YOUCAT Question n. 129 - Part V. Why can there be only one Church?
(Youcat
answer - repeated) Just as there is only one Christ, there can be only one Body
of Christ, only one Bride of Christ, and therefore only one Church of Jesus
Christ. He is the Head, the Church is the Body. Together they form the “whole
Christ” (St. Augustine). Just as the body has many members yet is one, so too
the one Church consists of and is made up of many particular churches
(dioceses). Together they form the whole Christ.
A deepening through CCC
(CCC 816 a) "The sole Church of Christ [is that] which our
Savior, after his Resurrection, entrusted to Peter's pastoral care,
commissioning him and the other apostles to extend and rule it.... This Church,
constituted and organized as a society in the present world, subsists in (subsistit in) the Catholic Church, which
is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with
him" (LG 8 § 2).
Reflecting and meditating
(Youcat comment)
Jesus built his Church
on the foundation of the Apostles. This foundation supports her to this day.
The faith of the apostles was handed down from generation to generation under
the leadership of the Pope, the Petrine ministry, “which presides in charity”
(St. Ignatius of Antioch). The sacraments, too, which Jesus entrusted to the
apostolic college, still work with their original power.
(CCC Comment)
(CCC 816 b) The Second Vatican Council's Decree on Ecumenism explains: "For it is through Christ's
Catholic Church alone, which is the universal help toward salvation, that the
fullness of the means of salvation can be obtained. It was to the apostolic
college alone, of which Peter is the head, that we believe that our Lord
entrusted all the blessings of the New Covenant, in order to establish on earth
the one Body of Christ into which all those should be fully incorporated who
belong in any way to the People of God" (UR 3 § 5).
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