HAS THE CATHOLIC CHURCH REPENTED?

February 17, 1998 (David W. Cloud, Fundamental Baptist Information Service, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061-0368, fbns@wayoflife.org) - We have published articles discussing the apologies of Pope John Paul II. A new book addresses this issue. It is titled When a Pope Asks Forgiveness: The Mea Culpa’s of John Paul II. Author Luigi Accattoli is Vatican correspondent for the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera. The book was first published in Italian in 1997. The English language translation was subsequently published this year.

APOLOGIES ARE PREPARING FOR CHRISTIAN UNITY

The apologies of John Paul II are in the context of his ecumenical goals. The ecumenical movement of this century is built upon the thesis that the division of denominations and churches is a sin. As early as 1920, the Anglican Church, at its Lambeth Conference, announced: "We acknowledge this condition of broken fellowship to be contrary to God’s will, and we desire frankly to confess our share in the guilt of thus crippling the Body of Christ and hindering the activity of his Spirit." The Faith and Constitution conference in Lausanne, 1927, also stated that the divisions of Christianity were a matter requiring repentance. The second World Council of Churches Assembly, Evanston, Illinois, 1954, proclaimed that "God has also given us a new awareness of the sin that characterizes the divided condition that we have inherited." Finally in 1964 the Catholic Church joined in with the ecumenical movement by the approval of the Decree on Ecumenism by the Second Vatican Council. (We have given excerpts from this decree in our book Is the Roman Catholic Changing, available from Way of Life Literature. This book is also available in the O Timothy Computer Library.)

UNITY WITH ROME IS THE GOAL OF ECUMENISM

It is crucial to understand that the Roman Catholic Church’s ecumenical activities have one, and only one, goal. Consider the following plain statement from Vatican II Council of the mid 1960s, which initiated Rome into the ecumenical movement:

"The term ‘ecumenical movement' indicates the initiatives and activities encouraged and organized, according to the various needs of the [Roman] Church and as opportunities offer, to promote Christian unity. ... The results will be that, little by little, as the obstacles to perfect ecclesiastical communion are overcome, ALL CHRISTIANS WILL BE GATHERED IN A COMMON CELEBRATION OF THE EUCHARIST, INTO THE UNITY OF THE ONE AND ONLY CHURCH, which Christ bestowed on his Church from the beginning. THE UNITY, WE BELIEVE, SUBSISTS IN THE CATHOLIC CHURCH AS SOMETHING SHE CAN NEVER LOSE" (Decree on Ecumenism, chap. 1, 4, p. 416).

Words could not be plainer. The Roman Catholic Church claims to be the one and only true church of Christ. It claims that in the RCC alone subsists true Christian unity. It claims that the papacy is the rock of unity, and that apart from proper relationship with the Catholic pope there is no unity. The New Catholic Catechism cites Vatican II when it says:

"The Pope, Bishop of Rome and Peter's successor, ‘is the perpetual and visible source and foundation of the unity both of the bishops and of the whole company of the faithful.’ ‘For the ROMAN PONTIFF, BY REASON OF HIS OFFICE AS VICAR OF CHRIST, AND AS PASTOR OF THE ENTIRE CHURCH HAS FULL, SUPREME AND UNIVERSAL POWER OVER THE WHOLE CHURCH, a power which he can always exercise unhindered.’"

JOHN PAUL II IS THE POPE OF ECUMENISM

John Paul II has been the pope of ecumenism. He has traveled the world in search of "Christian unity," meaning unity of all Christians with Rome. He was the first pope to travel to England. He has received a steady flow of representatives from major denominations. He has set up dialogue consultations with them.

The pope’s apologies can only be understood in the context of these ecumenical pursuits. Roger Schutz, founder of the influential ecumenical community at Taize, stated it like this: "We are not trying to find out who was wrong and who was right, but to reconcile ourselves to one another" (International gathering of youth, Notre Dame, Paris, Dec. 29, 1978). The author of When a Pope Asks Forgiveness, Luigi Accattoli, after surveying the papal texts touching on this subject, discerningly summarized the entire affair by saying: "Pope John Paul had the idea that reciprocal forgiveness was the preferred way for the ecumenical movement to follow" (p. 96). On May 31, 1980 Pope John Paul II, meeting in Paris with leaders of other denominations, stated:

"First and foremost, and in the dynamics of the movement toward unity, our personal and community memory must be purified of the memory of all the conflicts, injustice and hatred of the past. This purification is carried out through mutual forgiveness…" (Accattoli, p. 96).

