catholicism 101 -- part 2/8

My apologies about the formatting of this. The formatting from MS Word doesn't seem to be conserved in the blogger thing.

CATHOLICISM 101
Church of the Holy Cross
January 27, 2008

Part 2
The Scriptural Foundations of Catholicity:
Catholic Ministry / Catholic Mission

- The Divine Origin of the Church
o Isaiah 14.32: The Lord has founded Zion, and in her the afflicted of his people find refuge.
o We saw last time how the coming of Jesus and the proclamation of the Gospel (Greek “Evangelos” = “Good News”) meant the expansion of the promises God made to Abraham, to the whole world (all “the nations”).
o The Confession of St. Peter
• Matthew 16.15ff
• “Upon this rock I will build MY Church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it.”
• Jesus announces that he himself will establish the Church, and he calls it “mine”.
• The Lord’s announcement of the establishment of the Church comes on the heals of Peter’s confession: “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
• The Church is the domain, the community, of this confession. It is the Kingdom of the Incarnation (the Kingdom of God’s having become carne – meat, flesh). It is the domain within which this wild notion is believed and proclaimed, and by means of which the benefits of the Incarnation, and the Incarnation itself, are perpetuated and extended through time and throughout the world.
o Jesus’ foundation of the Church is the fulfillment and completion of prophecy.
• To David: “Your son, whom I will set upon your throne in your place, shall build the house for my name” (1 Kings 5.5).
• Jesus is called “son of David” throughout the Gospels, especially in Matthew.
• Matthew 1.1: “The Book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.”
• Psalm 127.1: “Unless the Lord builds the house, those who build it labor in vain.”
o Because God has himself established the Church, we may have confidence:
• in its teaching,
• that our souls are secure in the Church’s bosom,
• in the sacramental life of the Church,
• by the intentional conformity of our lives to the Church’s moral teachings;
• that the Church will not pass away.
- The Ministry and Mission of the Church
o Jesus is the great High Priest of Christianity
• “Therefore, holy brethren, who share in a heavenly call, consider Jesus, the apostle and high priest of our confession” (Hebrews 3.1).
o Jesus appointed others to share and perpetuate his apostolic and priestly ministry:
• “And he went up on the mountain, and called to him those whom he desired; and they came to him. And he appointed twelve, to be with him, and to be sent out to preach and have authority…” (Mark 3.13ff).
• ALL the baptized, who believe in Jesus, share in his work, but some among his many disciples are called to be with him and to share in his work, to be sent out, to preach, and to have authority, in a special way…
• “After this the Lord appointed seventy others, and sent them on ahead of him, two by two, into every town and place where he himself was about to come” (Luke 10.1).
• “And after six days Jesus took with him Peter and James and John, and led them up a high mountain apart by themselves; and he was transfigured before them” (Mark 9.2).
• In these three verses, we see smaller groups of disciples, called out from among the many, for special work (and these are not the only groups, or even the most important – cf. “the women”) – note the three special groups above: the 70, the 12, and the 3 (Peter, James, and John) – what’s going on with these groups?
• Recall that Jesus is the “prophet like Moses” who knows God face to face, and reveals him to the people:
• “And he said to Moses, ‘Come up to the LORD, you and Aaron, Nadab, and Abi'hu [THREE], and SEVENTY of the elders of Israel, and worship afar off. Moses alone shall come near to the LORD; but the others shall not come near, and the people shall not come up with him’… And Moses wrote all the words of the LORD. And he rose early in the morning, and built an altar at the foot of the mountain, and twelve pillars, according to the TWELVE tribes of Israel.” (Ex. 24.1ff).
• At the Last Supper, Jesus prays for the 12 Apostles (John 17.16ff): “They are not of the world, even as I am not of the world. Sanctify them in the truth; thy word is truth. As thou didst send me into the world, so I have sent them into the world. And for their sake I consecrate myself, that they also may be consecrated in truth. I do not pray for these only, but ALSO FOR THOSE WHO BELIEVE IN ME THROUGH THEIR WORD, that they may all be one; even as thou, Father, art in me, and I in thee, that they also may be in us, so that the world may believe that thou hast sent me.”
• Paul the rootedness of catholicity in apostolic doctrine: “So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, in whom the whole structure is joined together and grows into a holy temple in the Lord; in whom you also are built into it for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit” (Ephesians 2.19ff).
• Apostolic Succession: the priests and (especially) the bishops of the Catholic Church perpetuate the apostolic ministry of the Word of God (preaching the Gospel, but also pre-eminently offering the sacrifice of the Word made flesh – the ministry of “lifting up” Jesus (cf. John 12.32)).
• “My brother… a bishop in God’s holy Church is called to be one with the apostles in proclaiming Christ’s resurrection and interpreting the Gospel, and to testify to Christ’s sovereignty as Lord of lords and King of kings. You are called to guard the faith, unity, and discipline of the Church; to celebrate and to provide for the administration of the sacraments of the New Covenant…” (Book of Common Prayer, p. 515)
• The succession of bishops (and priests) from the Apostles has been taught since the very beginning:
o St. Clement of Rome (who knew Saints Peter and Paul, and who was himself the third pope) writes about the year 80 AD: “Through countryside and city [the apostles] preached, and they appointed their earliest converts, testing them by the Spirit, to be the bishops and deacons of future believers. Nor was this a novelty, for bishops and deacons had been written about a long time earlier. . . . Our apostles knew through our Lord Jesus Christ that there would be strife for the office of bishop. For this reason, therefore, having received perfect foreknowledge, they appointed those who have already been mentioned and afterwards added the further provision that, if they should die, other approved men should succeed to their ministry” (from St. Clement’s Letter to the Corinthians)