Alpha Omega

As it is with God, so too is it with His Holy Church; She too is unique. Of all the religions and churches in the world there is only one that can profess that it got its start from a band of illiterates, without political influence, without money and without worldly ambitions.

No other religion or church can profess that it got its start from a group of devoted followers who were rejected, hated and persecuted wherever they taught the beliefs of their Founder — such rejection, hatred and persecution being predicted by the founder.

No other religion or church can profess that its founder proclaimed that His disciples would not understand His teachings until after His death and that His disciples would abandon Him at His hour of greatest need.

No other religion or church can profess that its founder was killed by His own people or that it has had so many of its adherents die because they refused to reject its founder’s beliefs.

No other religion or church can profess that it has been persecuted by millions of individuals since it founding. No other religion or church can profess having this much opposition.

Our Lord started with nothing, stripped naked on a cross, and has built the strongest, most durable and the most influential kingdom that man has ever seen. Reason must ask: With so much opposition working against our Lord’s Holy Mother Church, why then has She not fallen a victim to other beliefs and teachings long, long ago? One is forced to ask: How has She survived?

The answer is simple. It is because God’s Holy Church is the only true church. She is the only church to teach total theological truth.

It is this latter that man needs in his religious teachings, not songs, praises and showmanship. Without truth one cannot find the fulfillment and happiness that the soul needs. It is the quest for the peace that truth provides, this burning desire within man soul, that inspires and beacons man to seek truth.

Since there will always be someone, somewhere, who desires the peace that a belief in truth brings, our Lord is assured that truth will always prevail. Upon finding truth, a child of God will adhere to it and thus further the teachings of God’s Holy Mother Church.

Finally, no other religion or church can profess that it has God the Father, God the Son and God the Holy Spirit protecting it.

The above is an obvious insinuation toward the Roman Catholic Church. However, there are many people who deny this and claim that it is the Christian Church and that the Roman Church is just one branch of the one Christian Church. Other people claim that it does not matter which church a person belongs to as long as one believes in Jesus Christ and as long as one is sincere. However, such beliefs fall short of total truth.

First of all, it is the Christian Religion. The Roman Catholic Church is the one true church of that religion. Secondly, one can find sincerity in any church or religion, even among those religions that are dedicated to opposing our Lord. Should one love God he would not substitute sincerity for truth. He would not allow his beliefs to fall short of total truth. To have one’s beliefs less than total truth is offering up imperfect gifts to God. Third, one must have more than just faith in Jesus Christ. One must have faith and works.

One’s works consist not only of helping one’s neighbor obtain food and clothing and other needs, but also feeding and clothing one’s own soul with truth and justice. Those who do not have their beliefs in total truth as revealed by God may have faith, but they lack works. Their souls are naked in sin before God.

However, this does not mean to imply that one must necessarily be a Catholic for salvation. One should not believe that only Catholics go to heaven or that Catholics have a special, higher place reserved for them in heaven; such beliefs are not true.

Heaven is open to all children of God. It does not matter whether one is a Catholic, a non-Catholic Christian or even a non-Christian. Heaven is for everyone who believes in God and loves his/her neighbor. It does not matter a great deal how one believes in God. However, non-Catholics are not offering up their first fruits to our Lord. They are not doing their works perfect before God.

One may say that truth, especially theological truth, is like concentric circles of a target. The closer to the center one keeps his/her faith, the closer to our Lord is one’s soul. Those who keep their faith aligned with the Mother Church may be said to have their souls in the center. The further from Her teachings one keeps his/her faith, the further from the center is one’s soul.

However, all religions are a manifestation of mankind’s attempt to find God, and from this point of view all religions and churches are equal. There is no one religion or church that is superior to another. God communicates to all mankind through all the religions and churches of the world. (This does not include those religions that are dedicated to the worship of Satan and death.) But when God wants to officially communicate with His children, He uses the Catholic Church.

