The Late Development of the Bishop of Rome

Beggars All ^ | October 08, 2010 | Matthew Schultz

[RnMomof7]

Friday, October 08, 2010

The Late Development of the Bishop of Rome

John Bugay has posted on Hermas and the structure of the early Roman church before. I don't have anything original to add to that discussion.

However, I'd like to provide some corroboration by Roman Catholic scholars Raymond Brown and John Meier, whose book received both the Nihil Obstat and the Imprimatur (bold mine):

There is no doubt that it [The Shepherd of Hermas] was written at Rome (Vis. 1.1.1.; 2.1.1; 4.1.2); and the suggestion that Clement would send it abroad (Vis. 2.4.3) may mean that Hermas' revelations had church status in Rome...[characterizing the letter] Bernard ("Shepherd" 34-35) may be closer to the mark: "Thus I Clement, like Hermas, is a Christian work which leans heavily on late-Jewish and early Jewish-Christian tradition and apologetics, and this raises the question as to the composition of the Roman Church in the late first and early second centuries. There would appear to be grounds for thinking that the influence of the Jewish-Christian element in the Church remained strong into the second century." I would rephrase slightly, for I think of Rome as containing a dominant Jewish/Gentile Christianity that had strong loyalties to Jerusalem and the Jewish tradition. The author of Hermas may have been ethnically a pure Gentile, but he would be representative of that continuing strain of Christianity. The indication that there was still a church structure of presbyter-bishops and deacons⁴³³ indicates how conservative the Roman church was.¹

The footnote (#433) referenced above reads (bold mine):

433. See p. 163 above. All the references to presbyters and bishops are in the sections that some would judge chronologically early. However, if the men sitting on the bench in Man. 11.1 are presbyters, then the structure of presbyter-bishops lasted into the 140s. Telfer, Office 61, however, thinks it unquestionable that by the time Hermas was finished there was a single-bishop at Rome.²

Page 163 (and the previous page) reveals the following discussion (bold mine):

An older generation of Roman Catholic scholars assumed that the single-bishop practice was already in place in Rome in the 90s or earlier; and they opined that, as fourth pope (third from Peter), Clement was exercising the primacy of the bishop of Rome in giving directions to the church of Corinth. The failure of Clement to use his own name or speak personally should have called that theory into question from the start, were there not other decisive evidence against it. As the ecumenical book Peter in the New Testament (done by Roman Catholics and Protestants together) affirmed, the connection between a Petrine function in the first century and a fully developed Roman papacy required several centuries of development, so that it is anachronistic to think of the early Roman church leaders functioning as later popes (see footnote 275 above). Moreover, the Roman episcopal list shows confusion...All of this can be explained if we recognize that the threefold order of single-bishop, with subordinate presbyters and deacons, was not in place at Rome at the end of the first century; rather the twofold order of presbyter-bishops and deacons, attested a decade before in I Peter 5:1-5, was still operative. Indeed, the signal failure of Ignatius (ca. 110) to mention the single-bishop in his letter to the Romans (a very prominent theme in his other letters) and the usage of Hermas, which speaks of plural presbyters (Vis. 2.4.2) and bishops (Sim. 9.27.2), make it likely that the single-bishop structure did not come to Rome till ca. 140-150.³

Some observations:

1. This work received both the Nihil Obstat and the Imprimatur. It therefore carries more general weight than those whose only qualifications as Catholic apologists are a keyboard and an internet connection.

2. Brown and Meier are established Catholic scholars. They therefore carry more weight than otherwise unknown lay-Catholic apologists on the subject.

3. Brown and Meier state their position in direct contrast to previous generations of Roman Catholic scholars. Even on something as important as the nature of the church government of Rome, with particular application to the power and authority of the bishop(s) there, Catholic scholarship has not been consistent. This observation plays into a variety of problems with Roman Catholicism, some of which are fairly obvious.

