Colossians 1:6

Honor also the Holy Church, your mother, as the heavenly Jerusalem, the holy city of God; love her, proclaim her. She it is who bears fruit and grows in the whole world in this faith which you have heard, the Church of the living God, the pillar and ground of the truth; she tolerates in the communion of the sacraments the wicked, who are to be separated in the end, from whom in the meantime she withdraws by reason of their diverse manners. For the sake of her grain that now groans among the chaff, whose mass will be revealed in the final winnowing and assigned to the barns. She receives the keys of the kingdom of heaven, that through her, by the blood of Christ and the operation of the Holy Spirit, the remission of sins may be effected. In this Church the soul that was dead in sins will revive, so as to be made alive with Christ, by whose grace we have been saved.

For there are both good and bad in the Catholic Church, which, unlike the Donatist sect, is extended and spread abroad, not in Africa only, but through all nations; as the apostle expresses it, "bringing forth fruit, and increasing in the whole world." But those who are separated from the Church, as long as they are opposed to it cannot be good; although an apparently praiseworthy conversation seems to prove some of them to be good, their separation from the Church itself renders them bad, according to the saying of the Lord: "He that is not with me is against me; and he that gathereth not with me scattereth."

But the evidence of all the several scriptures with one accord proclaims the Church spread abroad throughout the world, with which the faction of Donatus does not hold communion. The law of God declared, "In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." The Lord said by the mouth of His prophet, "From the rising of the sun, even unto the going down of the same, a pure sacrifice shall be offered unto my name: for my name shall be great among the heathen." The Lord said through the Psalmist, "He shall have dominion also from sea to sea, and from the river unto the ends of the earth." The Lord said by His apostle, "The gospel is come unto you, as it is in all the world, and bringeth forth fruit." The Son of God said with His own mouth, "Ye shall be witnesses unto me, both in Jerusalem, and in all Judea, and in Samaria, and even unto the uttermost part of the earth." Caecilianus, the bishop of the Church of Carthage, is accused with the contentiousness of men; the Church of Christ, established among all nations, is recommended by the voice of God.

It is much less surprising that he [Paul] used his verbs in the present tense in that passage which, as you remarked, he repeated again and again: "For the hope which is laid up for you in heaven, which you have heard before in the word of the truth of the gospel, which is come to you as also it is in the whole world, and brings forth fruit and grows." Although the gospel did not yet embrace the whole world, he said that it brings forth fruit and grows in the whole world, in order to show how far it would extend in bearing fruit and growing. If, then, it is hidden from us when the whole world will be filled by the church bringing forth fruit and growing, undoubtedly it is hidden from us when the end will be, but it certainly will not be before that.

Ver. 6. "Which is come unto you, even as it is also in all the world." He now gives them credit. "Is come," he said metaphorically. He means, it did not come and go away, but that it remained, and was there. Then because to the many the strongest confirmation of doctrines is that they hold them in common with many, he therefore added, "As also it is in all the world." It is present everywhere, everywhere victorious, everywhere established. "And is bearing fruit, and increasing, as it doth in you also." "Bearing fruit." In works. "Increasing." By the accession of many, by becoming firmer; for plants then begin to thicken when they have become firm. "As also among you," says he. He first gains the hearer by his praises, so that even though disinclined, he may not refuse to hear him. "Since the day ye heard it." Marvelous! that ye quickly came unto it and believed; and straightway, from the very first, showed forth its fruits. "Since the day ye heard, and knew the grace of God in truth." Not in word, saith he, nor in deceit, but in very deeds. Either then this is what he means by "bearing fruit," or else, the signs and wonders. Because as soon as ye received it, so soon ye knew the grace of God. What then forthwith gave proofs of its inherent virtue, is it not a hard thing that that should now be disbelieved?