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In an Age of Relativism, the Catholic Church is the Voice of Truth

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'Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice'

Truth is under attack in our nation, and, consequently, many have lost sight of its importance and beauty. Even so, the desire for truth remains, albeit it often lay dormant under the influences of a world laced with distraction, misguided purpose, and the various "isms" which pervade our culture.

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Highlights

GLADE PARK, CO (Catholic Online) -- "All the evils which poison men and nations and trouble so many hearts have a single cause and a single source: ignorance of the truth---and at times even more than ignorance, a contempt for truth and a reckless rejection of it. Thus arise all manner of errors, which enter the recesses of men's hearts and the bloodstream of human society as would a plague. These errors turn everything upside down: they menace individuals and society itself."

Considering the course of events in our nation which have taken place over the past half-century, the above words from Pope John XXIIIs encyclical "On Truth, Unity, and Peace" (Ad Petri Cathedram 6), issued on 29 June 1959, were indeed prophetic. At present, much of western society, so profuse with the odor of militant secularism, not only has little regard for the truth, but labors unceasingly yet futilely in an attempt to destroy it. Hatred or apathy or skepticism toward the truth is nothing new, however: Pilate asked our Lord Jesus Christ: "What is truth?" and then proceeded to order our Savior's crucifixion-an order which, as evil as it was, brought the promise of eternal life to humankind.

Truth is under attack in our nation, and, consequently, many have lost sight of its importance and beauty. Even so, the desire for truth remains, albeit it often lay dormant under the influences of a world laced with distraction, misguided purpose, and the various "isms" which pervade our culture. Nevertheless, it is in the desire for truth, which God has hard-wired into the human intellect, that man begins his great search for what is and what is not. Consequently, man asks, "What lies beyond my human vision; what is the purpose of my life; why am I here?" This leads to a more all-encompassing question: "What is reality?" It is in this search that, provided we are prayerful and sincere, we begin to discover the insanity brought on by lack of concern for the truth.

Further, we begin to recognize that the ultimate truth, the reality of our existence, the essence of what is and what is not, cannot be attained by man's own efforts. Man of himself cannot access the totality of reality. It is beyond our capability. Thus those who continue to seek recognize the need to seek the Other, the Author of life and truth. We here encounter God's revelation: yet man does not reach up and discover the transcendent God and then pull him down in order to know him and understand him. Rather, it is God who stoops down to man and reveals himself. It is God who says, "This is reality, this is what is." We can be certain that what God has revealed is absolutely true by virtue of the fact that he is Creator. God said of himself, "I am who am" (Exod. 3:14).

Listen To My Voice

Christians recognize that the answer to every question of truth and reality is found in the Son of God who assumed human flesh and became the Person of Jesus Christ. It is our Lord and Savior who said, "For this I was born and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice" (John 18:37). The question, then, is this: "How do we listen to the voice of Jesus?" Here we arrive at yet another discovery. We must either admit that we cannot listen to the voice of Jesus---atheists frequently point out that the present state of disunity found in Christendom proves no one knows or hears the truth---or that it is possible to listen to it but few are doing so. Is it possible to listen to the voice of Jesus? Yes, it must be, since Christ himself said: "Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice."

At this point some will insist that they indeed listen to Jesus' voice in the Bible. It is thought that, provided a person prays for guidance from the Holy Spirit, the truth will be revealed in the words of Scripture. However, such an idea implies that we ought to agree on what Scripture means. After all, the Holy Spirit is not divided: he does not first say this and then that. History has unequivocally shown the Scripture alone experiment to be a failure. While it is true that God speaks to us through his Inspired Word, and that reading Scripture is of vital importance, the fullness of truth cannot be attained through private, subjective interpretation of Scripture.

It is important to remember that when Jesus Christ said, "Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice," the New Testament did not yet exist, nor would it as a whole for many years (1 Thess. appeared in the 50s, while it is thought that the gospel of John was not written until the 90s). How did the early Christians listen to the voice of Jesus after the Ascension? The answer lies in the fact that the Twelve transmitted the revelation of Jesus Christ to the world. But that is not the whole of it, since they all, save St. John, soon died martyrs' deaths. Obviously, we have circled back to our original problem. How do we, here and now, listen to Jesus' voice?

