TEN TRUTHS YOU MAY NOT KNOW AND MAY NEVER WANT TO KNOW 1

By Nana Yaw Aidoo

The title of this note was inspired by a book written by Aaron Erhardt. This however is not an endorsement of everything that can be found in that book. I hereby submit some ten truths that you may not know and may never want to know.

TRUTH 1: Peter Was Not The First Pope.

According to Roman Catholic tradition, the apostle Peter was the first pope, thereby making the papal system of divine origin. It's public knowledge however that pope's do not marry. Strangely enough, Peter the supposed first pope did (Matt.8:14; 1 Cor.9:5).

Also, if Peter was a pope, then he was not like the modern "infallible" ones. When at a point in time he was guilty of the sin of dissimulation, he was rebuked sharply by a fellow apostle, in public (Gal.2:11ff). Would any Catholic dare rebuke the pope in public?

Moreover, if Peter was a pope, then he himself didn't know it. He called himself an apostle of Christ (1 Pet.1:1) and an elder (1 Pet.5:1) but he never called himself a pope. Further, we know that Peter endorsed Paul's writings as scripture (2 Pet.3:15-16) and in Paul's epistles, we see a list of roles that were played in the apostolic church. However, the one role that is conspicuous by its absence is the role of pope (Eph.4:11). According to Paul, oversight of the Lord's church was given to a group of men called "elders" (Acts 20:28), with a list of qualities that a man must possess in order to serve in that role (1 Tim.3:1-7; Titus 1:5-9). Yet, not even once did Paul speak  of "the pope" as a role or an office in the church of our Lord.

Also, if Peter was a pope, then he was the worst pope ever. Pope's reside in Rome don't they? Yet, in Paul's letter to the church at Rome, the Christians in Rome didn't even have spiritual gifts (Rom.1:11). It had to take Paul to go there to impart such gifts to them. This means that Peter either never stepped foot in Rome, or he was derelict in his duty, if indeed he were a pope.

My friends, I want you to know that even though Peter was not a pope and the role of pope is not scriptural, the apostle Paul touched on this issue, albeit in a bad light. In his letter to the Thessalonians, Paul wrote about "...the man of sin,...the son of perdition, who opposes and exalts himself above all that is called God or that is worshipped, so that he sits as God in the temple of God, showing himself that he is God" (2 Thess.2:3-4). All who know a little about "the great apostasy" of church history, know that this prophecy was fulfilled in the Roman Catholic Church (cf.1 Tim.4:1-4), which began about 600 years after the church of Christ began.

History has justified and continues to justify the evils that the Roman Catholic Church with its Papacy has wrought on Christendom and the world at large. Peter the supposed first pope rejected worship from Cornelius, because he was just a man (Acts 10:25-26) yet all other popes accept worship because they are supposedly "vicars of Christ".

Finally, we would end with the fact that the Roman Catholic Church and its papal system (and by implication all denominations), is a system that is bound for destruction (2 Thess.2:8).

If you didn't know this truth, hopefully you do now.

God bless us all in the name of Jesus Christ. Amen.

(To be continued...)