4. There are lay-Catholic apologists who object to the term "Roman Catholic." This, however, is how Brown and Meier both refer to themselves and previous generations of scholars within their own denomination. If it's acceptable for Brown and Meier, and morally consistent with Catholicism proper (via the Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur), it should be acceptable to lay-Catholic internet apologists.

____________

1. Antioch and Rome: New Testament Cradles of Catholic Christianity (Mahwah, NJ: Paulist Press, 1983, 2004), 203-204.

2. Ibid., 204.

3. Ibid., 162-163.

[redleghunter]

When you come across an Orthodox priest ask them if you can receive communion in his church. Let me know the answer.

[MamaB]

Love that song. Thanks.

[daniel1212]

http://peacebyjesus.witnesstoday.org/deformation_of_new_testament_church.html#Historical

[RnMomof7]

>>>>>>You cannot disprove apostolic succession<<<<<<<<

The problem is.. Roma can not “prove” it either

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-religion/3258150/posts

[RnMomof7]

Good link ..thank you

[redleghunter]

Here's another:

I Need Thee Every Hour

[MamaB]

Great. Have you ever heard Dave’s Highway of MS? They are 2 sisters and a brother who have been singing for years. The oldest 2 might be in college now. They are fantastic. They sing that song.

[daniel1212]

The Coptic Christians being beheaded, although not considered in union with the Pope, are Catholic and profess all of the beliefs that are being derided by the hostile and bigoted group here on FR who distort history; the Coptics hold the same belief in the sacraments, the special Love and veneration for the Blessed Mother, etc. as the beliefs being attacked.

You can only wish the Coptic Christians profess all of the beliefs that are being derided here, as most of belong to the Coptic Orthodox Church, and

There are many differences between these two churches; and unfortunately, these differences are increasing. It is important to read about them and understand their details which are found in the two links posted below where you will discover and learn that our church's traditions have not been replaced by neither modern conveniences nor contemporary thoughts:

• The nature of our Lord Jesus Christ
• The Filioque Controversy
• Purgatory
• Infallibility of the Pope
• Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin
• Primacy of St. Peter
• False Traditions
• Fasting

In these links, http://www.suscopts.org/resources/literature/orthodox-faith/difference-between-catholicism-and-orthodoxy/, you will find the biblical references on which the Coptic Orthodox Church has based her stance and traditions. A few more differences between the two churches as witnessed today are: The Coptic Orthodox Church... - http://www.suscopts.org/q&a/index.php?qid=1353&frommostpopular=yes

Also: Eastern Orthodox vs. Roman Catholic

The Orthodox Church opposes the Roman doctrines of universal papal jurisdiction, papal infallibility, purgatory, and the Immaculate Conception precisely because they are untraditional." - Orthodox apologist and author Clark Carlton: THE WAY: What Every Protestant Should Know About the Orthodox Church, 1997, p 135.

►Both purgatory and indulgences are inter-corrolated theories, unwitnessed in the Bible or in the Ancient Church.. — http://www.goarch.org/ourfaith/ourfaith7076

►The Orthodox Church does not believe in purgatory (a place of purging), that is, the inter-mediate state after death in which the souls of the saved (those who have not received temporal punishment for their sins) are purified of all taint preparatory to entering into Heaven, where every soul is perfect and fit to see God.

Also, the Orthodox Church does not believe in indulgences as remissions from purgatoral punishment. Both purgatory and indulgences are inter-corrolated theories, unwitnessed in the Bible or in the Ancient Church, and when they were enforced and applied they brought about evil practices at the expense of the prevailing Truths of the Church. If Almighty God in His merciful loving-kindness changes the dreadful situation of the sinner, it is unknown to the Church of Christ. The Church lived for fifteen hundred years without such a theory. — http://www.goarch.org/ourfaith/ourfaith7076

►What I found most disturbing in my reading was that the Orthodox objected to the doctrine [of the Immaculate Conception] not so much because of its proclamation of Mary as immaculate (indeed, the Orthodox liturgy repeatedly refers to Mary as "all holy ... .. immaculate," and "most blessed") but because of the erroneous understanding of original sin underlying it...

