1. So be it they be indeed sound doctrine, holy, and fitted to the people's edification.
2. So be it they be not read scandalously without sufficient differencing them from God's book.
3. So they be not read to exclude or hinder the reading of the Scriptures, or any other necessary church duty.
4. So they be not read to keep up an ignorant, lazy ministry that can or will do no better; nor to exercise the minister's sloth, and hinder him from preaching.
5. And especially if authority command it, and the church's agreement require it, as a signification what doctrine it is which they profess.
6. Or if the church's necessities require it; as if they have no minister, or no one that can do so much to their edification any other way.
7. Therefore the use of catechisms is confessed lawful in the church, by almost all.
Quest. CLI. May church assemblies be held where there is no minister? Or what public worship may be so performed by laymen? (As among infidels, or papists, where persecution hath killed, imprisoned, or expelled the ministers.)
Answ. 1. Such an assembly as hath no pastor, or minister of Christ, is not a church, in a political sense, as the word signifieth a society consisting of pastor and flock; but it may be a church in a larger sense, as the word signifieth only a community or association of private christians for mutual help in holy things.
2. Such an assembly ought on the Lord's days, and at other fit times, to meet together for mutual help, and the public worshipping of God, as they may, rather than not to meet at all.