Whilst writing this book, I sent some of my early drafts to a Baptist missionary friend. His complaint was this:
I agree with much of what you say in chapter 4. I agree that many Christians are much too individualistic... I agree that too many of us (especially Protestants and perhaps especially evangelicals) do not understand deeply enough the importance of the Body of Christ on earth. My problem comes when “the Body of Christ on earth” seems to become identical with the Roman Catholic Church. [1]
An Anglican Evangelical friend, also upon reading an early draft of my Chapter Four, said something like, “OK. That’s all very well, about the Church and all that. But what about the Pope? Is the Pope infallible?”
Many Evangelicals clearly harbour deeply held suspicions about what they believe to be the self-proclaimed identity of the Catholic Church in general, and of the Pope in particular. I reassured my friends as best as I could. And I hope that, thus far in this book, I have not suggested that the only valid manifestation of the Body of Christ on earth is the Roman Catholic Church. But if we are to unpick some of these suspicions, we need to look at what the Bible actually says about the identity of the Church.
We started to deal with this issue in Chapter Four. We saw
how both the Old and the New Testaments attest to a principle of inheritance or
succession, whereby religious leadership and authority are passed down to
successive generations – from Father to Son to “father” to “son” (e.g. Matt. 10:40, Jn. 20:21; Acts 1:26,
14:23, 20:28; 1 Cor. 4:15, 1 Tim. 1:2, Tit. 1:5): “He who receives you receives
me, and he who receives me receives the one who sent me” (Matt. 10:40). The
Bible is thus absolutely explicit about at least four generations of succession
in Church authority:
the Father,
the Son,
the apostles (“fathers through
the gospel” – 1 Cor. 4:15), and
the first generation of apostolic
appointees (“sons in faith” – 1 Tim. 1:2).
Was it God’s intention that the succession should stop with that first generation after the apostles – or should it continue onwards thence? Do Jesus’s very clear injunctions about the spiritual authority of His apostles extend to their successors? By definition we cannot, and will never, find an answer to these questions sola scriptura, for the Bible of course does not contain descriptions of how the Church worked in the years after the New Testament books were completed! It is important to emphasise this point: Scripture does not, and by definition cannot, tell us anything incontrovertible one way or another about how apostolic authority did or did not, or should or should not, continue after Bible times. The absence of clear biblical instruction on this point does not imply that it was God’s intention that after the passing of the first generation after the apostles apostolic authority would necessarily cease – any more than Moses’s failure to specify what was to happen after Joshua died implies that it would then be a good idea for everyone to “do as he saw fit” (Judg. 17:6, 21:25): it simply leaves the question as yet unresolved.
So, if we want to understand how the Church came to work in later generations, and why, we must read the non-biblical writings which came after the apostles. These writings are not, of course, infallible. Therefore they cannot tell us what must happen. But they can tell us what the Christian consensus was in the very early days of the Church. And so they can show us how the early Christians’ understanding of Church authority was handed down and developed over the generations.
Clement
Let us begin with a Bible character whose letters, though not included in the Bible, were probably written at the same time as, or perhaps even before, some of the New Testament. Clement was Paul’s co-worker (Phil. 4:3). What he wrote is therefore probably a reliable description of apostolic teaching and Christian practice in New Testament times. Here he is, writing towards the end of the first century A.D., urging the Christians of Corinth to fidelity to the hierarchy of the Church:
Christ received
His commission from God, and the Apostles theirs from Christ. The order of
these two events was in accordance with the will of God. So thereafter…, as they
went through the territories and townships preaching, they appointed their first
converts – after testing them by the Spirit – to be bishops [episkopous] and deacons [diakonous] for the believers of the
future. […]
Have we not
Notice how Clement is not adding anything new here to the apostolic revelation; he is merely clarifying and emphasising the importance of the biblical points which we identified in Chapter Four: the episkopoi were appointed by the apostles (Acts 1:26, 14:23, 20:28; Tit. 1:5), just as the apostles were commissioned by Christ, and just as Christ was commissioned by the Father (Matt. 10:40, Jn. 20:21); therefore their appointment is by divine will (1 Cor. 15:3, 2 Thess. 2:15, 2 Tim. 2:2, Tit. 1:9), and to act counter to this divinely-sanctioned order leads to disunity, which is to commit grave violence against the Body of Christ (1 Cor. 12:14-26) – “our own body”.
The one thing Clement says on this subject which is not found in Scripture is this:
Our Apostles
knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be dissensions over the
title of bishop [episkopes]. In their
full foreknowledge of this, therefore, they proceeded to appoint the ministers
I spoke of, and they went on to add an instruction that if these should f
Here Clement is telling us something to which the Bible does not directly attest, and could not have attested. But it does not sound unlikely, for all the reasons we discussed in Chapter Four, that the handing on of Church authority should indeed continue on to successive generations. Clement was Paul’s friend, was ordained by Peter, [4] and succeeded to the episkope of which Peter was apparently one of the first occupants, Rome. [5] He will have heard both their views on the subject, and will certainly have wanted to be faithful to those views. Though not infallible, Clement is a reliable witness to the teaching of the apostles.
Ignatius
We have already read a lot, in Chapter Ten, of Ignatius of Antioch (c. 35-107 A.D.), student of the apostle John. [6] Not long after Clement wrote his letter to the Corinthians, Ignatius journeyed to Rome for his own martyrdom. On the way he wrote a series of letters to various churches around the known world. Here are some of the things he said:
Since Jesus Christ has given such glory to you, it is only right that you should give glory to Him; and this, if sanctification is to be yours in full measure, means uniting in a common act of submission and acknowledging the authority of your bishop and clergy… For we can have no life apart from Jesus Christ; and as He represents the mind of the Father, so our bishops… represent the mind of Jesus Christ. [7]
Let me urge on you the need for godly unanimity in everything you do. Let the bishop preside in the place of God, and his clergy in the place of the Apostolic conclave… In the same way as the Lord was wholly one with the Father, and never acted independently of Him, either in person or through the Apostles, so you yourselves must never act independently of your bishop and clergy. On no account persuade yourselves that it is right and proper to follow your own private judgement; have a single service of prayer which everyone attends; one united supplication, one mind, one hope, in love and innocent joyfulness, which is Jesus Christ, than whom nothing is better. [8]
Every man who
belongs to God and Jesus Christ stands by his bishop. As for the rest, if they
repent and come back into the unity of the church, they too sh
We may not warm to Ignatius’s rather uncompromising language
here. But again, notice how everything he says draws out, clarifies and
organises the biblical injunctions regarding church authority. As the Father is
to Christ, so is Christ to the apostles, the apostles to the bishops, the bishops
to the clergy, and the clergy to
Irenaeus
By
the time we reach the later part of the second century A.D., the influence of
the Gnostic heresies is growing, and the consequences of schism are even more apparent
to the faithful. Irenaeus (c. 120-202
A.D.), a third-generation episkopos, writes
at length in his masterwork Against Heresies
about the dangers of f
“For in the Church,” it is said, “God hath set apostles, prophets,
teachers [cf. 1 Cor. 12:28],” and
Irenaeus stresses that the reliability of the Church in preaching the true gospel of Christ is the direct result of her unbroken apostolic succession, and her consequent fidelity to true apostolic Tradition:
It is within the power of all, therefore…, to contemplate clearly the tradition of the apostles manifested throughout the whole world; and we are in a position to reckon up those who were by the apostles instituted bishops in the Churches, and [to demonstrate] the succession of these men to our own times; those who neither taught nor knew of anything like what these [heretics] rave about… [11]
By the time of Irenaeus, therefore, i.e. less than a century after most of the New Testament books were
written, the early Christian understanding of the Church – guardian of authentic
Christian Tradition, in partnership with Scripture, under the guidance of the
Spirit, led by episkopoi who are direct
spiritual descendants of the apostles through a line of succession – was virtu
We may well baulk at the apparent absolutism of the opinions of men like Irenaeus. But we must remember that he was facing a spectre which had never yet happened in the history of Christianity: the break-up of the Church. Heresy threatened the faith at every juncture, and the consequences had to be spelt out. In our modern age, we have become so casual about the fact of Church division that we have forgotten what it was that made men like Irenaeus, Ignatius, Clement and Paul preach tirelessly the absolute necessity of the unity of the faithful. In our modern age, with Christianity fragmented into thousands of parts, we need to recapture some of these men’s indignation at what we have allowed to happen to the Body of Christ.
