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Q u i c k Q u e s t i o n s
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This Rock
Volume 3, Number 12
 December 1992 
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Is Sgt. Joe Friday on Your Staff?
Q: I'm puzzled by the title you chose for your department "Dragnet." What is it supposed to signify? Are you people religious cops? Do you have a fixation with police shows? Do you like to go around saying, "Just the facts, Ma'am"?
A: No, sirree! Sorry if we disappoint you, but Sgt. Joe Friday doesn't work here anymore and had nothing to do with the titling. We chose "Dragnet" for our commentary section because the section is a grab bag of the worthwhile, the worthless, and, at times, the just plain silly. The title itself comes from Matthew 13:47, which refers to a fishing net known as a dragnet: "The kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown into the sea, which collects fish of every kind. When it is full they haul it ashore and sit down to put what is good into buckets. What is bad they throw away."
Q: Is it true that Pope Gregory I denied that the pope is the "universal bishop" and taught that the Bishop of Rome has no authority over any other bishop?
A: No. Gregory the Great (540-604), saint, pope, and doctor of the Church, never taught any such thing. He would have denied that the title "universal bishop" could be applied to any one, himself included, if by that term one meant there was only one bishop for the whole world and that all other "bishops" were bishops in name only, with no real authority of their own. Such a distorted version of the biblical model of bishops is incompatible with Catholic teaching.
But that isn't to say that the title didn't--and doesn't--have a proper sense which Gregory approved of. If meant in the sense that the Bishop of Rome is the leader of all the bishops, the title is correct. If it means he is the only bishop and all the other "bishops" are not really successors to the apostles, it's false.
What Gregory condemned was the expropriation of the title Universal Bishop by Bishop John the Faster, the patriarch of Constantinople, who proclaimed himself Universal Bishop at the Synod of Constantinople in 588. Gregory condemned the patriarch's act because universal jurisdiction applies solely to the pope.
Some anti-Catholics cite the following quotations to give the false impression that Gregory was rejecting his own universal authority:
"I confidently say that whosoever calls himself, or desires to be called, Universal Priest, is in his elation the precursor of the Antichrist, because he proudly puts himself above all others" (Epistles 7:33).
"If then he shunned the subjecting of the members of Christ partially to certain heads, as if besides Christ, though this were to the apostles themselves, what wilt thou say to Christ, who is the head of the universal Church, in the scrutiny of the last judgment, having attempted to put all his members under thyself by the appellation of universal? Who, I ask, is proposed for imitation in this wrongful title but he who, despising the legions of angels constituted socially with himself, attempted to start up to an eminence of singularity, that he might seem to be under none and to be alone above all?" (Epistles 5:18).
Predictably, anti-Catholics neglect to inform their audiences that the context of these statements makes it clear that Gregory was not making these statements in regard to himself or to any other pope. He believed the Bishop of Rome has primacy of jurisdiction over all other bishops.
Gregory demonstrated this in his actions. He made it his business to approve candidates for the office of bishop. He rigorously examined men proposed for bishop and, rejecting some as unsuitable for the job, ordered that others be nominated instead (Epistles 1:55, 56; 7:38; 10:7). This is hardly behavior one would expect from a pope who renounced the idea of his having jurisdiction over other bishops.
Like his predecessors and successors, Gregory promulgated numerous laws, binding on all other bishops, on issues such as clerical celibacy (1:42, 50; 4:5, 26, 34; 7:1; 9:110, 218; 10:19; 11:56), the deprivation of priests and bishops guilty of criminal offenses (1:18, 32; 3:49; 4:26; 5:5, 17, 18), and the proper disposition of church revenues (1:10, 64; 2:20-22; 3:22; 4:11).
Gregory's writings show that he regarded and conducted himself as the universal bishop of the Church. He calls the diocese of Rome "the Apostolic See, which is the head of all other churches" (13:1). He said, "I, albeit unworthy, have been set up in command of the Church" (5:44). He taught that the pope, as successor to Peter, was granted by God a primacy over all other bishops (2:44, 3:30, 5:37, 7:37). He claimed that it was necessary for councils and synods to have the pope's approval to be binding and that only the pope had the authority to annul the their decrees (9:56, 5:39, 41, 44). He enforced his authority to settle disputes between bishops, even between patriarchs, and rebuked lax and erring bishops (2:50; 3:52, 63; 9:26, 27).
When Gregory denounced John the Faster's attempt to lay claim to the title Universal Bishop, his words were in accord with his actions and with his teachings. He was unequivocal in his teaching that all other bishops are subject to the pope: "As regards the Church of Constantinople, who can doubt that it is subject to the Apostolic See? Why, both our most religious Lord the Emperor and our brother the Bishop of Constantinople continually acknowledge it" (9:26).
Q: Can you offer any biblical justification for the Catholic Church's former teaching that it's sinful to eat meat on Fridays?
A: Yes, but, if you recognize the fact that Christ's Church is divinely authorized to teach, sanctify, and govern, there should be no need to "prove" it with biblical examples. If you don't recognize that, consider the following biblical facts.
Jesus guaranteed that when his Church teaches it teaches with his authority and that anyone rejecting his Church's teachings rejects him (Luke 10:16). This authority extends to Church discipline as well as doctrine. When the Church imposes a discipline, its members are bound to obey it, unless they are dispensed for a proportionate reason.
