Help with an argument about the first Pope?

[Mystophilus]

Exactly my point…by asking for the actual citation and source document…the claim/story can so easily be refuted. I had one such claimant locate the source of his claim, and had him post it (in another forum), and read it…then I started asking questions on the claims made and the actual words from the true document…all I got were attacks and attempts to divert the story…

That is another reason why I prefer to find and quote (translations of) the material myself (apart from the fact that it means not having to wait for them to respond): you can fairly easily demonstrate what it does say.

Having said that, a peculiar effect called Motivated Cognition, whereby people only see the conclusions which they want to see, can prevent sufficiently-biased readers from comprehending what is right in front of them. Such people are best left to their prejudices, I think.

By the way…I looked at the source…and could not locate the letter from Pope Gregory that you mention above…is this it:

"For even so Constantine, our most pious emperor, recovering the Roman commonwealth from the perverse worship of idols, subjected the same with himself to our Almighty God and Lord Jesus Christ, and was himself, with the people under his subjection, entirely converted to Him.

That is the one, from Pope Gregory to King Ethelbert.

 

[inkaneer]

Quote:
Originally Posted by inkaneer
Maybe not everything but a lot is. For instance on the subject of popes before Constantine we are speaking of the first 300 years of Catholicism. In that period of time we have documented people referring to the bishop of Rome and attributing to him the universal authority of the church.

Whoa there! Where is that document?

Try Irenaeus’ *Against Heresies *3:3:2 [A.D. 189] or Cyprian of Carthage work, The Unity of the Catholic Church 4; 1st edition [A.D. 251] or Eusebius of Caesarea’s Church History 5:23:1–24:11. If you want something earlier then Ignatius of Antioch in about 107 AD. Then there was Tertullian’s *Demurrer Against the Heretics *22 [A.D. 200] as well as his *Antidote Against the Scorpion *10 [A.D. 211] and *Modesty *21:9–10 [A.D. 220].

The term Pope was actually used first by the Patriarch of Alexandria.

Well the term would be papa or pater. Pope is the English version but it was Paul who first used the idea of a spiritual father even referring to himself as a father in 1Thess 2:11 as well as Phm 1:10 and 1Co 4:15. Bishops were once called Papa because it was in them that the authority of the church resided just as the authority in the family rested with the father.

 

[beehumble]

Okay then, where in the Bible does it prove or disprove that Constantine established the Papacy?

The Bible proves that Christ created the papacy. That whole keys thing - the keys went to the primary one of the twelve ministers in David’s kingdom, is my understanding. Jesus giving the ‘keys’ to Peter meant (and the other eleven knew it) he is to be considered the primary one of the twelve.

God bless you.