Irenaeus made one other important point about Church unity and Church authority – one which shocked me when I first read it, because I had not thought that this idea would have developed so early on in our Christian history – and that is this: that the pre-eminent apostolic line of Christian succession is none other than that
derived from the apostles, of the very great, the very ancient, and universally known Church founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul… For it is a matter of necessity that every church should agree with this Church, on account of its pre-eminent authority. [12]
How can it have become evident by so early a date that Rome has a pre-eminent authority in the worldwide Christian Church – even to the extent that “every church should agree with this Church”? If we are to do justice to this idea, we need to rewind a bit. We need to look at Simon Peter.
Peter and Abraham
It goes without saying that Peter is a very important person in the ranks of Jesus’s apostles. The first of the apostles in every list (Matt. 10:2, Mk. 3:16, Lk. 6:14, Acts 1:13), and often the only one to be named (e.g. Mk. 1:36, Lk. 9:32), his prominence in the gospels and in the early chapters of Acts, whether for his brilliance or sometimes for his faux pas, is indisputable. But there are two main passages which show him to be special in some very particular ways. The most famous is this exchange of words at Caesarea Philippi:
“But what about you?” he asked.
“Who do you say I am?”
Simon Peter answered, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed
to you by man, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter,
and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not
overcome it.” (Matt. 16:15-19)
The point of this passage is not to show what a clever man Peter was in recognising Jesus as the Christ. The important thing is the two aspects of apostolic authority which Jesus, by grace, confers on him.
The first is: “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.” The hard-hitting impact of this is lost in translation. In Greek it reads: “You are Petros, and on this petra I will build my church.” “Peter” and “rock” are the same word: Jesus was giving Simon a new name which had never been given to anyone before. Literally, he was saying, “You are Rock, and on this rock I will build my church.” [13] There can be little doubt about what Jesus meant in this context: Peter is the rock on which the Church is built. [14]
In making this pronouncement, Jesus was doing something which God had done many times before when appointing someone for a special task: giving a new name which represents something of the new character and destiny of the person. Abram was called Abraham (Gen. 17:5), meaning “exalted father” or “father of many”. [15] Jacob was renamed Israel (Gen. 32:28): “he struggles with God”. [16] James and John were called “Boanerges, which means Sons of Thunder” (Mk. 3:17). Jesus’s meaning would have been made even more vivid by the setting in which He said these words. Caesarea Philippi was a pagan city, full of temples devoted to various gods – most famously a temple to Pan hewn out of a vast rock formation which dominated the skyline. Imagine Jesus saying these words surrounded by all these grand pagan temples built on this rock, indicating that His ekklesia would be something quite different, built not upon a geological rock but on a human one, chosen by grace, shaped by His love, and sanctified by the Holy Spirit: a new man (cf. 2 Cor. 5:17, Eph. 4:24) “called by a new name that the mouth of the LORD will bestow… a crown of splendour in the LORD’s hand” (Is. 62:2-3).
The word “rock” has a long history in the pages of Scripture. Like blood and flesh, bread and wine, water and cloud, it is a constant presence in the life and history of Israel. Ultimately, as King David sang, there is one true Rock:
“The LORD
is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer;
my God is
my rock, in whom I take refuge…
For who is God besides the LORD?
And who is the Rock except our
God?
The LORD lives! Praise be to my
Rock!
Exalted be God, the Rock, my
Saviour!” (2 Sam. 22:2-3,32,47, cf.
Ps. 18) [17]
But, as we saw in Chapter Nine, the Shekhinah of God radiates out to the world, making holy those places and things which come near to Him. And so the rock on which Jacob dreams of the stairway to Heaven becomes a holy place, nothing less than the house of God, the gateway to Heaven:
When Jacob awoke from his sleep,
he thought, “Surely the LORD is in this place, and I was not aware of it.” He
was afraid and said, “How awesome is this place! This is none other than the house
of God; this is the gate of heaven.”
Early the next morning Jacob took
the stone he had placed under his head and set it up as a pillar and poured oil
on top of it. He called that place Bethel. (Gen. 28:16-19)
This rock becomes a typos which is taken up by Isaiah centuries later:
“See, I lay
a stone in Zion,
a tested
stone,
a precious
cornerstone for a sure foundation;
the one who
trusts will never be dismayed.” (Is. 28:16, cf.
Rom. 9:33, 1 Pet. 2:6)
And so, at the centre of the Jerusalem Temple, at its foundation, lay a rock. The Mishnah tells us that when the Temple was destroyed by the Babylonians in 586 B.C.,
after the ark had been taken away, there was a stone from the days of the earlier prophets, called the shethiyah [foundation], three fingers above the ground. [18]
According to the Mishnah, this was no ordinary rock:
Rabbi Isaac the Smith said: “The Holy One, blessed be He, cast a stone into the ocean, from which the world then was founded, as it is said: ‘Whereupon were the foundations thereof fastened, or who laid the corner-stone thereof?’” [Job 38:6] But the Sages said: “The world was created from Zion, as it is said…, ‘Out of Zion, the perfection of beauty, God hath shined forth’ [Ps. 50:2], that means from it the beauty of the world was perfected.” [19]
As so, as Middle East expert Kenneth Bailey explains, for the Jews of the second Temple, and therefore for Jesus and His disciples,
the center of the holy of holies, with its raised stone, was the most sacred spot in the world, and that stone was “in Zion” [Is. 28:16] at the center of the temple complex… It appears that said stone at the center of the holy of holies was understood to be the fulfilment of Isaiah’s promise that one day God would place a “precious stone”, a sure foundation in Zion. [20]
This rock is presumably still there. Perhaps it is the large rock which now lies at the centre of the Muslim shrine which we call the Dome of the Rock, which was erected on the Temple Mount in c. 690 A.D. I had the rare privilege of seeing this rock, on my first ever childhood visit to Israel, in 1969: since then entry to the Dome has been prohibited to non-Muslims, and so I may never see it again in this life. One may of course dispute exactly which rock is which, and whether either the Jews or the Muslims have identified the correct one, but one cannot deny the importance of the rock to anyone who seeks God’s Shekhinah.
