May 19, 2011 – Catechism 857-862

Really I only have two thoughts about the apostolic succession from the Apostles. To things are very clear towards the end of the Gospels and the beginning of Acts that it I think put in to question what some people think about the Catholic Church and its bishops and their link to the Apostles. People criticize the Catholic Church for its mistakes in its human failings in the leaders of the Church, but I think we have to look at Judas as one of the followers of Christ and the mistakes he made and the betrayal he accomplished as well as the cowardice of Peter in his denial of Christ. These were the Apostles that Christ chose to be his emissaries throughout the world, and yet they have these human weaknesses. For somebody to say and that the Catholic Church is not legitimate because of its human weaknesses is to ignore the fact that Christ chose men to be his Apostles that clearly show their human weaknesses in the most important difficulties that Christ endured.

Also we see and the idea of succession of the Apostles and that they felt it was very important to keep the office filled. It appears their understanding was not that Christ chose individual men to be the Apostles for their life and then when they died there would be no more Apostles. Is very clear from Acts and how they acted to replace the Judas' vacancy that they understood there was to be a succession of the office of Apostle. The succession is what we understand in the Catholic Church as the bishops that have been developed and laid out over the last 2000 years. So both the idea of human frailty in the bishops and the succession to of bishops, however criticized by some outside the Catholic Church, appear from the Gospels and the beginning of acts to be very Biblical understandings.