I sadly concluded that the erroneous Roman understanding of original sin had led to another erroneous teaching, the dogma of the Immaculate Conception. The dogma was clearly an unwarranted innovation.

It was much the same with the dogma of papal infallibility. This doctrine asserts that when the pope speaks ex cathedra, "from the throne," or officially, on matters of faith and morals, he teaches infallibly. Thus the whole Church is bound by his teaching. Orthodoxy and Catholicism - What are the differences - "Father" Theodore Pulcini ISBN 978-1-888212-23-5 [69] http://almoutran.com/2011/03/251

►Despite the high honor and the highest admiration which the Orthodox Church bestows upon the Virgin Mary Theotokos, it does not teach either her immaculate conception or her bodily assumption into the heavens.,

The west, in altering the Creed without consulting the east, is guilty (as Khomiakov put it) of moral fratricide, of a sin against the unity of the Church. In the second place, most Orthodox believe the Filioque to be theologically untrue. They hold that the Spirit proceeds from the Father alone, and consider it a heresy to say that He proceeds from the Son as well. There are, however, some Orthodox who consider that the Filioque is not in itself heretical,. and is indeed admissible as a theological opinion - not a dogma - provided that it is properly explained. But even those who take this more moderate view still regard it as an unauthorized addition.

That was how an Orthodox felt in the twelfth century, when the whole question had come out into the open. In earlier centuries the Greek attitude to the Papacy was basically the same, although not yet sharpened by controversy. Up to 850, Rome and the east avoided an open conflict over the Papal claims, but the divergence of views was not the less serious for being partially concealed. — http://www.stpaulsirvine.org/html/TheGreatSchism.htm

►It is evident from the Scripture that the Holy Spirit proceeds from the Father only; this was the belief from the very beginning of the One Undivided Church. When the church in the West inserted the "filioque" phrase into the Creed, this innovation precipitated the Great Schism of the Undivided Church. The "filioque" phrase is an error. It is not found in the Scripture. It was not believed by the Undivided Church for eight centuries, including the church in the West. It introduces a strange teaching of a double procession of the Holy Spirit and refers to two origins of the Spirit's existence, thus denying the unity of the Godhead.

The Church of Christ from the beginning baptized its members by a priest immersing them thrice in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. Immersion baptism was the practice of the early Church.

...the synods of the Fathers, as a whole and as individuals, have believed that their decisions are infallible. Their decisions, however, are not considered permanent until they are accepted by the "Conscience of the Church," the whole body of the faithful, clergy and laity, who must give their consent.— http://www.goarch.org/ourfaith/ourfaith7063

►Within a reintegrated Christendom the bishop of Rome will be considered primus inter pares serving the unity of God's Church in love. He cannot be accepted as set up over the Church as a ruler whose diakonia is conceived through legalistic categories of power of jurisdiction. His authority must be understood, not according to standards of earthly authority and domination, but according to terms of loving ministry and humble service (Matt. 20:25 27).- http://www.goarch.org/ourfaith/ourfaith8523

►In the Nicene Creed of faith our Church is described as the "One, Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church": "One" because there can only be one true Church with one head Who is Christ... Each of these titles is limiting in some respects, since they define Christians belonging to particular historical or regional Churches of the Orthodox communion..

“because it has all the proper attributes, the Orthodox Church is the living realization of the One Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church.” — http://www.antiochian.org/node/17076

Then there are those who attempt to join together all Christian religions into one faith. They would be horrified at the idea of a service with Hindus and Christians celebrating together, yet they do not bat an eyelash at the idea of Orthodox celebrating with Roman Catholics, who with no authority broke off from the Church close to a thousand years ago. — http://www.orthodox.net/articles/against-ecumenism.html

