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| Be united in your love Philippians 2:1-4 |
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If our life in Christ means anything to you if love can persuade at all, or the Spirit that we have in common, or any tenderness and sympathy, then be united in your convictions and united in your love, with a common purpose and a common mind. That is the one thing which would make me completely happy. There must be no competition among you, no conceit; but everybody is to be self-effacing. Always consider the other person to be better than yourself so that nobody thinks of his own interests first but everybody thinks of other people’s interests instead.
Let me begin by stating up-front that I am not trying to be the Catholic Gestapo, forcing people against their will to return to the Catholic Faith. I respect our Protestant brothers and sisters and I know that many of them are much further along the spiritual trail than I am. I know that they love the Lord Jesus and have given over their lives to Him and that they practice that commitment every day. The mainline Protestants set good examples as to what a Christian should be in many respects. The one charism that they cannot demonstrate, however, is that of unity. In the sixteenth century, an unbalanced monk went off in a new direction and created a church built in his own likeness and trashing things that made the faith united. From that day, the Church would never be the same. For, if you could split once because you disagreed with some principle that your local preacher was committed to, well then you could split again so that your view, in your church, took precedence and your world was once again in synch with what you thought and taught. The man in the third pew, however, has many problems with your interpretation and knows for a fact that he is right and you are wrong. Since you won't come around to his way of thinking, he splits and creates for himself a church in his own image. We could carry this on for quite a while if we wanted to, at least thirty-thousand times which is how many denominations of Christianity there are.
We pray for Christian unity but it is unlikely to come until Jesus does return and sets everything straight. There is only one direction that a return to Christian Unity can take and that is for the Protestants to come back home to Rome and accept the authority of the Church that Jesus founded and which bears the four charisms of the true church and that is that the Catholic Church is One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. It is the Apostolic charism that most Protestants have trouble with. First, they believe that the Bible is the sole source for all Christian doctrine. At first blush, this seems like a wonderful way to make sure that what you believe is what Christ intended. But it falls apart rather quickly when you realize that it is the freedom to interpret that has caused the Church to splinter into so many groups. If every man can interpret the Bible himself, well then every man is his own authority. Personal interpretation of the Bible leads to division because one person's interpretation is just as good as another's interpretation because they only have to answer to themselves.
The Church depends on Scripture, all Catholic teaching can be found in the Bible. If you look to the right, there is a paper you can view that shows where the teachings can be found. Now, the Church also has teachings that are not written in the Bible. These are the what we call the Sacred Traditions. Please note these are not traditions like having turkey on Thanksgiving or a tree at Christmas time or having a family reunion on the second week of August. Those are all human traditions. Sacred Tradition, on the other hand, is the passing of our beliefs from one generation to the next. It is rather ironic that one of the Sacred Traditions is the Holy Bible. From the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
"In order that the full and living Gospel might always be preserved in the Church, the apostles left bishops as their successors. They gave them their own position of teaching authority." Indeed, "the apostolic preaching, which is expressed in a special way in the inspired books, was to be preserved in a continuous line of succession until the end of time. This living transmission, accomplished in the Holy Spirit, is called Tradition, since it is distinct from Sacred Scripture, though closely connected to it. Through Tradition, "the Church, in her doctrine, life, and worship, perpetuates and transmits to every generation all that she herself is, all that she believes." "The sayings of the holy Fathers are a witness to the life-giving presence of this Tradition, showing how its riches are poured out in the practice and life of the Church, in her belief and her prayer." -- Catechism of the Catholic Church, par. 77-78
So, how does all this affect Christian Unity? Well, the Catholic Church occupies the high ground. It is she that bears the imprint of her founder, Jesus Christ. While some would say that we could become one again if we just engaged in some give and take, in compromise. Well, there is the rub. The Catholic Church has maintained her doctrine unchanged and her interpretations of the Biblical truth is the same today as it was in the sixteenth century. Protestants, on the other hand, have changed and changed and changed again and again so that with the exception of Christ, there are differences that the Protestant man or woman would not want to give up in the name of unity. Even if one denomination gave up one of their differences, there are thousands of others that would tell the Church to go peddle fish.
What would you have the Church give up in the name of Christian unity? Should we strip our churches of the Crucifix in favor of the Cross? Should we tone down our belief in what the Holy Eucharist is, namely, the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ and make it nothing more than a simple memorial using saltines and grape juice? Should we give up the Pope and institute a committee approach to church government where every man has a vote? Should we soften our stance on abortion or homosexuality? No, I do not see any of these things happening and these are the sorts of things that other denominations believe and allow and the Church could never compromise her teachings in the name of Christian unity.
So, it is unlikely that we will see a mass return to Rome by many of the Protestant denominations because in order for that to happen, the notion of private interpretation would have to go and they would have to submit to the authority of the One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic Church and that would be impossible for them to do.
The one hope we do have in this impossible situation is that what is impossible for man is possible for God. So, Catholics and Protestants alike should pray for unity and God may one day move His hand.