The prophet Daniel develops the rock image further, to refer to the future everlasting kingdom of God to be established by the Messiah. He explains to King Nebuchadnezzar:
“While you were watching, a rock
was cut out, but not by human hands. It struck the statue on its feet of iron
and clay and smashed them. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver and
the gold were broken to pieces at the same time and became like chaff on a threshing-floor
in the summer. The wind swept them away without leaving a trace. But the rock
that struck the statue became a huge mountain and filled the whole earth.” […]
“The God of heaven will set up a kingdom
that will never be destroyed, nor will it be left to another people. It will
crush all those kingdoms and bring them to an end, but it will itself endure
for ever. This is the meaning of the vision of the rock cut out of a mountain,
but not by human hands.” (Dan. 2:34-35,44-45)
Does the rock matter to Christians? Certainly – for Simon Peter himself takes up the theme, but calls Jesus the “living Stone – rejected by men but chosen by God and precious to him” (1 Pet. 2:4). Thus, Christ is the fulfilment of Isaiah’s prophecy of a “sure foundation” in Zion, as well as Daniel’s of a rock “not made by human hands” whose kingdom will endure forever. And of course He is the fulfilment of Jacob’s typos, for He is not only the true Rock, but also the true ladder to Heaven:
“I tell you truth, you shall see heaven open, and the angels of God ascending and descending on the Son of Man.” (Jn. 1:51)
For Christians therefore, Jesus is our Rock. He it was who accompanied the Israelites in the desert (1 Cor. 10:4), and He it is on whom we must build our oikos:
“Everyone who hears these words
of mine and puts them into practice is like a wise man who built his house [oikian] on the rock [petran]. The rain came down, the streams
rose, and the winds blew and beat against that house [oikia]; yet it did not f
In both Old and New Testaments therefore, the rock is an image of God’s Shekhinah. In the words of Jacob, and of Isaiah, and of Daniel, and of Jesus, and of Peter, the rock is the foundation stone of God’s oikos, and of the stairway to Heaven, and the everlasting Kingdom. For the Jews, the Temple in Zion is the fulfilment of that typos; for Christians, it is Christ.
However, just as God, the true Rock, can impart His holiness to mere rocks of the earth, so can He to mere people. Isaiah applied the same epithet to Abraham:
“Look to
the rock from which you were cut
and to the
quarry from which you were hewn;
look to
Abraham, your father...
When I called
him he was but one,
and I
blessed him and made him many.” (Is. 51:1-2)
Abraham, therefore, by participation in God’s holiness, is also a rock. God took Abraham and “made him many”; thus he is the father of the house of Israel (Jn. 8:33-59), the rock from which the people of God were hewn. And therefore, we Christians too are “made many” from the rock of Abraham, for “if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise” (Gal. 3:29).
Abraham was the rock of Israel, and their father. And so, if Peter is the rock of the new nation of God, the Church, then he too is our father; from him the Church will be hewn, and thus he too will be “made many”. Abraham is the typos, Peter the antitypos.
Peter himself, by extrapolation, draws the obvious conclusion:
As you come to him, the Living Stone… you also, like living stones, are being built into a spiritual house [oikos] to be a royal priesthood [hierateuma], offering spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. (1 Pet. 2:4-5)
Once again, we see at work the principle we examined in Chapters Nine and Eleven: God’s Shekhinah does not stay hidden; by His grace, it reaches out to other people and things so as to draw them into His life and make them holy. God is the Rock; therefore the Temple is the rock; therefore Jesus is the Rock. God is the Rock; therefore Abraham is a rock; therefore Peter is a rock. God is our Father; therefore Abraham is our father; therefore Peter is our father. “Out of these stones God can raise up children for Abraham” (att. 3:9, Lk. 3:8) – and so, therefore, we are living stones, being “raised up” and built into God’s house by the one Living Stone. The Rock draws men to Himself, and transforms us into His image, making us all building blocks of His heavenly oikos. What an amazing image!
Peter and Eliakim
Let us return to Caesarea Philippi. Jesus continues:
“I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.” (Matt. 16:19)
Peter is thus given the authority to do what until then only God could do, which is to make decisions which would have eternal effects. We can understand better what Jesus means by the “keys of the kingdom of heaven” if we realise that by using this phrase He is alluding to another passage from Isaiah:
In that day I will summon my servant, Eliakim son of Hilkiah. I will clothe him with your robe and fasten your sash around him and hand your authority over to him. He will be a father to those who live in Jerusalem and to the house [bayit] of Judah. I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no-one can shut, and what he shuts no-one can open. (Is. 22:20-22)
Here, then, is another typos: Peter is to take on a role in the New Covenant similar to that occupied by Eliakim in this part of the Old. Eliakim was not a king, but is described in the Old Testament as being “over the household [bayit]” (2 Kgs. 18:18,37, RSV) of the Kingdom of Judah, a sort of representative or prime minister of the great King Hezekiah. And so therefore Peter will not be a king, but will be the King’s representative, exerting authority “over the household” of the Church. Just like Eliakim in the Old Jerusalem, Peter will, by bearing the “keys of the kingdom”, be a “father” to those who belong to the New Jerusalem.
There is no doubt that in the early days of the Church, Peter does precisely that. The early chapters of the Acts of the Apostles depict him (alongside John) as the most prominent member of the Jerusalem church. And in the account of Ananias and Sapphira (Acts 5:1-11) Peter exercises his authority to “bind and loose” to devastating effect. In the words of the great Lutheran scholar Oscar Cullmann, “Peter retains for all time the unique greatness and dignity of having been in the first days of the Church of Jesus Christ the leader of the Primitive Church and thereby of the entire Church of that time. This must stand first of all as a fixed fact in the redemptive history at the beginning.” [21]
Peter the shepherd
The next passage about Peter which we must examine is this:
Jesus said
to Simon Peter, “Simon son of John, do you truly love me more than these?”
“Yes, Lord,”
he said, “you know that I love you.”
Jesus said,
“Feed my lambs.”
Again Jesus
said, “Simon son of John, do you truly love me?”
He
answered, “Yes, Lord, you know that I love you.”
Jesus said,
“Take care of my sheep.”
The third
time he said to him, “Simon son of John, do you love me?”
Peter was hurt because Jesus
asked him the third time, “Do you love me?”
He said, “Lord, you know all
things; you know that I love you.”
Jesus said,
“Feed my sheep.” […]
Then he said to him, “Follow me!”
(Jn. 21:15-17,19)
One fascinating detail is lost in translation, and that is that Jesus uses different words for “love” in his three questions. The first and second times, he asks “Agapas me?” which can refer to selfless love (agape) – the sort of love God has, and is (1 Jn. 4:16). It is as if he is asking, “Simon son of John, do you love me as much as the Father loves me, and as much as I love you?” Peter replies, “Philo se” – using the word more commonly used for the kind of love which exists between friends; it is as if he is saying “I am your friend.” The third time, when Peter loses his cool, Jesus downgrades His question, saying “Phileis me?” – as if he is asking, “Simon son of John, are you really my friend?”
Jesus clearly did not need to size up Simon Peter: He knew both what Peter was capable of and what he was not, better than Peter did, and He knew both the extent and the limitations of Peter’s love. But, by grace, He gave him a special task: to be the shepherd of God’s people, after Jesus had left this earth. [22]
What does Jesus say about being a shepherd?
