presently a renewed discussion among Southern Baptists and British Baptists concerning baptismal “sacramentalism”
and there is also a new openness among Churches of Christ toward a more historic Calvinian understanding of baptism as a means of grace,
there is hope for some kind of “rapprochement” between Southern Baptists and Churches of Christ in the United States. With historical perspective and theological reflection Churches of Christ and Southern Baptists are potentially on the verge of a Consensus Americanus.
Lordy, is the second coming! The way to have a consensus Jesusicus is to speak where the Bible speaks and be silent where the Bible is silent. It is clear that the Baptists (at least some of the 146 franchises) have made a historic industry out of trying to twist away all of the clear statements in the Bible. In the words of John MacAuthor, "it might be that Acts 2:38 means what it says." The latter day Baptists rest their case on the notion that contrary to all recorded evidence, the word for or EIS in Acts 2:38 means that we are baptized BECAUSE of the remission of sins. There is no babble loaded books which can get close to a shot-gun marriage without convincing the Baptists and the wannabes that EIS really means that we are baptized FOR or INTO or IN ORDER TO the remission of sins. Luke follows up closely to cut the scholars off at the pass by saying that we are converted THAT OUR SINS BE REMITTED. Now, I don't know how you can make that fit in a bed too short,.
John Mark Hicks: Generally, the Consensus united the Protestant Swiss Cantons in their sacramental theology and offered a mediating position between Zwingli and Luther which was ultimately Calvin’s own position.
When John Calvin uses the word "sacrament" it is not nearly as complex. None of these writers were repudiating baptism but the Catholic notion
I know it is a common belief that forgiveness, which at our first regeneration we receive by baptism alone,
The sinner receives forgiveness by the ministry of the Church; in other words,
not without the preaching of the gospel.
And of what nature is this preaching?
That we are washed from our sins by the blood of Christ.
And what is the sign and evidence of that washing if it be not baptism?
We see, then, that that forgiveness has reference to baptism.
This is not a sign of previous washing but is the outward act requesting that God give us A holy spirit or A good conscience which is the result of having our sins washed away.
The Catholics believed that the ACT of sprinkling water on an infant removed original sin: Calvin denies that. Baptism must be connected to faith in the fact that it is the act of Christ in washing away our sins. This cannot happen unless one believes. Therefore, in the real context salvation is not possible to an infant based on BAPTISM ALONG. Everyone agrees that we our sins are remitted after we have obeyed and complied with the object of our faith.
John Mark Hicks: In particular, the sacraments, according to the Consensus, offer (praestat) what the signs symbolize (Article VIII), the reality is not separated from the sign (Article IX), and the signs are themselves instruments of divine grace (Article XIII). The Consensus bridged a gap between Zwingli and Luther by stressing the instrumentality of the signs by the power of the Spirit.
However, a Calvinist would naturally assign the giving of the SIGN only to those predestinated by God from all eternity. Baptists who are Calvinists still believe that and so the UNITY is spoiled for the Church of Christ.
The signs effect nothing by themselves (Article XII) but “they are indeed instruments by which God acts efficaciously when he pleases”
while at the same time “salvation” is “ascribed” to God “alone” (Article XIII) because “it is God who alone acts by his Spirit” (Article XII).
While that is true, salvation is also ascribed to God alone without the death, burial and resurrection. The body "prepared for" Christ was not theological material and was made of about 85% water. Would we say that the cross as the instrumental means is SUBSEVIENT to God's purpose for ALL people whom He pleases to save. As God in Christ Jesus The Christ of God gets to define the INSTRUMENTAL means of his operations. John Calvin agrees with this perfectly. If Christ in Spirit prophesied a future WASHING by water and Mark connects it to the baptism by John and the disciples of Jesus then the eunuch was pretty smart when just by knowing Isiah he made the request. Here is the Isaiah Scroll which would have read just like the eunuchs.
