Holy Old Orthodox Catholic Archdiocese

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His Eminence the Patriarch Sir. Dr. Archbishop Michael

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The Sovereign Order of O.C.A.N.A. is a worldwide, lay, diplomatic religious order which seeks to glorify the Creator by promoting the sanctification of each member through work with the sick the poor and witness of the faith and to protect The Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

APOSTOLIC AUTHORITY AND SUCCESSION Apostolic Authority What did Early Christians Believe? Are Protestants right? The teachings of the Early Church Fathers on Apostolic Authority. Scripture Ordained Leaders Share in Jesus' Ministry and Authority Authority is Transferred by the Sacrament of Ordination Jesus Wants us to Obey Apostolic Authority Tradition / Church Fathers The Church Has Apostolic Succession Authority is transferred by the Sacrament of Ordination Scripture I. Ordained Leaders Share in Jesus' Ministry and Authority Matt. 10:1,40 - Jesus declares to His apostles, "he who receives you, receives Me, and he who rejects you, rejects Me and the One who sent Me." Jesus freely gives His authority to the apostles in order for them to effectively convert the world. Matt. 16:19; 18:18 - the apostles are given Christ's authority to make visible decisions on earth that will be ratified in heaven. God raises up humanity in Christ by exalting his chosen leaders and endowing them with the authority and grace they need to bring about the conversion of all. Without a central authority in the Church, there would be chaos (as there is in Protestantism). Luke 9:1; 10:19 - Jesus gives the apostles authority over the natural and the supernatural (diseases, demons, serpents, and scorpions). Luke 10:16 - Jesus tells His apostles, "he who hears you, hears Me." When we hear the bishops' teaching on the faith, we hear Christ Himself. Luke 22:29 - the Father gives the kingdom to the Son, and the Son gives the kingdom to the apostles. The gift is transferred from the Father to the Son to the apostles. Num 16:28 - the Father's authority is transferred to Moses. Moses does not speak on his own. This is a real transfer of authority. John 5:30 - similarly, Jesus as man does nothing of His own authority, but He acts under the authority of the Father.

John 7:16-17 - Jesus as man states that His authority is not His own, but from God. He will transfer this authority to other men. John 8:28 - Jesus says He does nothing on His own authority. Similarly, the apostles will do nothing on their own authority. Their authority comes from God. John 12:49 - The father's authority is transferred to the Son. The Son does not speak on his own. This is a transfer of divine authority. John 13:20 - Jesus says, "he who receives anyone who I send, receives Me." He who receives the apostles, receives Christ Himself. He who rejects the apostles and their successors, rejects Christ. John 14:10 - Jesus says the Word He speaks is not His own authority, but from the Father. The gift is from the Father to Jesus to the apostles. John 16:14-15 - what the Father has, the Son has, and the Son gives it to the apostles. The authority is not lessened or mitigated. John 17:18; 20:21 - as the Father sends the Son, the Son sends the apostles. The apostles have divinely appointed authority. Acts 20:28 - the apostles are shepherds and guardians appointed by the Holy Spirit / 1 Peter 2:25 - Jesus is the Shepherd and Guardian. The apostles, by the power of the Spirit, share Christ's ministry and authority. Jer. 23:1-8; Ezek. 34:1-10 - the shepherds must shepherd the sheep, or they will be held accountable by God. Eph. 2:20 - the Christian faith is built upon the foundation of the apostles. The word "foundation" proves that it does not die with apostles, but carries on through succession. Eph. 2:20; Rev. 21:9,14 - the words "household," "Bride of the Lamb," the "new Jerusalem" are all metaphors for the Church whose foundation is the apostles. II. Authority is Transferred by the Sacrament of Ordination Acts 1:15-26 - the first thing Peter does after Jesus ascends into heaven is implement apostolic succession. Matthias is ordained with full apostolic authority. Only the Catholic Church can demonstrate an unbroken apostolic lineage to the apostles in union with Peter through the sacrament of ordination and thereby claim to teach with Christ's own authority. Acts 1:20 - a successor of Judas is chosen. The authority of his office (his "bishopric") is respected notwithstanding his egregious sin. The necessity to have apostolic succession in order for the Church to survive was understood by all. God never said, "I'll

