Church of Carthage

Church of Carthage
Church of Africa
Paleochristian quarter in Carthage
Basic information
Location Carthage, Tunisia
Geographic coordinates 36°51′10″N 10°19′24″E / 36.8528°N 10.3233°E / 36.8528; 10.3233
Affiliation Pre-Schism Church
Rite African Rite
Province Africa Proconsulare
Ecclesiastical or organizational status Local church
Architectural description
Architectural type church
Architectural style Romanesque

The Church of Carthage (Church of Africa) was a local church established in the Roman province of Africa Proconsulare, with its ecclesiastical seat in ancient Carthage. It is in the Romanesque architectural style. The cathedral dissolved following the spread of Islam in the region.

History

Cyprian of Carthage, Thascius Caecilius Cyprianus, bishop of Carthage, Church Father, died in martyrdom in 258.

The church at Carthage was to the Church of Africa what the church at Rome was to the Church of Italy.[1] Carthage was at the heart of African Christianity in the Roman world. In Christian traditions, some accounts give as the first bishop of Carthage Crescens, ordained by Saint Peter, or Speratus, one of the Scillitan Martyrs.[2] Epenetus of Carthage is found in Pseudo-Dorotheus and Pseudo-Hippolytus lists of seventy disciples.[3] The account of the martyrdom of Saint Perpetua and her companions in 203 mentions an Optatus who is generally taken to have been bishop of Carthage, but who may instead have been bishop of Thuburbo Minus. The first certain historically documented bishop of Carthage is Agrippinus of the late 2nd century. Also historically certain is Donatus, the immediate predecessor of Cyprian (249–258)[4][5][6][7]

Early Christianity arrived in the 2nd century and soon gained converts in the towns and among slaves. More than eighty bishops, some from distant frontier regions of Numidia, attended the Council of Carthage (256). By the end of the 4th century, the settled areas had become Christianized, and some Berber tribes had converted en masse.

A division in the church that came to be known as the Donatist controversy began in 313 among Christians in North Africa. The Donatists stressed the holiness of the church and refused to accept the authority to administer the sacraments of those who had surrendered the scriptures when they were forbidden under the Emperor Diocletian. The Donatists also opposed the involvement of Emperor Constantine in church affairs in contrast to the majority of Christians who welcomed official imperial recognition.

The occasionally violent controversy has been characterized as a struggle between opponents and supporters of the Roman system. The most articulate North African critic of the Donatist position, which came to be called a heresy, was Augustine, bishop of Hippo Regius. Augustine maintained that the unworthiness of a minister did not affect the validity of the sacraments because their true minister was Christ. In his sermons and books Augustine, who is considered a leading exponent of Christian dogma, evolved a theory of the right of Orthodox Christian rulers to use force against schismatics and heretics. Although the dispute was resolved by a decision of an imperial commission in the Council of Carthage (411), Donatist communities continued to exist as late as the 6th century.

See also

References

  1. ↑ Plummer, Alfred (1887). The Church of the Early Fathers: External History. Longmans, Green and Company. p. 109.
  2. ↑ One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a work now in the public domain: Mesnage, Joseph; Toulotte, Anatole (1912). L'Afrique chrétienne : évêchés et ruines antiques. Description de l'Afrique du Nord. Musées et collections archéologiques de l'Algérie et de la Tunisie (in French). 17. Paris: E. Leroux. pp. 1–19. OCLC 609155089.
  3. ↑ One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a work now in the public domain: Cheyne, Thomas K.; Black, J. Sutherland, eds. (1903). "Epaenetus". Encyclopaedia Biblica. 2. New York: Macmillan. col. 1300. OCLC 1084084.
  4. ↑ "Cartagine". Enciclopedia Italiana di scienze, lettere ed arti (in Italian). 1931 – via treccani.it.
  5. ↑ Toulotte, Anatole (1892). Géographie de l'Afrique chrétienne (in French). 1. Rennes: impr. de Oberthur. pp. 73–100. OCLC 613240276.
  6. ↑ Morcelli, Stefano Antonio (1816). Africa christiana. 1. Brescia: ex officina Bettoniana. pp. 48–58. OCLC 680468850.
  7. ↑ Gams, Pius Bonifacius (1957) [1873]. "Carthago". Series episcoporum ecclesiae catholicae : quotquot innotuerunt a beato Petro Apostolo (in Latin). Graz: Akademische Druck- u. Verlagsanstalt. p. 463. OCLC 895344169.
    Gams "ignored a number of scattered dissertations which would have rectified, on a multitude of points, his uncertain chronology" and Leclercq suggests that "larger information must be sought in extensive documentary works." (Leclercq, Henri (1909). "Pius Bonifacius Gams". Catholic Encyclopedia. 6. )

Bibliography

  • François Decret, Le christianisme en Afrique du Nord ancienne, Seuil, Paris, 1996 ( ISBN 2020227746)
  • Paul Monceaux, Histoire littéraire de l'Afrique chrétienne depuis les origines jusqu'à l'invasion arabe (7 volumes : Tertullien et les origines – saint Cyprien et son temps – le IV, d'Arnobe à Victorin – le Donatisme – saint Optat et les premiers écrivains donatistes – la littérature donatiste au temps de saint Augustin – saint Augustin et le donatisme), Paris, Ernest Leroux, 1920.
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