You have asked — nay rather commanded, most pious brother — that in a letter given to your beatitude I should declare whether the oratories or basilicas of heretics could be adapted to the uses of our religion, when their founders have transferred themselves to the catholic law by the correction of their error. A worthy matter indeed, on which you consult, if only you had found one fit to answer. Yet because you have bidden it, I will unfold in what follows what I think consistent: with this proviso, namely, that I reserve no room for others to take offence, provided only that what they have believed must be established, they confirm either by clear reason or by an authority brought forth from the canonical volumes.
That which you have asked concerning private oratories or small basilicas is, just as concerning their churches, difficult to determine. For this must be recommended to catholic kings, whatever has been decreed concerning their subjects. Hence, I ask, first: if the bishops of his portion be consulted by the prince of our region — whose consent in the true religion God has granted us — whether we can answer that structures established by his father for the heretics ought to be applied to the catholic party. But if either we recommend it, or he consents, the heretics will not without cause complain of a persecution stirred up against them, since it more befits catholic mildness to endure the calumnies of heretics and gentiles than to inflict them.
For what is so harsh as that those who perish in open perversity should flatter themselves with confession or martyrdom? And because, after us and our king, God may grant a most happy long life — since nothing amid the course of times ought to be believed unchangeable — perhaps some heretic or other may reign, and whatever persecution he stirs up against the churches and persons, he will be said to have done not out of zeal for his sect, but by way of retribution for what was done in turn, and it will be reckoned to our sin, even after our death, that we are to be burdened with whatever posterity shall suffer. And perhaps the divine mercy will add that the offspring of the prince of whom we speak may, through a received fullness of faith, follow the catholic author.
Yet what if now someone among the neighbouring kings of an alien law should wish likewise to take vengeance in his own region for what he grieves to have been inflicted here upon his own priests? But if anyone of this sort, mocking me, should break out into these words, 'Let me enjoy the glory of my own time,' let a succeeding age look out for his estate. But whoever debates such things within himself, let him render me a little the reasoning I ask: whether heretics ought to be received by us with truth. If they are received, most luminous is the salvation, because as it is written, 'I believed, therefore have I spoken' (Psalm 116:10). Faith precedes speech, and confession follows belief; and by the laying on of the priestly hand the loss of depravity takes place, the fullness of faith is restored.
But as for an insensible thing which, once profaned at first, is polluted, I confess I do not know by what subsequent sanctification it is purged. I say assuredly: if an altar polluted by heretics can be consecrated, the bread too which is placed upon it can be transferred to our sacrifices. This the heretic founder did in the first place. He passes over to the divine promise: rejoicing in freedom, let him leave Egypt. Migrating to the right faith by a happy change, he rather leaves behind a stain than draws it with him: since something not lawful to an unpurgeable error, things polluted rather burden the touch than receive from the toucher any remedy. Hence also in the prophet Haggai: 'Thus says the Lord of hosts, question the priests of the law, saying:'
'If a man carry sanctified flesh, and touch with the edge of it bread, or any whatsoever thing, shall it be sanctified? But the priests answering said, No. And Haggai said: If one polluted touch any of all these, shall it be defiled?' — that is, that bread which had a while ago been holy — 'And the priests said, It shall be defiled' (Haggai 2:12-13). Wherefore it is to be inferred: if that bread can be consecrated upon these altars which, if consecrated bread touch it, is rendered unclean. The prophet Malachi also thus says: 'If you offer the blind for sacrifice, is it not evil? and if you offer the lame, is it not evil?' (Malachi 1:8). And a little after:
'Cursed,' he says, 'be the deceiver, who has in his flock a male, and making a vow sacrifices to the Lord a feeble one' (Malachi 1:14). What is more sincere than this judgement, what more manifest than such authority? The structure which you desire to appropriate by a repeated renewal — if it is sound, why is it blessed? if it is ailing, why is it offered? However much you may covet to draw into good the gifts offered by evil men, lame things will not be able to follow you unto holiness. The Apostle says he has undertaken to present a chaste virgin to Christ (2 Corinthians 11:2), that is, the Church. But the Church which belonged to heretics, although it is permitted to marry a better man, was not a virgin. Why then should a priest desire an unlawful thing, who is altogether forbidden from contact with a repudiated woman or a widow?
