Posted on 02/14/2015 1:16:14 PM PST by RnMomof7
"Historically, Catholics have argued that the papacy was a divinely-given institution papacy (Matt 16:17-19) etc., and they have relied on the notion that there have been bishops of Rome extending all the way back to the time of Peter.
This notion of bishops extending all the way back was thought to be actual history. In fact, as Shotwell and Loomis pointed out, in the General Introduction to their 1927 work "The See of Peter":
With reference to the Petrine doctrine, however, the Catholic attitude is much more than a "pre-disposition to believe." That doctrine is the fundamental basis of the whole papal structure. It may be summed up in three main claims. They are: first, that Peter was appointed by Christ to be his chief representative and successor and the head of his Church; second, that Peter went to Rome and founded the bishopric there; third, that his successors succeeded to his prerogatives and to all the authority thereby implied. In dealing with these claims we are passing along the border line between history and dogmatic theology. The primacy of Peter and his appointment by Christ to succeed Him as head of the Church are accepted by the Catholic Church as the indubitable word of inspired Gospel, in its only possible meaning. That Peter went to Rome and founded there his See, is just as definitely what is termed in Catholic theology as a dogmatic fact. This has been defined by an eminent Catholic theologian as "historical fact so intimately connected with some great Catholic truths that it would e believed even if time and accident had destroyed all the original evidence therefore. (xxiii-xxiv, emphasis in original).So, if the history of the early papacy is disrupted, it should, by all rights, disrupt the dogmatic definition of the papacy. And this is what we have come upon in our era: the most widely accepted historical accounts of the period -- which are now almost universally accepted among legitimate historians of the era -- is that Peter did not "found a bishopric." There was no "bishopric" in that city for 100 years after his death. The history completely contradicts what the "dogmatic fact" has held for more than 1000 years. Now, according to Eamon Duffy, among others, what was thought to be historical accounts were actually fictitious accounts that became passed along as history:
These stories were to be accepted as sober history by some of the greatest minds of the early Church -- Origen, Ambrose, Augustine. But they are pious romance, not history, and the fact is that we have no reliable accounts either of Peter's later life or the manner or place of his death. Neither Peter nor Paul founded the Church at Rome, for there were Christians in the city before either of the Apostles set foot there. Nor can we assume, as Irenaeus did, that the Apostles established there a succession of bishops to carry on their work in the city, for all the indications are that there was no single bishop at Rome for almost a century after the deaths of the Apostles. In fact, wherever we turn, the solid outlines of the Petrine succession at Rome seem to blur and dissolve. (Duffy, pg 2.)Briefly, on Peter and "the tradition," Reymond talks about the further lack of information about Peter in Scripture:
The Peter died in Rome, as ancient tradition has it, is a distinct possibility (see 1 Peter 5:13, where "Babylon" has been rather uniformly understood by commentators as a metaphor for Rome), but that he ever actually pastored the church there is surely a fiction, seven some scholars in the Roman communion will acknowledge. Jerome's Latin translation of Eusebius (not Eusebius's Greek copy) records that Peter ministered in Rome for twenty-five years, but if Philip Schaff (as well as many other church historians) is to believed, this is "a colossal chronological mistake." Paul write his letter to the church in Rome in early A.D. 57, but he did not address the letter to Peter or refer to him as its pastor. And in the last chapter he extended greetings to twenty-eight friends in Rome but made no mention of Peter, which would have been a major oversight, indeed, an affront, if in fact Peter was "ruling" the Roman church at that time. Then later when Paul was himself in Rome, from which city he wrote both his four prison letters during his first imprisonment in A.D. 60-62 when he "was welcoming all who came to him" (Acts 28:30), and his last pastoral letter during his second imprisonment around A.D. 64, in which letters he extend greetings to his letters' recipients from ten specific people in Rome, again he made no mention of Peter being there. Here is a period of time spanning around seven years (a.d. 57-64) during which time Paul related himself to the Roman church both as correspondent and as resident, but he said not a word to suggest that Peter was in Rome. (Reymond, "Systematic Theology," pg 814)
It has been suggested that Acts is a "selective" history, a fragmentary history, which simply did not include the facts pertaining to the last days and martyrdom of Peter and Paul. This is not acceptable, for such information would have been of great moment in the early church, which a century and a half before the rise of the cult of martyrs, only thirty-two years after the death of the apostles, remembered their martyrdom vividly (1 Clement 5). [But] the Early Church was so eager for details that within another century it created the full accounts which are found in the apocryphal Acts. (O'Connor, 11).In my next post, I'll provide a catalog of some of these.
History ping
The Politically Incorrect Jewish Story Behind Simon Peter - The First Pope In History.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VQ0PAJbYZgM
Ping to me for later reading.
It doesn’t shake me. But it does make me roll my eyes. The bigotry never stops.
And if anyone spams me with Biblical quotes, I’m gonna report it.
There is only one truth.. reach for a history book not written by Rome
So let me guess, you incite conflict on Saturdays and then pick up your Bible and go to church on Sundays?
That's the kind of neutral source you can count on to come through with the straight dope.
Heretics? Are you all still on about that? I guess you still wish they’d burn people at the stake for having a bible or reading it in their native language.
Why don't you expand on this for us.
Actually, there are Roman Catholic explanations... but not truths. Truth is found in God's Word -- in his breathed-out scripture.
Sadly, the only heretical contentions to be found are found in Roman Catholicism.
Hoss
Those nasty Biblical quotes right?
If you follow this, I don't CARE if you are a Catholic, Catholic who hates Protestants and won't let them into the Kingdom, Protestant, Protestant who hates Catholics and won't let them into the Kingdom, Messianic Jew or other. Stop wasting God's time slagging each other, and concentrate on THIS CORE TRUTH and GET OUT THERE AND ACT LIKE JESUS SHOWING HIS LOVE rather than your own petty need to control everybody else.
WITNESS Christ's love and WITNESS WITH Christ's love! It is like the Tower of Babel in here sometimes!
Man, you petty people annoy me and I am sure annoy God. START WINNING SOULS AND PREACHING THE GOOD NEWS BEFORE THE SEALS ARE BROKEN AND GOD DEMANDS OF YOU TO KNOW WHO YOU SAVED IN YOUR LIFE!
Wrong. The One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church has the truth.
There are people here who use Bible quotes to create spam - it is not kindly meant, it is meant to interrupt the thread and intimidate people who do not agree with the poster. The Bible can be used in bad ways.
Fine. Post them.
Catholics are great at making assertions but come up really short on providing any substantiation of them.
When someone challenges them, they're sent off to *Look it up yourself*, which is really saying..... *I can't support what I just claimed*.
Not according to scripture and history.
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