This exercise of authority is seen in Acts 15, where the Church, in its first major council, bound all Christians to the discipline of abstaining from meat that had been sacrificed to idols or that had come from strangled animals (19-29). When the Church promulgated its teaching about abstaining from meat (Acts 15:28-29), no Christian was free to disregard the discipline without committing sin. But since Paul explained that meat in itself is not unclean and the eating of meat is not inherently sinful (Rom. 14:1-23, 1 Cor. 8:1-13, 10:23-32), a Christian who violated the apostolic teaching in Acts 15 sinned not because the eating of meat was wrong but because he disobeyed a commandment of the Church. When the Catholic Church imposes a discipline such as not eating meat on Fridays, the same principle holds.
Consider this parallel example. A mother tells her son not to eat the cookies she just baked because it's close to dinner time and eating the cookies will spoil his appetite. The son ignores his mother's wishes and, when she's not looking, sneaks a few cookies. His sin is not the eating of cookies (a morally-neutral act in itself), but of disobedience.
Finally, we should mention why Friday abstinence was imposed. The Church recognizes that, since meat is a chief part of most meals served in most places, and since meat is usually the most valued or expensive part of a meal, abstinence from meat on Fridays is a good way for Christians to unite themselves more closely to the sufferings of their Lord (Rom. 8:16-17, 1 Pet. 2:21) by denying themselves something they enjoy. Abstinence from meat is a sacrifice which unites them in penance and strengthens the solidarity of the Church through mild suffering. It's also a good form of mortification, which disciplines the soul and strengthens its resistance to concupiscence. Paul practiced and recommended mortification: "I drive my body and train it, for fear that after having preached to others, I myself should be disqualified" (1 Cor. 9:27).
Q: Mormon missionaries recently visited my home, and we had a long discussion about differences between the Catholic Church and Mormonism. One of the things they take special pride in is their Church's teaching called "the Word of Wisdom," which proscribes smoking and the drinking of tea, coffee, and wine. How can I refute this false teaching?
A: Hold on there! Although the Mormon Church is in error on a lot of theological issues, its Word of Wisdom (see Doctrine and Covenants 89:1) is not a bad teaching and doesn't need to be refuted. True, Mormons have gone overboard in their rigorous denunciation of tea, coffee, and wine (they view those substances as inherently and always harmful to bodily health), but there is an underlying truth in their teaching.
The Catholic Church itself teaches that the intentional, unnecessary injuring of one's body is a sin against the Fifth Commandment. Now that medical science has shown beyond question the detriment smoking cigarettes causes to the body, many argue persuasively that people who choose to smoke (distinguishing them from those already addicted to the habit and who are unable to quit) are deliberately harming their body for no good reason and are sinning.
While this may be true in the case of smoking, it's not true in the case of and tea, coffee, and wine, unless those are used to excess. Most people can drink wine regularly and in moderation and never incur any health problems as a result. (Wine even can benefit one's health, as the ancients knew: "No longer drink only water, but use a little wine for the sake of your stomach and your frequent ailments" [1 Tim. 5:23].)
Naturally, people should avoid things which always cause direct harm to the body, such as illicit drugs and smoking, but the use of foods and drinks which cause no harm when used in moderation cannot be proscribed as evil. It's fine to give up good things as a mortification or in order to enjoy greater health (after all, no one needs to drink tea, coffee, or wine and can get along perfectly well without them). As Paul said, "Everything is lawful for me, but not everything is beneficial. Everything is lawful for me, but I will not let myself be dominated by anything" (1 Cor. 6:12). Insofar as the Word of Wisdom teaches people to lead healthier lives by avoiding certain foods, its teaching is beneficial but morally neutral. But Mormons are mistaken in condemning tea, coffee, and wine as inherently and always evil.
Q: A friend recently pointed out that Joshua 10:12 and 2 Kings 20:9 say the sun was made to stand still and that ancient Chinese astronomical records made during the time Joshua and 2_Kings were written nowhere mention the sun standing still. Isn't this evidence that the biblical accounts are incorrect?
A: No. Although we're not sure exactly what took place in those biblical accounts, we can be sure that, whatever the phenomenon was, it appeared to the observers that the sun stood still. The writers were perfectly correct to describe the events this way. What's more, God could have restricted the phenomenon to those in the immediate area, so people elsewhere would have noticed nothing unusual.
Such a localized phenomenon is documented to have occurred as recently as October 1917 in Fatima, Portugal. During our Lady's final apparition there, the sun began to pulsate and spin, giving off various colors, and appeared to plunge toward the earth in a zigzag motion. About 70,000 people witnessed this spectacle, all within a radius of a few dozen miles of Fatima. And it wasn't just Catholics who saw the sun's convulsions--many non-Catholics, even atheists, attested to the strange event, which was widely reported in the secular and communist newspapers. But in the rest of the world, indeed in the rest of Portugal, nothing unusual seemed to happen to the sun that day.
God is able to cause the sun or other celestial bodies to do wondrous things and restrict the evidence of the phenomenon to a localized area. This would explain why the Chinese had no inkling that God was doing something amazing with the sun on the other side of the planet.
Two excellent books dealing with the apparent contradictions in the Bible are Gleason Archer's Encyclopedia of Bible Difficulties (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1982) and William G. Most's Free From All Error, the latter available from This Rock postpaid for $13.95. (California residents add $1.00 sales tax.)
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