Time of Judgement QUESTION from Susan September 27, 2001 Thank you so much for answering my mail of last week.
Brother, I do need further clarifications.
In your first para. and second last para, you ended them with God said it matters. Where can I find that in the scriptures.
Also you said that Jesus is the personal founder of Catholic Church. Could you give me references for that too.
I would love to know them to tell my friend that our Church is the true Church founded by our Saviour.
Thank you so much once again.
ANSWER by John-Paul Ignatius, OLSM on September 28, 2001 Dear Mrs. Susan:
Well first off, don't let any Protestant trap you with this idea of find that in scriptures. It doesn't have to be found in scriptures! That idea of Scripture Alone was invented by a mentally disturbed and arrogance monk by the name of Martin Luther. He didn't want to submit to the Church's teaching authority, so he made up this idea of the Scripture alone so he could interpret the bible himself as he pleased. As a result Luther ripped out 7 books from the Old Testament and he wanted to rip out some books in the New Testament like Revelations, Hebrews, and especially the book of James which appears to contradict Luther's heresy of justification by faith alone. Then when Luther translated the Bible into German he messed with the text and added words, such as adding the word alone after the word faith in Romans 3:28. What a lot of people don't know is that Luther never intended people to interpret the Bible on their own -- which is what Protestants quickly did -- ending up with the 30,000 denominations -- no, Luther intended to deny the Church's authority to interpret and replace the Church with his own authority. He expected everyone to accept himself as the official interpretor.
At any rate, the bible represents only a SMALL portion of God's Word. The bible itself says that (John 21:25). NO WHERE in the Bible does it teach the bible alone. Sacred Tradition holds the bulk of God's Word and the Bible tells us to hear and OBEY the ORAL TRADITION (1 Cor 11:2; 2 Thess 2:15) and even tells us to SHUN those people who refuse to obey that Tradition (2 Thess 3:16)
So the question, Where is that in the Bible? is in essence a false question.
Now with that said, the fact is that most of the doctrines taught by the Catholic Church are either in the bible explicitly or implied by principles in the bible.
Now to your question, We know that to God it matters because the Church says so. When the Church officially teaches, it is God talking. More specifically we know that there is no salvation outside of the Church because the Bible tells us that one MUST be believe in Christ (we learn about Christ from the Church), we MUST be baptized (the Church does that) and John 6 says that we MUST eat the Eucharist to have eternal life (only the true Church with valid sacraments and holy orders can give the Eucharist).
As for Jesus founding the Church, the passages of Matt 16:18ff about Jesus giving the keys of the Kingdom to Peter show that Jesus was founding a Church. Jesus even explicitly says upon this rock (Peter) I will build my Church. What Church? Well, the passages in Matthew 16 tell us -- a Church with authority (just like in the Old Testament times. God has ALWAYS had an authority through which He dealt with His children -- all the way back to Adam).
Jesus gave the Keys, the symbol of authority, to Peter. When he did this we know that this was an act of setting up what we now call the Papacy because Jesus was quoting from Isaiah 22:21-22. In Isaiah the story is about the succession of office of the Prime Minister. The Prime Minister gets the keys of the Kingdom and whatever he locks is locked and whatever he unlocks is unlock. Jesus repeated this to Peter. Since Jesus did not quote scripture flippantly, it is clear that Jesus was making Peter the first prime minister of the New Covenant to replace the prime ministry of the Old Covenant which was held by the Chair of Moses (Matt 23:2).
Even the word Pope is in the Bible. Isaiah 22:21 says that this prime minister is a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalam and to the house of Judah. Well father is the word in English; if we are reading a bible in Italian the word would read papa. Pope is a form of papa. Pope means father. Thus the Bible says that the Prime Minister over Jerusalem (and we are the new Jerusalem under the New Covenant) is the Pope. Jesus established his church upon Simon, who he re-named, the ROCK (Peter means rock). The word Rock was traditionally reserved only to God, thus Jesus was giving Simon a very special mission to be the Vicar of Christ who is THEE Rock. Peter was a chip off the 'ol block.
And upon the Rock of Peter Jesus built his church. Yes, we can say to the Protestant, it was upon Peter's faith as they would argue, but it was STILL Peter. And with the reference to Isaiah we KNOW that it was MORE than merely his faith. Peter was being likened to the Prime Minister (the Pope) in Isaiah. The seat of authority HAD to pass from the Chair of Moses to someone. Who was that someone? The Bible clearly says Peter. Thus whatever faith community is in communion with the chair of Peter IS THE TRUE CHURCH THAT JESUS FOUNDED -- what we today call, the Catholic Church.
By the way, what I just descibed is the reason I converted from a Baptist Preacher to a Catholic.
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