432. Why One Church Only?

Posted by Eva Ulian May 30, 2015

432. Why One Church Only?

How many times have we heard the "apostolic succession" being mentioned? And how many times has it slipped like water off our backs without feeling the slightest of weight?

Actually, the meaning which the "Apostolic Succession" brings with it should not weigh on us at all, in effect, it should be cause for relief, joy, cheerfulness- yes because the "Apostolic Succession" is that mandate received directly from Jesus through the Holy Spirit which Jesus gave not only to Peter but to all the apostles on what we call the event of "Pentecost". When, after the resurrection, Jesus appeared to them, he said:

"As the Father has sent me, so I send you.Having said this, he breathed on them and said, "Receive the Holy Spirit;If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven them; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." . "(John 20: 21-23)

So the apostles laying their hands on other followers, thus creating the first bishops, passed on this mandate, and those passed on the same to others and so on right up to nowadays where we get an uninterrupted passing on of this mandate with our Bishop and Pastor Corrado.

That's why we say that our Catholic faith is one and apostolic, because this mandate issued directly from Jesus was handed down without any interruption.

So, even though everyone, and in particular our Pope Francis hope all Christians will collaborate with one another, to become as we believe one church, Catholic and Apostolic - as other denominations cannot claim this mandate transmitted directly and uninterruptedly by Jesus and which is called the "Apostolic Succession."

At this point one comes to ask how can the other churches that do not belong to the apostolic succession have the title of being "Christian"? In fact even the apostles made a similar observation:

'John said, "Master, we saw one casting out demons in your name, and we forbade him, because he was not of us."But Jesus said, "Do not stop him; no one who works a miracle in my name could soon afterwards speak evil of me. He that is not against us is for us. (Mark 9: 38-40)

So why on another occasion when Jesus was accused by the Pharisees to cast out demons in the name of Satan said, as it seems, the opposite?

"Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters." (Matthew 12: 30)

This phrase is easier to understand, because there are faiths, which, though they profess one God, persecute and kill Christians and of such barbarism our world today is full of evil examples. There are religions, nations, people, institutions that go against God himself and in effect in this phrase Jesus uses the first person singular form... "who is not with 'ME' is against 'ME' ... while in the previous sentence uses the plural form ... "Who is not against 'US' is for 'US'- therefore no contradiction, indeed one validates the other.

With this it is clear that today we are in a world that is not with God and the struggle of good against evil continues and perhaps even more fiercely than ever, and it is this awareness, of the meaning of the phrase "Apostolic Succession" that make us more than ever confident which side we must be on ... without a shadow of doubt.