An address delivered at Salt Lake Tabernacle, Sunday, March 19, 1911, following a discourse delivered by Elder Charles W. Penrose, of the Council of the Twelve. (Reported by F. W. Otterstrom.)
II.
My brethren and sisters, I greatly rejoice in these sublime principles expounded by our beloved brother and, now these many years, prominent elder in the Church, Charles W. Penrose. While listening to him on this occasion, I thought of the very many times I have had the opportunity of so listening to him and being instructed in these principles which concern the salvation of men. I remarked to Elder George Albert Smith, by whom I sat during the discourse, how much the youth of Israel, how much the present living membership of the Church of Latter-day Saints, and the many thousands that have passed away—how much we all owe to the faithful service of this witness for God! I felt that I wanted to acknowledge my own indebtedness to him for the service that he has rendered to the Church and to the world. I feel in my heart to thank God for his ministry, for the gifts of his mind. I thank the Lord that the Spirit of God has touched his understanding with inspiration to our edification for, lo, these many years. Those are my sentiments towards Brother Charles W. Penrose. The Lord bless him.
While contemplating the duty of speaking to this congregation, a duty that arises out of the appointment I received to be in attendance upon this conference, and while listening to the discourse just closed, I came to the conclusion that it is almost as important to tell the world what we do not believe as it is to tell them what we do believe. Really, there is great strength at times in a negative statement, a disclaiming of certain doctrines which we are slanderously reported to believe, but in which we do not believe. The force of this negative statement has been recognized by all the great councils of the Catholic church at least, from the first unto the last. Upon every formal announcement of dogma, by the councils of that church, there has been attached an anathematizing clause. For illustration, in the great council of Nicea, held early in the fourth century of the Christian era, after defining the doctrine concerning the nature of God and the relationship of the persons of the holy trinity, the Catholic church added this clause:
"But those who say that there was a time when he [the Son] was not, and that he was not before he was begotten, and that he was made of nothing, or affirm that he is of any other substance or essence, or that the Son of God is created and mutable or changeable, the Catholic church doth pronounce accursed."
CATHOLIC BELIEF.
And again, in the council of Trent, held in the sixteenth century, in defining the doctrine of justification, which was then in debate, and was one of the points of difference between the Protestants and the Catholic church, after defining the doctrine of justification, the Church said:
"If any one shall say that the sinner is justified by faith alone in the sense that nothing else is required, which may cooperate towards the attainment of the grace of justification, and that the sinner does not need to be prepared and disposed by the motion of his own will, let him be accursed."
And so the last council held by that church, known as the Vatican council, held in the closing months of 1869, and in the first months of 1870, defining the infallibility of the bishop of Rome, the pope of the Catholic world, the anathematizing clause stands as follows:
"But if any one, which may God avert, presume to contradict this our definition, let him be anathema."