give you leaders with authority for about 400 years, but after the Bible is compiled, you are all on your own." Acts 1:22 - literally, "one must be ordained" to be a witness with us of His resurrection. Apostolic ordination is required in order to teach with Christ's authority. Acts 6:6 - apostolic authority is transferred through the laying on of hands (ordination). This authority has transferred beyond the original twelve apostles as the Church has grown. Acts 9:17-19 - even Paul, who was directly chosen by Christ, only becomes a minister after the laying on of hands by a bishop. This is a powerful proof-text for the necessity of sacramental ordination in order to be a legitimate successor of the apostles. Acts 13:3 - apostolic authority is transferred through the laying on of hands (ordination). This authority must come from a Catholic bishop. Acts 14:23 - the apostles and newly-ordained men appointed elders to have authority throughout the Church. Acts 15:22-27 - preachers of the Word must be sent by the bishops in union with the Church. We must trace this authority to the apostles. 2 Cor. 1:21-22 - Paul writes that God has commissioned certain men and sealed them with the Holy Spirit as a guarantee. Col 1:25 - Paul calls his position a divine "office." An office has successors. It does not terminate at death. Or it's not an office. See also Heb. 7:23 an office continues with another successor after the previous office-holders death. 1 Tim. 3:1 - Paul uses the word "episcopoi" (bishop) which requires an office. Everyone understood that Paul's use of episcopoi and office meant it would carry on after his death by those who would succeed him. 1 Tim. 4:14 - again, apostolic authority is transferred through the laying on of hands (ordination). 1 Tim. 5:22 - Paul urges Timothy to be careful in laying on the hands (ordaining others). The gift of authority is a reality and cannot be used indiscriminately. 2 Tim. 1:6 - Paul again reminds Timothy the unique gift of God that he received through the laying on of hands. 2 Tim. 4:1-6 - at end of Paul's life, Paul charges Timothy with the office of his ministry . We must trace true apostolic lineage back to a Catholic bishop.

2 Tim. 2:2 - this verse shows God's intention is to transfer authority to successors (here, Paul to Timothy to 3rd to 4th generation). It goes beyond the death of the apostles. Titus 1:5; Luke 10:1 - the elders of the Church are appointed and hold authority. God has His children participate in Christ's work. 1 John 4:6 - whoever knows God listens to us (the bishops and the successors to the apostles). This is the way we discern truth and error (not just by reading the Bible and interpreting it for ourselves). Exodus 18:25-26 - Moses appoints various heads over the people of God. We see a hierarchy, a transfer of authority and succession. Exodus 40:15 - the physical anointing shows that God intended a perpetual priesthood with an identifiable unbroken succession. Numbers 3:3 - the sons of Aaron were formally "anointed" priests in "ordination" to minister in the priests' "office." Numbers 16:40 - shows God's intention of unbroken succession within His kingdom on earth. Unless a priest was ordained by Aaron and his descendants, he had no authority. Numbers 27:18-20 - shows God's intention that, through the "laying on of hands," one is commissioned and has authority. Deut. 34:9 - Moses laid hands upon Joshua, and because of this, Joshua was obeyed as successor, full of the spirit of wisdom. Sirach 45:15 - Moses ordains Aaron and anoints him with oil. There is a transfer of authority through formal ordination. III. Jesus Wants Us to Obey Apostolic Authority Acts 5:13 - the people acknowledged the apostles' special authority and did not dare take it upon themselves. Acts 15:6,24; 16:4 - the teaching authority is granted to the apostles and their successors. This teaching authority must be traced to the original apostles, or the authority is not sanctioned by Christ. Rom. 15:16 Paul says he is a minister of Christ Jesus to the Gentiles in the priestly service of the gospel of God, so that the offering of the Gentiles may be acceptable. This refers to the ministerial priesthood of the ordained which is distinguishable from the universal priesthood of the laity. Notice the Gentiles are the sacrifice and Paul does the offering.

