Letter 52: Augustine appeals to Severinus as family while pressing him toward catholic unity.

I received the letter of Your Fraternity with joy, even though it came very late and later than I had hoped. My joy became still greater when I learned that your man had come to Hippo for this one reason: to bring me your letter. I thought that this impulse had arisen in your heart for a reason, that you had remembered our kinship perhaps because you see, as I know your judgment has real weight, how painful it is that we who are brothers according to the flesh do not live together in one fellowship in the body of Christ. It is especially easy for you to notice and see the city set on a mountain, of which the Lord says in the Gospel that it cannot be hidden. This is the catholic church. It is called catholic in Greek because it is spread throughout the whole world. No one is allowed not to know it; according to the word of our Lord Jesus Christ, it cannot be hidden. The party of Donatus, however, is found only among Africans, while it slanders the whole world. It does not consider that, because it refused to bear the fruit of peace and charity, it has been cut off from the root of the Eastern churches, from which the Gospel came into Africa. Soil brought from there is adored by them, but if a believer comes from there they breathe on him in exorcism and rebaptize him. The Son of God, who is Truth, also foretold this when he said that he is the vine, that his own people are branches, and that his Father is the farmer: "Every branch in me that does not bear fruit, my Father will take away; every branch that does bear fruit, he prunes, so that it may bear more fruit." It is no wonder, then, if those who refused to bear the fruit of charity have been cut away from that vine which grew and filled every land. If their elders had brought true charges against their colleagues when they made the schism, they would have won their case before the churches overseas, from which the authority of the Christian faith flowed into these regions, and those against whom they brought the charges would have been outside. But now those men are found inside, in communion with the apostolic churches whose names they have and read in the sacred books, while these others are outside and separated from that communion. Who does not understand which side had the better case, when one side could win before impartial judges? Or if they had a good case and could not prove it to the overseas churches, how did the whole world injure them, when bishops everywhere could not rashly condemn colleagues who had not been convicted before them of the crimes alleged? As a result, innocent people are rebaptized, and Christ is breathed upon in innocent people as if he needed exorcism. But if those Donatists knew the charges against their African colleagues were true and neglected to demonstrate and prove them to the churches overseas, then they cut themselves off from the unity of Christ by a most criminal schism. They have no excuse, and you know it. This is especially clear because so many guilty men appeared among them and they tolerated them for so many years rather than tear apart the party of Donatus, yet at that earlier time they did not hesitate, on the basis of false suspicions, to break the peace and unity of Christ. You see it. But some bodily habit, brother Severinus, still holds you there. I have grieved and groaned over this for a long time, especially when I think of your good sense. I have long wanted to see you so that I might speak with you about it. What good is temporary health or blood relationship if, in our kinship, we despise Christ's eternal inheritance and everlasting salvation? For now let it be enough that I have written these things. To hard hearts they are very few and almost nothing; to your mind, which I know well, they are very many and very great. They are not mine, for I am nothing except as I await God's mercy. They belong to almighty God, and whoever despises him as Father in this world will find him as Judge in the world to come.

