(Death, Heaven, Purgatory, Hell)
Rite of Christian Initiation for Adults
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Apostolic Succession
The first Christians had no doubts about how to
determine which was the true Church and which doctrines the true teachings
of Christ. The test was simple: Just trace the apostolic succession of
the claimants.
Apostolic succession is the line of bishops stretching
back to the apostles. All over the world, all Catholic are part of a lineage that goes back to the time of the apostles,
something that is impossible in Protestant denominations (most of which
do not even claim to have bishops).
The role of apostolic succession in preserving
true doctrine is illustrated in the Bible. To make sure that the apostles’
teachings would be passed down after the deaths of the apostles, Paul told
Timothy, "[W]hat you have heard from me before many witnesses entrust to
faithful men who will be able to teach others also" (2 Tim. 2:2). In this
passage he refers to the first three generations of apostolic succession—his
own generation, Timothy’s generation, and the generation Timothy will teach.
The Church Fathers, who were links in that chain
of succession, regularly appealed to apostolic succession as a test for
whether Catholics or heretics had correct doctrine. This was necessary
because heretics simply put their own interpretations, even bizarre ones,
on Scripture. Clearly, something other than Scripture had to be used as
an ultimate test of doctrine in these cases.
Thus the early Church historian J. N. D. Kelly,
a Protestant, writes, "[W]here in practice was [the] apostolic testimony
or tradition to be found? . . . The most obvious answer was that the apostles
had committed it orally to the Church, where it had been handed down from
generation to generation. . . . Unlike the alleged secret tradition of
the Gnostics, it was entirely public and open, having been entrusted by
the apostles to their successors, and by these in turn to those who followed
them, and was visible in the Church for all who cared to look for it" (Early
Christian Doctrines, 37).
For the early Fathers, "the identity of the oral
tradition with the original revelation is guaranteed by the unbroken succession
of bishops in the great sees going back lineally to the apostles. . . .
[A]n additional safeguard is supplied by the Holy Spirit, for the message
committed was to the Church, and the Church is the home of the Spirit.
Indeed, the Church’s bishops are . . . Spirit-endowed men who have been
vouchsafed ‘an infallible charism of truth’" (ibid.).
Thus on the basis of experience the Fathers could
be "profoundly convinced of the futility of arguing with heretics merely
on the basis of Scripture. The skill and success with which they twisted
its plain meaning made it impossible to reach any decisive conclusion in
that field" (ibid., 41).
Pope Clement I
"Through countryside and city [the apostles] preached, and they appointed their earliest converts, testing them by the Spirit, to be the bishops and deacons of future believers. Nor was this a novelty, for bishops and deacons had been written about a long time earlier. . . . Our apostles knew through our Lord Jesus Christ that there would be strife for the office of bishop. For this reason, therefore, having received perfect foreknowledge, they appointed those who have already been mentioned and afterwards added the further provision that, if they should die, other approved men should succeed to their ministry" (Letter to the Corinthians 42:4–5, 44:1–3 [A.D. 80]).
Hegesippus
"When I had come to Rome, I [visited] Anicetus, whose deacon was Eleutherus. And after Anicetus [died], Soter succeeded, and after him Eleutherus. In each succession and in each city there is a continuance of that which is proclaimed by the law, the prophets, and the Lord" (Memoirs, cited in Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History 4:22 [A.D. 180])
Irenaeus
"It is possible, then, for everyone in every church,
who may wish to know the truth, to contemplate the tradition of the apostles
which has been made known to us throughout the whole world. And we are
in a position to enumerate those who were instituted bishops by the apostles
and their successors down to our own times, men who neither knew nor taught
anything like what these heretics rave about" (Against Heresies 3:3:1
[A.D. 189]).
"But since it would be too long to enumerate in
such a volume as this the successions of all the churches, we shall confound
all those who, in whatever manner, whether through self-satisfaction or
vainglory, or through blindness and wicked opinion, assemble other than
where it is proper, by pointing out here the successions of the bishops
of the greatest and most ancient church known to all, founded and organized
at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul—that church which
has the tradition and the faith with which comes down to us after having
been announced to men by the apostles. For with this Church, because of
its superior origin, all churches must agree, that is, all the faithful
in the whole world. And it is in her that the faithful everywhere have
maintained the apostolic tradition" (ibid., 3:3:2).
"Polycarp also was not only instructed by apostles,
and conversed with many who had seen Christ, but was also, by apostles
in Asia, appointed bishop of the church in Smyrna, whom I also saw in my
early youth, for he tarried [on earth] a very long time, and, when a very
old man, gloriously and most nobly suffering martyrdom, departed this life,
having always taught the things which he had learned from the apostles,
and which the Church has handed down, and which alone are true. To these
things all the Asiatic churches testify, as do also those men who have
succeeded Polycarp down to the present time" (ibid., 3:3:4).
"Since therefore we have such proofs, it is not
necessary to seek the truth among others which it is easy to obtain from
the Church; since the apostles, like a rich man [depositing his money]
in a bank, lodged in her hands most copiously all things pertaining to
the truth, so that every man, whosoever will, can draw from her the water
of life. . . . For how stands the case? Suppose there arise a dispute relative
to some important question among us, should we not have recourse to the
most ancient churches with which the apostles held constant conversation,
and learn from them what is certain and clear in regard to the present
question?" (ibid., 3:4:1).
