Views Concerning The Church and the Sacraments During the Second Period (300-750 A.D.): The Doctrine of the Church (3)

We noted toward the end of our preceding article that Augustine surely advocated church discipline but was not in sympathy with the Donatist movement. He lamented the fact that the Donatists had separated themselves, not only from those who had been justly accused of being traitors to their faith during the persecutions, but also from those who had been unjustly accused and that they had therefore separated themselves from the good and faithful in all the nations of the world. We noted toward...