Roman Catholicism

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The Roman Catholic Church is headed by the Pope (Supreme Pontiff), the Bishop of Rome, currently Pope Benedict XVI. It is the largest Christian denomination in the world, with more than 1.3 billion officially Baptized adherents (In the United States more than 64 million.) The Roman Catholic Church is the oldest institution in the western world. The Roman Catholic faith teaches that the Pope is the successor of St. Peter, the 'rock' (Matt 16:18) upon whom Jesus built his church. The term Catholic Church is, literally, the Universal Church of Jesus Christ (from the Greek katholikos, "universal").

"The chief teachings of the Catholic church are: God’s objective existence; God’s interest in individual human beings, who can enter into relations with God (through prayer); the Trinity; the divinity of Jesus; the immortality of the soul of each human being, each one being accountable at death for his or her actions in life, with the award of heaven or hell; the resurrection of the dead; the historicity of the Gospels; and the divine commission of the church. In addition the Roman Catholic Church stresses that since the members, living and dead, share in each other’s merits, the Virgin Mary and other saints and the dead in purgatory are never forgotten." [1] The presence of Christ is believed to be present in the Eucharist, the bread and wine is Jesus himself. Another essential belief is the veneration of Mary, the mother of Jesus as the Blessed Virgin Mary and veneration of the saints.

The principal sources for the essential beliefs of the Catholic Church are the Sacred Scriptures (the Bible), Sacred Tradition, and Living Magisterium of the Church.

The term Catholic is frequently applied to the Roman Catholic Church. Although many Protestants object to Roman Catholics monopolizing the term, because the defined meaning of Catholic is "universal" and comes from the Greek word Katholikos. The Eastern Orthodox Church also refer to themselves as, "one holy, Catholic, and apostolic church..."[2] Conversely, many Roman Catholics dislike the adjective "Roman" because it implies, contrary to (Roman) Catholic doctrine, that their church is not the universal Church of Christ.

Catholics in the world.
Catholics in the world.


Contents

History

The original Christian community was founded by Our Lord Jesus Christ and led by the Apostles. St. Paul the Apostle was, together with Saint Peter, the most notable of Early Christian missionaries. Christians were subjected to persecution, first under Nero, shortly after the foundation of the church, and again, more severely, under the emperors Decius and Diocletian in the third century as well as Domitian, Marcus Aurelius and others with the penalty for being Christian ultimately being death. After almost 300 years of persecution against the Church had only seen Christianity flourish, the Emperor Constantine I had a religious experience and legalized Christianity in the early fourth century. Going to war with the co-Emperor of the east Lucinius over his continued persecution of Christians, Constantine won and became sole Emperor. The age of persecution was over. In 380, Emperor Theodosius I accepted Christianity as the official religion of the Roman Empire. By the time of the fall of the Roman Empire in 476, the surrounding barbarian nations had been Christianized, although mostly they followed Arianism. Over the next century or so they embraced Catholicism.

During the Middle Ages the Church underwent a time of missionary activity and expansion. After numerous disputes between eastern and western churches that became more pronounced from the ninth century onwards, the Church underwent the Great Schism in 1054 that divided it into a Western (Latin) branch, which has been called the Catholic Church and an Eastern branch, which has become known as the Orthodox Church. Both traced their roots to the time of Jesus, but the Orthodox Church did not acknowledge the Pope as the one leader of the Church and instead believed that all of the patriarchs were equals.

The second major schism was the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century. As a reaction to the increasing popularity of Protestantism the Roman Catholic Church began to undertake some reforms. Firstly from 1869–1870 during the First Vatican Council. It was during the Second Vatican Council (1962–1965) that the most comprehensive reforms were undertaken. The Roman Catholic Church stretched relations with other Christian communities and other religions. The Roman Catholic Church also issued directions for a revision of the liturgy.

Different churches

The term "The Catholic Church" refers to any one of several Rites, but in the United States is often used synonymously for the largest Rite, the Latin Rite. Other Rites include the Byzantine, Alexandrian, Syriac, Armenian, Maronite, and Chaldean Rites. Some Eastern rites have significant differences in liturgy, history, discipline and hierarchy from the Roman Catholic Church, but still recognize the primacy of the Bishop of Rome (the Pope) and are in communion with Rome. These Eastern Rite churches are Catholic and do not belong to the Eastern Orthodox Church.

Despite important differences in doctrine, the Roman Catholic Church recognizes the Orthodox Church's Holy Orders (priesthood) as valid; however, the Orthodox generally follow a theory of ordination for place and purpose -- so the notion of being ordained outside the Orthodox Church is meaningless, and no theory of validity is held to.

The Roman Catholic Church has often, especially prior to the rise of Prtestantism, been considered the Western Church while the Greek Orthodox Church considered the Eastern Church. But more eastern than that, there were from the earliest centuries, the Aramaic Church of the East (see Aramaic Church) which considers itself to be a Catholic Church. The full name for this Church is the "Holy Apostolic and Catholic Church of the East" This Church, being cut of for most of the time from the Roman and Byzantine spheres by being in the "enemy" empire - Parthia,. developed differently from its sister Catholic Church of the West. The Church of the East also having the three fold ministry of Bishop, Priest, and Deacon, and being in Apostolic succession (through the Apostle Thomas rather than Peter), never developed the infallibility of bishops, as the Roman Church would do for the bishop of Rome (the Pope) speaking "ex cathedra" (nor infallibility of the synod of bishops as did the Greek Orthodox church). This elevates the authority of the Bible and brings affinity of this Catholic Church to the Evangelical world.

