Page:The New International Encyclopædia 1st ed. v. 04.djvu/398

* CATHOLIC APOSTOLIC CHURCH. 340 CATHOLIC EPISTLES. (consisting of elders, prophets, evangelists, and pastors), and a ministry of deaeons to take charge of temporal matters. This ministry is supported by tithes, the jieople giving a tentli of their income for the support of the jiricsthood. Cliurch all'airs are managed by a council of ministers of all classes, whose selection and arrangement are conceived to have been fore- shadowed in the structure of the Jlosaic taber- nacle. The Catholic Apostolic Church does not differ from other Christian bodies in regard to the conmion doctrines of the Christian religion; it onl}- accepts, in what it considers to be a fuller and more real sense, the phoiomena of Christian life. It believes that the wonder, mystery, and miracle of the Apostolic times were not acci- dental, but are essential to the divinely insti- tuteil Church of God, and its main function is to prepare a people for the second advent of Christ. A very special feature of the Catholic Apostolic Cliurch is its extensive and elaborate symbolism. In regard to the .sacrament of the Lord's Supper, the doctrine of the objective presence is held, but both transubstantiation and consubstantia- tion are repudiated. The Catholic Apostolic Church has established itself in England, Scotland, Canada, the United States, Prussia, France, Switzerland, Ireland, Belgium, Russia, Denmark, Sweden, Australia, and India. In the United States it has ten -churches and about thirty ministers. Consult G. ililler. History and Doctrines of Jrvingism (London. 1878). CATHOLIC BENEVOLENT LEGION. A fraternal organization in the United States which has for its object to unite for social and benevo- lent purposes Koman Catholic men between the ages of 18 and .5.5. It was organized in 1881, and since that time has distributed over .$14,000,- (100 to the beneficiaries of deceased members. It has o40 coimcils, in all parts of the United ■States. There is also an organization for women on parallel lines, known as the Catholic Wo- men's Benevolent Legion. CATHOLIC CHURCH (Lat. cathoUcus, Gk. KadoMnSg, Ixtitholikos, general, universal, from itnrd, A-ofn, according to + t'lor, holos, whole). The phrase Catholic Church is equivalent to 'universal Church,' and cannot properly be applied to any particular sect or body, though the vari- ous Christian denominations hold tliemselves to be within the meaning of the ap|)ellation as por- tions more or less pure of the Church Universal. It was first employed to distinguish the Chris- tian Church from the Jewish; the la'ter being restricted to a single nation, whereas the former was intended for the world in general. After- wards, it served to mark the diil'erence between the orthodox Christian Church and the various sects which sprang from it. The name has been retained by the Churcli of Rome, which was the visible successor of tlie primitive one; and al- though Protestant divines have been careful to deny its applicability to this Church any more than to others professing Christianity, yet the term 'Catholic' is still used by the populace of almost every Protestant country as synon^tinous with Roman Catholic, so that from their minds all conception of the literal meaning seems to have vanished. For an account of the Church of Rome, see the article Roman Cathouc ■CnuBCii. CATHOLIC (United) COPTS. A body of about ."ilioii native Kgyplian Lliristiaus, who acknowledge the authority of the Pojie of Rome. In 1855 one of their priests was appointed vicar apostolic and bishop in partibus residing in Cairo, but in 1895 Pope Leo XIII. gave the body a regular hieiarehy, whose bead is styled 'Patri- arcli of Alexandria of the Copts.' Consult E. L. Butcher, The ^luri/ of the (.'hurches of Eijiiiit from the lioman Conquest till 2V'oio (London, 1897). CATHOLIC CREDITOR. In the law of Scotland, one whose debt is secured by a lien or charge on nunc than one item of property be- longing to tile debtor — e.g. on two or more heritable estates for the same debt. The catho- lic creditor is bound so to exercise his right as not unnecessarily to injure the securities of other creditors. Thus, if he draw his whole debt from one piece of property, he must assign bis security over the rest to the postponed creditors. The right of such a creditor is called a catholic riijht. Consult Krskine, I'rinciples of the Ldirs of Krotland (Edinburgh, 1881). For the corresponding principle of the English and American law. see Marsiulixu. CATHOLIC EMANCIPATION ACT. See Roman C.^tiiulic E.manhi'.vtion Act. CATHOLIC EPISTLES. A group of seven letters in the New Testament (James, I., II. Peter, Jude, 1., IT., III. John) which have been designated by this name, as denoting the com- prehensive circle of the readers addressed in distinction from the individual churches and persons addressed in the letters by Paul. The term was first used in the Eastern Church, about the Second Century, and then only with refer- ence to I. .Jolin. which was so named in contrast with II. and III. John, as private letters. Later it was applied to II. Peter and Jude, as relative- ly general in their addresses; then to .James and I. Peter, as addressed to large ])ortions of the Church: and finally II. and 111. .John were in- cluded, either on the supjiositioii that the names given in their addresses (II. John "the elect lady and her children," III. John "Gains, the be- loved") were figurative designations of the Church, or under the impulse to gather all of John's letters in the same group. The term was also used of writings outside the canon (e.g. by Origen of the Epistle of Barnabas) and even of heretical writings (e.g. by Apollonius [in Eusebius. II. E. vii. 25] of tiie Epistle of the ^lontanist Themiston). Cyril of Alexandria ap- plies it to the letter of the Church of .Jerusalem, given in Acts xv. By the Fourth Century it had come to designate in the East the present group of seven letters. In the West these writ- ings were not known by any group name until the Fifth or Sixth Century." and then the name which was given them was Canonical. Biiii.i(iiAi'UY. Introductions: A. Jiilicher (Leipzig. IfOl) ; Commentaries: B. F. Westeott, Commenturii to Epistles of John (Cambridge, I88G) ; 0. Bigg, Commentan/ on Epistles of Saint Peter and ■Jude. International Critical Series (Xew York. 1902). General works on the New Testament Canon: B. F. Westeott, .1 General .Shcipi/ of the History of the Canon of the AVio Testament ( fith ed., Cambridge, 1889); A. H. Charteris. The Xeir Textnment Scriptures. Croall Lectures for 1882 (Xew York, 1882). See James,