The Catholic Church is often misunderstood and misquoted in terms of its teachings of faith and morals. Many of the Catholic faith myths come from a lack of willingness to pursue the truth about what the Church teaches. It is easier for some to take one thing out of spiritual or biblical context and use it as “proof” that the myth is true rather than do the research and study necessary to understand the Church’s teaching on a specific subject fully. A person can be willing to do the analysis, correctly quote what the Church teaches, and still disagree based upon their opinion. In and of itself, that is not a problem. The problem occurs when they ignore the teaching because it is necessary to support their opinion as truth. We cannot change scripture or alter the words of Jesus simply because they may be difficult to hear, uncomfortable, or contrary to the way we think things should be.
This is especially true for those who take a single scripture or two out of context to support their views against the Catholic Church. Many, if not all, of the objections against Church teaching begin by taking scripture out of context to find that “gotcha! see I told you so” moment. And by the way, there are Catholics that do the same thing.
A common example that non-Catholics use to try and prove that the Church is “wrong” is that scripture says we should call no one on earth father. By calling a priest father, we are going against the very words of Jesus. It is true that in Matthew 23:9 Jesus says, “Call no one on earth your father; you have but one Father in heaven.” Again, if you stop there, then yes, we should not call our priest father. But that would be taking this scripture completely out of context to simply prove an argument. So, let’s put this scripture into context.
In this chapter of Matthew, Jesus is talking to the Scribes and Pharisees about the fact that they are more interested in acquiring titles for the sake of power than they are about teaching the truth. Often in scripture, Jesus speaks in hyperbole or exaggeration to make a point. For example, when Jesus says to cut off our hands or pluck out our eyes if they are the source of sin, did he mean that literally? No, of course not. He was exaggerating to make the point that whatever is in our life that causes us to sin, we should separate ourselves (cut ourselves off) from it as radically as we would cut off our hand if it caused us to sin. That is the context in which Jesus is speaking in this passage about the use of father or teacher. The Scribes and Pharisees were taking the title of father and teacher to gain power and authority and have people follow them based upon what they were teaching, which was not the truth as Jesus was teaching. What Jesus was saying is that no man should use the term father or teacher to further their own agenda and gain more power by teaching something different than what God the Father teaches. (Ironically, that is exactly what the leaders of the Protestant Reformation did when they basically said that they were suddenly teachers of the truth and that everyone should no longer believe what Christians followed for 1,500 years. They claimed to be the new teachers with the new truth. This is exactly what Jesus warned about in this scripture). The Church agrees that God is the ultimate Father, and that the Fatherhood of God is unconditional and complete. Notice in the scripture how the writer uses the small “f” in describing the father on earth, and the capital “F” when describing God. That simple fact tells us that the context of this passage is more than the common anti-Catholic argument might indicate.
Jesus also tells them not to refer to themselves as “rabbi”, which means teacher. Using the non-Catholics logic, why is it ok to call those who assist in our education teachers. The reason and context are the same. Jesus meant that if you are going to use the title for power and a way to instruct others in something other than the truth as revealed by God, then that person should not call themselves teacher.
God the Father sent Jesus the teacher to once and for all reveal the truth about our salvation. Jesus then gave that authority to the apostles who then gave that authority to their successors who are the priests and bishops of the Catholic Church. John 20:21 says “[Jesus] said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you.” Jesus provides no exceptions. In other words, he does not say “…so I send you, except for these things”. Taking this in context, father and teacher are titles of leadership, guidance, and provider. In that sense, of course God is the ultimate Father, but that does not mean that priests, as provided by God, are not our spiritual fathers guiding us in our relationship with God.
In several scriptures, we see the apostles either refer to themselves as father or use an analogy of calling others their spiritual children. If what non-Catholics say is true simply to win an argument, then we would have to assume that not only did the apostles violate Jesus’ teaching, but we would also have to admit that the scripture contains contradictions, which it cannot contain as the inspired word of God. This is how we can be sure that the one verse of Matthew 23:9 is taken out of context.
The best example is found in 1 Corinthians 4:15 where Paul says, “Even if you should have countless guides to Christ, yet you do not have many fathers, for I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel.” Here Paul is saying that we may have many spiritual teachers, but not many spiritual fathers. He is telling them that he is their spiritual father in the same way his successor priests are our spiritual fathers today, and that it is in fact acceptable to refer to him as father. Paul’s words, as scripture, are divinely inspired by God.
Additional scripture refers to the apostles (and by succession the priests and bishops) as taking on the role of father. For example, in Galatians 4:19 Paul refers to his audience as his spiritual children (indicating the role of spiritual father); 2 Timothy 1:2 he refers to Timothy as his “child” (indicating the role of spiritual father); In 1 Peter 5:13, Peter refers to Mark as “my son” (indicating the role of spiritual father).
Continuing in the understanding of the context in which Jesus was speaking, by logic and reason we can conclude that the non-Catholic’s claim is simply not true. Agreeing with the fact that God is the ultimate Father, how would we even know what the word Father meant if we did not assign the word father to those in our world? What would be our frame of reference that we would use to understand what Jesus meant when he uses the term Father? It would just be a word that no one would understand. This is especially true for our biological fathers. There never seems to be a problem with the term as used by humans to describe the biological role of a man as something other than God the Father. If we could call no man father, then how do we understand the 4th Commandment: honor thy mother and father”?
Finally, in all things Catholic, everything is subordinate to God. Everything. God’s Fatherhood is unconditional and unlimited. The spiritual fatherhood of the priest is completely conditional and dependent on the Fatherhood of God. The spiritual fatherhood of a priest would never rise to the level of the ultimate Fatherhood of God.