Roman Catholic Church
The Catholic Church has an episcopate, with the Pope, who is the Bishop of Rome, at the top. The Catholic Church teaches that juridical oversight over the Church is not a power that derives from human ambition, but strictly from the authority of Christ which was given to his twelve apostles. The See of Rome, as the sole unbroken line of apostolic authority, descending from St. Peter (the "prince and head of the apostles"), is a visible sign and instrument of communion among the college of bishops and therefore also of the local churches around the world. In communion with the worldwide college of bishops the Pope has all legitimate juridical and teaching authority over the whole Church. This authority given by Christ to Peter and the apostles is transmitted from one generation to the next by the power of the Holy Spirit, through the laying on of hands, from the Apostles to the bishops, and from bishops to priests and deacons, in unbroken succession.
Read more about this topic: Episcopal Polity
Famous quotes containing the words roman, catholic and/or church:
“The Roman rule was, to teach a boy nothing that he could not learn standing. The old English rule was, “All summer in the field, and all winter in the study.” And it seems as if a man should learn to plant, or to fish, or to hunt, that he might secure his subsistence at all events, and not be painful to his friends and fellow men.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)
“I maintain that I have been a Negro three times—a Negro baby, a Negro girl and a Negro woman. Still, if you have received no clear cut impression of what the Negro in America is like, then you are in the same place with me. There is no The Negro here. Our lives are so diversified, internal attitudes so varied, appearances and capabilities so different, that there is no possible classification so catholic that it will cover us all, except My people! My people!”
—Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960)
“This is what the Church is said to want, not party men, but sensible, temperate, sober, well-judging persons, to guide it through the channel of no-meaning, between the Scylla and Charybdis of Aye and no.”
—Cardinal John Henry Newman (1801–1890)