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The Roman Catholic Church claims to have started in Matthew 16:18 when Jesus supposedly appointed Peter as the first Pope. However, the honest and objective student of the Scriptures and history soon discovers that the foundation of the Roman church is none other than the pagan mystery religion of ancient Babylon. While enduring the early persecutions of the Roman government 65-300 A.D., most of professing Christianity went through a gradual departure from New Testament doctrine concerning church government, worship and practice.
Local churches ceased to be autonomous by giving way to the control of “bishops” ruling over hierarchies. The simple form of worship from the heart was replaced with the rituals and splendor of paganism. Ministers became “priests,” and pagans became “Christians” by simply being sprinkled with water. SPRINKLED PAGANISM is about the best definition for the Roman Catholic
The Catholic has had so many heads.
The Roman Emperor Constantine established himself as the head of the church around 313 A.D., which made this new “Christianity” the official religion of the Roman Empire.
The first actual Pope in Rome was probably Leo I between 440-461 A.D. although some claim that Gregory I was the first 590-604 A.D. and there have been so many popes since that time and the current Pope now is Pope Francis since after the death of Pope John Paul.
Jesus Christ is our High Priest (Heb. 3:1; 4:14-15; 5:5; 8:1; 9:11), and all true Christians make up a spiritual priesthood (I Pet. 2:5). Jesus Christ has sanctified all Christians who believe in Him (Heb. 10:10-11). Furthermore, the practice of calling a priest “father” is not biblical Matthew 23:9. There is only ONE mediator between God and men (I Tim. 2:5).
The Catholic church teaches that Peter was the first Pope and the earthly head of the church, but the Bible never says this once. In fact, it was Peter himself who spoke against “being lords over God’s heritage” in I Peter 5:2-3. Popes do not marry, although Peter did (Mat. 8:14; I Cor. 9:5).
It was never recorded in the bible of Peter being in Rome, and it was Paul, not Peter, who wrote the epistle to the Romans. In the New Testament, Paul wrote 100 chapters with 2,325 verses, while Peter wrote only 8 chapters with 166 verses.
Peter, in his first epistle didn’t say anything about he begin a pope. He stated that he was simply “an apostle of Jesus Christ,” not a Pope (I Pet. 1:1).
The Roman papacy is just keeping members in bondage to a pagan church.
The Roman Catholics believe that Mary, the mother of Jesus, remained a virgin after the birth of Jesus and was sinless all of her life. She is worshiped in the Catholic church as the “Mother of God” and the “Queen of Heaven.” St. Bernard stated that she was crowned “Queen of Heaven” by God the Father, and that she currently sits upon a throne in Heaven making intercession for Christians.
The Bible did not tell us anything about any Queen in Heaven. In the Bible, Mary was a sinner just like the rest of us. She said herself that she needed a “Saviour” (Lk. 1:47), and she even had to offer a sacrifice for her sins in Luke 2:24. Jesus was only her “firstborn” son, according to Matthew 1:25, because she later had other children as well (Mt. 13:55; Gal. 1:19; Psa. 69:8).
There’s only ONE mediator between God and men, and The mediator is Jesus Christ not Mary (I Tim. 2:5). The last time we heard about Mary in the Bible, she’s praying WITH the disciples, not being prayed to BY the disciples (Acts 1:14).
The Bible never exalts Mary above anyone else.
The Catholic believe that someone can be saved through works, they call it salvation work. Apart from infant baptism, keeping sacraments, church membership, going to mass, praying to Mary, and confession (just to mention a few), the Catholic church has developed a system of salvation through WORKS.
God’s word says that we are saved by grace through faith in Jesus Christ, not through works:
“For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast.” (Eph. 2:8-9)
“But to him that worketh not, but believeth on him that justifieth the ungodly, his faith is counted for righteousness.” (Romans 4:5)
Jesus Christ came into this world to lay down His sinless life for US, to pay for our sins, because we couldn’t. Jesus is our only hope for salvation. Only by receiving Him as our Saviour can we enter the gates of Heaven. There is no other way.
“Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father but by me.” (John 14:6)
The Lord Jesus Christ came and paid for our sins by shedding His own Blood on the cross of Calvary.
By receiving Him as our Lord and Saviour, you can be WASHED from all your sins in His precious Blood (Rev. 1:5; Col. 1:14; Acts 20:28; I Pet. 1:18-19).
Notice these important words from Romans 5:8-9:
“But God commendeth his love toward us, in that, while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.”
Jesus paid our way to Heaven. By receiving Him as our Saviour, we will be receiving God’s ONLY means of Salvation for us. Romans 10:13 says, “Whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.” Romans 10:9 says, “That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved.”
The Catholic Church perverted the Christian practice of the Lord’s Supper (Mat. 26:26-28; I Cor. 11:23-27), then the Catholic Church created the Mass, which they believe to be a continual sacrifice of Jesus Christ:
“Christ…commanded that his bloody sacrifice on the Cross should be daily renewed by an unbloody sacrifice of his body and blood in the Mass under the simple elements of bread and wine.” (Mass sacrifice in The Catholic Encyclopedia, Vol. 10, Pg. 13)
Jesus never made such a command. If you’ll check the above references in Matthew 26 and I Corinthians 11, you’ll see for yourself that the Lord’s Supper is a MEMORIAL and a SHOWING of Christ’s death until He comes again. It is not a sacrifice.
The Catholic Encyclopedia states the following:
“In the celebration of the Holy Mass, the bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ. It is called transubstantiation, for in the Sacrament of the Eucharist the substance of bread and wine do not remain, but the entire substance of bread is changed into the body of Christ, and the entire substance of wine is changed into his blood, the species or outward semblence of bread and wine alone remaining.”
The Catholic Church teaches that the “Holy Mass” is a LITERAL EATING AND DRINKING OF THE LITERAL FLESH AND BLOOD OF JESUS CHRIST. The priest supposedly has the power to change the bread and wine into the body and blood of Christ.
Now, what does God’s word say about such practices? If you’ll read Genesis 9:4, Leviticus 17:11-12, and Acts 15:29, you will find that God absolutely FORBIDS the drinking of blood all through the Bible.
Rome teaches that the Mass is a continual “sacrifice” of Jesus Christ, but God’s word states that Jesus made the FINAL sacrifice on Calvary! This is made perfectly clear in Hebrews 10:10-12:
By the which will we are sanctified through the offering of the body of Jesus Christ once for all. And every priest standeth daily ministering and offering oftentimes the same sacrifices, which can never take away sins: But this man, after he had offered one sacrifice for sins for ever, sat down on the right hand of God.
From all that is written above, the Mass is unscriptural.
The Catholic Church teaches and also believe that a Christian’s soul must burn in purgatory after death until all of their sins have been purged. To speed up the purging process, money may be paid to a priest so he can pray and have special masses for an earlier release.
This heresy began creeping into the Roman Church during the reign of Pope Gregory around the end of the sixth century, and it has no scriptural support.
Jesus warned us about this pagan practice in Matthew 23:14 when He spoke of those who devoured widows houses and made long prayers for a pretence. Psalm 49:6-7 tells us that a person couldn’t redeem a loved one, even if such a place did exist: “They that trust in their wealth, and boast themselves in the multitude of their riches; None of them can by any means redeem his brother, nor give to God a ransom for him:”
Peter addresses this issue in Acts 8:20 when he says, “Thy money perish with thee, because thou hast thought that the gift of God may be purchased with money.” God’s word is clearly against the doctrine of purgatory.
The Catholic religion is filled with all sorts of symbols, images, and relics. The Catechism of the Council of Trent states these words:
“It is lawful to have images in the Church, and to give honor and worship unto them…”
Is his statement true? NO, Not according to God’s word.
Exodus 20:4-5 says, “Thou shalt not make unto thee any graven image, or any likeness of any thing that is in heaven above, or that is in the earth beneath, or that is in the water under the earth: Thou shalt not bow down thyself to them, nor serve them: for I the LORD thy God am a jealous God, visiting the iniquity of the fathers upon the children unto the third and fourth generation of them that hate me.”
