How exactly did catholicism turn into what it is today?

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Any proof for the first apostles being alive during the first heresy attacked?
 
I’d say the New Testament passages against Gnosticism written by those Apostles is a pretty good source. If I were guessing.
 
It was the undivided church. There are no alternative claimants at this time.

As to whether the True Church is Oriental Orthodox, Eastern Orthodox or Catholic after their schisms, that’s a totally different question.
 
The church in the first century was like a baby picture of the church today. Back then they did not even know the word Trinity, for example. We have grown through the years in wisdom and strength. Praise God!
 
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Christianity was Catholic from the beginning. To get an idea of what the early Church was like, read the earliest of the successors to the Apostles, the successor bishops such as Ignatius of Antioch. The Church was always Catholic.

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The Church of the Early Fathers | Catholic Answers

The writings of the early Church Fathers reveal the beliefs and practices of Christians in the first century. Click here and learn more.
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Can you give me some passages out of scripture that prove this?
 
Since the New Testament Scripture was assembled by the Catholic Church centuries after Jesus, are you sure you want to trust a reference that the Catholic Church put together out of all the writings that were available? There is no “bible”, no “New Testament” that is not authored by Catholics and assembled into the Bible by the Catholic Church. No Scripture, other than what the People of God put together for their own use in Worship and teaching one another.
If you trust the Bible, you are trusting the Pope, St. Jerome, the Magisterium, etc.
The people who put together the Bible as the Bible are telling you (by giving you the Bible with the Book of Acts which book they chose to be in the Bible) in Acts 15 that Peter, Paul, James, John, etc. were alive and dictating how the issue of Circumcision would be addressed with Gentiles.
 
John_Martin said:
Since the New Testament Scripture was assembled by the Catholic Church centuries after Jesus, are you sure you want to trust a reference that the Catholic Church put together out of all the writings that were available?
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Well, the canon was affirmatively given before the first major schism, so all Churches that claim visible decent implicitly claim to be the Church that affirmed the canon.

That said, Catholics didn’t close their canon until either Florence or Trent. I forget which. Either way, the reformation was underway.
 
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Ironic you should ask, since tomorrow is the feast day of Saint Ignatius of Antioch.

Ignatius of Antioch’s 7 letters are among the earliest post-New Testament documents, making them some of the earliest Christian documents on the record. He was bishop of Antioch, succeeding Peter there, and died around AD 110.

If you read his letters, you will notice a Christianity that can only be described as Catholic (and Orthodox, our sister church).

Ignatius talks about:
  • -the church being called “catholic”
  • -connecting the necessity of bishops with the church
  • -describing the three orders of Bishop, Priest (Presbyter), and Deacon
  • -emphasizing the Real Presence of the Eucharist
  • -appealing to the need for Christian unity, gathered around the bishop and Eucharist
  • -the understanding that Peter and Paul went to Rome and died there
  • -and Rome having a certain primacy or renowned legacy even among the other apostolic churches like Antioch, of which Ignatius was bishop.
…along with, of course, some basic Christian doctrines like the divinity – and humanity – of Christ.

So yes, Catholic Christianity was the original faith. Perhaps the Orthodox can claim him too, but then again, Orthodoxy is quite a difference from Protestantism, Mormonism, Jehovah Witnesses, Non-Denominational Christianity, Evangelicals, and all the rest as well.
 
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Saint Ignatius of Antioch is also thought to have been ordained Bishop by St. Peter or at least was picked by St. Peter for that position.
 
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