the church will not stay moving in one direction. It will be split by different visions.
Why can we recognize this principle on the local level, but not apply it to the universal level?
I’ll tell you why. Because, as I’ve said, most Christians are not serious about Church unity. They may pay lip service to ecumenical efforts, but they are not going to budge one inch on the theological particulars of their tradition in order to come back to a unified Church.
There’s no problem with the logic: if the local church needs a pastor for unity, the universal church needs a pastor for unity. The problem is that folks don’t like the conclusion.
Is there any indication that Jesus appointed one “senior pastor” over his Church? Absolutely! We just need to read the Scriptures with an open mind!
There is only one apostle whom Jesus names “the rock,” says that he will build his “church” on, and gives the “keys of the kingdom,” demonstrating that he has the role of the “royal steward” or second in command in the spiritual kingdom Jesus is establishing.
There is only one apostle who is always listed first in all the lists of apostles in the Gospel.
There is only one apostle who receives a triple commission to “feed and tend the sheep” in John 21, just before Jesus’ ascension. Since the word “pastor” literally means “shepherd,” and “senior” means “chief or primary,” we can say quite literally that Jesus appointed Peter as the “senior pastor” on the shores of Galilee after his resurrection (John 21).
Folks may resist applying Peter’s role to his successors, but the royal steward in the Old Testament had an “office and station” (Isa 22:19), and the replacement of Judas by Matthias in Acts 1 also demonstrates that the apostles had an “office” and “station” (Acts 1:20). In fact, the word for Judas’s apostolic “office” is literally episkopen in Greek, from which we get the word “episcopal” and ultimately even “bishop.”6
Peter ended his life crucified in Rome. The Roman Christians recognized his disciple Linus as his replacement; Linus in turn was replaced by Anacletus; and so on down to Pope Francis today. Jesus did not provide a “royal steward” only for the first thirty years of the Church’s existence.
3. The job of the “senior pastor” is to maintain unity.
Not his sole job, of course, but one of his most important responsibilities: certainly within a local church, and all the more so in the church universal. We see indications of Peter’s responsibility for unity in the Scriptures: Jesus prays that Peter’s faith will not fail, so that afterward he can “strengthen your brothers” (Luke 22:32), i.e., the other apostles. Strengthening them would certainly include keeping them together. At the first Church council described in Acts 15, it is Peter whose speech ends debate (Acts 15:7–11). Notice there is much debate before Peter speaks (15:7) and none afterward (15:12–29). As a result, the early Church did not split into “First Church of the Circumcision” and “First Church of the Gentiles.” Peter’s ministry kept the Church together.
4. He can only maintain unity by stopping fights.
This is simply obvious. Infighting, especially over theological issues, is what destroys Church unity. Different leaders have different opinions on a “hot button” issue, and before you know it, you’ve got two different denominations.
The weakness of Protestantism is that it lacks any way to resolve different plausible interpretations of Scripture.
If Jesus really intended the Church to remain together — which he did, according to John 17 — then he must have left us with the means to do it. Obviously, good intentions and the Holy Spirit are not those means, because Protestants have both of those and do not maintain unity. Christians have testified since the earliest fathers that one of the most important means to unity is the bishop of Rome, the successor of Peter, who is the touchstone of unity.7 Those who reject this testimony of the early Fathers have the responsibility to propose some other workable means of unity that Jesus left us.
As we saw above, the Scriptures themselves portray Peter in this role of settling theological fights. In Acts 15, his speech to the council of Jerusalem (vv. 7–12) settles the issue. When James, the leader of the “losing party,” rises to concede the argument, he cites the judgment of Peter (15:14) even before he cites the witness of Scripture (15:15–16). I don’t wish to argue from that fact that Peter’s testimony outweighs Scripture. But Acts 15:7–12 does show the authority Peter exercised within the early Church: an authority to settle divisive issues.
5. He can’t stop fights unless his word is final.
If his word isn’t final, other leaders will just argue with him, and continue arguing with each other, thereby destroying the unity of the Church.
6. His word isn’t final unless he is infallible.
Here’s where we finally come to the rub. Even Protestants who respect the role of the successor of Peter and see the need for a universal pastor still balk at the idea that his formal decision is backed by the Holy Spirit and cannot be wrong. But let us clearly understand: unless the Pope is backed up by infallibility, even when he would attempt to put an end to a fight people would just say he himself was wrong. The fight would just continue and the Church break apart.
Infallibility is really what is implied when Jesus gives to Peter personally an authority that he bestows on the rest of the apostles only corporately (as a group), namely, “what you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, what you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven” (Matt 16:19; cf. Matt 18:18). This, as Jewish scholars attest, is the promise of the backing of the divine court for the decisions that Peter makes concerning the interpretation of divine law. It entails that Peter’s decision is infallible, which means “unable to err.”8
Let us clarify that the Catholic Church has never held that the successor of Peter (or Peter himself!) was personally sinless, or that he never makes a wrong decision. Only a formal decision on doctrine is protected from error — in Jewish terms, a halakhic judgment. What constitutes a formal decision? The Church has standards for how that needs to be expressed.9 The technical term is that the Pope speaks ex cathedra, “from the throne,” which is not so much that he must physically sit on the throne of the bishop of Rome in St. John Lateran,10 but that he self-consciously and clearly intends to pass judgment on a disputed question on behalf of the whole Church.
So, we’ve explained the argument to the end. Let’s just run through it one more time to make sure we have grasped it: The job of the “senior pastor” of the universal Church is to keep unity, which he cannot do unless he can stop fights, and he can’t stop fights unless his decision is final, which implies he is infallible or “unable to err.” That’s it. That’s what I saw during my conversion to Catholicism, and I still see it today.
The Catholic Church remains one body, in part because of the gift of the papacy, the successor of Peter. Protestants have left the Catholic Church. Orthodox are separated from Peter. Like all who become separated from the Catholic Church, they have both been unable to maintain unity within their own ranks. Nonetheless, the Catholic Church remains a single body. It is not characteristic of Catholics to enter into schism. Great moral and spiritual reformers within Catholicism, unlike those within Protestantism, do not start new churches and break bonds of communion. No one ever says of Catholics that they are “the split C’s” the way they say of Presbyterians,
