Papal Supremacy and the Early Church

[Michael16]

I heard an interesting discussion of Hebrews chapter 10 on EWTN and it provoked some questions.

A: What’s the historical record concerning papal supremacy? When was the Holy Father accepted as the Head of the Church?

I ask because some historians and Protestants argue that it was Constantine the Great who headed the Church and that the Pope wasn’t the Head. Maybe that’s just polemics.

B: When did the sacramental system of ours be fully in place and was that before Saint Eusebius of Caesarea wrote his History?

C: What did the Mass look like before the codification of Sacred Scripture?

D: Why do we celebrate the Sabbath and the Sacrifice of the Mass on Sundays?

The same historical source I read said that it was Constantine the Great that shifted the Sabbath to Sunday; taking it over from the cult of Sol Invictus.

I believe we celebrate the Sabbath on Sunday because that’s the day Our Lord Resurrected.

 

[adamhovey1988]

I’m not at a computer right now so I can’t go through everything, but we celebrate the Lord’s day instead of The Jewish Sabbath because that is the day of the Resurrection. We have evidence of papal Supremacy from the Bible itself, with Jesus giving the keys to Peter. But, even if we didn’t we do have letters from Clement of Rome asserting his authority as the bishop of Rome Over The Universal Church. I forgot the rest of the question, but I’m sure someone else will chime in.

 

[twf]

The primacy of the Bishop of Rome was recognized from the earliest centuries, as witnessed by St Clement, in the late first century, intervening in Corinth. That said, our understanding of the papacy has certainly evolved. He acted more as a final court of appeal in the early centuries, rather than actively governing local churches.

The Acts in the New Testament already tells that the followers of Jesus met on the “first day of the week”.

St Justin Martyr describes a very Mass like liturgy in the mid 2nd century.

The earliest Fathers, including St Ignatius of Antioch, a disciple of St John who writes around the year 107 (just after the New Testament was completed) speaks of the real presence of the Eucharist, bishops, and even uses the term “the Catholic Church”.

 

[1ke]

How about one question and one topic at a time?

It is not good forum etiquette to throw our a bunch of topics in one thread. Makes difficult to discuss.

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

Maybe that’s just polemics.

Based on fact Constantine did not even have right to vote at Ecumenical Council, or that Bishop of Rome was later called “Bishop of Bishops”, yeah… that is a polemic…

When did the sacramental system of ours be fully in place and was that before Saint Eusebius of Caesarea wrote his History?

Their external appearance was different- Confessions were held publicly before entire present Church, for example. Baptisms were done in what resembles pool and deaconesses helped during distributing sacraments to women- because it would be scandalous to let priest (man, always man) touch woman. Priests were always present though!

D: Why do we celebrate the Sabbath and the Sacrifice of the Mass on Sundays?

1 Corinthians 16:2 “On the first day of every week, each of you is to put something aside and store it up, as he may prosper, so that there will be no collecting when I come.”
Acts 20:7 “On the first day of the week, when we were gathered together to break bread, Paul talked with them, intending to depart on the next day, and he prolonged his speech until midnight.”

Justin Martyr, first-century Saint writes about Mass being on Sunday.

The same historical source I read said that it was Constantine the Great that shifted the Sabbath to Sunday; taking it over from the cult of Sol Invictus.

That is not very precise though.

I believe we celebrate the Sabbath on Sunday because that’s the day Our Lord Resurrected.

That might be correct- though it was by Authority of Apostles that it was established.

C: What did the Mass look like before the codification of Sacred Scripture?

Now this one is pretty hard. There are numerous documents about Early Liturgies, but problem is that those documents are very ambiguous and it is very hard to distinguish false ones from true ones. It was probably Ad Orientem, Deacons being among people to correct them if they did not follow it correctly, and Old Testament was read as well as what has been sent from Apostles or deemed as Holy Texts (for example, Gospels- because codification of Scripture happened much after Scripture was all written down, so it did exist quite the time before that). Justin Martyr writes about Mass consisting of reading Scripture (OT probably, maybe Gospels), giving thanks, asking God for intervention and then Eucharist which is surely Body and Blood of our Lord. (Justin Martyr: On Christian Worship - 150 A.D. (The Prayer Foundation))

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

A: What’s the historical record concerning papal supremacy? When was the Holy Father accepted as the Head of the Church?

