Christian Unity (the book) - The Maranatha Community

in the 16 th Century, in addition to their clear agreement on the classicalPatristic Creeds.But Regensburg failed to proceed to agree on the powers of a General Councilon Transubstantiation and on Penance. The Colloquy lasted only about amonth; Luther rejected the agreement on justification as ‘a patched-up thing’and Rome rejected it because there was no mention of merit. On both sides ofthe debate at Regensburg there had been humanist scholars who werewanting success.A second attempt at a Colloquy at Regensburg in January 1546 also failed andhostilities broke out between the two sides. The great issue was, and still is,the question of authority, an insuperable difficulty to unity then: we mustconsider if it is so now. The time was not then ripe for a grappling with thismatter.But Protestantism itself was not yet ready for unity within its own ranks. In1560 John Calvin wrote to Archbishop Parker urging Queen Elizabeth toconvene an Assembly of Protestant ministers to frame a plan of worship andgovernment for all Reformed Churches. Calvin was prepared to acceptepiscopacy for the sake of unity; Cranmer and Bucer were supportive of themove, but no action was taken. Yet there were no essential doctrines touchingon the very nature of salvation on which the main Protestant churchesdisagreed.The Protestant insistence on private judgement can lead to tolerance ofother’s views or, equally, the entrenching of one’s own opinions.As well as the religious and doctrinal differences, political forces workedagainst alliances of any kind between Catholics and Protestants, except whenthey united against the Anabaptists. The Swiss cantons like Geneva, which hadgained independence upon becoming Protestant, did not want to surrendertheir freedoms to Catholicism.It is important to remember that the 16 th Century Reformers believed in theuniversality of the true Church, visible and invisible. They did not seethemselves as creating division in the body of Christ, but rather as renewing itin holiness and faithfulness to the Scriptures, and they wished to affirm theessential oneness of all Christians in that body. Their stern opposition to theAnabaptists was largely on the grounds that these radicals, in rejecting infantPage 69