Facts and Assertions: or a Brief and Plain Exhibition of the Incongruity of the Peculiar Doctrines of the Church of Rome / With Those Both of the Sacred Scriptures and of the Early Writers of the Christian Church Catholic

by George Stanley Faber

I. We find the claim of this supremacy authoritatively propounded, in manner following.

1. The Roman Church is the mother and mistress of all other Churches. [55a]

2. I acknowledge the holy catholic and apostolic Roman Church to be the mother and mistress of all Churches: and I promise and swear true obedience to the Roman Pontiff, the successor of the blessed Peter Prince of the Apostles, and the Vicar of Jesus Christ. [55b]

II. Such, in form, is the claim: but where find we its substantiation in the Bible?

1. The Roman Church had indisputably been founded in the apostolic age: for one of St. Paul’s Epistles is addressed to it.

Yet NOT A SINGLE SYLLABLE is said in Scripture, either prophetic or declarative, respecting the divine appointment, and consequently the divine right, of the Papal Supremacy.

We NO WHERE read in Holy Writ: either that the Roman Church ought justly to be obeyed, as the mother and mistress of all other Churches; or that the Pope is, at once, the successor of the blessed Peter Prince of the Apostles, and the Vicar of Jesus Christ.

From whatever quarter the divines of Trent have made these discoveries: it is quite clear, that the Bible throws no light upon the present subject.

2. The Romish Clergy, however, assure us: that the primacy or monarchy of the entire Catholic Church was, in the following express terms, granted to St. Peter by Christ himself.

Thou art Peter: and upon this rock I will build my Church; and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven: and, whatsoever thou shalt bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and, whatsoever thou shalt loose on earth, shall be loosed in heaven. [56]