I am the good shepherd; I know my sheep and my sheep know me – just as the Father knows me and I know the Father – and I lay down my life for my sheep. I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also. They too will listen to my voice, and there shall be one flock and one shepherd. (Jn. 10:14-16)
What a daunting task for Peter, to follow Jesus’s example as the good “Chief Shepherd” (1 Pet. 5:4)! He did, in point of fact, lay down his life for his sheep: all the early Christian writers agree that he was martyred in Rome during the Neronian persecutions in c. 64 A.D, by crucifixion. [23]
Peter’s successors
We have come to two important sets of conclusions about Church authority:
First, we saw in Chapter Four that the Church
is built on the apostles (Eph.
2:20),
who receive authority from Christ
in the same way that He receives it from the Father
(Matt. 10:40,
Jn. 20:21),
who therefore have the authority
to forgive sins on Christ’s behalf (Jn. 20:23),
who, by divine command, receive
and pass on the faith
(1 Cor. 15:3,
2 Thess. 2:15, 2 Tim. 2:2, Tit. 1:9);
who, by divine right, appoint episkopoi as their successors
(Matt. 10:40; Acts 1:26, 14:23 21:28;
Tit. 1:5)
who are
being led by the Holy Spirit into all truth (Jn. 14:26, 16:13);
so that they can, when necessary,
make important doctrinal decisions (Acts 15:1-31).
And we have seen in this chapter that this biblical testimony was unequivocally interpreted by the early Christians to imply that an ongoing system of succession should continue to operate in the Church. In the first centuries of the faith, it was accepted by every non-heretical Christian teacher that spiritual authority is passed down through successive generations of episkopoi, and that an essential part of being Christian is fidelity to the teaching handed down through these leaders.
Second, we have seen in this chapter that Peter received a
special grace from God. He was
the rock on
which is built the Church (Matt. 16:18),
just like
Abraham, from which the house of Israel was hewn (Is. 51:1-2);
the bearer
of the keys to the kingdom of Heaven (Matt. 16:19),
father to
those who belong to the New Jerusalem (Is. 22:21);
charged with
feeding the sheep of Christ’s flock (Jn. 21:15-17)
and strengthening his Christian
brethren (Lk. 22:32).
Put these two sets of conclusions together and it becomes hard to avoid this third: Just as all episkopoi have inherited their authority in a line of succession stretching back to the apostles, so too have Peter’s successors inherited his apostolic ministry. Peter’s successors remain our rocks, our shepherds, our fathers in Christ – just as Peter was. And so, from earliest days, the spiritual leadership of the worldwide Church has been centred on the place where Kefa was martyred, Rome. [24] Irenaeus, writing as early as 180 A.D., explains it like this:
The blessed apostles, then, having founded and built up the Church [of Rome], committed into the hands of Linus the office of the episcopate [episkopes]. Of this Linus, Paul makes mention in the Epistles to Timothy [2 Tim. 4:21]. To him succeeded Anacletus; and after him, in the third place from the apostles, Clement was allotted the bishopric [episkopen]. This man, as he had seen the blessed apostles, and had been conversant with them [Phil. 4:3], might be said to have the preaching of the apostles still echoing [in his ears], and their traditions [paradosis] before his eyes… To this Clement there succeeded Evaristus. Alexander followed Evaristus; then, sixth from the apostles, Sixtus was appointed; after him, Telephorus, who was gloriously martyred; then Hyginus; after him, Pius; then after him, Anicetus. Sorer having succeeded Anicetus, Eleutherius does now, in the twelfth place from the apostles, hold the inheritance of the episcopate [episkopes]. In this order, and by this succession, the ecclesiastical tradition [paradosis] from the apostles, and the preaching of the truth, have come down to us. And this is most abundant proof that there is one and the same vivifying faith, which has been preserved in the Church from the apostles until now, and handed down [tradita] in truth… [25]
Notice
how Irenaeus emphasises the inherited nature of the apostolic office, listing,
one after another,
Papal infallibility?
If there were more time and space, I could go on documenting the continuing development of the early Christian understanding of the Church and its leadership over the centuries following Irenaeus. [26] But I suggest that we have seen enough already to recognise a compelling case to show that, in the early Church, the importance and the authority of the line of Peter, episkopos of Rome, was at the least very widely acknowledged. But does all this add up to “papal infallibility”? Well, let’s see first what this concept really means, for there are few phrases in Christian history which have been so commonly misunderstood, by both its supporters and its critics. [27]
Papal infallibility, whilst a scary-sounding phrase, is, as defined by the Catholic Church, theological shorthand for a fairly modest idea. It does not mean that the Pope never makes mistakes. It does not mean that he never sins. It does not mean that he is always a good man. It does not mean that he is always wise. It does not mean that everything he says is true. It does not mean that his silence on a subject implies that he has no opinion on it. It does not even mean that his viewpoint on any issue is always to be followed. What does it mean then? Let us go to the most recent “official” Catholic Church document on the matter, which goes by the less than snappy title of The Dogmatic Constitution on the Church. It says:
Although the bishops, taken
individually, do not enjoy the privilege of infallibility, they do, however,
proclaim infallibly the doctrine of Christ on the following conditions: namely,
when, even though dispersed throughout the world but preserving for all that
amongst themselves and with Peter’s successor the bond of communion, in their
authoritative teaching concerning matters of faith and morals, they are in agreement
that a particular teaching is to be held definitively and absolutely. This is
still more clearly the case when, assembled in an ecumenical council, they are,
for the universal Church, teachers of and judges in matters of faith and morals,
whose decisions must be adhered to with the loyal and obedient assent of faith.
This infallibility, however, with
which the divine redeemer wished to endow his Church in defining doctrine pertaining
to faith and morals, is co-extensive with the deposit of revelation, which must
be religiously guarded and loyally and courageously expounded. The Roman
Pontiff, head of the college of bishops, enjoys this infallibility in virtue of
his office, when, as supreme pastor and teacher of all the faithful – who confirms
his brethren in the faith [cf. Lk.
22:32] – he proclaims in an absolute decision a doctrine pertaining to faith
and morals... The infallibility promised to the Church is also present in the
body of bishops when, together with Peter’s successor, they exercise the supreme
teaching office. [28]
Well, that is quite a mouthful, so let’s break it down a bit. These are the main points which I draw from this passage:
(1) Most doctrinal decisions made by the Church are taken by the full college of bishops working together.
(2) Their decisions are even clearer, and even more unequivocal, when taken in an official Church council – just as in the Bible (Acts 15:1-31).
(3) The Church cannot proclaim anything which runs counter to the doctrine received from previous generations (i.e. from Scripture and the universally accepted Tradition of the Church).
(4) The Pope is one of the bishops. Therefore, his assent is obviously essential to the collegiate teaching office of the bishops.
(5) If the bishops can’t agree, then the Pope can have the final say. (Because if they can agree, then it is not necessary for him to have the final say!)
(6) All of the above pertains only to important doctrinal issues of faith and morals – not “any old thing”!