After the bond of incest, the union comes too late. 'He who is joined,' he says, 'to a harlot becomes one body: shall I take the members of Christ, and make them the members of a harlot?' (1 Corinthians 6:15-16). See whether a harlot can be made whole again with the members of Christ joined to her, into whose body the members of Christ — that is, of the Christian — are turned by pollution. Hence also in another place the Apostle says (Ephesians 5:27) that he wishes the Church to be such as has no spot or wrinkle or any such thing. Can this in any way be said of the structures of heretics? A blessing bestowed upon things lacking sense and polluted neither cleanses the spot nor smooths out the wrinkle.
Nay rather, if we look a little more attentively, that lacks a spot which by newness is a token free of wrinkle. But that which has been doubled by repetition is covered with a wrinkle: such a thing holy sincerity by no means allows, and, putting off the old Adam, let it be compared to the new man who is offered. This newness the authority of the New Testament commends to us by the voice of the Gospels (Matthew 19:30). Hence the Lord Himself commanded a colt to be saddled for Himself, on which none before Him had sat (Mark 11:2): which colt, being untried by all worldly use, not blows imposed would render subject, but its holy beginnings would render meek.
And that the very mystery of the Lord's death might not lack the honour of newness, we read that our redeeming, the Lord's flesh, rested in a new tomb which was hewn in the rock (Luke 23:53). Who then would try to persuade me that after the corruptions of the dead a sepulchre can be cleansed? Although the moisture of putrefaction be dried up and the flesh already consumed, and white tombs be raised high, uncleanness remains in the remembrance, even if it be thought absent to the sight. You have indeed cast out the carrion of an alien dogma, and its dead strength you have cast forth from its sepulchre like bones lacking honour. But I think that the members of a holy body ought not to be laid down upon stenches. And perhaps you will say that heretics, if power be given them, defile our altars.
It is true, and I do not deny it. Indeed, invaders of others' houses rage, when they can, with foul talons. But to bring force to bear, to invade places, to alter altars, does not pertain to the dove. More particularly, then, must that be shunned which the heretic thinks lawful for himself. By this example it is the more fitting to avoid what the enemy embraces. Nor is it a wonder if they dare to repeat dedications, who frequent rebaptisms. Wherefore I have briefly indicated, not what I would decree, but what I would wish. I would not have the places of heretical worship invaded; I would rather they were left aside after the manner of workhouses. It is always to be wished, not that they should pass over transformed, but that, being left unfrequented, they should grow torpid. To you who bring the wholesome correction of the peoples, let an eternal widowhood remain to them:
nor let there ever be received by our people what is repudiated by its own out of zeal for conversion. Concerning the ministering vessels of heretics — which are judged sacred to them, execrable to us, that is, patens and cups — since you have bidden me write back likewise what I think, there is indeed an example of strong observance which is read in the Heptateuch (Numbers 16), concerning the censers of the sinners who, presuming to offer unlawful fire, were consumed by a burning that signified the eternal Gehenna in a temporal one. For those vessels of which we spoke lay mingled with ash and embers, unto the judgement of the dead and the terror of the living, and, though accustomed to the odours of incense, they had contracted an abominable uncleanness by the stench of perverse use.
Then to the lawgiving leader who consulted [the Lord] it was commanded by the divine word that he should melt these into the furnaces, and, beaten out into plates, affix them to the holy altar (Numbers 16:38). You see, therefore, that there too we are alike instructed that an execrable use of metals cannot, unless it pass through fire, be transferred to good. So much does fire confer upon metals, for the catholic comparison, as faith upon the senses. Hence also in the psalm the Prophet thus prays: 'Burn my reins and my heart' (Psalm 26:2). Let anyone by all means reprove, according to the discernment of his own sense, what I feel. I confess that I take no delight in those vessels which came captive to the churches of our law in the parts of upper Gaul:
which, presenting nothing voluntary, nothing innocent, if they are snatched from the grieving, will not be able to profit those who offer them. Why should the victor say to me, 'What I display upon your altars, made in any order of mine' — when it is bidden, 'Honour the Lord out of thy just labours' (Proverbs 3:9)? It is a small thing to give of labours, unless of thine own; a small thing of thine own, unless of just ones. Never would I pronounce those things offered, which before they were offered were carried off. But I always rejoice that such gifts are set upon the holy altars, as would be religiously — if not only properly, since to it its own seems everywhere, wherever it is catholic —
Why, bringing forth from his treasures each choicest thing, does he not take care, at all cost, that in those things which shall pertain to the holy ministry, preciousness may please no more than newness? Pray for what remains, that for a long time hereafter she may possess the wealth of her vows entrusted to her by God, not in hidden masses, but in public gifts; and, rejoicing together with the people subject to her, may always have for sacred uses something that she will bestow.