►The Church preserves unity in diversity. In the Orthodox Church there is no hierarch with universal jurisdiction since its One True Shepherd, our Lord Jesus, has never left His Church (Matthew 28:20). The Apostle Peter does not replace or substitute for Him. The Scriptures do indeed indicate that Peter exercises an important role as leader among the Apostles but his primacy is exercised in equality or collegiality ("primus inter pares") as the Book of Acts clearly shows. The Rock upon which the Church is built is our Lord Himself as we proclaim during Matins: "The Stone which the builders rejected has become the Cornerstone; this is the Lord's doing and it is marvelous in our eyes" (from Psalm 118:2 - also the most often repeated phrase from the Old in the New Testament: Matthew 21:42, Mark 12:10, Luke 20:17, Acts 4:11 and 1 Peter 2:7). Peter, a leader among the Apostles, was first to proclaim the Church's faith in our Lord upon Whom it is built: "You are the the Christ (i.e. the Messiah, God's Chosen and Annointed One - igk), the Son of the Living God" (Matthew 16:15). He did not see himself as that Rock. Such, at any rate, is the conviction of the Orthodox Church. — http://www.ukrainian-orthodoxy.org/questions/2007/appostolic.html

►Roman Catholic historian, Francis Dvornick, states:...the question of the apostolic character of a see was viewed in quite different fashion in the East. There had been many important sees in the East which had been founded by an Apostle: this was the case for Jerusalem, Antioch, Alexandria and Ephesus. - (Francis Dvornik, Byzantium and the Roman Primacy (New York: Fordham University, 1966), p. 43)

The East never accepted the regular jurisdiction of Rome, nor did it submit to the judgment of Western bishops. Its appeals to Rome for help were not connected with a recognition of the principle of Roman jurisdiction but were based on the view that Rome had the same truth, the same good. - Yves Congar, Diversity and Communion (Mystic: Twenty-Third, 1982), p. 26). More .

►The Orthodox Church believes that the Church exists where: 1) there is Apostolic Succession; 2) where the traditions and canons of the Church are preserved; 3) and where a right-believing Bishop in Apostolic Succession shepherds his people in good order according to these traditions and canons.

In the Roman Catholic Church, Apostolic Succession itself resides in the person of the Pope, who is Christ’s Vicar on earth. While modern Latin theologians have tried to restate or even reject it, and while the ecumenical pronouncements of the Latin Church have tried to downplay the significance of Papocentrism, it is the fundamental dogma of Roman Catholicism and a principle repeatedly defended by the present Pope. Even collegiality and shared primacy with the Eastern Patriarchates are subject to the magisterium of the Papacy.

And herein lies one of the most important differences between the Latin and Orthodox Churches in general: the Latin Church’s appeal to the authority of the Roman See and the Orthodox Church’s dependence on the authority of the wholeness of ecclesiastical tradition, the very Body of the Church. - http://orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/rome_orth.aspx

►Roman Catholicism, unable to show a continuity of faith and in order to justify new doctrine, erected in the last century, a theory of "doctrinal development." Following the philosophical spirit of the time (and the lead of Cardinal Henry Newman), Roman Catholic theologians began to define and teach the idea that Christ only gave us an "original deposit" of faith, a "seed," which grew and matured through the centuries. The Holy Spirit, they said, amplified the Christian Faith as the Church moved into new circumstances and acquired other needs.

Consequently, Roman Catholicism, pictures its theology as growing in stages, to higher and more clearly defined levels of knowledge. The teachings of the Fathers, as important as they are, belong to a stage or level below the theology of the Latin Middle Ages (Scholasticism), and that theology lower than the new ideas which have come after it, such as Vatican II.

