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Apologetic Support groups loyal to the Holy Father and Church's
magisterium
I'm a Methodist, thinking about joining the Church. I am going to the Catholic Church
service this weekend, and I am going to be talking to the priest, hopefully this weekend.
I had a couple of questions or requests, if you don't mind. First, I read on
your Apologetic site a while back, the section about where Jesus tells Peter that
He is the rock, and that He will build His Church on him. I'm not sure of the exact Scripture passage.
I know how a lot of people try to argue and say that Jesus called him a pebble,
or whatever.
There was a great explanation of this that someone wrote. It was about how Jesus was
giving Peter a three-cord compliment, etc.
If you know what I am talking about, and can find it, please send it to me, or
direct me to it.
Also, is it necessary to go through the Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults RCIA if you move to a different state and therefore
join a new parish?
Thanks for your help, as always.
I hope you are doing well, and have a good week.
Later,
Kevin Terry
{
Is Peter
the rock or the pebble and if you move to a new state, do you have to go through RCIA? }
Whether in one state or another, you have to go through RCIA , and you should probably
go totally in one parish or another. The pastor should be able to guide you appropriately or inform you of any exceptions.
I've CC'd my good friend Bob Centamore for his opinion.
The Catholic Church is different from the denominations of our separated
brethren. In these denominations, most of the time, you have an altar call, and then
they teach you about the faith of their denomination.
The Catholic Church wants the new member to know what the Faith is first,
before one makes a commitment and statement of faith, a statement of faith that,
like the martyrs, one would be willing to die for.
How can any Christian be expected
to die for a faith they don't know?
This is why RCIA is important. I will get back to you on Peter.
Take care,
Mike
Bob Centamore replied:
Hi Kevin,
I'm Bob Centamore, a friend of Mike Humphrey. I could not be more pleased
to hear you are considering becoming Catholic; I highly recommend it.
Mike and I share a passion for the Truth and the Catholic Church, which we
believe is the fullness of Truth as the Lord has revealed it to mankind.
The Catholic Church is the same around the world and is made up of several
different Rites.
The "Roman" Catholic Church is really
the Latin Rite Church, along with several other Rite churches
like:
the Chaldean Rite
the Maronite Rite
the Ambrosian Rite
the Bulgarian Rite, and
several
more.
All these Rites, the Latin "Roman" Rite being the largest, are
in communion with the Holy See
(the Pope) and are Catholic. So any Catholic
from any part of the world could worship legitimately at any parish in these
Rites.
So once a Catholic, always a Catholic, unless, of course, you renounce
the Faith. That said, one "dose" of RCIA is enough, but formation
takes a lifetime; we are pilgrims "on the Way", after all.
To your second point, where you said in part,
"Jesus was giving Peter a three-cord
compliment",
I'm not sure what you mean by that, but I bet Mike will give
you the background of:
whom Peter is
why we have a Pope, and
what the name change
means.
I would, however, like to add a comment about name changes, as found in the Scriptures.
Peter's preeminent position among the Apostles was symbolized at the very
beginning of his relationship with Christ. At their first meeting, Christ told
Simon that his name would thereafter be Peter, which translates as Rock (John
1:42).
The startling thing was, that — aside from the single time that Abraham is called
a "rock" (Hebrew: sur; Aramaic: Kepha) in Isaiah 51:1-2 — in the Old
Testament, only God was called a rock. The word rock was not used as a proper
name in the ancient world. If you were to turn to a companion and say,
"From
now on your name is Asparagus,"
people would wonder,
Why Asparagus?
What
is the meaning of it?
What does it signify?
Indeed, why call Simon the fisherman "Rock"?
Christ was not given to meaningless gestures, and neither were the Jews, as
a whole, when it came to names. Giving a new name meant that the status of
the person was changed, as when:
Abram's name was changed to Abraham (Genesis
17:5)
the names of the four Hebrew youths — Daniel, Hananiah, Mishael, and
Azariah — were changed to Belteshazzar, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. (Daniel 1:6-8)
But no Jew
had ever been called Rock.
If you have questions or comments about any of the above, please feel free
to contact me.