1 Cor. 5:3-5; 16:22; 1 Tim. 1:20; Gal 1:8; Matt 18:17 these verses show the authority of the elders to excommunicate / anathemize ("deliver to satan"). 2 Cor. 2:17 - Paul says the elders are not just random peddlers of God's word. They are actually commissioned by God. It is not self-appointed authority. 2 Cor. 3:6 Paul says that certain men have been qualified by God to be ministers of a New Covenant. This refers to the ministerial priesthood of Christ handed down the ages through sacramental ordination. 2 Cor. 5:20 - Paul says we are "ambassadors" for Christ. This means that the apostles and their successors share an actual participation in Christ's mission, which includes healing, forgiving sins, and confecting the sacraments. 2 Cor. 10:6 in reference to the ordained, Paul says that they are ready to punish every disobedience. The Church has the authority excommunicate those who disobey her. 2 Cor. 10:8 - Paul acknowledges his authority over God's people which the Lord gave to build up the Church. 1 Thess. 5:12-13 - Paul charges the members of the Church to respect those who have authority over them. 2 Thess. 3:14 - Paul says if a person does not obey what he has provided in his letter, have nothing to do with him. 1 Tim. 5:17 - Paul charges the members of the Church to honor the appointed elders (priests) of the Church. Titus 2:15 - Paul charges Timothy to exhort and reprove with all authority, which he received by the laying on of hands. Heb. 12:9 in the context of spiritual discipline, the author says we have had earthly fathers (referring to the ordained leaders) to discipline us and we respected them. Heb. 13:7,17 - Paul charges the members of the Church to remember and obey their leaders who have authority over their souls. 1 Peter 2:18 - Peter charges the servants to be submissive to their masters whether kind and gentle or overbearing. 1 Peter 5:5; Jude 8 - Peter and Jude charge the members of the Church to be subject to their elders. 2 Peter 2:10 - Peter warns the faithful about despising authority. He is referring to the apostolic authority granted to them by Christ.

3 John 9 - John points out that Diotrephes does not acknowledge John's apostolic authority and declares that this is evil. Deut. 17:10-13 - the Lord commands His faithful Israel to obey the priests that He puts in charge, and do to all that they direct and instruct. The Lord warns that those who do not obey His priests shall die. Num. 16:1-35 - Korah incited a "protestant" rebellion against God's chosen Moses in an effort to confuse the distinction between the ministerial and universal offices of priesthood, and Korah and his followers perished. (This effort to blind the distinctions between the priests and the laity is still pursued by dissidents today.) Sirach 7:29-30 - with all your soul fear the Lord and honor His priests, love your Maker and do not forsake His ministers. God is not threatened by the authority He gives His children! God, as our Loving Father, invites us to participate in His plan of salvation with His Son Jesus. Without authority in the Church, there is error, chaos and confusion. Tradition / Church Fathers I. The Church Has Apostolic Succession "And thus preaching through countries and cities, they appointed the first-fruits [of their labours], having first proved them by the Spirit, to be bishops and deacons of those who should afterwards believe. Nor was this any new thing, since indeed many ages before it was written concerning bishops and deacons. For thus saith the Scripture a certain place, 'I will appoint their bishops s in righteousness, and their deacons in faith.'... Our apostles also knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, and there would be strife on account of the office of the episcopate. For this reason, therefore, inasmuch as they had obtained a perfect fore-knowledge of this, they appointed those [ministers] already mentioned, and afterwards gave instructions, that when these should fall asleep, other approved men should succeed them in their ministry...For our sin will not be small, if we eject from the episcopate those who have blamelessly and holily fulfilled its duties." Pope Clement, Epistle to Corinthians, 42, 44 (A.D. 98). "For what is the bishop but one who beyond all others possesses all power and authority, so far as it is possible for a man to possess it, who according to his ability has been made an imitator of the Christ off God? And what is the presbytery but a sacred assembly, the counselors and assessors of the bishop? And what are the deacons but imitators of the angelic powers, fulfilling a pure and blameless ministry unto him, asAnencletus and Clement to Peter?" Ignatius, To the Trallians, 7 (A.D. 110). "Hegesippus in the five books of Memoirs which have come down to us has left a most complete record of his own views. In them he states that on a journey to Rome he met a great many bishops, and that he received the same doctrine from all. It is fitting to hear what he says after making some remarks about the epistle of Clement to the Corinthians. His words are as follows: 'And the church of Corinth continued in the true faith until Primus was bishop in Corinth. I conversed with them on my way to Rome, and