Now, I don’t actually think that this is a particularly radical way of going about things. No one in the Church, not even the Pope, can just “come up” with a doctrine and impose it others. Everything is done in consultation amongst the bishops – just as in Acts 15. Except in conjunction with the college of bishops, the Pope’s personal opinions have no greater validity than any of his colleagues – just as it was with Peter. The Pope’s authority comes precisely from being the leader of a group, not from his individual power. [29]
Furthermore, every generation of bishops, and every pope, is bound by the decisions of previous generations. Indeed, the idea of papal infallibility actually curtails the right of any Christian leader to doctrinally innovate – because to do so would be to violate the infallible decisions regarding faith and morals taken by previous generations. This fact has proved indispensable over the centuries in maintaining the Church’s fidelity to the Christian revelation. For example, in the fourth century, when the Arian heresy raged over Christendom, various bishops, even of such important places as Constantinople and Antioch, fell victim to the heresy; yet the bishops of Rome maintained their fidelity to the true Christian teaching. During the fifth and sixth centuries, whilst the Nestorian and Monophysite heresies claimed many of the bishops of Constantinople, Antioch and Alexandria, the bishop of Rome refused to preach anything other than the truth – sometimes even despite exile and imprisonment. [30] Orthodox bishop Kallistos Ware admits that during the early centuries of the Church’s history
the Roman see was noted for the purity of its faith: other Patriarchates wavered during the great doctrinal disputes, but Rome for the most part stood firm. When hard pressed in the struggle against heretics, men felt that they could turn with confidence to the Pope. [31]
At these times at least, Peter remained a rock. [32] And so the Church as a whole was prevented from falling into heresy.
There have been many heretical movements in modern Christian history which have tried to turn the Catholic Church away from its traditional teachings, towards, e.g. a “liberal” understanding of Scripture, or a watering-down of Christian moral teaching. But the Church will never, can never, succumb to these temptations, for the Church is bound to uphold the formally-defined teaching of its previous councils and popes on central matters of faith and morals. As more and more groups of Christians in the modern age, and indeed many individual Catholics, fall prey to the temptations of doctrinal and moral “liberalism”, it is the “infallibility” (whether you believe in it or not) of Church teaching, as defined by previous councils and popes, which remains a major bulwark against heresy. The Catholic Church can never rescind its previously formally defined teaching. It cannot deny Jesus Christ as the one Saviour, who died on the cross for our sins. It cannot deny the Trinity, the virgin birth, the miracles, the resurrection, the ascension, or that Christ will come again to judge the living and the dead. It cannot declare the Bible to be anything other than infallible. It cannot condone abortion, euthanasia, assisted suicide, adultery, fornication, divorce, or “gay marriage”. Doctrine, as we saw in Chapter Five, can develop, but can never contradict its own history.
These are a few of my favourite popes
The first pope I remember, and still my favourite, was John Paul I. He led the Church for a very brief time, dying suddenly a mere 33 days after being elected, in 1978. Conspiracy theories abound, of course, about his death, [33] as do theories about what kind of pope he might have been had he lived longer. He was known as “the smiling pope”, possibly because of the contrast he made with his very serious predecessor, Paul VI. And he undoubtedly had a gentleness and humility which endeared him to many who came across him, and which come across in this letter of his, “to King David”:
You say, “Lord, my heart is not
haughty” [Ps. 131:1]. I try to follow you, but have to confine myself to
praying: “I wish my heart not to chase after thoughts of pride!...”
That’s too little for a bishop,
you may say. I know, but the truth is that I’ve buried my pride a hundred times,
deluding myself that I’ve buried it deep in the ground; and yet I’ve seen it
come back a hundred times, livelier than ever: criticism still upsets me,
praise delights me, and I worry over other people’s opinion of me.
When I am given a compliment, I
must compare myself with the donkey that carried Christ on Palm Sunday. I must say
to myself: “Suppose the donkey had grown proud when he heard the applause of
the crowd, and, being the donkey he was, had bowed right and left to thank it,
like a prima donna. How people would have laughed!” [34]
A pope, then, is a bit like a donkey! (Wouldn’t Luther have loved the comparison?) He bears Christ, but is not to be confused with his master. John Paul’s first few public addresses as Pope were not about complex theological issues, but about biblical virtues: faith, hope and love (1 Cor. 13:13). And during the course of his address on love, he abandoned his script, called a young boy out of the audience, held his hand, and spoke to him one-to-one and off-the-cuff, saying:
The Lord has given us this strong
desire to make progress. Look… At first we went on foot, then on horseback, then
camels, then by carriage, then by train, now by airplane. Always advancing.
This is the law of progress… Love of God is a kind of journey. Here too, we must
make progress. Lord, make me love you more and more. Never stop. The Lord has
said to all Christians: “You are the light of the world.” “You are the salt of
the earth.” “Become perfect as my Heavenly Father is perfect.” Here, never stop.
Make progress, with the help of God, in loving God.
All right? There, I’ll let you go
now… [35]
Here then was a pope who put into practice the words of our Lord when He said, “Let the little children come to me, and do not hinder them, for the kingdom of God belongs to such as these” (Lk. 18:16, cf. Matt. 19:14). Upon hearing John Paul’s first public address as pope, one little girl sitting on her father’s shoulders remarked, “Papa, I understood everything!” – a marvellous affirmation of that pope’s ability to put complex theology into the language of simple people. [36]
My wife A.’s favourite pope was John Paul II. Sometimes dubbed John Paul “the great”, this man was highly charismatic, travelling the world as no pope before had ever done, exhorting Christians everywhere to fidelity to Christ and resistance to the wiles of the modern world, whether in the shape of Communism or Western materialism. A profound theologian, one of his greatest achievements, perhaps, was his “theology of the body”, a profound exploration of biblical teaching on love, sex and marriage – which has been exceptionally influential in Evangelical circles as well as Catholic. John Paul teaches that the sacredness of the sexual act and the indissolubility of marriage proceed from none other than the communal nature of God and His act of creation; that is why they cannot be negotiated away by human society:
The unity of which Genesis 2:24
speaks (“they become one flesh”) is undoubtedly expressed and realized in the
conjugal act. The biblical formulation, extremely concise and simple, indicates
sex, femininity and masculinity, as that characteristic of man – male and female
– which permits them, when they become “one flesh,” to submit their whole
humanity to the blessing of fertility… Right from the beginning it… binds the
woman and the man in the very mystery of creation.
The words of Genesis 2:23…
explain this concept in a particular way. Uniting with each other (in the conjugal
act) so closely as to become “one flesh,” man and woman, rediscover…, every time
and in a special way, the mystery of creation. They return in this way to that
union in humanity (“bone of my bones and flesh of my flesh”) which allows them
to recognize each other and, like the first time, to call each other by name… The
fact that they become one flesh is a powerful bond established by the Creator.
Through it they discover their own humanity, both in its original unity, and in
the duality of a mysterious mutual attraction. [37]
God is Three in One; man and woman are created to be two in one. In the same way, the Church, the Bride of Christ, is made to be many in one. In all these instances, the diversity implies a dynamic but unbreakable unity. Here then was a pope who took to heart these words of our Lord:
“At the beginning the Creator ‘made
them male and female’ [Gen. 1:27], and said ‘For this reason a man will leave
his father and mother and be united to his wife, and the two will become one
flesh’ [Gen. 2:24]. So they are no longer two, but one. Therefore what God has
joined together, let not man separate…
“Moses permitted you to divorce
your wives because your hearts were hard. But it was not this way from the
beginning.” (Matt. 19:4-6,8)
My wife was baptised by John Paul II, at Easter in 1987, in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. After the service, the Pope spent a few minutes speaking one-to-one with each of the adults he had baptised. A. remembers being deeply affected by this humble but powerfully charismatic man. She says of him: “You know how it says in the Bible that Jesus said to Peter and Andrew, ‘Come, follow me,’ [Matt. 4:19] and they just followed him straight away, just like that. Well, I never really understood how they could do that – until I met John Paul. But if he had said to me, there, after the Easter vigil in Rome, ‘A., I want you to stay here with me,’ I would have said yes. That was the strength of his aura. That’s how much like Jesus he was.”