All the stages are useful, all are resources; and the theologian may appeal to the Fathers, for example, but they may also be contradicted by something else, something higher or newer. On this basis, theories such as the dogmas of "papal infallibility" and "the immaculate conception" of the Virgin Mary (about which we will say more) are justifiably presented to the Faithful as necessary to their salvation. - http://www.ocf.org/OrthodoxPage/reading/ortho_cath.html

►There is nothing Orthodox about the charismatic movement. It is incompatible with Orthodoxy, in that it justifies itself only by perverting the message of the Fathers, suggesting that the Church of Christ needs renewal, and indulging in the theological imagery of, Pentecostal cultism. With such things, one cannot be too bold in his language of condemnation and reprobation. - http://orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/charmov.aspx

►Vladimir Lossky, a noted modern Eastern Orthodox theologian, argues the difference in East and West is due to the Roman Catholic Church's use of pagan metaphysical philosophy (and its outgrowth, scholasticism) rather than the mystical, actual experience of God called theoria, to validate the theological dogmas of Roman Catholic Christianity. For this reason, Lossky argues that the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholics have become "different men".[18] Other Eastern Orthodox theologians such as John Romanides[19] and Metropolitan Hierotheos[20][21] say the same

Roman Catholicism teaches, also, that, in the Age to Come, man will, with his intellect and with the assistance of grace, behold the Essence of God. The Orthodox declare that it is impossible to behold God in Himself. Not even divine grace, will give us such power. The saved will see, however, God as the glorified flesh of Christ.

According to Metropolitan Hierotheos that because the Roman Catholic Church uses philosophical speculation rather that an actual experience of God to derive their theology they are lead into the many errors that Orthodox call into question about their theology including the filioque[66]. - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Orthodox__Roman_Catholic_theological_differences

► Orthodoxy is not simply an alternative ecclesiastical structure to the Roman Catholic Church. The Orthodox Church presents a fundamentally different approach to theology, because She possesses a fundamentally different experience of Christ and life in Him. To put it bluntly, she knows a different Christ from that of the Roman Catholic Church.” — Clark Carlton, THE WAY: What Every Protestant Should Know About the Orthodox Church, 1997; http://www.touchstonemag.com/archives/article.php?id=13-07-033-b.

More: http://www.ocf.org/OrthodoxPage/reading/ortho_cath.html http://vivificat1.blogspot.com/2009/08/twelve-differences-between-orthodox-and.html

[daniel1212]

Since Luther, these attempts to undermine the TRUE HISTORICAL RECORD have never stopped.

You mean true because Rome has presumed to infallibly declare she is and will be perpetually infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula, which renders her declaration that she is infallible, to be infallible, as well as all else she accordingly declares.

It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine... I may say in strict truth that the Church has no antiquity....Primitive and modern are predicates, not of truth, but of ourselves...The only Divine evidence to us of what was primitive is the witness and voice of the Church at this hour. . — Most Rev. Dr. Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, Lord Archbishop of Westminster, The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost: Or Reason and Revelation (New York: J.P. Kenedy & Sons, originally written 1865, reprinted with no date), pp. 227-228.

...in all cases the immediate motive in the mind of a Catholic for his reception of them is, not that they are proved to him by Reason or by History, but because Revelation has declared them by means of that high ecclesiastical Magisterium which is their legitimate exponent.” — John Henry Newman, “A Letter Addressed to the Duke of Norfolk on Occasion of Mr. Gladstone's Recent Expostulation.” 8. The Vatican Council lhttp://www.newmanreader.org/works/anglicans/volume2/gladstone/section8.html

And which has use of forgeries , while even Catholic and other scholars testify against the propaganda of RC "true history. "

[redleghunter]

A good mix here:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k83w9cGTFZQ

[redleghunter]

Found them:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aiseCnwLpD4

[RnMomof7]

They have bits and pieces, but only in the CATHOLIC CHURCH is there the FULLNESS OF THE FAITH!

What does that mean ??

[RnMomof7]

Thats about it..They mock salvation by faith alone... and then they swallow everything Rome says by “faith alone”. Like the Mormons and the JW’s their prophet has the entire truth..

[St_Thomas_Aquinas]

They mock salvation by faith alone...

So does the Bible. That has to count for something if the Bible is the sole rule of faith, right?

You see that a man is justified by works and not by faith alone. --James 2:24

The phrase, "faith alone," is mentioned once in the Bible, and James 2:24 is it.

