I’ve been having an on-going discussion about Christianity, specifically Protestantism and Catholicism, with my friend and coworker, whom I call the H.

It has been a good conversation and has given me some renewed interest in learning about the history of Christianity, though, as a rule, my laziness wins out, and I research things just as much as I need to and not more.

During our discussions, some central questions have emerged. One of them is: How did God design his Church?

There is a spectrum here, with the Catholic Church at one end with its central structure and authority that encompasses the entire world and has definitive teachings of the faith developed over the 2,000 years of its existence.

At the other end of the spectrum is a church on every other corner, unconnected with one another in any true sense, largely ignorant of what each other believes and differing in beliefs on many important matters, with the local authority of the pastor and church council leading the rest of the members.

These are the extremes of the spectrum. There are also possible positions in between these two where you have, for example, groups like the Southern Baptist Convention that has various guidelines and rules that its member churches should follow, though the churches can always vote to leave the convention if they want. Or you have small churches that have made a few “seed” churches around the area. Or you even have the worldwide Anglican communion that has some authority and some regularity of teachings throughout its loose association.

So how did God do it? He established his Church, of that there is no doubt, but what was that Church like? Was it more like the Catholic Church or more like the different church on every corner?

If God desired to lead his Church into all truth and for it to be the pillar and bulwark of the truth, would he have from the beginning let his church fracture again and again in doctrine and have thousands of “churches” all over the place, each believing different things, some closer to the fullness of the revealed truth of God than others?

God doing it that way doesn’t make sense. Jesus is a God of order, not disorder. He is a God who created human beings and human society–created with a need for authority and structure. Perversion of authority leads to tyranny and perversion of structure leads to bureaucracy or instability, but both these things, when filled by virtuous people, are God’s tools for bringing order to our human lives.

I believe God wanted and wants all people to believe in the Truth, Who is Jesus Christ. I believe he also wants them to know the truth on matters of faith and morals.
Is it wrong to abort a pre-born baby? But what about in the case of rape or of incest?
Is it wrong to use the birth control pill? Does it really abort pre-born babies sometimes?
Is it wrong to euthanize someone? But what if they are “brain dead”? What does it mean to be brain dead?
What are the sacraments? Does God give grace through the sacraments?
What is the nature of God? Where did the Holy Trinity doctrines come from?
etc.

These questions are of vital importance, and yet there is major disagreement on their answers among Christians. God wants all Christians to believe in His truth on each one of these matters.

God must have been directing his Church throughout all of its history to the truth on these matters. How has he done that?
Well, he made a Church. He said he would do it: “You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church.”

“I will build my Church.” Did Jesus do that? Yes.

Did he then let his Church scatter to the winds and leave them without authority and structure? After all, couldn’t he have just sent the Holy Spirit into all the Christians and infallibly guided each one of them into all truth?

Yes, he could have, but he didn’t. He didn’t do it that way because, as he said at the end of John 2, “he knew what was in a man”. God has bound himself with the rule that he will not violate man’s free will, so he cannot “force” someone to believe in him. It always remains a free choice up to each person. Thus, the beauty of Mary’s “be it done unto me according to your word”.

But, knowing how weak and full of faults we are, how dense we can be and how ignorant of so many things that we make judgments on anyway, individually guiding each person into all truth independently of one another was just an unworkable idea, and if I could see that, you better believe God could.

Instead, amazing as it is to our American, independent (and often foolishly prideful) spirit, God created his Church and by his Holy Spirit guided it collectively into all truth. It was the only way he could do it that made sense. He chose 12 apostles. He spent 3 years with them, teaching them, leading them, praying with them and for them, and loving them. He told them things that would not understand until later, dense as they were. He knew how weak each one was, and how every single one of them would flee in wide-eyed, cowardly terror when the soliders came for him.

He died on the Cross, and they didn’t understand or believe. He rose from the dead, back to life, and showed himself to them. He breathed the Holy Spirit into them and told them that those whose sins they forgive on earth are forgiven in Heaven, and vice versa, calling to mind a similar declaration he made to them before his death. He gave them authority–his own authority, which the Father had given him. “He who listens to you, listens to me. And he who listens to me, listens to the Father who sent me.”

I am too tired to wrap this up into any semblance of conclusion, but as a teaser for more to come, hopefully, I ask you: Should I go to Crestview Baptist church or to Crestview Methodist church right across the street? I didn’t go out looking for these churches; rather, I pass by them almost every week as they are right down the street from St. Louis Catholic Church where I go! (You can even see the street names turn into saint names as you get closer to St. Louis).

Isn’t is eminently logical to ask: Why are there two Christian churches both named “Crestview” right across the street from each other? Didn’t it strike at least one of those church founders as odd when the other church began building right next to them and then named their church so similarly? Didn’t they want to go over and say, “Hey my brother in Christ! Uh, why are you building a Christian church here when we got one already? Why don’t you come join us and we can be one, just as Jesus and the Father are one; you know, like Jesus prayed we would be?”

To be continued…