My eldest daughter A.S. remembers attending, at the age of fifteen, Pope Benedict XVI’s prayer vigil in Hyde Park, during his visit to the U.K. in 2010. He visited a country weighed down by the aggressive atheism of Richard Dawkins and Christopher Hitchens, one with a “liberal” secular press bent on rubbishing the Christian faith at every turn. Yet this firm, kind, intellectually unassailable man charmed even the journalists who, almost despite themselves, turned against the Dawkins crowd:
In a manner wholly unlike our
home-grown clerics, the Pope spoke to the soul of our country, affirming
eternal moral verities which our own political and religious leaders normally
prefer to avoid…
Pope Benedict’s declarations over
the past few days have been remarkable and, in modern Britain, virtually
unprecedented. They were delivered in the calmest, meekest, least ranting way
possible, and yet they carried a great authority that largely comes, I think, from
the Pope’s sense of holiness and evident goodness, as well as from the dignity
of his office. Even hard-hearted cynics and sceptics could not fail but listen… [38]
The example of Catholicism’s rivals
suggests that the church might well be much worse off if it had simply
refashioned itself to fit the prevailing values of the age. That’s what the
denominations of mainline Protestantism have done, across the last four decades
– and instead of gaining members, they’ve dwindled into irrelevance.
The Vatican of Benedict and John
Paul II, by contrast, has striven to maintain continuity with Christian tradition,
even at the risk of seeming reactionary and out of touch. This has cost the
church its once-privileged place in the Western establishment, and earned it the
scorn of fashionable opinion. But continuity, not swift and perhaps foolhardy
adaptation, has always been the papacy’s purpose, and the secret of its lasting
strength. [39]
During his visit to the U.K., Benedict invited A.S. and all the young people who heard him to attend the next World Youth Day, in Madrid. There his message to the Christian youth of the world was this:
“God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son” [1 Jn. 5:11]. Jesus himself tells us that he is our life [cf. Jn 14:6]. Consequently, Christian faith is not only a matter of believing that certain things are true, but above all a personal relationship with Jesus Christ. It is an encounter with the Son of God that gives new energy to the whole of our existence. When we enter into a personal relationship with him, Christ reveals our true identity and, in friendship with him, our life grows towards complete fulfilment. [40]
How much more “evangelical” can one get?! Here, then, was a pope who reminds us that:
“I am the way and the truth and the life. No-one comes to the Father except through me. If you really knew me, you would know my Father as well.” (Jn.14:6)
The current pope, Francis, when elected in 2013, became the darling of the Western secular press, who were convinced that, because this man appeared to speak about helping the poor more than abstract theology, he would be a “Catholic Gorbachev” [41] and overturn the Catholic faith, abandoning the ancient biblical teachings on divorce, abortion and homosexuality. They forgot, of course, that the Pope is Catholic, and that He is bound to uphold the infallible teachings of Christ’s Church stretching back 2000 years. The Pope is Catholic, and so when Francis says things like this:
Each individual Christian and every community is called to be an instrument of God for the liberation and promotion of the poor, and for enabling them to be fully a part of society. This demands that we be docile and attentive to the cry of the poor and to come to their aid. A mere glance at the Scriptures is enough to make us see how our gracious Father wants to hear the cry of the poor: “I have observed the misery of my people who are in Egypt; I have heard their cry on account of their taskmasters. Indeed, I know their sufferings, and I have come down to deliver them… so I will send you” [Ex. 3:7-8,10]… If we, who are God’s means of hearing the poor, turn deaf ears to this plea, we oppose the Father’s will and his plan. [42]
he is not revolutionising Christianity, but bringing us all back to the difficult and painful words of our Lord, which we are often so good at ignoring or “interpreting” out of existence:
“Then he will say to those on his
left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the
devil and his angels. For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was
thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, I was a stranger and you did not invite
me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, and I was sick and in prison
and you did not look after me.’
“They also will answer, ‘Lord,
when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick
or in prison, and did not help you?’
“He will reply, ‘I tell you the
truth, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for
me.’
“Then they will go away to
eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.” (Matt. 25:41-46)
If we fear Francis’s teaching on poverty, the chances are we fear Jesus’s as well. If we fear John Paul II’s teaching on marriage, we probably fear Jesus’s too. If we fear the popes, it may be because they are compelled to be faithful in their teaching to the teaching of Jesus Christ and His Church. Look at their human personalities, and you may see many things you don’t like. But look through them, and on the other side you can see Christ. The donkey can bear the Lord.
Authority and rebellion
In answer to the question of whether the popes have always been good or wise men, or have always led their Church wisely, we must give an emphatic “no”. But of course, the same answer can be given to the question of whether Simon Peter was always a good and wise apostle, or always led his Church wisely. And yet God chose him. So an alternative question to ask may be: “Do I accept God’s right to appoint mere men to have overall spiritual authority – within clearly defined boundaries – over his household on earth?” If my answer to that question is “no”, then it may help me to go back and see what Scripture has to say about the authority of God’s appointed leaders. Here, for example, are two passages which occur very close to each other in the book of Numbers, and which contain a wealth of insight into our relationship with our spiritual leaders:
Miriam and Aaron began to talk
against Moses… “Has the LORD spoken only through Moses?” they asked. “Hasn’t he
also spoken through us?” And the LORD heard this…
Then the LORD came down in a pillar
of cloud; he stood at the entrance to the Tent and summoned Aaron and Miriam.
When both of them stepped forward, he said, “Listen to my words:
“When a prophet
of the LORD is among you,
I
reveal myself to him in visions,
I
speak to him in dreams.
But
this is not true of my servant Moses;
he
is faithful in all my house [bayit].
With
him I speak face to face.” (Num. 12:1-2,5-8)
Korah son of Izhar, the son of Kohath,
the son of Levi, and certain Reubenites – Dathan and Abiram, sons of Eliab, and
On son of Peleth – became insolent and rose up against Moses. With them were 250
Israelite men, well-known community leaders who had been appointed members of
the council. They came as a group to oppose Moses and Aaron and said to them,
“You have gone too far! The whole community is holy [kadoshim], every one of them, and the LORD is with them. Why then
do you set yourselves above the LORD’s assembly [qahal]?”
When Moses heard this, he fell
face down. Then he said to Korah and all his followers…: “Now listen, you
Levites! Isn’t it enough for you that the God of Israel has separated you from
the rest of the Israelite community…? He brought you and all your fellow Levites
near himself, but now you are trying to get the priesthood too. It is against
the LORD that you and all your followers have banded together.” (Num.
16:1-5,8-10)
In both these rebellions, it is worth noticing a few things: First, neither Miriam and Aaron, nor Korah and his friends, think that they are rebelling against God. Indeed, in their complaints to Moses, they invoke the LORD. They are sure that He is on their side. They have the best of intentions – but they are mistaken.
