By RAYMOND DE SOUZA
Part 22
It is true that Jesus came first for the Jews. Many individuals accepted Him, like the apostles, disciples, and their converts, but as a nation they refused Him. So the apostles spread their mission to the Gentiles — that means, to our ancestors. But even if the Jews had accepted Him, the apostles would still have spread their mission to the likes of you and me — Gentiles and their descendants. And why so? Because He gave His apostles a most emphatic command not to confine their teaching to people of any particular race or social status. And they obeyed Him.
In December 2013, I was in India, in a series of speaking engagements in the state of Kerala, and learned about the apostolate that St. Thomas carried out there, and even visited the place where he was buried. India! Yes, the words of the psalmist were fulfilled: “Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world,” and St. Paul told the Colossians that the Gospel is believed “in the whole world” (Psalm 19:4; Romans 10:18; Col. 1:6).
Of course, St. Paul was not speaking in an absolute manner, that is, that in his own lifetime every Tom, Dick, and Harriet had already heard the Gospel. He was speaking of the moral universality of the Church, or her moral Catholicity, which was and is guaranteed by the promise of Christ Himself, that He would be with the apostles — and their successors — till the end of time, and He fulfilled His promise to send the Holy Spirit to be with them and within them over the centuries.
Since Christ’s promise cannot fail, His Church remains to the end of time, and invites everyone to enter. Another aspect of her Catholicity is that it is Christ’s will that all men be saved. Therefore the Church must go on preaching His message throughout the world. Hence the ideal is to convert the whole world — absolute universality.
But the fulfillment of Christ’s will that all men be saved has an important and necessary consequence: All men are called to join His Church, because there is no other way of salvation but through Jesus Christ. Regardless of anyone’s good intentions, pagan religions and heresies do not save anybody. Those who hear the Gospel have no excuse of ignorance. Jesus’ will is clear in this matter: “Preach the Gospel to the whole creation….He who does not believe will be condemned” (Mark 16:15-16).
Here is the opposite of today’s unbridled ecumenism: No one, therefore, who comes to know and recognize the true Church, but refuses to join it, because he opts for something more akin to his preferences, can be saved. And what about those who, knowingly and willingly, leave the Church of Christ? Here is more bad news for the apostates and schismatics: “As for a man who is factious, after admonishing him once or twice, have nothing more to do with him, knowing that such a person is perverted and sinful; he is self-condemned” (Titus 3:10).
Wow! As you see, St. Paul did not pull punches about calling a spade a spade in matters of doctrinal deviations. This can be easily understood, because the Church of Christ, as St. Paul says, is the living body whereof Christ is the Head. Whoever severs himself from the body — the Church — severs himself from the Head — Christ — and cannot be saved, for in Christ alone is salvation.
“I am the vine,” said Christ. “You are the branches. He who abides in Me, and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from Me you can do nothing. If a man does not abide in Me, he is cast forth. . . . The branches are gathered, thrown into the fire and burned” (John 15:5-6).
The conclusion about the universality or Catholicity of the Church of Christ is simple: Everyone who knows her must join her if he wants to be saved. Christ will not force anyone to join, but salvation comes through Him, and Him alone — not Buddha, Mohammed, Zoroaster, Joseph Smith, or whomever — and salvation comes in His terms, not ours. His body is the Church, and we are saved through her and in her.
Therefore, every effort along the lines of ecumenical dialogue can be praiseworthy as long as the final goal of the dialogue is conversion, unity in faith, morals, and ecclesiastical discipline. To be united just in prayer, each one in his way and to his own “god,” is not Christianity.
Neither Jesus nor the apostles made the slightest effort to “ecumenize” with other religions — only to evangelize their members, so that there would be only one Lord, one faith, and one Baptism (Eph. 4:5) in the one Church of God, the pillar and mainstay of the truth (1 Tim. 3:15). In the Church Triumphant in Heaven there are no distinct denominations, but in the other place there may be, no problem.
The Church of Christ is also apostolic, that is, it was founded on the apostles, especially Peter. In simple terms, any Christian church today that does not derive its doctrines and authority from the apostles is not the Church of Christ — it is a man-made institution. However well-meaning the founders may have been — we do not judge anyone’s intentions, only facts — it remains true to say that they are man-made, and cannot be alternative means of salvation.
The apostolicity of the Church of Christ is evident from His own utterances in the Gospel:
“As the Father has sent Me, even so I send you” (John 20:21). “He who hears you hears Me, and he who rejects you rejects Me, and he who rejects Me rejects Him who sent Me” (Luke 10:16).
The words of Christ make it clear that the apostles are the last envoys whom God will send to the human race. But did He give that mission to those eleven after the Resurrection, and to them alone? Or did the apostles understand that they should have successors who would enjoy Christ’s assistance, as they themselves did?
The Acts of the Apostles shows that they elected Matthias to replace Judas, so he was the first successor of the apostles. St. Paul was not one of the twelve and yet is referred to as “The Apostle,” who wrote more epistles than all the others put together; St. Barnabas was only a disciple, and yet is also referred to as apostle. And the history of the early Church also records that the successors had the same mission as the original twelve.
Irreplaceable Eyewitnesses
For instance, St. Clement, who died about AD 100, wrote in his famous letter, “Christ was sent by God, the apostles by Christ. They appointed bishops and deacons…and they made order that when they [the bishops and deacons] died, other men of tried virtue should succeed in their ministry.”
St. Irenaeus, writing toward the end of the second century, one thousand and three hundred years before anybody ever heard of Martin Luther, referred to “the bishops and their successors down to our time who have been appointed by the apostles” (Adv. Haer., III, 3).
To sum up: The Church is apostolic in her origin, by being built “on the foundation of the apostles” (Eph. 2:20), and in her teaching, which she has received and passes on from the apostles, who were the original and irreplaceable eyewitnesses to the life, death, and Resurrection of the Son of God.
Next article: The Church of Christ is visible, imperishable, and infallible.
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(Raymond de Souza is an EWTN program host; regional coordinator for Portuguese-speaking countries for Human Life International [HLI]; president of the Sacred Heart Institute, and a member of the Sovereign, Military, and Hospitaller Order of the Knights of Malta. His website is: www.RaymonddeSouza.com.)
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