12. (10) Hear the word of YHWH princes of Sodom and give ear to the Torah of our God people of Gomorrah. (11) What are they to me,
13. your multiplied sacrifices, says YHWH, I am sated with holocausts of rams and the fat of fatlings, and in the blood
14. of bulls and lambs and goats I have no delight. (12) When you come to see my face to make this request
15. from your hands treading my courtyard. (13) Do not continue to bring empty gifts, Incense is an abomination
16. to me, new moon and sabbaths, calling of reading meetings, I am not able to endure even the sacred assembly. (14) Your new moons and seasonal feasts
17. my soul hates, they are a burden to me, I am tired of bearing them. (15) And when you spread your hands I will hide my eyes
18. from you, also when you multiply prayer I will not listen, your hands are full of blood. [+and your fingers+]
19. [+of iniquity+] (16) Wash and make yourselves clean and turn away the evil of your habitual practices from before my eyes, stop doing evil. (17) LearnIsa 1:16 Wash you, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before mine eyes; cease to do evil;20. to do well, pursue judgement, bless the oppressed, judge the orphan, contend for the widow. (PP)
Rachac (h7364) raw-khats'; a prim. root; to lave (the whole or a part of a thing): - bathe (self), wash (self).
Le.14:9 But it shall be on the seventh day, that he shall shave all his hair off his head and his beard and his eyebrows, even all his hair he shall shave off: and he shall wash his clothes, also he shall wash his flesh in water, and he shall be clean.
21. Please come and let us reason together says YHWH,
if your sins are like scarlet they shall be white as snow
Revealed by the Spirit of Christ as a promise and threat.
22. if they be as red as crimson they shall be as wool. (19)
If you are obedient and you give heed
then of the good of the Land [{you shall eat.}]
Fulfilled by Jesus Christ. He that believeth AND is baptized SHALL BE saved.23. (20) But if you refuse and you rebel
you will be devoured by the sword because the mouth of YHWH has said it.
Fulfilled by Jesus Christ. He that believeth not (Apistos meaning to rebel) shall be damned.
Acts 8:36 And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water: and the eunuch said, See, here is water;So FAITH was not the WHOLE thingy: it was a LACK of faith which would HINDER baptism and it was baptism which requested God to give them A holy spirit.
what doth hinder me to be baptized
Acts 8:37 And Philip said,
that the eunuch saw him no more: and he went on his way rejoicing.
G2967 kōluō ko-loo'-o From the base of G2849 ; to estop, that is, prevent (by word or act):—forbid, hinder, keep from, let, not suffer, withstand.
John Mark Hicks: 1812 was a significant year for both Churches of Christ and American Baptists. In that same year Alexander Campbell, Adoniram Judson and Luther Rice were immersed upon their profession of faith in Jesus and embraced credobaptism as biblical theology.
False: Credo Baptists practice believer's baptism believe that saving grace and church membership are gifts from God by the recipient's faith alone. Even so, this was to repudiate infant baptism based on the parent's faith.
Hicks: Believer’s baptism is held by some Baptists Evangelicals to have no saving effect, but to be a public expression of faith, symbolically representative of the baptisand’s own conversion.
Alexander Campbell eta; Other Christian groups hold baptism to have salvific value. Churches of Christ for example, teach that baptism by immersion is a necessary part of salvation without which one cannot enter into the kingdom of God
Alexander Campbell Baptism Book IV: Nor is it only casually intimated that New Testament [249] baptism was ordained for this purpose. It is the only purpose for which it was ordained; whether in the hands of John or of the twelve Apostles. What could be more plain or intelligible than such forms of expression as the following:--"John did baptize in the wilderness, and preach the baptism of repentance for the remission of sins." (Mark i. 4.) It was not a baptism, but the baptism of repentance. It was not for remission of sins, but for the remission of sins. The fixtures of language could not more safely secure the intention of an institution. It was not because your sins have been remitted; but it is for, or in order to the remission of sins.
That was true when Alexander Campbell was baptized for the remission of sin by a Baptists because the Baptists practiced immersion: he thought that the Kingdom of God was among the Baptists si
Hicks suggests that the proper view is the credobaptism view: dipping but BECAUSE you have been saved by your OWN faith. They all twist Campbell to say that he "would fellowship" an unbaptized ethical easier than a baptized believer. Not true: Campbell would rather ASSOCIATE with an unbaptized person who practiced Christian principles rather than a baptized person who did not practice Christian principles.
