Catholicism in
Rome sitting "Upon this rock," a reference to
Matthew 16:18 The
Catholic Church teaches that Christ founded only "one true Church", and that this one true Church is the Catholic Church with the
bishop of Rome (the pope) as its
supreme,
infallible head and locus of communion. From this follows that it regards itself as "the universal sacrament of salvation for the human race" and the "only true religion". According to the
Catechism of the Catholic Church,
Catholic ecclesiology professes the Catholic Church to be the "sole Church of Christ"—i.e., the one true church defined as "one, holy, catholic, and apostolic" in the
Four Marks of the Church in the
Nicene Creed. The
Council of Nicea (AD 325) originally formulated this teaching and ratified the Nicene Creed. The church teaches that only the Catholic Church was founded by Jesus Christ, who
appointed the Twelve Apostles to continue his work as the Church's earliest
bishops. Catholic belief holds that the Church "is the continuing presence of Jesus on earth", and that all duly-consecrated bishops have a lineal
succession from the apostles. In particular, the Bishop of Rome (the
Pope), is considered the successor to the apostle
Simon Peter, from whom the Pope derives his
supremacy over the Church. The 1943 papal encyclical
Mystici corporis Christi further describes the Church as the
Mystical Body of Christ. Thus the Catholic Church holds that "the one Church of Christ which in the Creed is professed as one, holy, catholic and apostolic ... This Church constituted and organized in the world as a society,
subsists in the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the Bishops in communion with him." In
Humani Generis,
Pope Pius XII declared that "the
Mystical Body of Christ and the Catholic Church are one and the same thing." The Second Vatican Council repeated this teaching, stating in the Decree on the Eastern Churches: "The Holy Catholic Church, which is the Mystical Body of Christ, is made up of the faithful who are organically united in the Holy Spirit by the same faith, the same sacraments and the same government." In responding to some questions regarding the doctrine of the Church concerning itself, the Vatican's
Sacred Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith stated, "
Clarius dicendum esset veram Ecclesiam esse solam Ecclesiam catholicam romanam..." ("It should be said more clearly that the Roman Catholic Church alone is the true Church..") a statement of what is known as the doctrine of
extra Ecclesiam nulla salus. In the encyclical
Mortalium animos of 6 January 1928,
Pope Pius XI wrote that "in this one Church of Christ no man can be or remain who does not accept, recognize and obey the authority and supremacy of Peter and his legitimate successors" and quoted the statement of
Lactantius: "The Catholic Church is alone in keeping the true worship. This is the fount of truth, this the house of Faith, this the temple of God: if any man enter not here, or if any man go forth from it, he is a stranger to the hope of life and salvation." Accordingly, the Second Vatican Council of 1962–1965 declared: "Whosoever, [...] knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by Christ, would refuse to enter or to remain in it, could not be saved. And in a decree on ecumenism,
Unitatis redintegratio, it stated: "Catholics must gladly acknowledge and esteem the truly Christian endowments from our common heritage which are to be found among our separated brethren. It is right and salutary to recognise the riches of Christ and virtuous works in the lives of others who are bearing witness to Christ, sometimes even to the shedding of their blood. For God is always wonderful in His works and worthy of all praise." The Catholic Church teaches that the fullness of the "means of
salvation" exists only in the Catholic Church, but the church acknowledges that the
Holy Spirit can make use of
ecclesial communities separated from itself to "impel towards Catholic unity" and thus bring people to salvation in the Catholic Church ultimately. It teaches that anyone who is saved is saved through the Catholic Church but that people can be saved
ex voto and by
pre-baptismal martyrdom as well as when conditions of
invincible ignorance are present, although invincible ignorance in itself is not a means of salvation. Catholic theology regards formal
schismatics as outside the church, understanding by "formal schismatics" baptized "persons who, knowing the true nature of the Church, have personally and deliberately committed the
sin of schism". The situation, for instance, of those who have been brought up from childhood within a group not in communion with
Rome, and who are acting in good faith and have maintained almost the entirety of the orthodox faith, differs.
Lutheranism The Lutheran Church views itself as the "main trunk of the historical Christian Tree" founded by Christ and the Apostles, holding that during the
Reformation, the Church of Rome fell away. The
Augsburg Confession found within the
Book of Concord, a compendium of belief of the
Lutheran Churches, teaches that "the faith as confessed by Luther and his followers is nothing new, but the true Catholic faith, and that their churches represent the true catholic or universal church". When the Lutherans presented the Augsburg Confession to
Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor in 1530, they believe to have "showed that each article of faith and practice was true first of all to Holy Scripture, and then also to the teaching of the church fathers and the councils".
