Why is Catholicism the Correct Faith?

[VociMike]

Have you ever read this? It certainly made me think and do a lot of questioning. I need to read and research further.
sxws.com/charis/relics10.htm

What problem does this present to your faith? Do you think that Peter may not have even existed? That is the only point I was making, that he existed and that he wrote of Christ and that he died for his faith. Whether we have his relics or not doesn’t change any of this for me. How many famous people from 2000 years ago do we have indisputable bones of? Is this a requirement to believe they existed?

 

[VociMike]

No, I don’t think they made anything up, I do think they believed what they witnessed. The problem for me is that there are cultists who believe so strongly in their leaders that they too, believe in their miracles or what they’ve told their followers. Cultists have also died for their beliefs in what they witnessed and what they were told by their leaders.

But it was “their leaders” who died right along with them. Are you suggesting that all of the early Christians were deluded unto death? Is that really the most likely explanation? I would categorize it as an explanation desperate to avoid the obvious.

Oh, and what suicidal cult has survived for 2000 years? That alone should differentiate suicidal cults from the Church.

 

[Atreyu]

Have you ever read this? It certainly made me think and do a lot of questioning. I need to read and research further.
sxws.com/charis/relics10.htm

Would you like to read the findings of one of the archaeologists who discovered the supposed bones of Peter? You can do so here.

 

[Faith1960]

Would you like to read the findings of one of the archaeologists who discovered the supposed bones of Peter? You can do so here.

Thanks. I’ve read part of it and will read more later. Do you have anything like this written more recently? The link to the webpage I posted earlier was written long before yours and I’d like to compare the findings and opinions of more recent archaeologists.

 

[Faith1960]

What problem does this present to your faith? Do you think that Peter may not have even existed? That is the only point I was making, that he existed and that he wrote of Christ and that he died for his faith. Whether we have his relics or not doesn’t change any of this for me. How many famous people from 2000 years ago do we have indisputable bones of? Is this a requirement to believe they existed?

It makes me question what they really have there. I mean, they say they’re the bones of St. Peter, yet, there are more leg bones than humans have, there are bones belonging to a woman and bones from various animals. It makes me question the credibility of what the Church claims they have buried there.

 

[Faith1960]

But it was “their leaders” who died right along with them. Are you suggesting that all of the early Christians were deluded unto death? Is that really the most likely explanation? I would categorize it as an explanation desperate to avoid the obvious.

I don’t know, Mike, I wasn’t there. All I’m going by is what was suggested in the documentary I saw last night as well as other things I’ve watched and read over the years. I know the Catholic position but really, each side has valid points.

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[ricmat]

It makes me question what they really have there. I mean, they say they’re the bones of St. Peter, yet, there are more leg bones than humans have, there are bones belonging to a woman and bones from various animals. It makes me question the credibility of what the Church claims they have buried there.

If there were an attempt to perpetrate a fraud here, and the actual bones of St. Peter were “not available”, certainly the perpetrators would be smart enough to use some other human male’s bones.

Just because you read it on the internet doesn’t make it true. Back a few hundred years ago when I was growing up, folks used to say “I saw it on TV so it must be true.” Of course, it wasn’t all true then, and neither is internet fiction true.

 

[Atreyu]

Thanks. I’ve read part of it and will read more later. Do you have anything like this written more recently? The link to the webpage I posted earlier was written long before yours and I’d like to compare the findings and opinions of more recent archaeologists.

The book I linked to was written by an archaeologist who worked on the actual dig in the 20th century. The page you linked to was written by an ex-Catholic priest turned anti-Catholic who doesn’t even know the Catholic teaching on Papal Infallibility:
Bart Brewer:

Well . . . In 1956, the Vatican hired anthropologist Venerando Correnti to study the bones that Pius XII had certified had been found in the genuine tomb of Peter. It must be remembered that, when speaking ex cathedra in matters touching on faith and morals involving the whole church, the popes are infallible. And, certainly, the identification of the tomb and relics of Peter, of whom Pius XII was one of an unbroken line of successors, must touch on the faith of all the Catholic church. Wouldn’t you think?

No I most certainly would not think.

Brewer is not an archaeologist. I’m not sure that the book I linked to discusses the bones at all (in fact, it was written before the second pronouncement - this one by Paul VI - of the discovery of Peter’s bones), but the author of the book is 100 times more authoritative than Brewer no matter how you look at it. As for more recent articles on the subject, there was this one at the same website, written by the same author.

 

[VociMike]

It makes me question what they really have there. I mean, they say they’re the bones of St. Peter, yet, there are more leg bones than humans have, there are bones belonging to a woman and bones from various animals. It makes me question the credibility of what the Church claims they have buried there.

