The Fourth Mark: The Church is Apostolic

Submitted by the Catholic Evidence Guild of Guam

The Church is apostolic because she is founded on the apostles. Umm, ok, but what is an apostle? From the beginning of Jesus' ministry, he "called to him those whom he desired; ... and he appointed twelve, whom he named apostles to be with him, and to be sent out to preach" (Mk 3:13-14). From then on, they would also be his "emissaries" or "apostles" These emissaries were sent out with the command to baptize and teach all nations to observe all that Jesus commanded them (Mt 28:19-20) and assured by Jesus himself that: "Whoever listens to you listens to me. Whoever rejects you rejects me. And whoever rejects me, rejects the one who sent me." (Luke 10:16).

These were clearly intended to be men who led the Church in every way necessary and blessed with the graces to do so. Well, that was good for "Biblical" times, but does that apply now? And, if it does apply now, how is the Church founded by Christ "apostolic" today?

Let us start by looking again at Saint Paul's Letter to the Ephesians where he describes the structure of the Church. "So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the holy ones and members of the household of God, built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets with Christ Jesus himself as the capstone. Through him the whole structure is held together and grows into a temple sacred to the Lord; in him you are also being built together into a dwelling place of God in the Spirit" (Ephesians 2:19-22).

We see an image of a living structure "built upon the apostles" and held together by Christ Jesus which is growing into a "temple sacred to the Lord." How long will it grow? What does it finally look like?

In that other very Catholic book of the Bible, Revelations, we read of a scene described by Saint John the Apostle:"One of the seven angels ...came and said to me, `Come here. I will show the bride, the wife of the Lamb.' He took me in spirit to a great, high mountain and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God. It gleamed with the splendor of God. ... The wall of the city had twelve courses of stone as its foundation, on which were inscribed the twelve names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb" (Rev 21:9-14).

There, at the end of time, we see the completed Church, the Bride of the Lamb, coming down out of heaven no less founded on the apostles than on the day of Pentecost when the Catholic Church first burst out of the Upper Room. What about the time between Pentecost and Jesus' Second Coming? Once all the apostles died, that was it, right?

Well, Saint Luke the Evangelist describes an interesting scene immediately prior to Pentecost in his "Acts of the Apostles". Since Judas the Betrayer was numbered among the apostles, and Judas was now dead, either someone had to take his place as an apostle or gradually there would be no apostles! If the office of apostle was meant to be temporary, the Church could have just said "So long, Judas!" and moved on. This didn't happen, however, as Saint Rock (a.k.a. Peter) once again set the course for the Church.

"During those days Peter stood in the midst of the brothers. He said, . .. `Therefore, it is necessary that one of the men who accompanied us the whole time the Lord Jesus came and went among us...become with us a witness to his resurrection.' ...Then they gave lots to them and the lot fell upon Matthias, and he was counted with the eleven apostles." (Acts 1:15-26).

This solid demonstration that "apostle" was to be an office and not just a single person or group of persons was a fulfillment of Christ's prophetic founding of his Church on Rock so that "the gates of hell would not prevail against it" (Matthew 16:18). This office of apostle extended to Saint Peter's role as Pope, which we will address in our next article.