This is why He established Her, to teach His truths to all the children of God. Our Lord communicates with all His children in numerous ways, including other churches. But the Catholic Church is the instrument through which God officially communicates with all mankind and presents Himself to man. The pope is His representative on earth and the servant of the Holy Mother Church, and She is the servant of all mankind. By serving the needs of mankind the Catholic Church serves Her Lord and Creator, Jesus Christ.

Again, it is the Christian Religion. The Holy Roman Catholic Church is the one true church of that religion and the church through which God officially communicates to mankind. All other Christian churches must stem their origin from the Holy Mother Church. Not only does the Holy Bible testify to this fact but one may also use the writings of those children of God who embarked upon our Lord’s fishing vessel after His Ascension into heaven.

Those biblical references that prove the exclusive apostolicity of the Roman Catholic Church will not be used at this time. There are two reasons for this. First of all, it has already been done by the Catholic Church and anyone wishing this information only needs to seek it and it can be found. However, one must be humble, for a lack of humility will blind the soul to truth, especially theological truth.

The second reason is that these same verses have been twisted and distorted with incorrect, private interpretations by those who do not love God. Consequently, many faithful children of God have been innocently led astray, like sheep to a slaughter house. One should note that those who give their own private interpretations of the scriptures are throwing away the words of St. Peter, our Lord’s first captain of His Mother Ship.

The Roman Catholic Church does not allow Her children to give private interpretations for the Holy Scriptures. Rather, the Mother Church waits for our Lord to reveal His message in His own way and on His own time. Any Catholic professing to have a message from Jesus Christ or an interpretation of scripture must submit to the proper authority in Rome.

Anyone who claims to be a Catholic and who does not submit to the Holy See and the laws of the Mother Church is not a true Catholic. Such a person is a Catholic in name only. Such a person gives lip service to the Holy Church, while his heart is far from our Lord. It is thus that the supremacy of the Holy See in defining Catholic doctrine guarantees to the faithful that private interpretations of the Holy Scriptures will not prevail in the teachings of the Catholic Church.

Due to all the private and diverse interpretations of scripture one cannot use the Holy Bible to prove the exclusive apostolicity of the Roman Catholic Church. One must therefore go to the only other source; namely, the writings of the saints.

One may liken these children of God to those seamen who climb up to the crow’s nest of a sailing ship at sea. They see clearly where the ship is going and proclaim such to their fellow seamen on deck below.

So too is it with the saints. With humble and contrite hearts, they have risen to spiritual perfection and see clearly the truths of God. They stood by the Catholic Church Ship. They stood by the Catholic Church even when those captains and officers — who followed St. Peter and the apostles — became drunk on watch. While they were alive, they wrote down the truths they discovered so that all those who came after them seeking truth would know what to believe in and what not to believe in.

These writings which proclaim that the Catholic Church is the one true church are abundant and easy to find. It is regrettable that only a very few of these verifications will be able to be reviewed in this treatise. However, those wishing to find more and perhaps better verifications need only search in the writings of the saints. One will find that they all proclaim the same truth.

One of the most obvious places to start such a search is in the writings of those saints of the Holy Mother Church who were inspired by our Lord before the Reformation. One cannot use the writings of the post Reformation saints because many individuals claim that these souls were prejudiced and “brainwashed” by the Catholic Church. But before the Reformation there was no one claiming the existence of a “branched” Christian church, so there was no need for the Catholic Church to defend against this teaching. Consequently, the pre-Reformation children of God could not be prejudiced or brainwashed in this way.

Pope St. Clement I (90 - 99 A.D.), the third successor to St. Peter, has written a letter to Corinth that clearly explains the hierarchy of the bishops. Many believe he is the Clement St. Paul mentions in his letter to the Philippians, 4:3. The purpose of Clement’s letter was to dispel a controversy that had arisen among them at that time. His letters were highly valued by the early Mother Church and were placed with the canonical books of the bible.