Under His Mercy,
Bob Centamore
Mary Ann replied:
Hey Mike,
You give RCIA too much credit. Usually it is doctrinally deficient. I read that half
of the converts through RCIA revert to their previous state within a short time.
It may have been about the nation or about one diocese — I forget which.
I am not
surprised. I know in our local RCIA , a leader was showing people traditional Church
music, and she picked the guitar music of the 60's. She is now singing breathy torch
songs in our local parish, when she is not leading a pickup band, playing the ridiculous
60's songs.
Mary Ann
Mike followed-up:
Hi Kevin,
We have a Pope because it was Jesus' wish to have a human servant, an icon of unity, to serve His Church,
and keep the Christian Faith He founded intact for His believers. The Papacy,
as Pope Benedict XVI has said, is not a monarchy. It's also not a dictatorship. It's the Pope's role
to listen to the voice of Christ and to:
safeguard and protect that which cannot change in Christian teaching,
and
address new morally ambiguous issues that arise in our contemporary
times.
Catholic Christians believe in the words of Jesus when He said:
13 And Jesus came into the quarters of Cæsarea Philippi:
and he asked his disciples, saying: Whom do men say that the Son of man
is? 14 But they said: Some John the Baptist, and other some Elias,
and others Jeremias, or one of the prophets. 15 Jesus saith to them:
But whom do you say that I am? 16 Simon Peter answered and said:
Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God. 17 And Jesus answering
said to him: Blessed art thou, Simon Bar-Jona: because flesh
and blood hath not revealed it to thee, but my Father who is in heaven. 18 And I say to thee: That thou art Peter; and upon this rockI will
build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it.* 19 And I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And
whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven:
and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, it shall be loosed also in
heaven.* 20 Then he commanded his disciples, that they should
tell no one that he was Jesus the Christ.
I was a little surprised that we haven't answered the "false interpretations
of Matthew 16:13-20" in our CPATS/AskACatholic knowledge base yet.
I found three sources below that will be helpful in understanding the Church's
Teachings on the Pope and Papacy. The Catholic Answers article below titled "Peter
the Rock", is probably the best. The second article by James Akin, and
the Holy Quotes below, are also good.
Upon this rock (Peter) I will build my Church. And the gates of Hell can never overpower it.
Note: Our
Protestant brethren will say to understand Matthew 16:18, we have to get behind
the English to the Greek. They will go on to say in Greek, the word for rock is petra, which means a large, massive stone. The word used for Simon's new name is different; it's petros, which means a little stone, a pebble.
In order to give the proper Catholic reply to Matthew 16:18, we have to get behind the
Greek argument to the Aramaic.
Although we don't know if the original Biblical manuscripts were in Aramaic
or not, many scholars believe Our Lord probably spoke Aramaic because it
was the native tongue for Jesus' immediate disciples.
In Aramaic there is
onlyone word for rock: Kepha. So he would have said:
"Blessed are you Simon bar Jonah, for flesh and blood have not revealed
this to you but my Heavenly Father. So I say to you thou are Kepha and
upon this Kepha I will build My Church and the gates of Hell will
not prevail against [it|Her]."
The only manuscripts we have
of Matthew are written in Greek but Greek scholars — even non-Catholic
ones — admit, the wordspetros and petrawere synonyms in first century Greek. They meantsmall stone and large
rockin some ancient Greek poetry, centuries before the time of Christ,
but that distinction had disappeared from the language by the time Matthew's
Gospel was rendered in Greek. The difference in meaning can only be found in
Attic Greek, but the New Testament was written in Koine Greek — an entirely
different dialect. In Koine Greek, bothpetros and petra simply meant rock.
If
Jesus had wanted to call Simon a small stone, the Greek lithos would have been
used.
I will give you the keys of the kingdom of Heaven: whatever you bind on earth will be bound in Heaven; whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in Heaven.
Peter spoke saying: "My brothers, he said, .... But we believe
that we are saved in the same way as they are: through the grace of the Lord Jesus." The entire assembly fell silent,
and they listened to Barnabas and Paul describing all the signs and wonders God
had worked through them among the gentiles."