Laestadian Lutherans, in particular, emphasize this belief. In the Lutheran Churches, the "Office of the Keys is the special authority which Christ has given to His Church on earth: to forgive the sins of the penitent sinners, but to retain the sins of the impenitent as long as they do not repent." Lutheran doctrine cites as the basis for the sacrament of
Confession and Absolution. These Baptists maintain that those who held their views throughout history, including the "
Montanists,
Novatians,
Patarenes,
Bogomils,
Paulicians,
Arnoldists,
Henricians,
Albigenses, and
Waldenses", were
persecuted for their faith, a belief that these Baptists maintain to be "grand distinguishing mark of the true church". In the introduction of
The Trail of Blood, a Baptist text that explicates the doctrine of Baptist succession, Clarence Walker states that "The history of Baptists, he discovered, was written in blood. They were the hated people of the Dark Ages. Their preachers and people were put into prison and untold numbers were put to death."
J. M. Carroll, the author of the said text
The Trail of Blood, also appeals to historian
Johann Lorenz von Mosheim, who stated "Before the rise of
Luther and
Calvin, there lay secreted in almost all the countries of Europe persons who adhered tenaciously to the principles of modern Dutch Baptists." In addition Shurden writes that Baptists who uphold successionism believe that "only a true church-that is, a Baptist church-can legitimately celebrate the ordinances of
baptism and the
Lord's Supper. Any celebration of these
ordinances by non-Baptists is invalid." These views are generally no longer widely held in the Southern Baptist Convention although they are still taught by some Southern Baptist Churches and many
independent Baptist churches,
Primitive Baptists (Reformed Baptists), and some "congregations affiliated with the
American Baptist Association."
Anabaptists family in
Lyndonville, New York.
Amish The
Amish, as with other
Anabaptist Christians, believe that "the established church became corrupt, ineffectual, and displeasing to God." The Amish believe that the true church is pure and separate from the world:
Anabaptist theologian
Donald Kraybill writes:
George Fox and his followers "believed that they were called to carry out the true reformation, to restore apostolic Christianity, and to make a fresh beginning". As such, "The Quaker community was the one true Church, and consequently those converted by Quaker preaching were expected to join it." Among some Quakers, there became a "shift from being the one and only True Church to being a part of the True Church" and so "
marriage with non-Quakers became accepted by many in the Quaker community", though "they still had to marry within the Meeting House, as well as gain approbation."
Methodism and
entire sanctification to the public at events such as
tent revivals and
camp meetings, which they believe is the reason that God raised them up into existence. With regard to the position of Methodism within
Christendom, the founder of the movement "John Wesley once noted that what God had achieved in the development of Methodism was no mere human endeavor but the work of God. As such it would be preserved by God so long as history remained." Calling it "the grand depositum" of the Methodist faith, Wesley specifically taught that the propagation of the doctrine of
entire sanctification was the reason that God raised up the Methodists in the world.
Restorationism . He said that
Jesus and
God the Father told him that all the churches of his day were corrupt and abominable.
Restorationism is a broad category of churches, originating during the
Second Great Awakening, that characterize themselves as a return to very early Christianity after the true faith was lost in a
Great Apostasy. Prominent among these groups are the
Christian churches and churches of Christ, the
Churches of Christ (Stone-Campbell movement), the
Christadelphians, the
International Bible Students, the
Jehovah's Witnesses, and the
Latter Day Saint movement (
Mormonism). The idea of "restoration" was a popular theme of the time of the founding of these branches, and developed an independent expression in both. In the Stone-Campbell movement, the idea of restoration was combined with Enlightenment rationalism, "precluding emotionalism, spiritualism, or any other phenomena that could not be sustained by rational appeals to the biblical text." It specifically teaches that "it is the '
final remnant' of His true church [spanning] the centuries".
Seventh-day Adventist eschatology promulgates the idea that in the
end times, there will be a "growing opposition between the 'true' church and the 'apostate' church." According to
Seventh-day Adventist theology, these apostates are referred to as "
Babylon", which they state is an amalgam of religions (including other
Christian denominations) that worship on Sunday rather than the Lord's
Sabbath, Saturday (). The SDA Church, in their view, "has drawn substantially on the biblical text, especially the books of
Daniel and
Revelation, to argue for its own status as the true remnant church which has a divine commission both to exist and to preach its apocalyptic message to the world at large."
Christian Conventions Some small episcopal church groups, such as the "
Workers and Friends", represent themselves as nondenominational and hold all other churches to be false.
