Donatism

"Quaerite, Donatistae, si nescitis, quaerite ab Ierusalem per terrena itinera in circuitu usque in Illyricum quot mansiones sint: si tot Ecclesias computemus, dicite quemadmodum per Africanas contentiones perire potuerunt. Ad Corinthios, ad Ephesios, ad Philippenses, ad Thessalonicenses, ad Colossenses vos solas Apostoli epistulas in lectione, nos autem et epistulas in lectione ac fide et ipsas Ecclesias in communione retinemus. PL 43, 414"

"Can. 8. Si quis dixerit, per ipsa novae Legis sacramenta ex opere operato non conferri gratiam, sed solam fidem divinae promissionis ad gratiam consequendam sufficere: an. s."

"Can. 12. Si quis dixerit, ministrum in peccato mortali exsistentem, modo omnia essentialia, quae ad sacramentum conficiendum aut conferendum pertinent, servaverit, non conficere aut conferre sacramentum : an. s. (cf: DS 1154)."

"Joined by fanatics of all kinds and the dregs of society, the Donatists indulged in all sorts of excesses, avoided contact with Catholics, going so far as to wash the places where they had been in order to purify them, and roamed the countryside begging. “Genus hominum otiosum ab utilibus operibus... maxime in agris territans, ab agris vacans et victus sui causa villas circumiens rusticorum, unde et circumcellionum nomen accepit.” (Note of the Author) exorcising, inflicting horrible tortures on themselves, as we will see later that the holy men and marabouts of Islam did."

"For several decades, [...], Donatism was political opposition, religious rivalry, and a practical attitude, rather than a theoretical position and abstract system. The orthodox did not even have the desire or the means to refute it methodically. Political power opposed it for them, but they never tired of petulantly calling on it for help."

"If Donatism is in direct continuity with pre-Constantinian Christianity, it should not imagine that it represents the only church. The church of Christ has the promise of universality, while the Donatist church has not crossed the ethnic and territorial boundaries of Africa. Furthermore, after a heroic period of confessions and martyrdom, the Donatist church, especially during the period of the Moorish uprisings, came to contract the same disfiguring blemishes that it discovers in the official community."