They say that Campbell would FELLOWSHIP all of the sects because they might have baptized believers. However, Campbell said that if there were true Christians (as opposed to christians) they should COME OUT OF BABYLON. The Baptists flying the Church of Christ sign at once-Christian colleges insist that Campbell would FELLOWSHIP the sects.
A History of the Baptists VIII
The Schism of Alexander Campbell.They [Baptists] were little men in a big office. The office did not fit them. They had a wrong idea, too, of what was wanting. They seemed to think that a change of apparel-a black coat instead of a drab—broad rim on their hat instead of a narrow one—a prolongation of the face, and a fictitious gravity-a longer and more emphatic pronunciation of certain words, rather than scriptural knowledge, humility, spirituality, zeal, and Christian affection, with great devotion and great philanthropy were the grand desiderata ...
Some eight or ten pages of large dimensions, exhibiting our remonstrance against all human creeds as bonds of union or communion among Christian churches, and expressed a willingness, on certain conditions, to cooperate or unite with that Association; provided only, and always, that we should be allowed to preach and teach whatever we learned from the Holy Scriptures, regardless of any creed or formula in Christendom.
Mr. Campbell was regarded as a kind of religious Goliath, and was met at every cross road and every toll gate by well intentioned, half informed preachers of the different denominations and challenged to produce his credentials, to enter into a discussion in defense of his original and peculiar views. Our hero was nothing loth to do so. Such opportunities were precisely what he desired. A vast audience would gather together to hear what to them was vastly more attractive than a great battle to the death between two celebrated gladiators.
There is not anyone promoting the Stone-Campbell Movement trying to REUNITE by CAPITULATION to the use of INSTRUMENTS who does not deliberately force Alexander Campbell to lie for them.
In the Missing Lunenburg Correspondence, Alexander Campbell wrote among other things:
5. In the last place, to be satisfied with any thing that will just do in religion,
is neither the Christian disposition nor character;
and not to desire to know and do the whole will of God,
places the individual out of the latitude and longitude
of the opinion which we have advanced.
These things being so, then we ask, wherein does the avowal of such an opinion
disarm us of arguments for professor or profane,
on the value of the baptism in the Christian Institution;
or the importance and necessity of separating one's self
from all that will not keep the commandments of Jesus;
and of submitting without delay to the requisitions of the illustrious Prophet
whom the Almighty Father has commanded all men to obey?
Irenaeus Against Heresies Book 1 Chapter XXI.-The Views of Redemption Entertained by These Heretics.
1. It happens that their tradition respecting redemption 267 is invisible and incomprehensible, as being the mother of things which are incomprehensible and invisible; and on this account, since it is fluctuating, it is impossible simply and all at once to make known its nature, for every one of them hands it down just as his own inclination prompts. Thus there are as many schemes of "redemption" as there are teachers of these mystical opinions.
And when we come to refute them, we shall show in its fitting-place,that this class of men have been instigated by Satan to a denial of that baptism which is regeneration to God, and thus to a renunciation of the whole [Christian] faith.2. They maintain that those who have attained to perfect knowledge must of necessity be regenerated into that power which is above all.For it is otherwise impossible to find admittance within the Pleroma, since this [regeneration]
it is which leads them down into the depths of Bythus.
For the baptism instituted by the visible Jesus was for the remission of sins,
but the redemption brought in by that Christ who descended upon Him,was for perfection;
and they allege that the former is animal, but the latter spiritual.
John Mark Hicks: Their heirs, however, engaged in hostile and sometimes bitter disputes over the design of baptism.
"What a comfortable thing is this theory of regeneration! The sinner's to be regenerated when actively striving against the divine influence. At the moment of regeneration, "he has," in one sense, "no more efficient agency in accomplishing it than Lazarus had in becoming alive from the dead"; and in another sense, he is not passive, but "does all he can to resist the divine influence, and prevent his own regeneration, until he is made willing by divine almighty power." This is Standard divinity; and he that preaches divinity is a pious, regenerated, Regular Orthodox Baptist Christian Minister! Of how much value, on this theory, is all the preaching in Christendom? The Holy Spirit may be busily at work upon some drunken sot, or some vile debauchee, who is as dead as Lazarus on one side, and on the other resisting the Spirit with all his moral and physical energy, up to the moment that the Almighty arm pierces him to the heart with a sword, and makes him alive by killing him! Cincinnati Baptist Journal of 26th July
It is pretty hard to think that Hicks is not engaging in a hostile and bitter dispute over the design of baptism. On the charge of Baptismal Regeneration refuting the FAITH ONLY, Campbell wrote.
