I'm a protestant Christian....ask me anything!

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If your willing to accept the Catholic’s interpretation of Matthew 16 then you acknowledge that Christ established a visible church with a hierarchy of bishops headed by Peter, the first Pope. If the visible Church is to continue as Jesus intended, so does the hierarchy, and all of Peter’s successors would assume his office as head of the Church.
 
The problem I see with that logic is that throughout the bible when they wanted to find out who God’s selected individual was they did lots which would be based on chance similar to flipping coin. The pope is chosen by bishops.
 
humbleseeker said:
all of Peter’s successors would assume his office as head of the Church.
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I think this is a key phrase. It would seem as much of the early church assumed all Bishops were “Peter’s successors” on top of that many also held that any primacy that the Bishop of Rome had was more honorary than jurisdictional. Wouldn’t the early church be the in the best position to know, if so, why did many oppose the idea of the supremacy of the bishop of Rome?
 

The “First among equals” in the EO is considered the successors of Andrew if I read it correctly


So I dont see any reason any of them assume they are all successors to Peter. (Edit: Although the Patriarchs of Antioch claims to be )Patriarch of Antioch - Wikipedia

Edit: Do you have an sources that would elude to the Early Bishops believing that they were all the successors of Peter? Hope that’s not snarky
 
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Marshmallow1 said:
Edit: Do you have an sources that would elude to the Early Bishops believing that they were all the successors of Peter? Hope that’s not snarky
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I don’t have an article to link to but here’s some quotes…

Cyprian of carthage
“The Lord speaks to Peter, saying, ‘I say unto thee, that thou art Peter; and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven; and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven, and whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.’ And again to the same He says, after His resurrection, ‘Feed my sheep.’ And although to all the apostles, after His resurrection, He gives an equal power, and says, ‘As the Father hath sent me, even so send I you: Receive ye the Holy Ghost: Whose soever sins ye remit, they shall be remitted unto him; and whose soever sins ye retain, they shall be retained;’ yet, that He might set forth unity, He arranged by His authority the origin of that unity, as beginning from one. Assuredly the rest of the apostles were also the same as was Peter, endowed with a like partnership both of honour and power; but the beginning proceeds from unity.” (On the Unity of the Church, 4)

“Our Lord, whose precepts and admonitions we ought to observe, describing the honour of a bishop and the order of His Church, speaks in the Gospel, and says to Peter: ‘I say unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock will I build my Church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven: and whatsoever thou shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.’ Thence, through the changes of times and successions, the ordering of bishops and the plan of the Church flow onwards; so that the Church is founded upon the bishops, and every act of the Church is controlled by these same rulers.” (Epistle 26:1)
 
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John Chrysostom

“James was invested with the chief rule [in Acts 15], and think it no hardship. So clean was their soul from love of glory. ‘And after that they had held their peace, James answered,’ etc. (v. 13.) Peter indeed spoke more strongly, but James here more mildly: for thus it behooves one in high authority, to leave what is unpleasant for others to say, while he himself appears in the milder part.” (Homilies on the Acts of the Apostles, 33)

“At all events the master of the whole world, Peter, to whose hands He committed the keys of heaven, whom He commanded to do and to bear all, He bade tarry here [Antioch] for a long period. Thus in His sight our city was equivalent to the whole world. But since I have mentioned Peter, I have perceived a fifth crown woven from him, and this is that this man [Ignatius of Antioch] succeeded to the office after him. For just as any one taking a great stone from a foundation hastens by all means to introduce an equivalent to it, lest he should shake the whole building, and make it more unsound, so, accordingly, when Peter was about to depart from here, the grace of the Spirit introduced another teacher equivalent to Peter, so that the building already completed should not be made more unsound by the insignificance of the successor.” (Homily on St. Ignatius, 4)

Here was just a few examples where church fathers applied primacy fairly equally. Now I’ll admit, my knowledge may be flawed (I always have more to learn as do we all) but i still see no major consensus on the bishop of Rome having complete authority.
 
I had a big long thing, i had to edit it and accidentally lost half od what I wrote… I hate doing these things on my phone haha but i hope you can kinda see my perspective on it 🙂
 
Ignatius of Antioch was a martyr who lived circa AD: 35-108. Here is a quote from him affirming the Church offices of bishop, presbyter (priest) and deacon being there from the earlier dates of the Church.
“See that you all follow the bishop , even as Jesus Christ does the Father, and the presbytery as you would the apostles; and reverence the deacons , as being the institution of God. Let no man do anything connected with the Church without the bishop.”
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http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12272b.htm - List of Popes

For lineage on contemporary bishops, please see this link: http://www.catholic-hierarchy.org/

I have heard it said that during the first 3+ centuries, every Bishop of Rome (Pope) was also a martyr.

Note: If you look into what the New Testament says about “elders” and search out the underlying Greek root words, it will often be referring to “episkopos” (bishop) or “presbyteros” (priest).
 
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stoplooklisten said:
Here is a quote from him affirming the Church offices of bishop, presbyter (priest) and deacon being there from the earlier dates of the Church.
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Right, i have no problem with that. This is about primacy of the Bishop of Rome specifically.
 
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