It is commonly thought that the Catholic church forbids its priests to marry. But this is true only of the Latin Rite. Eastern Rite Catholic Church congregations which are in communion with the Roman Catholic church have a married priesthood and diaconate although bishops may not marry. It is a common sight for non Latin rite Catholic priests to be seen, particularly in the Mid East and India, with wives and children. Priestly celibacy for Latin Rite Roman Catholic, though in force, is considered as canonical ruling having papal force but not an infallible decree or teaching coming "ex cathedra" - and thus priestly celibacy may be changed by the Pope and be in line with the non Latin rites of the Catholic Church. Some of the non Latin rites of the Catholic Church are: the Melkite Church (also known as the Greek Catholic Church), the Maronite Church, the Chaldean Catholic Church (a part of the Aramaic Church of the East that came under the Pope), the Malankara Church, the Syro-Malabar Church, and the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church. The general rule in the Roman Catholic Church in relation to its eastern rite communions within it is to allow the customs, practices, and even doctrines to remain "eastern". This approach entails not only the allowance of married priests but also mixed vernacular liturgies of natural development (Aramaic with Arabic, Aramaic with Greek), baptism of infants immediately followed by Chrismation (confirmation), rather than the Latin rite 12 year interval between baptism and confirmation, baptism by full immersion even of infants rather than sprinking or pouring as in Latin rite.


The Roman Catholic Church historically regarded Protestant Christianity as heretical, that is, being against Roman doctrine. However, this changed in the 1960's when Pope John XXIII called the Second Vatican Council, where the doors of the Church were opened wide, and Protestants referred to as "our separated brethren".

John Paul II
John Paul II

The Anglican Church (Episcopalian in the United States) occupies an odd situation, because it encompasses within it factions ("Low Church") that emphasize its Protestant aspects and factions ("High Church") that emphasize its Catholic aspects. Anglo-Catholics regard the Anglican church as part of the Catholic Church, and in the unbroken line of the Apostolic Succession. The Roman Catholic Church and the Eastern branches take a position that could be described as saying that the Anglican Church is almost but not quite Catholic. There have long been unification overtures, and Anglican priests who wish to adopt Catholic Holy Orders are often provided with an abbreviated path to that goal.

The Nicene Creed, the great historical statement of Christian belief, contains the line "I [or we] believe in one holy, catholic and apostolic church". The Apostles' Creed contains a similar affirmation. However, Protestants and Catholics place different interpretations on the term "universal", or "catholic". Protestants believe that it refers to the general, over-arching spiritual unity of all Christian believers, Jew or gentile, which transcends individual churches and denominations. Catholics, on the other hand, believe that the Roman Catholic Church, as the single true church founded by Christ, is the universal Catholic Church in which there is neither Jew nor gentile. Some prefer not to refer to their own church as the "Roman" Catholic Church, on the grounds that such formulations implicitly deny this point of doctrine.

Saint Paul's Writings

St. Paul is the second most prolific contributor to the New Testament. Thirteen letters are attributed to him and fully known as the "Catholic (or Universal) Epistles of Paul". The letters are written in Greek. The epistles contain the basis of Christian doctrine, interpretation and commentary from earlier scriptures. They are full of expositions of what Christians should believe and how they should live.

St. Paul reminded the Christians how they should live. They should think about the things in heaven (Colossians 3:2), because they belong with Christ (Colossians 3:3-4). They should not do evil deeds (Colossians 3:5-11). Instead, they should love other people (Colossians 3:12-14). And they should serve God (Colossians 3:15-17). If we invite Jesus into our lives, we will become friends of God (Colossians 1:15-23).


St. Paul's influence on Christian thinking has been more significant than any other single New Testament author.


Fathers

St. Ambrose, Bishop of Milan from 374 to 397, was one of the most illustrious Fathers and Doctors of the Church, and fitly chosen, together with St. Augustine, St. John Chrysostom, and St. Athanasius, to uphold the venerable Chair of the Prince of the Apostles in the tribune of St. Peter's at Rome. [3]


Recent Controversy

Cerro de los Angeles, Madrid, Spain.
Cerro de los Angeles, Madrid, Spain.

Widespread controversy erupted in 2001 and the years following over past abuse of minors by some Catholic clergy involving inappropriate sexual contact. The difficulty spanned multiple churches and, unfortunately, difficulty in knowing how to deal with it sometimes led to the priests who were involved being moved from church to church by the presiding Bishops. For the most part the Catholic Church quietly cleaned this up internally in the mid 1980s. The vast majority of allegations of abuse that came to light in the 2000s occurred before this time period. Of course most priests were not involved, but the damage that could be done by even a small number of priests if not properly checked was horrible. Although words like pedophile were often used in the press, in truth 90% of the cases involved priests making overtures towards teenage boys, and not pedophilia. It was a case of breaking vows and non-celibate homosexuality.[4].

Due to the scandal, the U.S. Catholic church has paid out more than $2 billion in abuse claims.[5]

Incidents of abuse are not unique to the Catholic Church. A recent article from Associated Press (June 19, 2007) reported that three companies which insure the majority of Protestant churches in America indicated that they receive 260 reports annually of minors being abused by clergy, church staff, or volunteers.[6] There is a general consensus that this type of abuse is not relegated to any religion in particular, but is a systemic societal issue.[7]

See also

External links

Virgin Mary and Child
Virgin Mary and Child

References

  1. ↑ The Columbia Encyclopedia
  2. ↑ http://www.answers.com/topic/catholic
  3. ↑ St. Ambrose Catholic Encyclopedia.
  4. ↑ http://cc.msnscache.com/cache.aspx?q=72992710807995&mkt=en-US&lang=en-US&w=98cf251&FORM=CVRE4
  5. ↑ L.A. Catholic church settlement
  6. ↑ http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2007/06/18/80877.htm
  7. ↑ http://www.reformation.com/CSA/AbuseNotSimplyAChurchProblem.htm
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