CAPG's Blog 

His labours were rewarded with the crown of martyrdom, he being seized by the enemies of his faith, and flayed alive. Pray for all who labour in the Gospel, that they may be ready to give their lives for Christ, and employ them in his service.

This festival of an apostle calls upon all Christians to give thanks to God for His mercy in calling them to the faith of Christ; and for the means which he has appointed to deliver them from all doubts, and secure them in His truths. They are called upon to thank Him for not leaving them to the weakness and uncertainty of their own private judgment, but appointing apostles, and sending them to deliver His faith to all nations; commanding all to hear and believe them under pain of eternal condemnation: He that believeth not, shall be condemned. Christ teaches His apostles, and the apostles teach the people. Thus the people when they hear the apostles, hear Christ: He that heareth you, heareth me. This was the method which Christ himself appointed for converting the whole world to his faith; and by this method the whole world was converted.

Now who dares presume to change the method ordained by Christ? Who can pretend to find a better? If an angel should have come, and taught any other, we ought not to have received it. How then can any justify themselves in following another recommended only by men? If we had lived in the days of the apostles, we should have observed this method, and been instructed in the Christian faith, by hearing the apostles. And why must we not follow the same method now? The same spirit of truth, which was promised to the apostles, was promised to abide with them and their successors, to the end of the world: Behold I am with you all days, even to the end of the world. He shall give you another Paraclete, that He may abide with you for ever. The Spirit of truth. Are not these Christ's own words? Is not He the eternal truth? Though heaven and earth pass away, yet His words cannot pass away.

Are we not therefore to believe Him? And can we profess to believe Him, if we believe not His words? To disown these, is to deny Christ. Since therefore He has promised that the Spirit of truth shall abide with the apostles for ever, and lead them into all truth to the end of the world, we must believe that this spirit abides with their successors, the pastors of His Church, in all ages, and must depend upon the guidance of this spirit in His Church, as much now, as if we had lived in the days of the apostles. If we had lived then, we should have had nothing more to depend on, than Christ's promise made to His apostles. We have the same now: and as Christ is the same now as he was then, so we have the same to depend upon. Our dependence is not to be more limited than His promise. His promise extended to all ages: and therefore the dependence of Christians upon it must be in all ages. Therefore did Christ say that His Church was built upon a rock, and that the gates of hell should not prevail against it. Therefore is the profession of believing the Catholic Church, inserted in the creed, as an article of faith, not for the time of the apostles only, but for all ages. Whoever proceeds by this method has his faith built on Christ Himself, on His word and promise, on the conduct of His Holy Spirit. Divine faith can stand only on divine authority. This is in Christ's Church, which is led into all truth by God's spirit; and therefore the Christian assents to what is delivered by this Church, because it carries with it the authority of God himself, who has promised to abide with her for ever." The Catholic Year by Fr. John Gother