THE CHURCH'S sacramental life was established by Christ the Incarnate Word within the all-embracing procession of Divine Mercy. It was to his visible Church that Jesus entrusted his high-priestly sacramental ministry under the guardianship of the Holy Spirit: "And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained." [Jn 20:22-23]
CHRIST GAVE the "keys of the kingdom of heaven" [Mt 16:18-19] to Peter and entrusted him with the ministry of shepherding his flock. Under Peter's watchful eye, the sheep are watered and pastured in peace. The ministry of Peter—the rock on which Christ built his Church—binds the faithful securely to the love of Christ and looses them from captivity to sin and death. The name Petros (Gk.) means “rock”, and Jesus intended Peter and his successors to be the foundation of his Church throughout time.
APOSTOLIC FOUNDATION
MOREOVER, JESUS pointedly secures his institution of the Petrine ministry to his own absolute, unchanging and eternal high priesthood. The psalmist prophesied of Christ: "You are a priest for ever after the order of Melchizedek." [Psa 110:4] Thus the Barque of Peter possesses a "sure and steadfast anchor" [Heb 6:19], and the "powers of death shall not prevail against it". [Mt 16:18] This is not mere symbolism but rather the Church's indispensable and irreplaceable mission of reconciliation—not for a moment or an hour, a year or a lifetime but continuing until the close of the age. [cf. Mt 28:18-20]
THE COLLEGE of the Twelve with Peter at its head was not established by Christ as an expedient labor pool which would dissolve abjectly and embarrassingly after his ascension or on the death of the last apostle. Never will the apostolic foundation of the living Church be subjected to dissolution by corruption or death. The Holy Spirit is genuine. The Church's enduring apostolic and sacramental ministry is no less genuine. The Holy Spirit leads and guides the Church's pope and bishops in every generation.
"ONE, HOLY, CATHOLIC AND APOSTOLIC"
THE HEALING ministry of the Holy Spirit is authentic, and the Church's historic emphasis on God's generative love, immutable justice, and prodigal mercy is no less authoritative and valid. We believe that we will rise from the dead when Christ returns in his glory, and so we cry out, "O death, where is thy victory? O death, where is thy sting?" [1Cor 15:55] If the Church is to rescue sinners who are as good as dead in their sins, she herself must be free from failure or decay.
BECAUSE THE Church is betrothed to Christ as his Bride, she herself shares in his immortality: "Let us rejoice and exult and give him the glory, for the marriage of the Lamb has come, and his Bride has made herself ready; it was granted her to be clothed with fine linen, bright and pure"-- for the fine linen is the righteous deeds of the saints." [Rev 19:7-8]
THE "ONE, holy, catholic and apostolic Church” did not create herself at the beginning nor will she re-create or dissolve herself in submission to the present generation. The Church is no more a designer accessory than God's own eternal heaven. Indeed, the Church is a "crown of beauty in the hand of the Lord, and a royal diadem in the hand of your God". [Isa 62:3]
