Francis Turretin (1623–1687) was a Genevan Reformed theologian of Italian Protestant descent, pastor at the Italian congregation in Geneva and professor of theology at the Genevan Academy. His principal work, the Institutio Theologiae Elencticae (3 vols., 1679–1685), became the standard dogmatics text of high Reformed orthodoxy, shaping confessional Calvinist theology well into the nineteenth century, particularly in Scotland and America through Princeton Seminary. He was a fierce defender of Reformed doctrine against Arminianism, Socinianism, and Roman Catholicism, and a key figure in the formation of the Helvetic Consensus Formula (1675).
Institutes of Elenctic Theology, Part Three
Institutio Theologiae Elencticae, Pars Tertia
Where Our Church Was Before Luther and Zwingli
Ubinam Ecclesia Nostra Fuerit Ante Lutherum et Zuinglium
Section X of Quaestio X in Turretin's treatment of the Church provides the positive response to the Roman Catholic challenge demanding to know where the Reformed church was before Luther and Zwingli. Turretin argues that the question must be understood under four aspects—doctrine, persons, location, and form of governance—and that under the first and most important aspect (doctrine), the substance of saving faith has been preserved in every age through Scripture, the Apostles' Creed, baptism, and the Lord's Supper, even when the church lay hidden and was mixed with the corruptions of Rome, as God has always providentially conserved his elect until the Reformation.
On the Stipends of Ministers and Ecclesiastical Goods
De Stipendiis Ministrorum, & Bonis Ecclesiasticis
Quaestio XXVIII of Turretin's treatment of the Church asks whether ministers of the church are owed some stipend, and answers affirmatively against the Anabaptists. Turretin marshals scriptural arguments from both Testaments to show that those who labor in the Gospel have a right to be supported by it, then surveys the legitimate sources of ministerial income—the labor of preaching, congregational provision, and endowments—while warning against the excesses of greed and luxury. He also traces the historical origin of ecclesiastical benefices and properties, acknowledging how an originally legitimate institution was corrupted by papal patronage and monastic accumulation.