Scripture
There are many Catholic beliefs. Catholics do not have to accept every one of them. As a young Protestant I thought otherwise and saw the Catholic Church as some very hard dictatorial institution. This is not true. For example, the famous visionary events at Fatima in 1914 have been validated by the Church as a true event. There were after all some 70,000 attendees during the last event. But if you are a Catholic, you are not required to believe that. We will list on this site sometime in the future the exact minimum beliefs required to be a true Catholic Christian. Our topic here is the words of Christ that validate the claims of the Church. It is suggested you go to each article on the truth page that matches the issues we mention here.
On this website we operate from a logical, linear progression, starting with the belief that the Bible is valid and true. Then we take the view that we can pretty much tell when Christ expects us to take his words seriously and literally. Well, we’re to take pretty much everything he says seriously. After all he was God on earth and he didn’t stay here long, so his words were at a premium. But we can tell when he is speaking in parables, and also when something might be symbolic. And we can tell when he is being literal, which is most of the time.
So when Christ looks down from the cross at death and says to his mother, "Woman, behold your son." Then he says to the disciple, "Behold your mother,” he means it. He means she is our spiritual mother if we are Christian. So what are my justifying words of Christ for the primacy of the Catholic Church in the Christian world? They are threefold: (1) the definitive words about the reality of Christ being present in the Eucharist. He repeats the point with graphic words and does not correct those who are disgusted by the reality of the suggestion; (2) the naming of Peter to head the Church in the future when the time comes for Christ to ascend into Heaven. He is not talking about Peter’s faith as a rock. He is referring to Peter, whom he names “Peter” (that being the first known use of that word as a name in the Western World). And he uses the pronoun “you” (which can only refer to a person) when he offers the keys to the kingdom to Peter; (3) the statement that the gates of hell cannot prevail against the kingdom tells me that the Church on earth cannot fail and cannot be wrong, in the broader sense. Church leaders can have faults, but in the big things, the most important things, they will not choose wrongly. Why? Because, hell cannot prevail, not when it really matters most.
Christ, The Church & Evil
Well, that’s the basic principle of the matter. So what of the priest who abuses a child? Well, first that is a crime and a horrible action, especially from a holy person in a position of trust. It is also, as far as we know a mental flaw in the perpetrator, which doesn’t quite make it seem any better does it? The organization of the church dealt with some of those cases badly. Perhaps they did not quite know how to deal with it. Perhaps they were in shock too.
But it also has nothing to do with a scriptural interpretation or a monumental decision of the Church about belief or faith. People forget that the main role of the Church is not to fix earth. It is to save people’s souls. So right there from the beginning of the conversation, we Catholics lose all nonbelievers. The question is posed by Lee Strobel in his book The Case for Christ as to why Christ did not speak out against slavery in his time. The answer is that he was not here to right all of the world evils. In those ancient times he would have had a monumental task even for a God. But the point, beyond the comedy, is that Christ did not come to correct evil but to tell people how to avoid it and how to get forgiven and saved in spite of it -- because he knew evils like slavery were not going away. Even if he preached about that, they weren’t going away. He did not even have the ears of the leaders in his own Jewish religion. Do you think he was going to change the ancient world?
So, why didn’t God shout from the heavens? Why didn’t Christ have more power to speak and be heard by all the Roman Empire or the whole planet? We will have to ask the theologians the definitive answer to this one, but I’m pretty sure it is because that would have worked only to a point. It would have shook up the ancient world and echoed to our time. We would have books and movies and documentaries galore trying to interpret dim historical memories of the event. In the interim 2000 years the evil would have come back, in fact would have never left, because evil exists. Big shock folks, the devil is real and evil exists.
The world rejected Christ. That is part of the point of our Faith. The world has rejected our Creator. How would you feel if you could make a little diorama with people and animals in it, and then somehow make the things in it, that should be alive, actually come alive? Then how would you feel if your little society turned to you and, more or less immediately, gave you the middle finger. Christ advised his followers about good life styles and holy behavior, but he never made any major assault on the individual evils. His followers weren’t even a majority of the people. He knew he would not stop evil in the world.
History
Even in the Church he founded and left to us there has been real or perceived evil. The favorite target of the secular world is the Spanish Inquisition. Funny how they never seem to notice that it is not the Catholic Inquisition, but the Spanish Inquisition. It was, of course, under the auspices of the Church, but it was Spanish and it was carried out by Spaniards.