"Our opponents contend for a regeneration begun and perfected before faith or baptism - a spiritual change of mind by the Holy Spirit, antecedent to either knowledge, faith, or repentance, of which infants are as susceptible as adults; and, therefore, as we contend, make the gospel of no effect.
By way of reprisals, they would have their converts think that we go for nothing but water, and sarcastically call us the advocates of "water regeneration." They think there is something more sublime and divine in "spirit regeneration"; and therefore claim the title of orthodox." Alexander Campbell, Regeneration
Contrary to those who slander "church of Christ cults" for preaching "baptismal regeneration" Campbell taught in part:
"VI. Baptism is, then, designed to introduce the subjects of it into the participation of the blessings of the death and resurrection of Christ; who "died for our sins," and "rose again for our justification." But it has no abstract efficacy. Without previous faith in the blood of Christ, and deep and unfeigned repentance before God, neither immersion in water, nor any other action, can secure to us the blessings of peace and pardon. It can merit nothing. Still to the believing penitent it is the means of receiving a formal, distinct, and specific absolution, or release from guilt.
"Therefore, none but those who have first believed the testimony of God and have repented of their sins, and that have been intelligently immersed into his death, have the full and explicit testimony of God, assuring them of pardon.
"To such only as are truly penitent, dare we say, "Arise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling upon the name of the Lord," and to such only can we say with assurance, "You are washed, you are justified, you are sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus, and by the Spirit of God." The Christian System, Baptism
One suspects that no more abuse has been heaped upon any group than from the Babtists agaisnt Baptism FOR the remission of sins and NOT beginning to use noise machines after never using noise machines. This is a psychological ploy to intimidate people against teaching that the Bible and most recorded history demands that baptism is required for the remission of sins.
John Mark Hicks: Generally speaking, conservative Stone-Campbell adherents—particularly among 20th century Churches of Christ—
moved away from Campbell’s own Calvinian understanding of baptism as a “means of grace”Hicks means A means of grace along with other means of grace. However, the Bible says that Baptism is THE MEANS ordained by God in Christ as HIS plan for people to REQUEST that they be saved: that request in 1 Peter 3:21 is baptism. A form of doctrine is a "pattern capable of being imitated." We imitate that patter and only THEN are we said to be free from sin or saved. If Baptism is just ONE means of Grace (which Calvin nor Campbell never taught) then there must be OTHER means of Grace. Grace is Christ PERSONIFIED as He was the Word of God personified. Otherwise Grace is a goroup of browned-eyed Greek prostitute goddesses made known as SINGERS.
Titus 2:11 For the grace of God that bringeth salvation hath appeared to all men,Campbell will be forced to define 4 levels of the meaning of Christian. He makes a distinction between one who is IGNORANT of the Gospel and one who has been taught:
Titus 2:12 Teaching us that,
denying ungodliness and worldly lusts,
we should live soberly, righteously, and godly, in this present world;
Titus 2:13 Looking for that blessed hope, and the glorious appearing of the great God and our Saviour Jesus Christ;
Titus 2:14 Who gave himself for us,
that he might redeem us from all iniquity,
and purify unto himself a peculiar people,
zealous of good works.
Titus 2:15 These things speak, and exhort, and rebuke with all authority. Let no man despise thee.
Campbell continued:
I do not formally answer all the queries proposed knowing the one point to which they all aim. To that point only I direct these remarks. And while I would unhesitatingly say that I think that
every man who despises any ordinance of Christ
or who is willingly ignorant of it, cannot be a Christian;But to conclude for the present--he that claims for himself a license to neglect the least of all the commandments of Jesusstill I should sin against my own convictions, should I teach any one to think that if he mistook the meaning of any institution while in his soul he desired to know the whole will of God he must perish forever.
because it is possible for some to be saved who through insuperable ignorance or involuntary mistake, do neglect or transgress it;
or he that wilfully neglects to ascertain the will of the Lord to the whole extent of his means and opportunities because some who are defective in that knowledge may be Christians,
is not possessed of the spirit of Christ and cannot be registered among the Lord's people.
