The Necessity of the Church
The
Church is One
Dr. Scott Hahn
My
Journey Home
Dr. Eduardo
J. Echeverria
The
Catholic Church: The Church of the Early Fathers
Jim Anderson
Before
You Object
Fr. Ray
Ryland
The
Church is Catholic
Jim Anderson
The
Necessity of Being Catholic
James Akin
In
Search of the New Testament Church
Mark D.
Steele
John
Paul II's "Ecumenical Passion"
Msgr. John
O. Barres
Other Journals
THE CHURCH IS CATHOLIC
The Catechism of the Catholic Church is a “genuine, systamatic presentation of the faith and of Catholic doctrine.” Keeping this in mind it is therefore fitting to review certain pertinant chapters of the Catechism where they address the subject of the doctrine of the Church:
What does “catholic” mean?
830 The word “catholic” means “universal,” in
the sense of “according to the totality” or “in keeping
with the whole.” The Church is catholic in a double sense: First,
the Church is catholic because Christ is present in her. “Where
there is Christ Jesus, there is the Catholic Church.” In her subsists
the fullness of Christ’s body united with its head; this implies
that she receives from him “the fullness of the means of salvation”
which he has willed: correct and complete confession of faith, full sacramental
life, and ordained ministry in apostolic succession. The Church was, in
this fundamental sense, catholic on the day of Pentecost and will always
be so until the day of the Parousia.
831 Secondly, the Church is catholic because she has been sent out by
Christ on a mission to the whole of the human race: All men are called
to belong to the new People of God. This People, therefore, while remaining
one and only one, is to be spread throughout the whole world and to all
ages in order that the design of God’s will may be fulfilled: he
made human nature one in the beginning and has decreed that all his children
who were scattered should be finally gathered together as one.... The
character of universality which adorns the People of God is a gift from
the Lord himself whereby the Catholic Church ceaselessly and efficaciously
seeks for the return of all humanity and all its goods, under Christ the
Head in the unity of his Spirit.
Each particular Church is “catholic.”
832 “The Church of Christ is really present in all legitimately
organized local groups of the faithful, which, in so far as they are united
to their pastors, are also quite appropriately called Churches in the
New Testament.... In them the faithful are gathered together through the
preaching of the Gospel of Christ, and the mystery of the Lord’s
Supper is celebrated.... In these communities, though they may often be
small and poor, or existing in the diaspora, Christ is present, through
whose power and influence the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church
is constituted.”
833 The phrase “particular church,” which is the diocese (or
eparchy), refers to a community of the Christian faithful in communion
of faith and sacraments with their bishop ordained in apostolic succession.
These particular Churches “are constituted after the model of the
universal Church; it is in these and formed out of them that the one and
unique Catholic Church exists.”
834 Particular Churches are fully catholic through their communion with
one of them, the Church of Rome “which presides in charity.”
“For with this church, by reason of its pre eminence, the whole
Church, that is the faithful everywhere, must necessarily be in accord.”
Indeed, “from the incarnate Word’s descent to us, all Christian
churches everywhere have held and hold the great Church that is here [at
Rome] to be their only basis and foundation since, according to the Savior’s
promise, the gates of hell have never prevailed against her.”
835 “Let us be very careful not to conceive of the universal Church
as the simple sum, or. . . . the more or less anomalous federation of
essentially different particular churches. In the mind of the Lord the
Church is universal by vocation and mission, but when she pub down her
roots in a variety of cultural, social, and human terrains, she takes
on different external expressions and appearances in each part of the
world.” The rich variety of ecclesiastical disciplines, liturgical
rites, and theological and spiritual heritages proper to the local churches
“unified in a common effort, shows all the more resplendently the
catholicity of the undivided Church.”
Who belongs to the Catholic Church?
836 “All men are called to this catholic unity of the People of
God.... And to it, in different ways, belong or are ordered: the Catholic
faithful, others who believe in Christ, and finally all mankind, called
by God’s grace to salvation.”
837 “Fully incorporated into the society of the Church are those
who, possessing the Spirit of Christ, accept all the means of salvation
given to the Church together with her entire organization, and who by
the bonds constituted by the profession of faith, the sacraments, ecclesiastical
government, and communion are joined in the visible structure of the Church
of Christ, who rules her through the Supreme Pontiff and the bishops.