The Church got along for 1900 years without Peter’s bones. Why does it now rise and fall on Peter’s bones? I don’t get it.

 

[Atreyu]

It makes me question what they really have there. I mean, they say they’re the bones of St. Peter, yet, there are more leg bones than humans have, there are bones belonging to a woman and bones from various animals. It makes me question the credibility of what the Church claims they have buried there.

As I understand the events that surrounded the dig - including the pronouncements made by Pius XII and then Paul VI - the following occurred:

1. 
   *]The actual bones of Peter were found, but removed near the start of the dig to a nearby location in the Vatican Grottoes, without their significance realised.
   *]Some other bones were found, and various Catholic anthropologists proclaimed them to be the bones of Peter himself.
   *]Guided by his scientists, Pius XII made the pronouncement quoted by Brewer in his article.
   *]In comes the anthropologist Venerando Correnti who quickly realises that these bones couldn’t possible by the bones of Peter (some of them were female and there were too many leg bones - I’m not sure about what he may or may not have said about other animal bones being there).
   *]At some stage, it is determined that the bones should be in a particular place, but none are found there.
   *]At some later stage, it is realised that originally there were bones there, and that they were removed at the start of the dig.
   *]These bones are tested, and (quoting from the article I’ve linked to in this post):
   

   1. The cloth of purple interwoven with gold-thread in which the bones were wrapped at that time confirms the highest dignity then attributed to the remains. The royal purple harmonizes perfectly in fact with the royal porphyry which decorates the outside of the monument.

   1. The anthropological examination of the bones - belonging to a single individual - showed that they conform perfectly to what, by tradition, we can imagine was Peter’s physical appearance at the time of his martyrdom. Apart from the obvious fact that they belong to a male, the bones indicate a sturdy build and an age somewhere between 60 and 70.

   *]Paul VI now makes the second pronouncement.
   
   Apart from the bits of evidence mentioned in the article I linked to in this post, I was told - on a tour of the excavations themselves - that the bones found had bones from every part of the human body, except the feet. This fits in perfectly with the tradition, which states that Peter was crucified upside down, as his followers would have needed to remove his body quickly from the cross. Of course, I cannot verify this information. Note though that Brewer doesn’t verify any of his “archaeological evidence”. Where are his citations?

 

[Faith1960]

The Church got along for 1900 years without Peter’s bones. Why does it now rise and fall on Peter’s bones? I don’t get it.

It doesn’t rise or fall on that. For ME, though, that article, along with what I heard in the documentary, along with the back and forth, seemingly endless debates going between Catholic vs Protestant, Christian vs Agnostic, Athiest vs anyone with a belief in a Higher Power of any kind is confusing for me.

 

[Atreyu]

It doesn’t rise or fall on that. For ME, though, that article, along with what I heard in the documentary, along with the back and forth, seemingly endless debates going between Catholic vs Protestant, Christian vs Agnostic, Athiest vs anyone with a belief in a Higher Power of any kind is confusing for me.

Faith, there are a lot of people who speak against the Church. Many times, they actually misrepresent the Church’s teachings (as did Brewer in the article you linked to). Personally I hope that these people misrepresent the Church accidentally, out of ignorance. Yet I find it hard to believe that an ex-priest could get a teaching (the teaching on Papal Infallibility) so wrong - accidentally - that I suspect he must have done so on purpose. Why would he do so?

 

[Faith1960]

Faith, there are a lot of people who speak against the Church. Many times, they actually misrepresent the Church’s teachings (as did Brewer in the article you linked to). Personally I hope that these people misrepresent the Church accidentally, out of ignorance. Yet I find it hard to believe that an ex-priest could get a teaching (the teaching on Papal Infallibility) so wrong - accidentally - that I suspect he must have done so on purpose. Why would he do so?

I don’t know. I guess it’s possible that he really is that ignorant but I’d like to think priests are educated about Catholicism to a greater degree than most lay people. If he truly did write that on purpose, he obviously wants to sway people away from the Church. I’ve never seen such anti-Catholicism before until I came back to the Church last year. Maybe when I was growing up in the Church I was too young to understand or perhaps I was sheltered to the point I didn’t hear very much against our faith. As I got older, I either paid little attention or it’s gotten much worse lately. I’m not really sure, but it seems that there are a lot of people who are anti-Catholic these days. It could be that I’m more sensitive to this now. Last year when I called my mother-in-law to tell her that DH (he was raised Baptist) and I were going to have our marriage blessed (validated, whatever the correct term is ) and that she and my father-in-law were invited to the ceremony, she suddenly became very quiet and I sensed she was less than thrilled. After a few uncomfortable seconds of silence she said something to the effect of “if he really WANTS to do that” she would come to the ceremony but first she needed to talk it over with her husband.