We also mock Luther's tradition of Sola Scriptura because it's not taught by the Church nor contained in the Bible. The Bible tells us to reject false human traditions like "faith alone" and "Scripture alone."

"Thus you nullify the word of God by your tradition that you have handed down." --Mark 7:13

You should "listen to the church," as Christ commands, because it is "the pillar and foundation of truth," as St. Paul tells us.

[daniel1212]

You cannot disprove apostolic succession.

Rather, what you cannot prove is apostolic succession, that the original apostles were succeeded by popes and prelates distinctively titled "hiereus”="priests" who were to engage in a uniquely sacerdotal acts as their primary ordained function, offering flesh and blood as a expiatory sacrifice and dispensing it to the people in order to obtain spiritual and eternal life.

The Scriptural facts are that there are no apostolic successors named (like for James: Acts 12:1,2) after Judas, who was to chosen maintain the original 12 (Rv. 21:14) - thus only one was chosen. Nor was any elected by voting, versus casting lots (no politics). (Acts 1:15ff)

And nowhere does the Holy Spirit ever refer to NT pastors (presbuteros=senior/elder or episkopos= superintendent/overseer, these being one office: Titus 1:5-7) as “hiereus” or “archiereus” (priest or high priest).

What occurred is that "presbuteros" in Greek (presbyter in Latin) was translated into English as "preost," and then "priest," but which also became the word used for "hierus" ("sacerdos" in Latin), losing the distinction the Holy Spirit made by never distinctively giving NT presbuteros the distinctive title hiereus.

More.

And instead of dispensing bread as part of their ordained function, which NT pastors are never described as doing in the life of the church, and instead the primary work of NT pastors is that of prayer and preaching. (Act 6:3,4) "Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine." (2 Timothy 4:2)

And which is what is said to "nourish" the souls of believers, and believing it is how the lost obtain life in themselves. (1 Timothy 4:6; Psalms 19:7;Acts 15:7-9)

And turning to history as the church became progressively deformed in becoming like the empire in which it was found, w have the findings of such RCs as,

Klaus Schatz [Jesuit Father theologian, professor of church history at the St. George’s Philosophical and Theological School in Frankfurt] in his work, “Papal Primacy ,” pp. 1-4, finds:

“New Testament scholars agree..., The further question whether there was any notion of an enduring office beyond Peter’s lifetime, if posed in purely historical terms, should probably be answered in the negative.

That is, if we ask whether the historical Jesus, in commissioning Peter, expected him to have successors, or whether the authority of the Gospel of Matthew, writing after Peter’s death, was aware that Peter and his commission survived in the leaders of the Roman community who succeeded him, the answer in both cases is probably 'no.”

If we ask in addition whether the primitive church was aware, after Peter’s death, that his authority had passed to the next bishop of Rome, or in other words that the head of the community at Rome was now the successor of Peter, the Church’s rock and hence the subject of the promise in Matthew 16:18-19, the question, put in those terms, must certainly be given a negative answer...” (page 1-2)

If one had asked a Christian in the year 100, 200, or even 300 whether the bishop of Rome was the head of all Christians, or whether there was a supreme bishop over all the other bishops and having the last word in questions affecting the whole Church, he or she would certainly have said no." (page 3, top)

“We probably cannot say for certain that there was a bishop of Rome [in 95 AD]. It is likely that the Roman church was governed by a group of presbyters from whom there very quickly emerged a presider or ‘first among equals’ whose name was remembered and who was subsequently described as ‘bishop’ after the mid-second century.” (Schatz 4).