Second, their main rationale for complaining is not intrinsically a bad one. They say, rightly, that God has “also spoken through us”; after all, “the whole community is holy”! They see Moses’s exalted position as unfair to the rest of them. They are seeking an oikos which is more egalitarian, more democratic, less hierarchical. But they fail to appreciate the basic principle of God’s holiness, which we discussed in Chapter Eleven: in God’s household, authority comes solely from God and is directed back towards God. It is based, not upon where we want to put ourselves, nor where others think we should be put, but on where God chooses to put us. Moses, like Peter, was chosen for his episkope by grace – not because of his suitability in human terms for that leadership, nor even because God thought he would carry out his duties impeccably – but by God’s election. This is a completely different concept of hierarchy from the one which the Israelites would have become used to in Egypt – and from the one to which we have become accustomed in the modern world. God’s household is not a tyranny; but nor is it an egalitarian democracy. It is quite simply hierarchical, because at its centre is God our Father, our Rock, our King. All the relationships within that oikos are determined by where God chooses to put us in His household.
The rebels’ instinct for democracy in evident in this third complaint they make:
That night all the people of the
community raised their voices and wept aloud. All the Israelites grumbled against
Moses and Aaron… And they said to each other, “We should choose a leader and go
back to Egypt…”
Then the glory of the LORD
appeared at the Tent of Meeting to all the Israelites. The LORD said to Moses,
“How long will these people treat me with contempt? How long will they refuse
to believe in me, in spite of all the miraculous signs I have performed among
them?” (Num. 14:1-2,4,10-11)
We should choose a leader! We shouldn’t accept the leader that God has given us, because that is unfair! And yet, the LORD responds that for the people to choose a leader of their own is not just a harmless bit of democracy: it is tantamount to “contempt” for God Himself.
As Christians we may well have good reasons for feeling sceptical about the authority of Peter or his successors – just as we may have good reasons to feel that the phrase “papal infallibility” generates more heat than light. But then we need to ask ourselves, “What is our alternative?” There may well be good alternative ways of running a church, perhaps even in some sense “better” ways – but we must be careful to be sure that anything we suggest is genuinely founded in Scripture and apostolic teaching. If we want the people of God to be an egalitarian community, our vision is not biblical. If we want the Church to be democratic, our vision is not scriptural. If we want the Kingdom of God to be less hierarchical, again we are articulating a vision which has no counterpoint in God’s household as articulated in the Bible. If we want God’s worldwide oikos to have no visible unity, but merely to consist of a multitude of independent subsections, then we are seeking a church which is disunited – and that too is not in God’s image. We may, with justification, feel that the Church’s authority has been abused and badly interpreted over the centuries: reform has always been necessary, and most certainly remains necessary! [43] But to ignore the possibility of the legitimacy in principle of such authority is in line with neither the testimony of Scripture nor the beliefs of the earliest Christians. Remember: “You are not to do as we do here today, everyone as he sees fit” (Deut. 12:8)!
Scripture gives us a picture of a people of God who aspire to live in unity, in a hierarchical structure, under the King. The King is now in Heaven. During the course of this chapter, we have examined some of the scriptural typoi for who His deputy, the leader on earth of this holy oikos, should be: Abraham, Moses, Eliakim, Peter – all flawed, yet chosen, men. If we feel that Peter’s current successor is not in continuity with these typoi, then we must seriously ask ourselves: Who else is? And if we have no answer to that question, then we may find ourselves in the same position as Korah and his friends: full of righteous indignation but bereft of any scripturally-based alternative.
At the end of the day, the best image there is of God’s household is to be found in the nature of God Himself. The Trinity is the perfect oikos: one which expresses itself in perfect fatherhood, sonship and love – not in egalitarianism or democracy, nor the dispersion or abolition of hierarchy or unity. And so, if God’s oikos on earth is to image the perfect oikos which is the Trinity, then we in the Church need to learn to relate to each other in unified fatherhood, sonship and love – in imitation of the perfect hierarchy which is God. The great missionary pope Gregory I (c. 540-604) expressed this dynamic well, writing to his fellow episkopoi:
In position you are my brethren, in character my fathers... What is given to another beyond what reason demands is subtracted from yourself. For as for me, I do not seek to be prospered by words but by my conduct. Nor do I regard that as an honour whereby I know that my brethren lose their honour. For my honour is the honour of the universal Church: my honour is the solid vigour of my brethren. Then am I truly honoured when the honour due to all and each is not denied them... Away with words that inflate vanity and wound charity. [44]
That our achievement of this vision is faulty in practice does not invalidate our pursuing it in principle. The Catholic theologian Hans Küng expresses it well:
The Church may forsake her God; he will not forsake her. On her path through time she may go astray, she may stumble and very often fall, she may come up against robbers and remain lying half-dead. Yet her God will not pass her by, but will pour oil into her wounds, raise her up, and pay also what could not be foreseen for her healing. So the Church will be able to continue on her way, living on the forgiveness, the healing, and the strengthening of her Lord! [45]
And so, as Catholic philosopher Andrew Greely explains:
Imagine, if you will, my
separated brother or sister, that you see a large crowd of Catholics wildly
cheering a pope, any pope. You could marvel at the intellectual weakness of
such subservience to the teachings of a man who is human like the rest of us…
I suggest to you that you
consider the possibility that the crowd of Catholics is cheering for itself,
for its Church, and for its unity in diversity. The pope symbolizes the Church
and God’s presence in it. It is not a perfect Church and he is not a perfect
man. He makes mistakes under ordinary circumstances, just as the rest of us do.
The cheering Catholics… nonetheless applaud him not out of mindless obedience
but because… the pope confirms for them that the enchantment is real, that
grace is everywhere, that the stories they’ve heard are true. [46]
SCRIPTURAL SUMMARY of
Chapter Thirteen
apostolic succession
Judg. 17:6, 21:25; Deut. 12:8; Matt. 1:1-17, 10:40; Lk.
3:23-37, Jn. 20:21; Acts 1:20-26, 14:23, 20:28;
1 Cor. 4:15, 1 Tim. 1:2, Tit.
1:5
Peter
Matt. 10:2; Mk. 1:36, 3:16; Lk. 6;14, 9:32; Acts 1:13
Peter, Abraham and
the Rock
Gen. 17:5, 28:16-19; 2 Sam. 22:2-47, Job 38:6, Ps. 18; Is. 28:16,
51:1-2, 62:2-3; Dan. 2:34-45;
Matt. 3:9, 7:24-25, 16:15-19; Lk. 3:8; Jn. 1:51,
8:33-59; Rom. 9:33, Gal. 3:29, 1 Pet. 2:4-6
Peter, Eliakim and
the keys
2 Kgs. 18:18, 18:37; Is. 22:20-22, Matt. 16:19, Acts 5:1-11
Peter the shepherd
Jn. 10:14-18, 21:15-19; 1 Pet. 5:4
Peter’s successors
Phil. 4:3, 2 Tim. 4:21
authority and
rebellion
Num. 12:1-8, 14:1-11, 16:1-11
[1] William N. McElrath, personal
e-mail, 26th May, 2011
[2] Clement, The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians 42 & 46, in Early Christian Writings, ed. Maxwell
Staniforth (Penguin, London, 1988)
[3] Clement, The First Epistle of Clement to the Corinthians 44, in Early Christian Writings, ed. Maxwell
Staniforth (Penguin, London, 1988)
[4] Tertullian, The Prescription Against Heretics XXXII, in Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 3, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark,
Edinburgh), on www.ccel.org
[5] Irenaeus, Against Heresies III.III.3, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on www.ccel.org
[6] The Martyrdom of Ignatius I, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on
www.ccel.org
[7] Ignatius, The Epistle to the Ephesians 2-4, in Early Christian Writings, ed. Maxwell Staniforth (Penguin, London,
1988)
[8] Ignatius, The Epistle to the Magnesians 6-7, in Early Christian Writings, ed. Maxwell Staniforth (Penguin, London,
1988)
[9] Ignatius, The Epistle to the Philadelphians 3, in Early Christian Writings, ed. Maxwell Staniforth (Penguin, London,
1988)
[10] Irenaeus, Against Heresies III.XXIV.1, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on
www.ccel.org
[11] Irenaeus, Against Heresies III.III.1, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on www.ccel.org
[12] Irenaeus, Against Heresies III.III.2, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on
www.ccel.org
[13] If you speak French you will see
the point clearly: “Tu es Pierre et sur cette pierre je bâtirai
mon Eglise.”