So I reason; and I think in so reasoning I am sustained by all the Prophets and Apostles of both Testaments.
John Mark Hicks: Since 1999 a large number of monographs and journal articles have appeared in British publications that have argued for baptismal sacramentalism, that is, baptism as the “evangelical sacrament” that is a normative part of the conversion narrative and A means of grace (cf. Anthony R. Cross, “The Evangelical Sacrament: Baptisma Semper Reformandum,” Evangelical Quarterly 80.3 [2008] 195-217 which is available at Jay Guin’s website–see also his posts on Baptist Sacramentalism and the work of Stan Fowler). This movement has embraced a Calvinian sacramental theology. Indeed, the Baptist World Alliance has come to some agreement with the World Alliance of Reformed Churches on the meaning of baptism.
There are a growing number of Southern Baptists who are moving in this direction as well though they are reticent about sacramental language. Their linguistic hesitation is rooted in some of the same qualms and perceived baggage that is also current among historic and contemporary Churches of Christ.
I think what the Southern Baptist theologians and especially pastors have discovered to their consternation is that people INSIST on immediate baptism and about half believe that they were being baptized IN ORDER that their sins be remitted. The scholars are running really hard to try to conform to the common sense of anyone who has ever read the Bible.
At the same time, many of those who practiced believer's baptism as an old pagan practice, loved to hold the salvation of souls in their hands. A person who confessed their faith was not baptized until the dogma had been inculcated and the group judged their fitness to be a member of their congregation. Jesus DID NOT die for their sins but He must come and die FOR THEM at their baptism or THEY must become Chrsit and die for their own sins. See the meaning of Believers Baptism which means the washing of those ALREADY clean..
John Mark Hicks: Nevertheless, there is a recognition that Southern Baptist practice has de-emphasized baptism. The most significant evidence of this shift is Broadman & Holman’s 2006 Believer’s Baptism: Sign of the New Covenant in Christ, edited by Thomas R. Schreiner and Shawn D. Wright.
Robert H. Stein writes a particularly illuminating chapter on baptism in Luke-Acts, arguing that the components involved in one becoming a Christian—repentance, faith, confession, the gift of the Spirit, and baptism—
Bible readers will notice the switching. Acts speaks of believing, repenting, confession of sins, Baptism, the remission of sins, then the gift of A holy spirit. A spirit is A holy spirit when sin has been removed: this is never promised outside of baptism.
are all very closely related temporally in Luke-Acts, often taking place on the same day (52). Rightly emphasizing the corporate nature of water baptism, Stein shows that the church baptized believers only in the book of Acts, as those being “added” to the church (Acts 2:41) involved both faith and baptism (55-56).
In the book of Acts, to speak of a believer or one who comes to believe in Christ is to speak of one who has been baptized; indeed, water baptism is intimately connected to the new birth.
Jn 3:3 Jesus answered and said unto him,
Verily, verily, I say unto thee,
Except a MAN be born AGAIN
he cannot see the kingdom of God.
It is not possible to miss what Jesus said:
A MAN must be born AGAIN to SEE the kingdom.
The parallelism is
A MAN must be [future] born of H20 and Spirit.
Jn 3:4 Nicodemus saith unto him,
How can a MAN be born when he is OLD?
can he enter the second time into his
mother's womb, and be born?Jn 3:5 Jesus answered,
Verily, verily, I say unto thee,
Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit,
he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.It insults Jesus to have him say that you cannot enter the kingdom until you are BIRTHED Baptism, then, is not for those who have yet to receive the gift of the Spirit by faith, but only for those who have repented of sin and trusted in Christ alone for salvation.
Those conforming to the Baptists plan of salvation insist that the connection that Jesus made between BORN AGAIN and born of water and spirit teach the same thing as the reluctant Baptists trying to stall a total revision.