abode with the Corinthians many days, during which we were mutually refreshed in the true doctrine. And when I had come to Rome I remained a there until Anicetus, whose deacon was Eleutherus. And Anicetus was succeeded by Soter, and he by Eleutherus. In every succession, and in every city that is held which is preached by the law and the prophets and the Lord.'" Hegesippus, Memoirs, fragment in Eusebius Ecclesiatical History, 4:22 (A.D. 180). "True knowledge is [that which consists in] the doctrine of the apostles, and the ancient constitution of the Church throughout all the world, and the distinctive manifestation of the body of Christ according to the successions of the bishops, by which they have handed down that Church which exists in every place, and has come even unto us, being guarded and preserved without any forging of Scriptures, by a very complete system of doctrine, and neither receiving addition nor [suffering] curtailment [in the truths which she believes]; and [it consists in] reading [the word of God] without falsification, and a lawful and diligent exposition in harmony with the Scriptures, both without danger and without blasphemy; and [above all, it consists in] the pre-eminent gift of love, which is more precious than knowledge, more glorious than prophecy, and which excels all the other gifts [of God]." Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 4:33:8 (A.D. 180). "But if there be any (heresies) which are bold enough to plant themselves in the midst Of the apostolic age, that they may thereby seem to have been handed down by the apostles, because they existed in the time of the apostles, we can say: Let them produce the original records of their churches; let them unfold the roll of their bishops, running down in due succession from the beginning in such a manner that [that first bishop of theirs] bishop shall be able to show for his ordainer and predecessor some one of the apostles or of apostolic men,--a man, moreover, who continued steadfast with the apostles. To this test, therefore will they be submitted for proof by those churches, who, although they derive not their founder from apostles or apostolic men (as being of much later date, for they are in fact being founded daily), yet, since they agree in the same faith, they are accounted as not less apostolic because they are akin in doctrineThen let all the heresies, when challenged to these two tests by ou r apostolic church, offer their proof of how they deem themselves to be apostolic. But in truth they neither are so, nor are they able to prove themselves to be what they are not. Nor are they admitted to peaceful relations and communion by such churches as are in any way connected with apostles, inasmuch as they are in no sense themselves apostolic because of their diversity as to the mysteries of the faith." Tertullian, Prescription against the Heretics, 33 (A.D. 200). "And that you may still be more confident, that repenting thus truly there remains for you a sure hope of salvation, listen to a tale? Which is not a tale but a narrative, handed down and committed to the custody of memory, about the Apostle John. For when, on the tyrant's death, he returned to Ephesus from the isle of Patmos, he went away, being invited, to the contiguous territories of the nations, here to appoint bishops, there to set in order whole Churches, there to ordain such as were marked out by the Spirit." Clement of Alexandria, Who is the rich man that shall be save?, 42 (A.D. 210).