Well, around time when Peter died, Rome was already considered to hold special place. Ignatius of Antioch, who was student of St. John Apostle actually deemed Rome as having primacy too;
“the Church which is beloved and enlightened by the will of Him that wills all things which are according to the love of Jesus Christ our God, which also presides in the place of the region of the Romans, worthy of God, worthy of honour, worthy of the highest happiness, worthy of praise, worthy of obtaining her every desire, worthy of being deemed holy, and which presides over love, is named from Christ, and from the Father, which I also salute in the name of Jesus Christ, the Son of the Father”
Those links might help:
http://www.unamsanctamcatholicam.co...y/98-papal-primacy-in-the-first-councils.html
http://catholicismhastheanswer.com/quotes-on-the-supremacy-and-primacy-of-peter/

Hope this is helpful. It would be also notable that during East-West Schism of 1054, Orthodox Saint, George the Hagiorite, Monk from Georgia, defended “inerrancy (infallibility) of Roman Church” despite being so far from Rome or Latin influence.

 

[GiftofMercy]

It is not Adam asking all these questions, it is Michael

 

[po18guy]

Read the Didache. A quick read, it was written while the Apostle John was still living. It details the earliest of Christian beliefs and practices. Very Sacramental and not a peep about scripture of any type. An illuminating video with early Church fathers references is this one from Dr. William Marshner, a Lutheran theologian and convert.

 

[thistle]

I heard an interesting discussion of Hebrews chapter 10 on EWTN and it provoked some questions.

A: What’s the historical record concerning papal supremacy? When was the Holy Father accepted as the Head of the Church?

I ask because some historians and Protestants argue that it was Constantine the Great who headed the Church and that the Pope wasn’t the Head. Maybe that’s just polemics.

B: When did the sacramental system of ours be fully in place and was that before Saint Eusebius of Caesarea wrote his History?

C: What did the Mass look like before the codification of Sacred Scripture?

D: Why do we celebrate the Sabbath and the Sacrifice of the Mass on Sundays?

The same historical source I read said that it was Constantine the Great that shifted the Sabbath to Sunday; taking it over from the cult of Sol Invictus.

I believe we celebrate the Sabbath on Sunday because that’s the day Our Lord Resurrected.

You would be well advised to start a thread for each of your questions. It gets too confusing trying to discuss so many topics in one thread.

 

[Hodos]

I ask because some historians and Protestants argue that it was Constantine the Great who headed the Church and that the Pope wasn’t the Head. Maybe that’s just polemics.

I think this would be a misunderstanding. Constantine was separate from the Church, he was a secular emperor. However, he used his influence as the emperor to advocate for the Council of Nicaea (good thing). At times though, his influence wasn’t so great (exiling Athanasius multiple times and advocating on behalf of Arian bishops, for example). There is no doubt that Constantine called for and presided over the Council of Nicaea, and that the Bishop of Rome did not attend (as did most of the Bishops from the Western portion of the empire). This lends credence to both Protestant and Roman Catholic historians who claim that the office of the Pope, and its influence on the Church, was something that developed over time. Current views of the papacy just don’t fit when you try to read them anachronistically back into history.

 

[SeraficLeo]

The Pope’s personal absence from the Council vouchsafed the integrity and independence of the Church as distinct from the secular power and authority. It minimized the effectiveness of scheming at the council and the effectiveness of intimidation tactics on the members present, wherever its source (you might be able to bully participants, but it’s tougher to bully the Pope back in Rome, who’s assent was required for final, authoritative ratification by the Church). The Pope was always represented, however, uniquely by his legates.

From the earliest records we have a kind of negative witness to the unique place and position of the Roman Church, namely the fact that every heretic and heresy seems to have made it a priority to convince the Roman Church of its acceptability or orthodoxy. This implies that Roman approbation carried great weight across the Christian world. Again as a negative example, we have the response of a bishop from the region of Palestine bitterly complaining about the Bishop of Rome’s rather grandiose claims to his own prerogatives in the Church - and while it is true he complains about this and accuses the Roman bishop of being proud or boastful, he also notes those basic claims and even, if memory serves, that the Roman bishop linked himself not only directly to Saint Peter but even made reference to the significance of the keys. The point here is that such claims were known to the Church and even in the East from at least the 200s A.D., long before the first ecumenical councils.