The Church in Rome, of course, housed its own main office that carried out investigations (the Inquisition) of "religious" (priest and others) who taught wrong doctrine. The office exists today and is called the Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith. The current Pope Benedict, as Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger, headed the office in the recent past. The Roman Church did carry out its own Inquisition. The mission of the office was and is to prevent the spread of wrong doctrine by Catholic religious. In the barbarian-like times of the Inquisition, the Church, unfortunately, was at times also barbaric. According to some sources, the Church authorities did not pronounce sentences nor punish those found guilty of heresy. The civil authorities did; indicative, I suppose, of the close relationship that developed during medieval times when the Catholic Church was often the only authority. We cannot blame the Church for all of the circumstances of history any more than we can blame others who lived and functioned within the confines of their respective times on earth. The Church was and is manned by humans, and we are all flawed. Only Catholic haters paint the historical mistakes of the Church with the same brush used for Nazis Germany or Stalinist Russia. Those were societies steeped in evil at particular times. The Roman Catholic Church is a holy institution of God whose members often made flawed choices, because of their human frailties. The Inquisition in general and the Spanish occurrence in particular are a part of Catholic history that has unfairly been allowed to wrongly characterize the Church as a whole. That characterization is not an accurate measure of the overall worth and 2000 plus years of its history. Rather it is the result of centuries of secular and Protestant propaganda that used the historical event inaccurately and disproportionally.
It seems that the worst of the historical Inquisitions was in Spain. As much as I love Spain, the Spanish and the wonderful culture, which is in my family, one must take note of the fact that Spain was one of the most backward countries in Europe during the modernization that started at the end of the Middle Ages. And Spain resisted change. One can argue, of course, that it was also a good thing, and Spain is perhaps a more beautiful country today because of it. But in those times it was a harsh society in many ways, including especially religion.
Spain took her hate for anyone not Catholic out on the Netherlands, when that country came under her control, and upon America, where she became the dominate colonial power. Desoto’s march through the Southeast region of North America was a study in butchery and the effects of new diseases on indigenous people to be rivaled by none. Had the car manufacturer done better research, we probably never would have had Desotos on the roads. Interestingly, the pope during the era of American conquest demanded better behavior from conquistadores, but he was ignored. People are just sometimes evil. Landing in a new land with only the goal of exploitation in mind might just accentuate the evil a bit. Add to that the fact that the main goal in exploiting the place was finding and stealing the people's gold and . . . ?!
Evil exists in the world. It just does. Some people are evil, and some good people do evil things. Some are laymen, and some are in positions of authority. Some are religious and even Christians. Evil actions by Christian people do not change everything around them. Unfortunately, it just makes their surroundings like the rest of the world, and (when it's the Church) we don't expect that. We have a right to not expect that, but then we are sinners too.
Historical wrongs within the Church are a concern and a topic for study. Wrong behavior is a fact of human nature. It does not negate the validity of the organization to which the perpetrator belongs, even if it is the Church. However much it is bad for the Church or any holy organization, it is one issue among many. The issue is compounded because we expect God's church on earth to be perfect. Please find me one that is, any denomination. Insurance statistics reveal larger payouts for abuse claims in the Protestant sector than in the Catholic Church.
On the more basic topic of the foundations of the Church on earth, the Church is justified by scripture. If you are going to accept Christian scripture, then consider the literal approach and see if it says to you: “Catholicism” or something else. I just say to myself: “Christ said it, Christ meant it.” If He is God, you pretty much have to believe what He says.
The Spanish Inquisition by Henry Kamen, Yale University Press, 1997 is described as a revision and is said to revolutionize the study of the subject. The author is an expert on the field and did an additional 30 years of study before writing this book.
The subject is also discussed from the Catholic side in the 6 vol.
series A History of Christendom by Dr. Warren H. Carroll,
Ph.D.Christendom Press.
vol. 1 The Founding of Christendom
vol. 2 The Building of Christendom
vol. 3 The Glory of Christendom
vol. 4 The Cleaving of Christendom
vol. 5 The Revolution against Christendom
vol. 6 The Crisis of Christendom
Dr. Carroll is the founder of Christendom College in Virginia