Why do we believe what we do?

[JoePa]

I am a new Catholic (confirmed last Easter) and want to better understand the basis for why we believe what we do. I’m talking about the doctrine laid out in the Catechism and Papal decrees of Infallability, etc.

My uneducated guess is Matthew 16:19. I read this to mean that Jesus, through the Holy Spirit, granted Peter, and subsequently all his successors, the authority and power to make known the truth as it has already been bound and loosed in Heaven.

More specifically, the Holy Spirit revealed these truths to Peter and his successors therefore the “rules of the church” were authored by God and not by man.

Having this understanding will help me cement my faith. Thanks for the assistance

 

[Didi]

Father John Corapi teaches that Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition and Magisterial Teaching all must co-exist; where one is, the others are there also. It’s like a three-legged stool; you remove one leg and it falls down. And they will never contradict each other.

Jesus, Himself, tells us to follow tradition in 1 Cor. 11:2 “I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you.” And Paul does also “So, then, brethren, **stand firm and hold to the traditions ** which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter.” (2 Thess. 2:15)

There was far too much that Jesus taught for it to all be written down: “But there are also many other things which Jesus did: were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.” (John 21:25)

This is why Jesus gave His authority to His apostles and to the Church which was founded by Peter: “…the church of the living God, the pillar and bulwark or the truth.” (1 Timothy 3:15)

“You, yourselves, are our letter of recommendation, written on your hearts, to be known and read by all men; and you show that you are a letter from Christ delivered by us, written not with ink but with the Spirit of the living God, not on tablets of stone, but on tablets of human hearts. Such is the confidence that we have through Christ toward God. Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to claim anything as coming from us; our sufficiency is from God, who has qualified us to be ministers of a new covenant, not written in code but in the Spirit.” (2 Cor 3:2-6)

We are also warned by Peter about making sure we have a teaching authority (which is the Magisterium of the Church) in 2 Peter 3:16: “So also our beloved brother Paul wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, speaking this as he does in all his letters. ** There are some things in them hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other scriptures**.”

We believe what we do because it was established by Jesus, who gave authority to the apostles, and both written and oral traditions and teachings have been passed down through their successors for 2000 years. The Truth does not and will not change. That is our awesome Catholic heritage!

 

[Eileen_T]

I just love Fr Corapi. I hope he comes out to NZ. We are so far away we have to rely on CDs and EWTN.

 

[Peace_Seeker_1]

as well!

Didi (well, Father Corapi!) sums it up quite well. Here’s something else to think about - the church came before the Bible We were established by Jesus, so everything we do is according to Tradition and Scripture!

Peace

 

[DianJo]

The one thing that helps me with this is that I remember that Jesus said He would send the Holy Spirit to the Apostles and that He would help them remember all that He taught them. Therefore everything that we were taught through Apostolic Succession is a direct result of the Holy Spirit intervention and can be nothing but truth!