Even though incorporated into the Church, one who does not however persevere
in charity is not saved. He remains indeed in the bosom of the Church,
but ‘in body’ not ‘in heart.’”
838 “The Church knows that she is joined in many ways to the baptized
who are honored by the name of Christian, but do not profess the Catholic
faith in its entirety or have not preserved unity or communion under the
successor of Peter.” Those “who believe in Christ and have
been properly baptized are put in a certain, although imperfect, communion
with the Catholic Church.” With the Orthodox Churches, this communion
is so profound “that it lacks little to attain the fullness that
would permit a common celebration of the Lord’s Eucharist.”
The Church and non Christians
839 “Those who have not yet received the Gospel are related to the
People of God in various ways.” The relationship of the Church with
the Jewish People. When she delves into her own mystery, the Church, the
People of God in the New Covenant, discovers her link with the Jewish
People, “the first to hear the Word of God.” The Jewish faith,
unlike other non Christian religions, is already a response to God’s
revelation in the Old Covenant. To the Jews “belong the sonship,
the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the
promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and of their race, according
to the flesh, is the Christ”; “for the gifts and the call
of God are irrevocable.”
840 And when one considers the future, God’s People of the Old Covenant
and the new People of God tend towards similar goals: expectation of the
coming (or the return) of the Messiah. But one awaits the return of the
Messiah who died and rose from the dead and is recognized as Lord and
Son of God; the other awaits the coming of a Messiah, whose features remain
hidden till the end of time; and the latter waiting is accompanied by
the drama of not knowing or of misunderstanding Christ Jesus.
841 The Church’s relationship with the Muslims. “The plan
of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first
place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of
Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind’s
judge on the last day.”
842 The Church’s bond with non Christian religions is in the first
place the common origin and end of the human race: All nations form but
one community. This is so because all stem from the one stock which God
created to people the entire earth, and also because all share a common
destiny, namely God. His providence, evident goodness, and saving designs
extend to all against the day when the elect are gathered together in
the holy city. . . .
843 The Catholic Church recognizes in other religions that search, among
shadows and images, for the God who is unknown yet near since he gives
life and breath and all things and wants all men to be saved. Thus, the
Church considers all goodness and truth found in these religions as “a
preparation for the Gospel and given by him who enlightens all men that
they may at length have life.”
844 In their religious behavior, however, men also display the limits
and errors that disfigure the image of God in them: Very often, deceived
by the Evil One, men have become vain in their reasonings, and have exchanged
the truth of God for a lie, and served the creature rather than the Creator.
Or else, living and dying in this world without God, they are exposed
to ultimate despair.
845 To reunite all his children, scattered and led astray by sin, the
Father willed to call the whole of humanity together into his Son’s
Church. The Church is the place where humanity must rediscover its unity
and salvation. The Church is “the world reconciled.” She is
that bark which “in the full sail of the Lord’s cross, by
the breath of the Holy Spirit, navigates safely in this world.”
According to another image dear to the Church Fathers, she is prefigured
by Noah’s ark, which alone saves from the flood.
“Outside the Church there is no salvation”
846 How are we to understand this affirmation, often repeated by the Church
Fathers? Re formulated positively, it means that all salvation comes from
Christ the Head through the Church which is his Body:
Basing itself on Scripture and Tradition, the Council teaches that the
Church, a pilgrim now on earth, is necessary for salvation: the one Christ
is the mediator and the way of salvation; he is present to us in his body
which is the Church. He himself explicitly asserted the necessity of faith
and Baptism, and thereby affirmed at the same time the necessity of the
Church which men enter through Baptism as through a door. Hence they could
not be saved who, knowing that the Catholic Church was founded as necessary
by God through Christ, would refuse either to enter it or to remain in
it.
847 This affirmation is not aimed at those who, through no fault of their
own, do not know Christ and his Church: Those who, through no fault of
their own, do not know the Gospel of Christ or his Church, but who nevertheless
seek God with a sincere heart, and, moved by grace, try in their actions
to do his will as they know it through the dictates of their conscience
those too may achieve eternal salvation.
848 “Although in ways known to himself God can lead those who, through
no fault of their own, are ignorant of the Gospel, to that faith without
which it is impossible to please him, the Church still has the obligation
and also the sacred right to evangelize all men.”
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