John Calvin speaking of this notes:
This error had its origin in the fictitious sacrament of penance, on which I have already touched. What remains will be said at the proper place. There is no wonder if men who, from the grossness of their minds, are excessively attached to external things, have here also betrayed the defect, - if not contented with the pure institution of God,
they have introduced new helps devised by themselves,But if repentance is recommended during the whole of life, the power of baptism ought to have the same extent. Wherefore, there can be no doubt that all the godly may, during the whole course of their lives, whenever they are vexed by a consciousness of their sins,
as if baptism were not itself a sacrament of penance.recall the remembrance of their baptism, that they may thereby assure themselves of that sole and perpetual ablution which we have in the blood of Christ.
John Mark Hicks: Churches of Christ are more open in recent years to moving back to Alexander Campbell’s own original Calvinian understanding of the instrumentality of baptism as a means of grace.
Hicks misrepresents Alexander Campbells views of Baptism from a careless reading of BOOKS written about thse people.
If we are saved by GRACE and baptism is an instrumental means of grace, then how does that differ from being saved by baptism (by God) because that is the only time and Place Christ commanded us to REQUEST that grace. John Calvin had a host of things to say about baptism: true it is a sign of many things but it is also a means. A check is a sign that someone has given us some money. However, it has no valueuntil we present that SIGN at the bank.
John Calvin "that as many of us as were baptised into Jesus Christ, were baptised into his death? Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death," that we "should walk in newness of life," (Rom. 6: 3, 4.)
By these words, he not only exhorts us to imitation of Christ, as if he had said, that we are admonished by baptism, in like manner as Christ died, to die to our lusts, and as he rose, to rise to righteousness;but he traces the matter much higher, that Christ by baptism has made us partakers of his death, in grafting us into it (Rom. 6:5).
And as the twig derives substance and nourishment from the root to which it is attached,We are promised it by grace, we receive it by grace, "the grace of God hath appeared TEACHING us to deny ungodliness." Baptism is a SIGN that we are REQUESTING A good conscience or A holy spirit. When we SIGN that request then Peters says without equivocation: BAPTISM DOETH NOW SAVE US.so those who receive baptism with true faith truly feel the efficacy of Christ's death in the mortification of their flesh, and the efficacy of his resurrection in the quickening of the Spirit (Rom. 6:8). On this he founds his exhortation, that if we are Christians we should be dead unto sin, and alive unto righteousness (Rom. 6:11).He elsewhere uses the same argument, viz., that we are circumcised, and put off the old man, after we are buried in Christ by baptism, (Col. 2: 11-12.) And in this sense, in the passage which we formerly quoted, he calls it "the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost," (Tit. 3: 5.)
We are promised, first, the free pardon of sins and imputation of righteousness; and,
secondly, the grace of the Holy Spirit, to form us again to newness of life.
Noah was saved by PURE GRACE:
Heb. 11:7 By faith Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet,
moved with fear,
prepared an ark to the saving of his house;
by the which he condemned the world,
and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith.Heb. 11:8 By faith Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance,
obeyed; and he went out, not knowing whither he went.
Gen. 26:4 And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven,
and will give unto thy seed all these countries;
and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed;
Gen. 26:5 Because that Abraham
obeyed my voice,
and kept my charge,
my commandments,
my statutes,
and my laws.
Gen. 26:6 And Isaac dwelt in Gerar
John Mark Hicks: Campbell’s baptismal theology articulated an instrumental understanding of baptismal grace but at the same time valued character more than ritual and mercy more than sacrifice.
John Calvin He elsewhere uses the same argument, viz., that we are circumcised, and put off the old man, after we are buried in Christ by baptism, (Col. 2: 11-12.) And in this sense, in the passage which we formerly quoted, he calls it "the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost," (Tit. 3: 5.)
We are promised, first, the free pardon of sins and imputation of righteousness; and,
secondly, the grace of the Holy Spirit, to form us again to newness of life.As for SIGNS:
What greater boast could the apostles make, and what greater those who baptise in the present day?
For they are only ministers of the external sign,
whereas Christ is the Author of internal grace,
as those same ancient writers uniformly teach, and, in particular, Augustine, who, in his refutation of the Donatists, founds chiefly on this axiom, Whoever it is that baptises Christ alone presides.