The pope’s goal for the Great Jubilee 2000 is stated in the following papal memorandum sent to Catholic cardinals in 1994:

"The immanence of the end of the second millennium invites all to an examination of conscience and to suitable ecumenical initiatives, so that in the face of the Great Jubilee they may find themselves, if not fully reconciled, at least in less opposition and division than they were during the course of this second millennium."

That same year the pope said, "We cannot come before Christ, the Lord of history, as divided as we have unfortunately been during the second millennium" (John Paul II, Extraordinary Consistory, St. Peter’s, Rome, June 13, 1994).

Pope John Paul II claims that the division of Christianity is a sin. In his famous Encyclical, Ut Unum Sint (That They May Be One), he said: "Christian unity is possible, provided that we are humbly conscious of having sinned against unity and are convinced of our need for conversion." He is not talking about conversion from being lost to being saved. He is talking about conversion from disunity to unity, conversion by repenting of the "sin" of division.

THE ISSUE IS NOT VIOLENCE, BUT AUTHORITY

The pope has issued mild, general apologies for the Inquisition and a few other matters, but they have not dealt with the heart of the issue. To repent biblically in regard to the Inquisition, the Roman Catholic Church would have to address the issue of authority. This is not what is happening. The Roman Catholic Church is calling for a "Great Jubilee" for the year 2000 to promote ecumenical unity. The first Central Committee meeting for the Great Jubilee was held in February 1996, with 107 delegates from Catholic, Orthodox, Anglican, Lutheran, and Methodist denominations. The president of the Commission is Catholic Dominican priest Georges Cottier, theologian of the "papal household." (The Dominican priests were at the forefront of carrying out the horrible Inquisition.) In conjunction with the Great Jubilee, two international congresses, to be held in Rome, are proposed to re-evaluate history and to remove obstacles to denominational unity. One will evaluate the Inquisition. Priest Cottier described the type of inquisition injustices which will be addressed:

"The acceptance of denunciations and the safeguarding of the secrecy of the accusers; the usual exclusion of a defender; the excessive widening of the definition of heresy; the use of torture, even within the limits and restrictions of the law; and the death penalty are all acts contrary to the genuine spirit of the Gospel" (Accattoli, When a Pope Asks Forgiveness, p. 79).

This type of thing misses the point. The Inquisition was wrong not merely because it was violent or merely because it trampled the rights of people, it was wrong because it was a wretched misappropriation of authority. The Roman Catholic Church does not now and never has had any God-given authority over Bible-believing people and churches. This is the heart of the matter. The Inquisition was carried out under the direct "authority" of the popes, but they had no God-given authority. They were usurpers. There is one Head of true churches, and that is the Lord Jesus Christ. It is not a sin to worship God apart from the Roman Catholic Church. It is not a sin to be separated from Rome. It is not a sin to reject Rome’s heresies. It is not a sin to be divided from error. The RCC is not a biblical church in any sense whatsoever. It has absolutely no God-given authority. It is strictly a man-made institution. Unless it acknowledges this, the RCC has not repented in any biblical fashion.

Having addressed the authority issue, the RCC, if were to it truly repent of its sin, would call upon its members to reject the false gospel of Roman sacramentalism and be born again through faith in the finished work of Jesus Christ and to join sound New Testament assemblies. It would then disband its unscriptural institution forever.

Don’t be deceived. The Roman Catholic Church has not repented.

For a description of the horrible Inquisition see the author’s book ROME AND THE BIBLE: TRACING THE HISTORY OF THE ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH AND ITS PERSECUTION OF THE BIBLE AND OF BIBLE BELIEVERS, 200 pages, 1996, Way of Life Literature, P.O. Box 610368, Port Huron, MI 48061-0368, fbns@wayoflife.org.