opinions, or in orthodoxy. But as we have seen, the presence of the religious object for the theoretical consciousness, in any form, is not religion.
(2) The second mistake is more common. In morality what we know we feel or see, and can not doubt. There is nothing to believe against appearances. We have a claim and the consciousness that this is satisfied or unsatisfied, but nothing beyond ourselves to hold for true; except so far as in the social object it is before our eyes. But in religion, despite of appearances, we have to believe that something is real. We must have an inward assurance that the reality is above the facts; and we must carry that out against facts in which we can not see the inward reality, and seem to see what is contrary thereto. It is by faith in our reconcilement with the invisible one reality that we are justified.
That inward assurance, the self-consciousness that we are one with the divine, and one with others because one with the divine, naturally does not exist without expressing itself. And moreover it is right that it should express itself; because that expression reacts most powerfully upon the self-consciousness, to intensify it, and so strengthen the conviction and will in which faith consists. It is right that the certainty of identity with the divine, and with others in the divine, should be brought home by the foretasted pleasure of unalloyed union; and that in short is the rationale of the cultus. The cultus is a means to the strengthening of faith, and is an end in itself by subserving that end. As anything more and beyond it is not an end; it may be harmless, and again it may be the destruction of true religion.
And the religious community entails signs of communion; and these, as the cultus generally, entail ministers; and it is generally found more convenient to have certain persons set apart, just as again the state generally finds it convenient to support and regulate one or more religious communities.[1] These ministers,
- ↑ Religious communities may be called ‘churches;’ but churches in this sense must not be confounded with the Church proper. That is the whole body of Christ, and whether it is limited or not depends on the answer to the question whether the spirit of Christ is limited; whether it is visible or not, is answered with that answer; as also the questions whether it can be divided, re-united, and so forth. A true view of the Church is of the last importance. From that view, in our opinion, it follows that in the one Church proper there is no hierarchy, no spiritual superior, and can be none, because the spirit of Christianity excludes such things. Wherever there are ecclesiastical superiors (as it is convenient that there should be), there ipso facto you have a finite religious body, which, as a consequence, can not be nor represent the Church proper.
