The Establishment of the Roman Catholic Church by B. G. Wilkinson

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Feb 7, 1907

The Establishment of the Roman Catholic Church

By B. G. Wilkinson

B. G. WILKINSON

THE question has been asked, When, where, and by whom was the Roman Catholic Church established? There is no doubt that an answer to the question would be interesting to the readers of the REVIEW.

To come directly to the point, I would say that the Roman Catholic Church, as we know it now, was never, at any place, established by a divine authority. Its present form was developed by the political party which captured its organization after the great victory of the early Christians over the persecutions of pagan Rome. “Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer: behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison, that ye may be tried” (Rev. 2:10), said Jesus to the early Christian church. Through long years of severe suffering, the church came up to great victory—to gain what? To seize worldly power?—No! but to continue spreading the kingdom.

Such, however, was not the result. The persecution ended 312 A. D. By 325 the organization of the church had been captured by the worldly and political forces within it, which had long sought the mastery. I can no better relate this than by the famous report of Mr. Briand, whose bill in the French House of Congress became the law separating church and state:—

“The adoption of Christian ideas by Constantine (Roman emperor) inaugurated a new era in the history of Christianity. Since the day when Constantine presided over the Council of Nice (325 A. D.), since the moment when, after having been sovereign pontiff of the pagan religion, he proclaimed himself to have become Christian ‘emperor and doctor, king and priest,’ the tendencies of the religion of Jesus found themselves profoundly modified. The word of the Galilean, ‘Render therefore unto Cæsar the things which are Cæsar’s; and unto God the things that are God’s,’ was

henceforth without application. Confusion was established between the spiritual and the temporal; the church borrowed for its organization the administrative frame of the empire, and the church was led by a succession of circumstances, to take into her hands a considerable part of temporal power.”

Here was the beginning of the change in the church, the result, not of divine authority, but of human invention. In this change, the now worldly church had before her two models,—an empire of absolute sovereignty and a visible absolute head. When the Roman empire fell, about one hundred and fifty years later, the church continued its organization among its own followers; while the Bishop of Rome became its absolute head, bearing the title of “pope.” Also along these lines the Roman Church has developed ever since.

Takoma Park, D. C.