My belief is that on the road to Emmaus (Luke 25:13-35) is where some information not written in the Bible comes from by tradition in the Catholic Church where Jesus Christ explains Old Testament references to some disciples. But why did they not write it down, a letter possibly entitled: the Lords talk on the way to Emmaus? Because the two disciples were probably illiterate and they, over the course of their lives, passed on the information by word of mouth.
The Ethiopian understanding that he needed Philip’s help to understand the Bible (Acts 8:26-40) is why you need an apostolic church and there can really only be one visible apostolic church otherwise you don’t know who to ask. These things make us part of one coherent body – the Mystical Body of Christ.
The born again quote by Christ (John 3:3) means we are born again into the kingdom of God, not as white, black, Asian, Caucasian, Russian, Chinese, Korean, German, Italian, Greek, Japanese, Filipino, Mexican, Columbian, Canadian or American but as Roman Catholics (Galatians 3:28). The tower of Bable, the separation of mankind is repaired in the universality (the Greek Katholico meaning universal) of the Roman Catholic Church (even in the Churches name the 2 great ancient civilizations are joined – Greek and Roman). The common language of the Roman Catholic Church has been Latin for a millennia and a half – 1500 years. This common language made it possible for priest in different counties to talk to each other to coordinate operations such as the rescue of Jews during WWII just to use a recent example.
The death on the cross is the consummation of Christs wedding with his bride because his death gives us the privilege of being born again into the Kingdom of Heaven as adopted sons and daughters of God. Just as the marital act, an act produce by the will of at least one of two parties, can but won’t necessarily produce children between a man and a woman, Jesus Christs death won’t necessarily produce a citizen of heaven in any particular human being, but just as the marital act, might. Just as with Adam and Eve and the whole of salvation history, every one is the result of the cooperation of at least 2 people but their ultimate destiny is in their hands.
The whole concept of the mystical body of Christ is introduced most clearly in 1 Corinthians 12:12-27 which says: 12 For just as ithe body is one and has many members, and all the members of the body, though many, are one body, jso it is with Christ. 13 For kin one Spirit we were all baptized into one body—lJews or Greeks, slaves1 or free—and mall were made to drink of one Spirit.
14 For the body does not consist of one member but of many. 15 If the foot should say, “Because I am not a hand, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 16 And if the ear should say, “Because I am not an eye, I do not belong to the body,” that would not make it any less a part of the body. 17 If the whole body were an eye, where would be the sense of hearing? If the whole body were an ear, where would be the sense of smell? 18 But as it is, nGod arranged the members in the body, each one of them, oas he chose. 19 If all were a single member, where would the body be? 20 As it is, there are many parts,2 yet one body.
21 The eye cannot say to the hand, “I have no need of you,” nor again the head to the feet, “I have no need of you.” 22 On the contrary, the parts of the body that seem to be weaker are indispensable, 23 and on those parts of the body that we think less honorable we bestow the greater honor, and our unpresentable parts are treated with greater modesty, 24 which our more presentable parts do not require. But God has so composed the body, giving greater honor to the part that lacked it, 25 that there may be no division in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another. 26 If one member suffers, all suffer together; if one member is honored, pall rejoice together.
27 Now qyou are the body of Christ and individually rmembers of it.
Priest by tradition are thought of as “altus Christus” or other Christs, this is why they are called “father” as the head of the parish family, with the local parish/church as the bride of Christ. That this is the correct interpretation can be found in Galatians 2:19-21
19 For I, through the law, am dead to the law, that I may live to God: with Christ I am nailed to the cross.
20 And I live, now not I; but Christ liveth in me. And that I live now in the flesh: I live in the faith of the Son of God, who loved me, and delivered himself for me.
21 I cast not away the grace of God. For if justice be by the law, then Christ died in vain.
Paul’s love for his “parishioners” or diocese as a bishop not because of the law directly, but if he loves his parishioners then he will not drift from the law (Galatians 5:14), but it is the love of God through Paul exemplified by Jesus Christ’s life and death on the cross that informs his actions.
There are different functions in the same community/body: “some apostles [bishops], some prophets, some and others some evangelists, and others some pastors [priests] (Ephesians 4:11). This is show that Jesus Christ envisioned there being different functions in his church and it makes sense that who-should -be-what should be selected by merit by the church as Mathias was as a replacement to Judas by the apostles or those who would be their successors – present day bishops. This concept is reinforced in 1 Corinthians 12:28.
The fact that the guiders or principals of a religion, usually priests (empowered to offer sacrifice for/with the people of the religion), were selected by God, is not new. In fact it was the case in the precursor of the Roman Catholic church the Jewish religion. In the Jewish religion the priest were picked by natural law (decedents of Levi and specifically Aaron for high priests Exodus 18:1-5). To allow for peoples other than Jews to be selected, supernatural law, selection by the apostles, guided by the Holy Ghost, as in the case of Mathias, was the rule in Jesus Christ’s Catholic Church. Christ said He came to fulfil the (Jewish) law not to abolish it. if this is true, after 2 of the most important books in Jewish law: Leviticus and numbers, were written for priest why would Jesus Christ, as suggested by Martin Luther, abolish the priesthood as differentiated from unconsecrated Christians? He would not. In the Old Testament in the book of Numbers chapter 16 God showed what he thought of priests as having a separate vocation from unconsecrated people when He physically and destroyed Korah’s rebellion when Korah and his hoard suggested otherwise. Many would say “but there was also so much describing dietary restrictions.” My reply to that would be: those were all removed when in Mark 7:15 Jesus Christ basically said there is nothing outside of a man that enters into him that can defile him, but the thing that proceeds from him that is what defile him.
The information in the square brackets was added for emphasis and clarity to the original bible quotes.
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