10 ‘Catholic at Heart’: Our Common Fundamentals are the Catholic Faith of the Undivided Early Catholic Church
Go To the Beginning of this Book Excerpts from The Bible’s ‘Big Picture’
“Catholic at Heart” – What Fundamentally Orthodox Protestant/Evangelical/Pentecostal Christians and Eastern Orthodox Christians and Catholic Christians Are Already United in Is Precisely the Catholic Faith of the Undivided Early Catholic Church
According to the standards of the Early Church (which called itself the Catholic Church, because it was the Catholic (Universal) Communion of Orthodox Christian Sister Churches), “doctrinally conservative,” traditionally orthodox Protestant/Evangelical Christians are “Catholic at heart” while “doctrinally liberal” Protestant Christians who question, doubt, or deny the traditional Christian fundamentals and the traditional Bible Canon itself are “Protestant at heart.” This is because the vast common Christian faith which fundamentally orthodox Protestant/ Evangelical/ Pentecostal Christians (and Eastern Orthodox Christians) and Catholic Christians are already united in is precisely the Catholic faith, with its traditional New Testament and its traditional essential “fundamental” Christian doctrines as articulated by the Early Church Councils of Catholic overseers (bishops/eparchs, patriarchs and popes) in official settlement of the many early Christian CONTROVERSIES over these issues (Catholic Tradition and Magisterium understood as functions of the mystery revealed in the Bible (Ephesians 5:32 etc.) that the Church is the “Body of Christ” and the thus the “pillar and foundation of the truth” – 1Timothy 3:15). For Protestant Christians to attack or criticize the Catholic Church out of desire to remain in protest against it is to attack the historical and the only solid foundation for the New Testament Canon and the traditional fundamentals of orthodox Christianity.
All non-Catholic Christians who believe in the traditional fundamental tenets of orthodox Christianity believe in the Bible (including the Catholic Church’s New Testament fixed in a very Catholic process from 367-405 AD) as interpreted by Catholic Sacred Tradition as clarified by the Catholic Magisterium (teaching office) of overseers (bishops/eparchs, patriarchs and popes) at the Undivided Early Catholic Church’s Ecumenical and other major Councils . God has revealed Himself not only through the written Word of the Bible, but through the Living Word, Jesus Christ Himself, and the Bible calls the Church on Earth the Body of Christ. Jesus the Head of the Body spoke through His Body, the Undivided Early Catholic Church (with its Sacred Tradition and Magisterium of overseer/bishops and popes guided “into all truth” by the Holy Spirit as per Jesus’s John 16:13 promise), when this Catholic Church collected and officially defined the New Testament Canon and clearly articulated and developed the only proper fundamental interpretations of the Bible which all orthodox (non-heretical) Christians accept, and which make them all Catholic at heart. All traditional, fundamentally orthodox Christians act just like Catholics where it matters most!
Thus to avoid in the long term the Protestant “doctrinal liberalism” which is the mature form of Protestantism, with its uncertainty or unorthodoxy, currently orthodox Protestant churches must eventually (this process cannot be rushed) formalize their relationship with the Catholic Church they already belong to “in heart” by their commitment to the traditional Catholic New Testament and traditional Catholic Christian fundamentals. But, according to the model of the Undivided Early Catholic Church’s Catholic Communion of orthodox Sister Churches and the precedents of former Nestorian and other heretics or schismatics who later recanted their errors and rejoined the ancient Catholic Christian communion they had left in their own reunified Sister Churches (such as the Chaldean Rite of the Catholic Church), “Catholic at heart” Protestant churches must not simply rejoin the Roman Rite of the Catholic Church they left but form new Rites/Sister Churches within the Catholic Communion. Such new Rites would allow them as Catholic Christians to be permanently solid in Christian orthodoxy (to ensure they avoid the fate of so many once-but-no-longer-orthodox Protestant churches, like the one I was raised in), while at the same time formally enriching the Catholic Communion with their particular Evangelical strengths and gifts from God, as one of its Sister Churches (they already informally enrich the Catholic Communion which has already borrowed many good things, especially worship songs, from “Catholic at heart” Protestants).
This formal reunion of “Catholic at heart” Protestant Christians with the Catholic Church (for the benefit of all sides) is something that will take much time, as both Catholic and Protestant Christians have to get used to thinking about Christian unity the way the Undivided Early Church lived it. The great majority of today’s Catholic Christians are Roman Rite Catholic Christians who because of their numerical dominance for centuries got used to mistakenly thinking the Catholic Church was just their one Roman Rite of the Catholic Church, and these Roman Catholics are only just starting to learn and get used to the fact that their huge Rite is only one of the Sister Churches in the ancient and unbroken Catholic (Universal) Christian Communion of orthodox Christian Sister Churches known collectively as the Catholic Church – as their own recent 21st Ecumenical Council (Vatican Council II) at last clearly and officially defined (at Vatican II all the minority Eastern Rite Catholic overseers/bishops/eparchs were appropriately influential, getting the majority Roman Rite overseer/bishops to recognize the Catholic Church always was and was always meant to be much more than the Roman Catholic Sister Church, despite its current huge size). So not only will fundamentally orthodox, therefore “Catholic at heart” Protestant/ Evangelical/ Pentecostal churches (and Eastern Orthodox Churches already virtually the same as Eastern Catholic Rites) have to become ready to formalize their relationship with the Catholic Church they already belong to in heart by their traditional Christian orthodoxy, but today’s Catholic Christians will also have to become ready to welcome large numbers of non-Roman Rite Christians of many older and newer Rites back into the ancient Catholic Communion of orthodox Sister Churches. The 21st Ecumenical Council (Vatican II) has already laid the groundwork for serious dialogue about this to happen, which will have to be engaged in by all sides patiently and lovingly “so that the world may believe,” as Jesus made it clear the world’s belief in Him is contingent upon our loving Christian unity (John 17:21,23).
© 2007, 2009 Peter William John Baptiste SFO
Go To the Beginning of this Book Excerpts from The Bible’s ‘Big Picture’