Apologeticae sive Theologiae Fundamentalis, Tomus II (Pars Altera): Demonstratio Catholica

From what has been said, the primacy, while Peter lived, was exercised and acknowledged in the Church. It is asked, however, whether, once he died, the primatial prerogative also perished, or whether rather it endures perpetually in the successors of Peter. That the primacy begun in blessed Peter is continued perennially is concluded from the very institution of the primatial office, and indeed from the fact, from the words, and from the end of the institution.

1. From the fact that Christ instituted the primacy. For "the monarchical form of government, which Christ conferred upon the Church instituted by Himself, must be said to persevere as long as Christ abrogates it or converts it into another, aristocratic or democratic, form. For no one but the author of the Church is permitted to convert its form into another, and thereby to destroy the prior one. But Christ nowhere promised that He would convert its form into another, nor did He do anything by which such a future change is intimated. Rather, since He promised that the Church instituted by Him would be everlasting, He at the same time indicated that its monarchical form also would be everlasting. For if another form succeeded the monarchical one, another Church would succeed, since a society is changed by an essential change of the form of government, as is evident when, somewhere a monarchy having been converted into a republic, the new civil society, the republic, is said to have succeeded the old one, the monarchy."¹

Against this the adversaries wrongly object: "The primacy was Peter's personal prerogative; therefore it was extinguished by his death." The primacy was indeed Peter's personal prerogative, inasmuch as it was proper to Peter alone, not common to the other apostles; but it was not a personal prerogative in the sense that it was granted to Peter as a private person. Rather, Peter received the primacy as a public person, i. e., as the supreme pastor of the Church. But an office that is public, or that regards the good of the Church, ought never to have ceased. The rights that a prince acquires are acquired for the kingdom, and when the prince dies they remain proper to the kingdom. Thus the primatial right, which prince Peter obtained, he obtained for the Church, and hence it is to endure perennially in the Church.²

2. From the words by which Christ instituted the primacy. It is easily shown that the words by which Christ promised and conferred the primacy regard Peter not as a private person shortly to die, but as a person to live perpetually in his successors.

a) The words of the promise constitute Peter the indestructible foundation of the Church: "Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it." But a foundation must endure as long as the building will stand. Now Christ so founded His Church that it would be everlasting; hence by that very fact He does not allow its foundation to be withdrawn when Peter dies. This is clear a fortiori, because Christ foretells that the Church will be attacked perpetually, and yet will never be destroyed by the gates of hell, because it has Peter as its foundation. Thus by that very fact the Petrine foundation is to endure perennially. Hence Leo the Great: "The firmness of the foundation, upon which the whole height of the Church is built, is not assailed by any mass of the temple incumbent upon it. For the solidity of that faith which was praised in the prince of the apostles is perpetual; and just as what he believed in Christ remains, so what Christ instituted in Peter remains . . . The disposition of truth, therefore, remains, and blessed Peter, persevering in the strength of the rock he received, has not relinquished the governance of the Church he undertook."³

Peter is moreover constituted the key-bearer of the kingdom of heaven, endowed with the divine power of binding and loosing: "And I will give to thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven. And whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth, it shall be bound also in heaven: and whatsoever thou shalt loose upon earth, it shall be loosed also in heaven." But the key-bearer of the kingdom of heaven must be present and discharge the office of binding and loosing as long as the everlasting Church shall endure. For he bears the keys and is commanded to bind and loose not for Peter's advantage, but for the Church's benefit. In this sense Tertullian: "Remember that here the Lord left his keys [of the kingdom of heaven] to Peter and through Peter to the Church."⁴ And Augustine teaches that the keys were given to Peter as to one bearing the person of the Church.⁵

b) The words of the conferral establish Peter as the supreme pastor to feed the whole flock of Christ. But to the flock of Christ belong all the sheep and lambs without restriction of time, i. e., the bishops and the faithful of both the apostolic and the post-apostolic age. Therefore Peter must feed not only those, but also these — indeed, in his successors. But indeed, if the primatial pastorate had ceased with the death of Peter, the flock of Christ would from then on be without a shepherd, i. e., the visible body of Christ would be without a visible head — a truncated body. That this is absurd is evident of itself. A fortiori, however, the thesis shines forth:

