The Church

It can seem odd that the Creed asks us to believe in the Church. We can see the Church: its buildings, its clergy, its failings. But the Creed points deeper. The word church translates the Greek ekklesia, "those called out", the people God gathers from every nation (CCC 751). This article explains what the Creed means by it.

People, Body and Temple

Of the New Testament's many images for the Church, three stand out.

The Church is the People of God. As God once chose Israel, he now gathers a people from every nation, through faith in Christ and Baptism, to share Christ's priestly, prophetic and royal mission (CCC 781–786).

The Church is the Body of Christ. Christ is the head and we are the members, joined to him and to one another, above all in the Eucharist (CCC 787–796; 1 Corinthians 12:12–27).

The Church is the Temple of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit dwells in it as the soul dwells in a body, giving it life and unity (CCC 797–801).

One, holy, catholic and apostolic

The Nicene Creed names four marks, or characteristics, of the Church (CCC 811).

One

The Church is one because its source is the one God, its founder is the one Christ, and its soul is the one Spirit (CCC 813). Unity is not uniformity: the Church holds a great variety of peoples, cultures and rites (CCC 814). What binds it is one faith, one shared sacramental worship, and the succession of bishops from the apostles (CCC 815). Christ's one Church "subsists in" the Catholic Church: it is found there in its fullness (CCC 816).

Holy

How can a Church of sinners be holy? Because its holiness comes not from its members but from Christ, who gave himself up to make the Church holy, and from the Spirit who lives in it (CCC 823–824). The Church is holy in what it has been given: the Gospel, the sacraments, the means of grace. Its members, clergy included, are still on the way, and the Church is at once holy and always in need of purification (CCC 827). Its canonised saints show what that holiness looks like in a life (CCC 828).

Catholic

Catholic means "universal" or "according to the whole". The Church is catholic because Christ is present in it with the fullness of the means of salvation, and because it is sent to the whole human race (CCC 830–831). It lives in local Churches, or dioceses, each gathered around its bishop and in communion with Rome (CCC 832–835).

Apostolic

The Church is apostolic because it is built on the foundation of the apostles, keeps and hands on their teaching, and is still taught, made holy and guided by them through their successors, the bishops (CCC 857–860).

Peter, the pope and the bishops

Jesus chose the Twelve as a body, with Peter at their head (CCC 880). He said to Peter:

And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it.

— Matthew 16:18

He also gave Peter the keys of the kingdom (Matthew 16:19). Peter's office continues in the bishop of Rome, the pope, and the apostles' office in the bishops together with him (CCC 881). The pope is the visible source and foundation of unity for bishops and faithful alike (CCC 882). The bishops, in communion with him, teach, sanctify and govern their own Churches (CCC 883–887).

Infallibility needs precise words. It does not mean the pope cannot sin, or that everything he says is free from error. It means that when the pope, as supreme pastor of the whole Church, proclaims by a definitive act a doctrine of faith or morals, the Holy Spirit preserves that teaching from error. The same gift belongs to the bishops together with the pope, above all in an ecumenical council (CCC 891). Solemn definitions of this kind are rare: those of Mary's Immaculate Conception (1854) and her Assumption (1950) are the examples usually given. Most teaching comes in the ordinary way, and asks of the faithful a sincere religious assent (CCC 892).

Other Christians and other religions

Divisions among Christians are real wounds, and blame lies on both sides (CCC 817). Those born into other Christian communities today cannot be charged with the sin of separation, and Catholics accept them as brothers and sisters in the Lord (CCC 818). Many elements of holiness and truth are found outside the visible bounds of the Catholic Church, and the Spirit uses them (CCC 819). The Orthodox Churches in particular share a communion with Catholics so deep that it lacks little (CCC 838). Praying and working for unity is the concern of every Catholic (CCC 820–822).

The Church recognises its bond with the Jewish people, the first to hear the word of God (CCC 839), and with Muslims, who with us adore the one merciful God (CCC 841). It respects whatever is true and good in other religions as a preparation for the Gospel (CCC 842–843). It teaches that all salvation comes from Christ through his Church, and that anyone who knew that God had made the Church necessary for salvation, and still refused to enter it or remain in it, could not be saved (CCC 846). Yet those who, through no fault of their own, do not know Christ or the Church, but seek God sincerely and, moved by grace, try to do his will as their conscience shows it to them, may also attain eternal salvation (CCC 847). None of this cancels the mission to share the Gospel with everyone (CCC 848).

The communion of saints

The Apostles' Creed adds "the communion of saints": God's one family, on earth, in purification and in heaven, sharing in holy things and praying for one another (CCC 946–962). See the communion of saints.

Going deeper

• The communion of saints, the Church across death.
• The early Church, the apostles' Church in history.
• Scripture and Tradition, on how the apostles' teaching is handed on.
• Read next: CCC 748–870 on the Church and its marks, and CCC 871–896 on its structure.