 

[vern_humphrey]

A: What’s the historical record concerning papal supremacy? When was the Holy Father accepted as the Head of the Church?

The Apostles regarded Peter as the leader. The dignity of the seat descends to the successors, so all Bishops of Rome were considered the head of the church on earth thereafter. The fourth Pope, Clement, wrote to the Corinthians, who had driven out some of their clergy, and directed to take them back. They obeyed.

I ask because some historians and Protestants argue that it was Constantine the Great who headed the Church and that the Pope wasn’t the Head. Maybe that’s just polemics.

Constantine was not a Catholic. Near the end of his life he was baptized as an Aryan by Eusebius of Constantinople.

What did the Mass look like before the codification of Sacred Scripture?

The earliest description of the Mass is found in the First Apology of Justin, about 150 AD. It substantially follows today’s Mass.

Why do we celebrate the Sabbath and the Sacrifice of the Mass on Sundays?

Because that’s the day of the Resurrection – see Justin’s First Apology.

The same historical source I read said that it was Constantine the Great that shifted the Sabbath to Sunday; taking it over from the cult of Sol Invictus.

Constantine became Emperor more that 150 years after Justin wrote his First Apology.

 

[Bon_Croix]

St. Irenaeus wrote of deferring to Papacy long before Constantine’s birth.

 

[otjm]

To a certain extent, the issue of the Pope as head of the Church is asking the results of a question that was not being asked as such and wasn’t for a long time. It would appear (and appearance may not be an answer) that by the time of the break in 1054 that papal supremacy was set; but the break itself indicates that not everyone was on board with that issue. The Pope was the head of the Church, but much of the issue seemed to revolve around the “first among equals”, and disputes seemed to be resolved often without sending the issue to Rome. As to when the papacy took on more authority (or perhaps the inverse; when less authority was perceived in local areas) is fodder for historians.

 

[dochawk]

what @otjm said . . .

there was no question about Rome’s primacy in the early church, but “supremacy” is, as he said, a much later question that wasn’t asked. Too often, one is assumed to mandate the other . . .

also, the papal election were subject to confirmation by the Byzantine Emperor . . .

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

also, the papal election were subject to confirmation by the Byzantine Emperor . . .

Actually, is there any occasion where Pope did not claim his office because of disapproval of Emperor? Just curious. I know about Byzantine Papacy period and need of Imperial confirmation, but am not sure about whether empire ever controlled papacy in reality.

 

[dochawk]

I don’t know if it ever happened in the byzantine period (but then, the fact that he could likely carried over to the elections . . .), but it did happen at the beginning of the 20th

Wikipedia shows eleven cases of veto from 1644 to 1903 (after which the next choice was seated and changed the law).

Jus exclusivae - Wikipedia

Also see a history at

Papal conclave - Wikipedia

In short, the Western (old Rome) emperor was asked to settle a disputed election in 418. In 533 Pope John II recognized the right of Ostrogothic kings to ratify the election, which would pass to the byzantine emperor–and the pope wouldn’t take office until ratified. No mention is made of exercise, but due to distance, this changed to notification. After this, the Holy Roman Emperor, and then multiple Catholic emperors held a veto . . .

I knew some of this, but didn’t realize that it was that common . . .

Also, after Constantinople fell, the muslim sultan had a rather significant role in choosing eastern Patriarch . . .

 

[Michael16]

Thank you everyone for your helpful replies. My next question is, @dochawk is why were laymen having a role in papal elections? In my mind, laymen having a role, even emperors; seems disturbing to me. I’d think that it should be only churchmen having a role in electing a Pope.

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

Actually lay people of Rome had influence in elections too- not just clergy. Laity choosing their bishops was practice for loooong time- until it got abused by bribes from nobles and Latin Church stopped it. Not sure about East.

 

[OrbisNonSufficit]

Thanks, that is helpful.