3. From the end for which Christ instituted the primacy. Christ conferred the primacy upon Peter to preserve the unity of the Church. But the necessity of preserving ecclesiastical unity urges perpetually. Therefore, even after the death of the prince of the apostles, the primacy endures. It is proved thus:

Major. That Christ conferred the primacy upon Peter to preserve the unity of the Church is established both implicitly by the nature of the matter and explicitly by the will of Christ manifested in word. By its nature, a supreme government entrusted to a single physical person singularly tends to preserve the moral unity of a society. St. Thomas gives the reason for this: "For . . . that which is one of itself can be the cause of unity more fittingly than many united."⁶ Hence wherever the author of nature wished to promote the strictest unity, He chose monarchical government: think of the domestic society, over which He placed the father of the family, and likewise of the religious society of the Old Testament, over which He placed the high priest. Likewise in civil societies, even in those constituted democratically, on the occasion of a revolution a dictatorial government is instituted to recover unity. Indeed St. Jerome writes: "Even dumb animals and the herds of wild beasts follow their leaders. Among bees there are princes; cranes follow one in an ordered line. There is one emperor, one judge of a province. Rome, as soon as it was founded, could not have two brothers as kings at the same time, and it is consecrated by parricide . . . The individual bishops of the churches, the individual archpriests, and the whole ecclesiastical order rest upon their own rulers."⁷ Therefore it is to be presumed that Christ also granted the primacy to Peter for this end, that the unity of the Church might be intimately preserved. In truth this will of Christ is expressly manifested in those titles given to Peter the primate: rock, key-bearer, shepherd. Peter is called the rock of the Church because, like a foundation, he unites all the parts of the ecclesiastical building; he is called the key-bearer of the kingdom of heaven because, as a true steward, he rules the united Church and keeps factions away from it; he is called the shepherd because he is bound to unite the sheep of Christ in his own person. Therefore the unity of the Church is the end to be attained through the Petrine primacy.

Minor. But the necessity of preserving ecclesiastical unity always urges,⁸ since the Church must always remain one within and without, the one spouse of Christ, the one body of Christ, the one fold, the one house of God — in brief, since the most ardent desire of Christ always urges: "That they may be one."⁹ Indeed, the necessity of preserving unity urges much more in the post-apostolic age than in that apostolic time, when the Church was less widely diffused; when "the multitude of believers had one heart and one soul"¹⁰; when the memory of Christ the Lord, still living, remained fixed in minds; when finally the individual apostles, by their authority and personal infallibility, more easily held the Church throughout the world in unity.¹¹

Conclusion. Therefore, even after the death of the prince of the apostles, the primacy endures — that distinguished means and bond of ecclesiastical unity chosen and instituted by Christ Himself. This indeed the Fathers proclaim with one voice, and among them especially Cyprian in his golden little book "De catholicae ecclesiae unitate".¹² This the council of Ephesus declared.¹³ This the Vatican council again proposed for belief, teaching: "But that the episcopate itself might be one and undivided, and that the whole multitude of believers might be preserved in the unity of faith and communion through priests adhering to one another, placing blessed Peter before the other apostles, He instituted in him the perpetual principle of both unities . . . What the Lord Christ, prince of pastors and great shepherd of the sheep, instituted in blessed Peter the apostle for the perpetual salvation and perennial good of the Church, that, by the same author, must endure continuously in the Church, which, founded upon the rock, will stand firm even to the end of the ages . . . If anyone, therefore, shall say that it is not by the institution of Christ the Lord Himself or by divine right that blessed Peter has perpetual successors in the primacy over the whole Church . . . let him be anathema."¹⁴