Schatz additionally states, Cyprian regarded every bishop as the successor of Peter, holder of the keys to the kingdom of heaven and possessor of the power to bind and loose. For him, Peter embodied the original unity of the Church and the episcopal office, but in principle these were also present in every bishop. For Cyprian, responsibility for the whole Church and the solidarity of all bishops could also, if necessary, be turned against Rome." — Papal Primacy [Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1996], p. 20)

• Roman Catholic scholar William La Due (taught canon law at St. Francis Seminary and the Catholic University of America) on Cyprian:

....those who see in The Unity of the Catholic Church, in the light of his entire episcopal life, an articulation of the Roman primacy - as we have come to know it, or even as it has evolved especially from the latter fourth century on - are reading a meaning into Cyprian which is not there." (The Chair of Saint Peter: A History of the Papacy [Maryknoll, New York: Orbis Books, 1999], p. 39

• Catholic theologian and a Jesuit priest Francis Sullivan, in his work From Apostles to Bishops (New York: The Newman Press), examines possible mentions of “succession” from the first three centuries, and concludes from that study that,

“the episcopate [development of bishops] is a the fruit of a post New Testament development,” and cannot concur with those (interacting with Jones) who see little reason to doubt the notion that there was a single bishop in Rome through the middle of the second century:

Hence I stand with the majority of scholars who agree that one does not find evidence in the New Testament to support the theory that the apostles or their coworkers left [just] one person as “bishop” in charge of each local church... - — Francis Sullivan, in his work From Apostles to Bishops , pp. 221,222,224

Roman Catholic [if liberal and critical] Garry Wills, Professor of History Emeritus, Northwestern U., author of “Why i am a Catholic,” states,

"The idea that Peter was given some special power that could be handed on to a successor runs into the problem that he had no successor. The idea that there is an "apostolic succession" to Peter's fictional episcopacy did not arise for several centuries, at which time Peter and others were retrospectively called bishops of Rome, to create an imagined succession. Even so, there has not been an unbroken chain of popes. Two and three claimants existed at times, and when there were three of them each excommunicating the other two, they all had to be dethroned and the Council of Carthage started the whole thing over again in 1417." — WHAT JESUS MEANT, p. 81

• American Roman Catholic priest and Biblical scholar Raymond Brown (twice appointed to Pontifical Biblical Commission), finds,

“The claims of various sees to descend from particular members of the Twelve are highly dubious. It is interesting that the most serious of these is the claim of the bishops of Rome to descend from Peter, the one member of the Twelve who was almost a missionary apostle in the Pauline sense – a confirmation of our contention that whatever succession there was from apostleship to episcopate, it was primarily in reference to the Puauline tyupe of apostleship, not that of the Twelve.” (“Priest and Bishop, Biblical Reflections,” Nihil Obstat, Imprimatur, 1970, pg 72.)

Eamon Duffy (Pontifical Historical Commission, Professor of the History of Christianity at the University of Cambridge, and former President of Magdalene College) states: “Self-consciously, the popes began to model their actions and their style as Christian leaders on the procedures of the Roman state”. — Eamon Duffy notes (“Saints and Sinners”, ©2001 edition)

• Eastern Orthodox scholarship also adds voice to this,

It is illuminating to understand that even some very illustrious Roman Catholic theologians today recognize that the Papacy as it now exists is of late origin. W. DeVries admits, “...throughout the first ten centuries Rome never claimed to have been granted its preferred position of jurisdiction as an explicit privilege” (Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism by Methodios Fouyas, p. 70). Avery Dulles considers the development of the Papacy to be an historical accident. “The strong centralization in modern Catholicism is due to historical accident. It has been shaped in part by the homogeneous culture of medieval Europe and by the dominance of Rome, with its rich heritage of classical culture and legal organization” (Models of the Church by Avery Dulles, p. 200) http://www.orthodoxresearchinstitute.org/articles/ecumenical/maxwell_peter.htm

Then you have the manner of preservation of faith and "unbroken succession that preceded the Reformation:

Referring to the schism of the 14th and 15th centuries, Cardinal Ratzinger observed,

"For nearly half a century, the Church was split into two or three obediences that excommunicated one another, so that every Catholic lived under excommunication by one pope or another, and, in the last analysis, no one could say with certainty which of the contenders had right on his side. The Church no longer offered certainty of salvation; she had become questionable in her whole objective form--the true Church, the true pledge of salvation, had to be sought outside the institution.