Jehovah's Witnesses Originating from the
Bible Student Movement under
Charles Taze Russell, the Jehovah's Witnesses were founded under
Joseph Franklin Rutherford, who, after a
presidency dispute, was recognized as the second president of the
Watch Tower and Tract Society of Pennsylvania, the official publishing company and organization of the Bible Students, first founded in 1881. In 1938, Rutherford introduced what he called a
theocratic (literally,
God-ruled) organizational system. The Organization since the time of Rutherford, has long laid claim to being "Jehovah's one and only true Organization" which is led or guided by a class of "
anointed Christians", and represented by a leading group known as the "
Faithful and Discreet Slave", which claims to be operating under the direct control of Jesus Christ to exercise teaching authority in all matters pertaining to
doctrine and
articles of faith since the year 1919, when Jesus was said to have "appointed his 'Slave' over his 'Domestics'", after his "Invisible Presence" or "
Parousia" in the year 1914. Since 2012 the Jehovah's Witnesses leadership, the
Governing Body, have laid exclusive claim to being "Jehovah God's Faithful and Discreet Slave", and maintain their position that salvation can only be found in the Organization of the Jehovah's Witnesses. Smith later reported in some versions of his
First Vision in his teenage years, Jesus had told him that all churches that then existed "were all wrong; [and] that all their creeds were an abomination in his sight". The Latter Day Saints combined their religion with "the spirit of nineteenth-century Romanticism" and, as a result, "never sought to recover the forms and structures of the ancient church as ends in themselves" but "sought to restore the golden age, recorded in both Old Testament and New Testament, when God broke into human history and communed directly with humankind." The church teaches that all people who achieve the
highest level of salvation must be baptized by one who holds the proper authority to perform such an ordinance; however, those who missed that opportunity in their lifetime may be included through a proxy
baptism for the dead, in which a church member is baptized on their behalf inside a
temple. Most other Latter Day Saint churches claim to be the rightful continuation or successor of the church Smith established and therefore claim to be the one true church. However, the
Community of Christ, the second-largest Latter Day Saint church, has recently de-emphasized this belief in favor of a position that the Community of Christ "is part of the whole body of Christ". The church's canonized
Doctrine and Covenants continues to contain the declaration that the church is the "only true and living church".
Iglesia ni Cristo The
Iglesia ni Cristo (INC) a
Philippine-based Christian religion, like other restorationist groups, professes that it is the one church founded by Jesus. Adherents hold that the
Iglesia ni Cristo ("Church of Christ" in Tagalog) is the only true
church of Jesus Christ as restored through a human instrument (
sugo)
Felix Manalo. The church recognizes Jesus Christ as the founder of the Christian Church. Meanwhile, its reestablishment is seen as the signal for the
end of days. They believe that the church was
apostatized by the 1st or 4th century due to
false teachings. The INC says that this apostate church is the Roman Catholic Church. Members believe that the
Iglesia ni Cristo is the fulfillment of the passage above. Based from their doctrines, "ends of the earth" pertains to the time the true church would be restored from apostasy and "east" refers to the
Philippines where the "Church of Christ" would be founded. The INC teaches that its members constitute the "
elect of God" and there is no
salvation outside the INC.
Faith alone is insufficient for salvation. The
Iglesia ni Cristo says that the official name of the true church is "Church of Christ". The two passages often cited by INC to support this are Romans 16:16 "Greet one another with a holy kiss. All the churches of Christ greet you" and the
George Lamsa translation of
Acts 20:28: "Take heed therefore ... to feed the church of Christ which he has purchased with his blood."
Shincheonji Church of Jesus Shincheonji Church of Jesus, the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony (SCJ), commonly known as Shincheonji Church of Jesus or simply Shincheonji (
Korean: 신천지;
Hanja: 新天地; lit. '
New Heaven and New Earth'; IPA:
[ɕintɕʰʌndʑi]), is a
Abrahamic monotheistic new religious movement established in
South Korea by
Lee Man-hee in 1984. Shincheonji's teaching claims that their chairman, Lee Man Hee, is the pastor promised in the
New Testament, and that the
Book of Revelation was written in secret
parables whose meaning was revealed to Chairman Lee by God. Shincheonji teaches that it is the
one true religion, with its members receiving salvation at the
Last Judgment. Its adherents believe everyone not in the group will be denied forgiveness and destroyed. The group's founder and leader is variously referred to by church followers as "Chairman Lee (이 총회장)"; "the Chairman (회장)"; "the Promised Pastor (약속의 목자)"; "the One who Overcomes (이긴자)"; or "the Advocate (대언자)." Adherents believe Lee is the
successor to Jesus Christ, and as having the unique ability to interpret the
Book of Revelation. The group also believes in the
times of fulfillment of New Testament prophecies, the most pious 144,000 adherents of the church will enjoy salvation and
eternal life as promised in
Revelation 7. ==See also==