It would be a serious error to imagine that God did not take this situation into account. Our Lord Jesus clearly said that those who belong to the truth listen to his voice. Therefore it must be possible for us to listen to our Savior---here in the present, today. And indeed it is. Jesus made his voice available to all generations in his infallible Catholic Church established on St. Peter (see Matt. 16:17-19) some twenty centuries ago. To borrow from Rev. John O'Brien, the Catholic Church possesses deed and title to the fullness of truth. While that may seem a leap to some, it is simply a conclusion drawn from Scripture, history, and reason. God does not make mistakes. He most certainly would not allow his Son to die on the cross only to have mankind muddle the truth and integrity of his divine revelation in a few short years.

Through apostolic succession and the authority conferred on the Church by God himself, we have mother Church as faithful guardian and transmitter of the truth for all people---in every place and state of life. The voice of the Church is the life-giving nourishment which both feeds and satisfies the human quest to know what lies beyond the senses, to understand the ultimate meaning and purpose of life, to see deeply and clearly into reality as it is. This is so because it is Christ, the way and the truth and the life (John 14:6), who gives the Church her life, light and mission. In the Church we listen to the voice of Christ and belong to the truth. It is the Church who illumines what is, unveiling the reality of things to mankind.

The Catholic Church: A Mother Whose Infallible Eyes See Reality

In his book Theology and Sanity, Frank Sheed points out the critical importance of seeing as the Church sees: the advantage of uniting our human intellect to the Church's divinely guided vision is "that the Universe the Church sees is the real Universe, because she is the Church of God. Seeing what she sees means seeing what is there. And just as loving what is good is sanctity, or the health of the will, so seeing what is there is sanity, or the health of the intellect" (22).

If seeing as the Church sees is sanity, then the Church sees the truth: she sees with infallible eyes. Some, however, find the concept of infallibility difficult to swallow---a problem which is most often due to misunderstanding. But is the Church an organic, divine and human institution who infallibly transmits God's revelation to the world? We have God's promise that she is. The Church is guided by the Holy Spirit into all truth (John 16:13); she speaks with Christ's own voice (Luke 10:16); Christ is with his Church always (Matt. 28:20); the Church is the final arbiter in matters of moral dispute (Matt. 18:15-17); and the authority of binding and loosing is conferred on the Church (Matt. 18:18).

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The above Scripture passages emphasize very clearly the fact that the Church is an infallible, definite and specific Church. She is not, on the other hand, simply an abstract concept in which the word "church" is used synonymously with the word "Christian." Catholics do not believe in a church; they believe the Church. For example, in Matthew's gospel we find Jesus instructing his disciples on the Church's authority over morals: "If your brother sins (against you), . . . [and] refuses to listen even to the church, then treat him as you would a Gentile or a tax collector" (18:15-17). Obviously, according to the words of our Savior, the Church possesses the authority to rule on faith and morals. "Amen, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven" (Matt. 18:18).

But why should we be concerned with the topic of infallibility? Is it not enough to be Christian? Fr. Ronald Walls wrote: "[Infallibility] is important because it has to do with the possibility of our learning the truth. In order to live a good and happy life men and women must have a grasp on the truth. They must know how life can be conformed to reality, to the way things have been designed; they must know something at least about the mind of the One who created things and made them as they are" (The Catholic Faith, Mar./Apr. 1998).

In a word, no infallible Church, no true Christian religion. It is often difficult to understand why there is not a greater love for the truth; for every Christian, every person of good will, should find the truth as vital as life itself. Apart from the Church, man's pronouncements on what is, on the meaning of life and death and on whatever other spiritual notion one might care to raise, can be little but speculation.

St. Irenaeus wrote (c. 200 A.D.): "For where the Church is, there is the Spirit of God; and where the Spirit of God, there the Church and every grace. The Spirit, however, is Truth" (Against Heresies, 3, 24, 1).

Pope John XXIII implores us to recognize the purpose of our intellects which God has given us with love: "Some men, indeed do not attack the truth willfully, but work in heedless disregard of it. They act as though God had given us intellects for some purpose other than the pursuit and attainment of truth. This mistaken sort of action leads directly to that absurd proposition: one religion is just as good as another, for there is no distinction here between truth and falsehood" (APC 17).

Light Your Free Payer Candle for a departed loved one

What is Palm Sunday?

Live on March 20, 2024 @ 10am PDT

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F. K. Bartels is a Catholic writer who knows his Catholic Faith is one of the greatest gifts a man could ever have. He is a contributing writer for Catholic Online. Visit him also at catholicpathways.com

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