The Conservative Reformation and Its Theology - Saint Mary ...

so thoroughly tolerant as our own. Over against the unity of Rome under a
universal Head, the unity of High-Churchism under the rule of Bishops,
the unities which turn upon like rites or usages as in themselves necessary,
or which build up the mere subtleties of human speculation into articles of
faith, over against these the Lutheran Church was the first to stand forth,
declaring that the unity of the Church turns upon nothing that is of man.
Where the one pure gospel of Christ is preached, where the one foundation
of doctrine is laid where the "one faith" is confessed, and the alone divine
Sacraments administered aright, there is the one Church; this is her unity.
As the Augsburg Confession 140 declares "The Church, properly so called,
hath her notes and marks, to wit: the pure and sound doctrine of the
gospel, and the right use of the Sacraments. And, for the true unity of the
Church, it is sufficient to agree upon the doctrine of the gospel, and the
administration of the Sacraments."
Our fathers clearly saw and sharply drew the distinction between
God's foundation and man's superstructure, between the essential and the
accidental, between faith and opinion, between religion and speculative
theology, and, with all these distinctions before them, declared, that
consent in the doctrine of the gospel and the right administration of the
Sacraments is the only basis of the unity of the Church. This basis, the
Lutheran Church has defined and rests on it, to abide there, we trust, by
God's grace, to the end of time.
In this basis of unity is implied, first of all, that, in a really united
Church, there shall be agreement as to what subjects of the gospel
teaching are to be considered its doctrine, or articles of faith, or
fundamentals, (for all these terms are here practically synonymous,) and
not either mere matters of opinion, or of secondary importance.
It is no evidence that two men or two parts of a Church are really in
unity because they say a certain creed is right on fundamentals, if it be not
certain that they agree as to what subjects of the gospel teaching are
fundamental. The Socinian and Trinitarian are in unity of faith, and could
alike accept the
140 Art. VII.