"It is against this background of a profoundly shaken ecclesial consciousness that we are to understand that Luther, in the conflict between his search for salvation and the tradition of the Church, ultimately came to experience the Church, not as the guarantor, but as the adversary of salvation. (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, head of the Sacred Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith for the Church of Rome, “Principles of Catholic Theology,” trans. by Sister Mary Frances McCarthy, S.N.D. (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1989) p.196). http://www.whitehorseinn.org/blog/2012/06/13/whos-in-charge-here-the-illusions-of-church-infallibility/)

[dangus]

I know I can’t. What’s your point?

[redleghunter]

I know I can’t. What’s your point?

That's the point.

[piusv]

Fellow Catholics: don't let you hearts be troubled.

Eh, for the most part I ignore them. To me they are like gnats.

[daniel1212]

..They mock salvation by faith alone... and then they swallow everything Rome says by “faith alone”. Like the Mormons and the JW’s their prophet has the entire truth..

The two as dissimilar in that one refers to resting upon Christ to save us by His sinless blood, while the other refers to trusting Rome cannot err, yet which leads to confidence in one's own merits and the powers of Rome to save.

And they also avoid following the premise of the necessity of ensured perpetual magisterial veracity for assurance of Truth to its logical conclusion.

[daniel1212]

All of this can be explained if we recognize that the threefold order of single-bishop, with subordinate presbyters and deacons, was not in place at Rome at the end of the first century; rather the twofold order of presbyter-bishops and deacons, attested a decade before in I Peter 5:1-5, was still operative.

Titus 1:5-7 shows that presbuteros (senior/elder) or episkopos (superintendent/overseer) refer to one office, with the former title corresponding to the mature leadership of the person, and the latter to his function.

.the evidence both from the New Testament and from such writings as I Clement, the Letter of Polycarp to the Philippians and The Shepherd of Hermas favors the view that initially the presbyters in each church, as a college, possessed all the powers needed for effective ministry. This would mean that the apostles handed on what was transmissible of their mandate as an undifferentiated whole, in which the powers that would eventually be seen as episcopal were not yet distinguished from the rest. Hence, the development of the episcopate would have meant the differentiation of ministerial powers that had previously existed in an undifferentiated state and the consequent reservation to the bishop of certain of the powers previously held collegially by the presbyters. — Francis Sullivan, in his work From Apostles to Bishops , pp. 224

"So far as i know, it was only ca. 200 that the term “priest” started to be applied to the bishop and only still later was it applied to the presbyter. This observation explains why some Protestant churches which insist on using New Testament language alone refuse to call their ministers priests. When in the post-New Testament period the language of priesthood did begin to be applied to the bishops and presbyters, it brought with it a certain Old Testament background of sacrificing Levitical priesthood. The introduction of that language was logically tied in to the development of the language for the eucharist as a sacrifice. (...I think there were sacrificial aspects in the early understanding of the eucharist, but I have no indication that the eucharist was called a sacrifice before the beginning of the second century.) When the eucharist began to be thought of as a sacrifice, the person assigned to preside at the eucharist (bishop and later presbyter) would soon be called a priest, since priests were involved with sacrifice." — Raymond Brown (Sulpician Father and a prominent Biblical scholar), Q 95 Questions and Answers on the Bible, p. 125, with Imprimatur.

Catholic writer Greg Dues in “Catholic Customs & Traditions, a popular guide” states, "Priesthood as we know it in the Catholic church was unheard of during the first generation of Christianity, because at that time priesthood was still associated with animal sacrifices in both the Jewish and pagan religions."

"When the Eucharist came to be regarded as a sacrifice, the role of the bishop took on a priestly dimension. By the third century bishops were considered priests. Presbyters or elders sometimes substituted for the bishop at the Eucharist. By the end of the third century people all over were using the title 'priest' (hierus in Greek and sacerdos in Latin) for whoever presided at the Eucharist."