He has written that the apostles “appointed the first fruits of their conversion to be bishops and ministers over such as should afterwards believe . . . so likewise our apostles knew by our Lord Jesus Christ, that should contentions arise, upon account of the ministry. And therefore having a perfect knowledge of this, they appointed persons, as we have before said, and then gave direction, how, when they should die, other chosen and approved men should succeed in their ministry” (XIX:4,16-17).

St. Irenaeus (140 - 202) gave the Catholic Church one of Her earliest records of popes, and he referred to the papacy at Rome as the primary example of apostolic succession. He believed that all other churches should follow the example of Rome. Having been a disciple of St. Polycarp, who was the Bishop of Smyrna and a disciple of St. John the apostle, he was instrumental in getting that apostle’s gospel sanctioned as authentic, as many did not at first readily accept his gospel as being canonical.

St. Irenaeus also gave the Mother Church one of Her earliest examples of a “rule of faith” or creed of the main teachings of the bishops. This was used by the fledgling Mother Church to uphold Her authority in matters of doctrine. Finally, St. Irenaeus often acted as a mediator between the churches in the West and those in the East.

During the fourth and fifth centuries Rome made constant headway in furthering Her claim to primacy over the whole Mother Church. Pope St. Damasus (366 - 384) proclaimed that the papacy was supreme by virtue of our Lord’s promise to St. Peter (Mt.16:18-19).

Then Pope St. Siricius (384 - 399) went a step further by not only hearing appeals, but he also proclaimed the right to make decisions for the whole Mother Church in all matters pertaining to both doctrinal disputes and disciplinary action.

Finally, Pope St. Leo I (440 - 461), referred to as Leo the Great, defined the See of St. Peter as the “Rock” on which our Lord built His Holy Church and that Rome’s successors, the popes, were God’s temporary and mystical personifications on earth. Pope St. Leo believed that the church at Rome had authority over the whole Mother Church, and that Rome was Her supreme ruler and ultimate teacher.

The term catholic was first applied to the Mother Church in a letter of St. Ignatius, Bishop of Antioch (circa 107 A.D.). He was a child of God believed by many to have also been a disciple of St. John.

In his letter to the Smyrneans, he exhorts them to obey their bishops, their priests and their deacons: “See that ye all follow your bishop, as Jesus Christ, the Father; and the presbyter, as the Apostles, and reverence the deacons as the command of God. . . . Wheresoever the bishop shall appear, there let the people also be; as where Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church” (III:1,4).

One should note that this is a paraphrase of a passage in the letter to the Hebrews, where it says that one should obey the bishops (13:17).

In a letter to St. Polycarp, Ignatius tells the faithful to “hearken unto the bishop, that God may hearken unto you. My soul be security for them that submit to their bishop, with their presbyters and deacons” (II:12).

There are many others throughout history who have proclaimed the absolute authority and sanctity of the Catholic Church. Some of these apologists are: St. Athanasius (295 - 373), St. Ephraem (306 - 373), St. Cyril of Jerusalem (315 - 386), St. Jerome (342 - 420), St. John Chrysostom (347 - 407), St. Peter Chrysologus (406 - 450), St. John Damascene (676 - 754), St. Thomas Aquinas (1226 - 1274), St. Catherine of Siena (1347 - 1380), and St. Thomas More (1480 - 1535).

These mentioned are only a few of them. One should note that some of these mentioned are considered as holy men moved by God by all of Christianity, and St. Thomas Aquinas is considered by many to have been the most influential man in Christianity since St. Paul.

Finally, both Martin Luther and John Calvin called for a return to the teachings of St. Augustine, a Roman Catholic apologist. One cannot acknowledge the greatness and truthfulness of these children of God without also acknowledging the greatness and truthfulness of their writings.

All the above is clear proof that the Mother Church has gone by the name of Catholic since at least the first century. This is a historic fact that no one can deny. One is forced to ask: Did the name suddenly change after the Reformation to the Christian Church and did the teachings suddenly change also? It is doubtful. Her name did not change nor did Her teachings change! Again, it is the Christian Religion but the Roman Catholic Church is the one true church of that religion.

Alpha Omega

The Mother Ship