Peter is mentioned 191 times in the New Testament. All the other Apostles names combined are mentioned only 130 times. And the most commonly referenced apostle apart from Peter is John, whose name appears 48 times.
Interested in what the very first Christians thought, taught, and died for?
Let someone else take over his office. Out of the men who have been with us the whole time that the Lord Jesus was living with us, from the time when John was baptizing until the day when he was taken up from us, one must be appointed to serve with us as a witness to His Resurrection.
Thank you for your answers; they were very helpful and educational. What I was
trying to get out of the Peter question is this:
I know Catholics say that Jesus
called Peter "the rock", and said He would build His Church upon him, but I know some denominations immediately fire back that Jesus was really calling
Peter
"a pebble", or "small smooth stone", saying that He
(Jesus) would build the Church upon Himself.
Even as a devout Protestant, I never thought that made much sense, and now I really
don't.
What I was talking about with the three cord compliment is that, I heard
from a Catholic, I think on the CPATS web site, that Jesus was complimenting
Peter with one thing, and then another, and then finally calling him "the
rock", and said He would build His Church upon him. So it wouldn't make much
sense for Jesus to say one good thing about Peter, and then another, and then end
it by calling him "a pebble".
Hope all this doesn't sound too confusing, but I was just trying to get a better
grasp on this topic.
Thanks for all the help, and God Bless you.
Kevin Terry
Bob Centamore replied:
Hi Kevin,
I hope you read the information Mike referred to in his reply about the
name change, especially from Catholic Answers about petra vs.
petros and the Greek vs. Aramaic, etc.
You said: So it wouldn't make much
sense for Jesus to say one good thing about Peter, and then another, and then end
it by calling him "a pebble".
"But when He had turned
around and looked at His disciples, He rebuked Peter, saying, 'Get behind
Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God,
but the things
of men.' "
So Peter was a man like the rest of us in that he could make personal mistakes, but was given a special grace by
Jesus to not teach error. To restate it,
Peter was infallible when teaching about Faith and Morals. So Papal personal
sin was, and still is, possible, but this promise to teach infallibly was
given to Peter and his successors, and this promise made by the Lord is
one of the main strengths of the Catholic Church. We call this teaching
arm of the Church the Magisterium. There were some popes that
did bad things, especially around the year 1000 A.D., but they still did not teach error.
Further questions [and/or] comments are welcome.
Under His Mercy,
Bob C.
Kevin replied:
Bob,
I totally agree with what you are saying, and know that Peter wasn't above
making mistakes or being rebuked by our Lord. What I was saying, was what
I had heard. In the Scriptures, Jesus gave Peter two compliments and then
a third, calling him a rock as a spoke of building the Church.
It would be like me saying,
"Hey Bob, you are smart, a great writer,
you have terrible grammar, and I want to base my newspaper on your work."
I
don't know if that makes it easier or not. I think I opened Mike's e-mail,
but haven't had time to read it fully yet. I truly appreciate your help
though, and hope I can throw some questions your way if I need help.
I met with my RCIA Director this morning, and if everything goes as planned,
I will be joining the Church at the Easter Vigil. I think that is what
she called it.
Hope you have a good week.
Thanks and God Bless you.
Kevin Terry
Bob Centamore replied:
Hi Kevin,
Yep, the Easter Vigil (Mass) is generally the time Catechumens (and often candidates)
enter the Catholic Church. The reason Mike CC'd your question to me is because I
helped start and was Director of RCIA in my parish.
I have heard many bad things about other RCIA programs, and more often than not, RCIA programs were not very good. They tended to gloss over "difficult" areas
and watered down the Faith. That was a couple of years back, so hopefully things have
changed. I know nothing about your RCIA Director or the particular process you are
about to enter, but if you have questions or think there is problem, please feel free
to contact me.
This Church you are about to enter is a beautiful thing, and I don't want you to get a
distorted view of it at the start of your journey.
I'm sure you're very busy now, but I wanted to mention I have a copy of an article
about Peter being the rock, etc. If you don't get a chance to look at Mike's stuff,
let me know if you want me to send it to you via e-mail.
Under His Mercy,
Bob C.
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