EPISTOLA 52 Scripta forte in eodem tempore (399-400). A. hortatur Severinum, consanguineum donatistam, ut scelestum deserat schisrna, querens se copulatos non esse in uno Christi corpore, quod est Ecclesia (n. 1), multaque explorans de catholica unitate ac de Christi hereditate (n. 2-4). Domino multum desiderabili et valde carissimo fratri Severino, Augustinus Perfecte fratres nulli nisi in Christi corpore. 1. Litteras Fraternitatis tuae etsi valde sero, etsi praeter quod speraveram, tamen laetus accepi, maximeque ampliori gaudio perfusus sum, cum cognovissem hominem vestrum hac ipsa sola causa venisse Hipponem, ut ad me litteras tuae Fraternitatis afferret. Cogitavi enim non sine causa hoc exortum esse in animo tuo ut recoleres consanguinitatem nostram; nisi quia fortasse perspicis, sicut novi non leve pondus prudentiae tuae, quam sit dolendum, ut qui secundum carnem fratres sumus, in Christi corpore non una societate vivamus, praesertim quia facile tibi est attendere et videre civitatem super montem constitutam, de qua Dominus ait in Evangelio quod abscondi non possit 1. Ipsa est enim Ecclesia catholica; unde graece appellatur, quod per totum orbem terrarum diffunditur. Hanc ignorare nulli licet; ideo secundum verbum Domini nostri Iesu Christi, abscondi non potest. In Christi vite ramus aridus Donatismus. 2. Pars autem Donati in solis Afris calumniatur orbi terrarum, et non considerat ea sterilitate, qua fructus pacis et caritatis noluit afferre, ab illa radice Orientalium Ecclesiarum se esse praecisam, unde Evangelium in Africam venit: unde terra si eis afferatur, adoranti fidelis autem si inde veniat, exsufflant etiam et rebaptizant. Hoc enim etiam praedixit Filius Dei, qui veritas est 2, se esse vitem, suos autem filios esse sarmenta, et Patrem suum agricolam: Sarmentum, inquit, quod in me non dat fructum, Pater meus tollet illud, sarmentum autem quod in me dat fructum, purgat illud, ut maiorem fructum afferat 3. Non ergo mirum est, si de illa vite quae crevit et omnes terras implevit 4, praecisi sunt illi qui fructum caritatis afferre noluerunt. Omnes Ecclesias excepta Donatiana cum apostolicis communicare. 3. Qui si vera crimina obiecissent collegis suis, maiores eorum quando schisma fecerunt, ipsi obtinuissent causam suam apud Ecclesiam transmarinam, unde ad istas partes christianae fidei manavit auctoritas, ut illi essent foris quibus eadem crimina obiiciebant. Nunc autem cum illi inveniuntur intus communicare Ecclesiis apostolicis, quarum nomina in Libris sanctis habent et recitant, isti autem foris positi et ab illa communione separati sunt, quis non intellegat eos habuisse causam bonam, qui eam apud medios iudices obtinere potuerunt? Aut si causam bonam habebant, et eam transmarinis Ecclesiis probare non potuerunt, quid illos laesit orbis terrarum, ubi episcopi collegas suos, qui apud eos obiectis criminibus convicti non erant, temere damnare non possent? Itaque innocentes rebaptizantur, et Christus in innocentibus exsufflatur. Si autem iidem Donatistae Afrorum collegarum suorum vera crimina noverant, et neglexerunt ea demonstrare et probare transmarinis Ecclesiis, ipsi se ab unitate Christi sceleratissimo schismate praeciderunt, non habent quod excusent, et vos nostis; maxime quia tam multi scelerati apud eos emerserunt, et toleraverunt illos per tot annos, ne partem Donati conscinderent, et non dubitaverunt illo tempore falsas suspiciones suas obiicientes, pacem Christi unitatemque disrumpere, et vos videtis. Sanguinis vinculum nihil prodesse ad aeternam salutem. 4. Sed nescio quae carnalis consuetudo, frater Severine, ibi vos tenet; et olim doleo, olim gemo, maxime prudentiam tuam cogitans, et olim te videre desidero, ut de hac re tecum loquerer. Quid enim prodest vel salus vel consanguinitas temporalis, si aeternam Christi haereditatem salutemque perpetuam in nostra cognatione contemnimus? Haec me interim scripsisse suffecerit, quae duris cordibus valde pauca sunt et prope nulla; animo autem tuo quem bene novi, valde multa sunt et valde magna. Non enim mea sunt, qui nihil sum, nisi quod exspecto misericordiam Dei; sed ipsius Dei omnipotentis, quem quisquis in hoc saeculo comtempserit patrem, inveniet in futuro iudicem.