"We are not to credit these men, nor go out from the first and the ecclesiastical tradition; nor to believe otherwise than as the churches of God have by succession transmitted to us." Origen, Commentary on Matthew (post A.D. 244). "Our Lord, whose precepts and admonitions we ought to observe, describing the honour of a bishop and the order of His Church, speaks in the Gospel, and says to Peter: 'I say unto thee, That thou art Peter, and upon this rock will I 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 shall loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.' Thence, through the changes of times and successions, the ordering of bishops and the plan of the Church flow onwards; so that the Church is founded upon the bishops, and every act of the Church is controlled by these same rulers." Cyprian, To the Lapsed, 1 (A.D. 250). "Therefore the power of remitting sins was given to the apostles, and to the churches which they, sent by Christ, established, and to the bishops who succeeded to them by vicarious ordination." Firmilian, To Cyprian, Epistle 75[74]:16 (A.D. 256). "It is my purpose to write an account of the successions of the holy apostles, as well as of the times which have elapsed from the days of our Saviour to our own; and to relate the many important events which are said to have occurred in the history of the Church; and to mention those who have governed and presided over the Church in the most prominent parishes, and those who in each generation have proclaimed the divine word either orally or in writing... When Nero was in the eighth year of his reign, Annianus succeeded Mark the evangelist in the administration of the parish of Alexandria...Linus ...was Peter's successor in the episcopate of the church there...Clement also, who was appointed third bishop of the church at Rome." Eusebius, Ecclesiastical History,1:1,2:24, (A.D. 325). "Lo! In these three successions, as in a mystery and a figure ... Under the three pastors,--there were manifold shepherds" Ephraem, Nisbene Hymns, The Bishops of Nisibis (Jacob, Babu, Valgesh), 13,14 (A.D. 350). "[W]hile before your election you lived to yourself, after it, you live for your flock. And before you had received the grace of the episcopate, no one knew you; but after you became one, the laity expect you to bring them food, namely instruction from the Scriptures ... For if all were of the same mind as your present advisers, how would you have become a Christian, since there would be no bishops? Or if our successors are to inherit this state of mind, how will the Churches be able to hold together?" Athanasius, To Dracontius, Epistle 49 (A.D. 355). "[B]elieve as we believe, we, who are, by succession from the blessed apostles, bishops; confess as we and they have confessed, the only Son of God, and thus shalt thou obtain forgiveness for thy numerous crimes." Lucifer of Calaris, On St. Athanasius (A.D. 361).

"[W]e shall not recede from the faith ... as once laid it continues even to this say, through the tradition of the fathers, according to the succession from the apostles, even to the discussion had at Nicea against the heresy which had, at that period, sprung up." Hilary of Poitiers, History Fragment 7 (ante A.D. 367). "[D]uring the days of that Anicetus, bishop of Rome, who succeeded Pius and his predecessors, For, in Rome, Peter and Paul were the first both apostles and bishops; then came Linus, then Cletus ... However the succession of the bishops in Rome was in the following order. Peter and Paul, and Cletus, Clement..." Epiphanius, Panarion, 27:6 (A.D. 377). "He [St. Athanasius] is led up to the throne of Saint Mark, to succeed him in piety, no less than in office; in the latter indeed at a great distance from him, in the former, which is the genuine right of succession, following him closely. For unity in doctrine deserves unity in office; and a rival teacher sets up a rival throne; the one is a successor in reality, the other but in name. For it is not the intruder, but he whose rights are intruded upon, who is the successor, not the lawbreaker, but the lawfully appointed, not the man of contrary opinions, but the man of the same faith; if this is not what we mean by successor, he succeeds in the same sense as disease to health, darkness to light, storm to calm, and frenzy to sound sense." Gregory of Nazianzen, Oration 21:8 (A.D. 380). For they have not the succession of Peter. Go and make disciples of every nation... Matthew 28:18-20.

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The Holy Old Orthodox Catholic Archdiocese Archbishop Michael O.O.C.A.

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