[14] Most modern-day Protestant scholars
agree. Lutheran theologian Oscar Cullmann, whose book on Peter is probably one
of the most thorough and fair-minded studies of Peter written, writes: “All
Protestant interpretations that seek in one way or another to explain away the
reference to Peter [in Matt. 16:18] seem to me unsatisfactory. No, the fact
remains that when Jesus says that he will build his ekklesia upon this rock, he really means the person of Simon.”
[Oscar Cullmann, Peter: Disciple, Apostle,
Martyr (SCM, London, 1962), p. 213] Evangelical Edmund Clowney agrees: “Protestant
exegetes have often tried to separate the confession from Peter, and to make
the confession itself the rock upon which the church rests… [This] carries no
weight, however, in the face of the emphatic connection that Jesus made between
the name he had given Peter and the position he assigned him. Peter is Christ’s
‘Rock’.” [Edmund P. Clowney, The Church
(Inter-Varsity, Leicester, 1995), pp. 39-40]
[15] See NIV footnotes.
[16] See NIV footnotes.
[17] See also: Deut. 32:15-18, 1 Sam.
2:2; Ps. 19:14, 28:1, 31:3, 42:9, 62:2-7, 78:35, 89:26, 92:15, 95:1, 144:1; Is.
17:10, 26:4, 44:8.
[18] Seder Mo’ed: Yoma 53b, on halakhah.com
[19] Seder Mo’ed: Yoma 54b, on halakhah.com
[20] Kenneth E. Bailey, Jesus Through Middle Eastern Eyes (SPCK,
London, 2008), pp. 326-327
[21] Oscar Cullmann, Peter: Disciple, Apostle, Martyr (SCM,
London, 1962), p. 229
[22] See also Lk. 22:31-32.
[23] e.g. Clement, The First Epistle
of Clement to the Corinthians 5,
in Early Christian Writings, ed. Maxwell
Staniforth (Penguin, London, 1988); Gaius of Rome, Dialogue with Proclus
& Dionysius of Corinth, Letter to the
Romans: both quoted in Eusebius, History
of the Church II.25 (Penguin, London, 1989); Tertullian, The Prescription Against Heretics XXXVI
& Against Marcion IV.V & Scorpiace XV, all in Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 3, ed. Phillip
Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on www.ccel.org. See also Jn. 13:36-37,
21:18-19, 1 Pet. 5:13, and Eusebius, History
of the Church II.15.2 (Penguin, London, 1989).
[24] See also Tertullian, The Prescription Against Heretics XXXVI,
in Ante-Nicene Fathers, vol. 1, ed.
Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on www.ccel.org: “Rome, from which
there comes even into our own hands the very authority (of apostles themselves).
How happy is its church, on which apostles poured forth all their doctrine along
with their blood! where Peter endures a passion like his Lord’s! where Paul
wins his crown in a death like John’s.”
[25] Irenaeus, Against Heresies III.III.3, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers, vol. 1, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on www.ccel.org
[26] For example, from the next
generation after Irenaeus, see Cyprian, On
the Unity of the Church 4-8, in Ante-Nicene
Fathers vol. 5, ed. Phillip Schaff (T&T Clark, Edinburgh), on www.ccel.org.
[27] a bit like, e.g., sola scriptura or sola fide!
[28] Lumen Gentium 25, in Vatican
II: The Conciliar and Post-Conciliar Documents, ed. Austin Flannery
(Dominican, Dublin, 1992)
[29] For an interesting exploration of
this topic, see J. M. R. Tillard, The
Bishop of Rome, trans. John de Satgé (SPCK, London, 1983), pp. 123-191.
[30] David B. Currie, Born Fundamentalist, Born Again Catholic
(Ignatius, San Francisco, 1996), pp. 92-96
[31] Timothy Ware, The Orthodox Church (Penguin, London, 1964), p. 36.
[32] For a handy list of some of these
instances, see “Did the early Eastern Church recognize
the primacy of the Pope?”, on www.catholicbridge.com
[33] e.g. David Yallop, In God’s
Name (Corgi, London, 1985)
[34] Albino Luciani, “To King David”,
in Illustrissimi: The Letters of Pope John
Paul I (Collins, London, 1979), pp. 69-70
[35] “John Paul I on Love (Part II)”,
on www.youtube.com
[36] John L. Allen
Jr., “Debunking four myths about John Paul I, the ‘Smiling Pope’”, National Catholic Reporter (2 Nov. 2012), on www.ncronline.org
[37] Pope John Paul II, “Marriage One
and Indissoluble in First Chapters of Genesis: general audience of 21 Nov. 1979”,
on www.ewtn.com
[38] Stephen Glover, “If only the Archbishop of Canterbury dared to speak with a fraction of
Benedict's authority”, The Daily Mail
(20 Sep. 2010), on www.dailymail.co
[39] Ross Douthat, “The Pope and the Crowds”,
The New York Times (19 Sep. 2010), on
www.nytimes.com
[40] Message of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI for the Twenty-Sixth World
Youth Day (2011), on w2.vatican.va
[41] e.g. Tony Barber, “A cheerful Pope Francis reveals readiness to reform
Vatican”, Financial Times (10 July,
2014), on www.ft.com
[42] Pope Francis, Evangelii Gaudium: Apostolic Exhortation on the Proclamation of the
Gospel in Today's World 187 (Vatican Press, 2013), on w2.vatican.va
[43] a fact recognised by the Catholic
Church: see Lumen Gentium I.8 & Unitatis Redintegratio II.6, both in Vatican II: The Conciliar and Post-Conciliar
Documents, ed. Austin Flannery (Dominican, Dublin, 1992)
[44] Register of the Epistles of St. Gregory the Great VII.XXX (to Eulogius,
Bishop of Alexandria), in Nicene and
post-Nicene Fathers Ser. II vol. 12, ed. Philip Schaff (CCEL, Grand
Rapids), on www.ccel.org
[45] Hans Küng, Infallible? An Inquiry (Doubleday, Garden City, 1971), p. 187 (cf. Lk. 10:25-37)
[46] Andrew Greely, The Catholic Imagination (University of
California, Berkeley, 2000), p. 188
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