"[I]t is incumbent to obey the presbyters who are
in the Church—those who, as I have shown, possess the succession from the
apostles; those who, together with the succession of the episcopate, have
received the infallible charism of truth, according to the good pleasure
of the Father. But [it is also incumbent] to hold in suspicion others who
depart from the primitive succession, and assemble themselves together
in any place whatsoever, either as heretics of perverse minds, or as schismatics
puffed up and self-pleasing, or again as hypocrites, acting thus for the
sake of lucre and vainglory. For all these have fallen from the truth"
(ibid., 4:26:2).
"The true knowledge is the doctrine of the apostles,
and the ancient organization of the Church throughout the whole world,
and the manifestation of the body of Christ according to the succession
of bishops, by which succession the bishops have handed down the Church
which is found everywhere" (ibid., 4:33:8).
Tertullian
"[The apostles] founded churches in every city,
from which all the other churches, one after another, derived the tradition
of the faith, and the seeds of doctrine, and are every day deriving them,
that they may become churches. Indeed, it is on this account only that
they will be able to deem themselves apostolic, as being the offspring
of apostolic churches. Every sort of thing must necessarily revert to its
original for its classification. Therefore the churches, although they
are so many and so great, comprise but the one primitive Church, [founded]
by the apostles, from which they all [spring]. In this way, all are primitive,
and all are apostolic, while they are all proved to be one in unity" (Demurrer
Against the Heretics 20 [A.D. 200]).
"[W]hat it was which Christ revealed to them [the
apostles] can, as I must here likewise prescribe, properly be proved in
no other way than by those very churches which the apostles founded in
person, by declaring the gospel to them directly themselves . . . If then
these things are so, it is in the same degree manifest that all doctrine
which agrees with the apostolic churches—those molds and original sources
of the faith must be reckoned for truth, as undoubtedly containing that
which the churches received from the apostles, the apostles from Christ,
[and] Christ from God. Whereas all doctrine must be prejudged as false
which savors of contrariety to the truth of the churches and apostles of
Christ and God. It remains, then, that we demonstrate whether this doctrine
of ours, of which we have now given the rule, has its origin in the tradition
of the apostles, and whether all other doctrines do not ipso facto
proceed from falsehood" (ibid., 21).
"But if there be any [heresies] which are bold
enough to plant [their origin] in the midst of the apostolic age, that
they may thereby seem to have been handed down by the apostles, because
they existed in the time of the apostles, we can say: Let them produce
the original records of their churches; let them unfold the roll of their
bishops, running down in due succession from the beginning in such a manner
that [their first] bishop shall be able to show for his ordainer and predecessor
some one of the apostles or of apostolic men—a man, moreover, who continued
steadfast with the apostles. For this is the manner in which the apostolic
churches transmit their registers: as the church of Smyrna, which records
that Polycarp was placed therein by John; as also the church of Rome, which
makes Clement to have been ordained in like manner by Peter" (ibid., 32).
"But should they even effect the contrivance [of
composing a succession list for themselves], they will not advance a step.
For their very doctrine, after comparison with that of the apostles [as
contained in other churches], will declare, by its own diversity and contrariety,
that it had for its author neither an apostle nor an apostolic man; because,
as the apostles would never have taught things which were self-contradictory"
(ibid.).
"Then let all the heresies, when challenged to
these two tests by our apostolic Church, offer their proof of how they
deem themselves to be apostolic. But in truth they neither are so, nor
are they able to prove themselves to be what they are not. Nor are they
admitted to peaceful relations and communion by such churches as are in
any way connected with apostles, inasmuch as they are in no sense themselves
apostolic because of their diversity as to the mysteries of the faith"
(ibid.).
Cyprian of Carthage
"[T]he Church is one, and as she is one, cannot
be both within and without. For if she is with [the heretic] Novatian,
she was not with [Pope] Cornelius. But if she was with Cornelius, who succeeded
the bishop [of Rome], Fabian, by lawful ordination, and whom, beside the
honor of the priesthood the Lord glorified also with martyrdom, Novatian
is not in the Church; nor can he be reckoned as a bishop, who, succeeding
to no one, and despising the evangelical and apostolic tradition, sprang
from himself. For he who has not been ordained in the Church can neither
have nor hold to the Church in any way" (Letters 69[75]:3 [A.D.
253]).
Jerome
"Far be it from me to speak adversely of any of
these clergy who, in succession from the apostles, confect by their sacred
word the Body of Christ and through whose efforts also it is that we are
Christians" (Letters 14:8 [A.D. 396]).
Augustine
"[T]here are many other things which most properly
can keep me in [the Catholic Church’s] bosom. The unanimity of peoples
and nations keeps me here. Her authority, inaugurated in miracles, nourished
by hope, augmented by love, and confirmed by her age, keeps me here. The
succession of priests, from the very see of the apostle Peter, to whom
the Lord, after his resurrection, gave the charge of feeding his sheep
[John 21:15–17], up to the present episcopate, keeps me here. And last,
the very name Catholic, which, not without reason, belongs to this Church
alone, in the face of so many heretics, so much so that, although all heretics
want to be called ‘Catholic,’ when a stranger inquires where the Catholic
Church meets, none of the heretics would dare to point out his own basilica
or house" (Against the Letter of Mani Called "The Foundation" 4:5
[A.D. 397]).
NIHIL OBSTAT:
I have concluded that the materials
presented in this work are free of doctrinal or moral errors.
Bernadeane Carr, STL, Censor Librorum, August 10, 2004
IMPRIMATUR:
In accord with 1983 CIC 827
permission to publish this work is hereby granted.
+Robert H. Brom, Bishop of San Diego, August 10, 2004