Organization of the Catholic Church

CHN ^ | December 2, 2009 | David W. Emery

[NYer]

This is one of the best descriptions and explanations I have ever read. Hope you find it informative as well.

[Lorica]

Bookmarking, thanks

[NYer]

Ping!

[GregB]

Bill O’Reilly should read this but he is too busy writing books about wayward priests.

[BenKenobi]

Thank you so much!

[arthurus]

Succinct and useful for instruction. Thanks for your work.

[ThanhPhero]

This is an excellent outline.

[Ol' Sox]

Thank you! I am going to pass this on as supplemental material to the candidates in our RCIA class.

[Salvation]

**Authority in the Catholic Church begins not with the bishops, but with Jesus Christ and God’s divine revelation in him. This revelation is the reason for the Church’s existence as the People of God, just as the Israelites (Jews) were the People of God before the incarnation of the Son of God, whom they referred to as Messiah (Christ, the Anointed One — because anointing with a special oil was the symbolic way used by the peoples of the middle east to designate their civil and religious leaders;**

Excellent post. Thank you!

[steve86]

It is very good.

[steve86]

You should encourage the candidates in your RCIA class to attend mass at some of the other liturgical traditions; they are much more authentic and true to the faith than is the heavily protestantized Novus Ordo.

[NYer]

Thank you! I am going to pass this on as supplemental material to the candidates in our RCIA class.

An excellent idea! Hopefully others will borrow your suggestion and apply it to their classes as well.

BTW - I maintain a Catholic Ping List for articles on current news and topics of interest to Catholics. Please freepmail me if you would like to be added to the list.

[NYer]

You should encourage the candidates in your RCIA class to attend mass at some of the other liturgical traditions; they are much more authentic and true to the faith than is the heavily protestantized Novus Ordo.

There is great merit in this suggestion. I am a cradle Catholic but, except for one event in HS when an Armenian Catholic priest celebrated that liturgy for us, I do not recall any other time in my life when mention was made of the other 22 churches that make up the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church. In fact, I am a Roman Catholic, practicing my faith in a Maronite (Antiochene) Catholic Church. "Same faith, different flavor". As more and more RC Churches are being closed in this diocese, our small parish continues to thrive. Catholic visitors are often very confused by the liturgy and think they are in an Orthodox Church.

[JoeMac]

As a somewhat lapsed but still church-going Catholic(and I went to Catholic schools in the ‘60s) I’ve never had any use for the Vatican. Never needed it to know the miracle of faith , the love of Christ and the power of The Holy Spirit. Incidently the Vatican owes its existence to Benito Mussolini. He gave them their status as a state in exchange for making Catholicism the official religion of Italy.

[NYer]

Your point is?

[trisham]

I believe the point is that God works in mysterious ways. :)

[GregB]

I starting his book A Bold Fresh Piece of Humanity and there is a chapter where he start on the Priest scandal involving children and went on to say it would talk about it later.I gave the book back to the person who lent it to me. You could do a book and the abuse of children and it cuts across all people not just a group of people.

[Campion]

Incidently the Vatican owes its existence to Benito Mussolini. He gave them their status as a state in exchange for making Catholicism the official religion of Italy.

That's revisionist history on the order of the famous line from "1066 and All That", about how "in 1536, the Pope and his minions left the Church of England". The Vatican was part of a independent state, ruled by the Pope, long before Mussolini was a glimmer in his daddy's eye.

Italy was united as a nation in 1871. Prior to that time, the Pope ruled the central part of the Italian penninsula -- an area much, much larger than the current Vatican City -- as its secular ruler. The nation was called the "Papal States".

After the Pope's armies were defeated by the Italians under Garibaldi, the Pope retreated to the Vatican and refused to recognize the new Italian state. (The term "prisoner of the Vatican" was used to describe the Popes of that era.)

What the concordat with Mussolini in 1929 did was simply to end that irregular situation. The Popes accepted the conquest of most of their traditional territory by the Italians. The Italians accepted the independent existence of Vatican City as a tiny remnant of the Papal States.

[steve86]

I think the majority of U.S. Catholics think they’re “just supposed to” assist at the Ordinary Form of the Latin Rite and really nothing else (although some are aware of the Extraordinary Form if it is available in their area). Back a few years ago when when a Byzantine visiting priest celebrated mass here once a month I was possibly the only person to attend who didn’t already have some ethnic or other link with that rite. What a wonderful celebration of Catholic worship that others missed! Were only that priest to resume his visits as some of us Extraordinary Form people would have somewhere to go when the Latin Mass is not offered.