Image worship is unscriptural and will end with the eternal damnation of those who practice it (Rev. 14:11).
Mother Teresa.
I also want to talk about Mother Teresa she was known for her good works and helping the needy and fighting against the cause of poverty in the world, she has help children as a teacher and also as a mother just as it is in her name.
Mother Teresa was born Agnes Gonxha Bojaxhiu in Skopje*, Macedonia, on August 26**, 1910. Her family was of Albanian descent. At the age of twelve, she felt strongly the call of God. She knew she had to be a missionary to spread the love of Christ. At the age of eighteen she left her parental home in Skopje and joined the Sisters of Loreto, an Irish community of nuns with missions in India. After a few months’ training in Dublin she was sent to India, where on May 24, 1931, she took her initial vows as a nun. From 1931 to 1948 Mother Teresa taught at St. Mary’s High School in Calcutta, but the suffering and poverty she glimpsed outside the convent walls made such a deep impression on her that in 1948 she received permission from her superiors to leave the convent school and devote herself to working among the poorest of the poor in the slums of Calcutta. Although she had no funds, she depended on Divine Providence, and started an open-air school for slum children. Soon she was joined by voluntary helpers, and financial support was also forthcoming. This made it possible for her to extend the scope of her work.
The story of Mother Teresa’s life is no mere humanitarian exploit, as she would be the first to declare. It is a story of biblical faith. It can only be explained as a proclamation of Jesus Christ by – in her own words – “loving and serving Him in the distressing disguise of the poorest of the poor, both materially and spiritually, recognizing in them and restoring to them the image and likeness of God”
It has been said that Mother Teresa might have done more to fight the causes of poverty in the world. Mother Teresa was aware of this criticism. She would shrug as if saying: ‘while you go on discussing causes and explanations, I will kneel beside the poorest of the poor and attend to their needs’. The beggar, the leper, the victim of AIDS do not need discussions and theories; they need love. The hungry cannot wait for the rest of the world to come up with the perfect answer; they need effective solidarity. The dying, the handicapped and the defenceless unborn, who are without a constituency in the utopian ideologies which, especially in the last two hundred years, have been trying to model the perfect world, need a loving human presence and a caring hand.
On October 7, 1950, Mother Teresa received permission from the Holy See to start her own order, “The Missionaries of Charity”, whose primary task was to love and care for those persons nobody was prepared to look after. In 1965 the Society became an International Religious Family by a decree of Pope Paul VI.
Today the order comprises Active and Contemplative branches of Sisters and Brothers in many countries.
In 1963 both the Contemplative branch of the Sisters and the Active branch of the Brothers was founded. In 1979 the Contemplative branch of the Brothers was added, and in 1984 the Priest branch was established.
The Society of Missionaries has spread all over the world, including the former Soviet Union and Eastern European countries. They provide effective help to the poorest of the poor in a number of countries in Asia, Africa, and Latin America, and they undertake relief work in the wake of natural catastrophes such as floods, epidemics, and famine, and for refugees. The order also has houses in North America, Europe and Australia, where they take care of the shut-ins, alcoholics, homeless, and AIDS sufferers.
The Missionaries of Charity throughout the world are aided and assisted by Co-Workers who became an official International Association on March 29, 1969. By the 1990s there were over one million Co-Workers in more than 40 countries. Along with the Co-Workers, the lay Missionaries of Charity try to follow Mother Teresa’s spirit and charism in their families.
Mother Teresa’s work has been recognised and acclaimed throughout the world and she has received a number of awards and distinctions, including the Pope John XXIII Peace Prize (1971) and the Nehru Prize for her promotion of international peace and understanding (1972). She also received the Balzan Prize (1979) and the Templeton and Magsaysay awards.
Mother Teresa died on September 5, 1997.
She has been a wonder woman and lived a blessed life because she enjoyed what she was doing.
I hope the people she left to handle what she has started work with the same zeal she worked with.