What do many Catholics believe was the ultimate source of authority?

Answer 1

Many Catholics believe the Pope is the ultimate source of authority, while others believe this is really church tradition as compiled and collected in the 'Magisterium' since the Pope and Cardinals must obey it: it is the ultimate source of authority for Catholics and is the church's interpretation of both secular and non-secular matters and takes precedence over everything else including The Bible.

Answer 2

Catholic AnswerIt's just Catholic, not Roman Catholic. Roman is an epithet first commonly used in England after the protestant revolt to describe the Catholic Church. It is never used by the official Catholic Church.

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The source of authority for the Catholic Church is its head, Our Blessed Lord, Jesus Christ. The Catholic Church is His Mystical Body, with Jesus as its head and we as its members. Our Blessed Lord taught the apostles and send the Holy Spirit to teach them everything, and then vested all authority in them, and guaranteed that authority through His Holy Spirit. Within the first century after Christ's Ascension, some of that was written down in what we now call the New Testament. The Pope, Pope Damasus 1 at the Council of Rome decree which books belonged to the New Testament and were infallible and which were not. He then combined it with the Old Testament that Our Blessed Lord had used and in 380 A.D., we had a Bible which was written to be a preaching tool of the Apostles and is guaranteed by the same infallible Church that is guided by the Holy Spirit and guaranteed by God. Thus we call these two: Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture, the two of them guided by the Magisterium are the sources of authority for the Church on earth.

from the Catholic Encyclopedia

The Church is the Mystical Body of Christ as set forth by St. Paul in various passages, more especially in Ephesians 4:4-13 (cf. John 15:5-8). The doctrine may be summarized as follows:

•The members of the Church are bound together by a supernatural life communicated to them by Christ through the sacraments (John 15:5). Christ is the centre and source of life to Whom all are united, and Who endows each one with gifts fitting him for his position in the body (John 15:7-12). These graces, through which each is equipped for his work, form it into an organized whole, whose parts are knit together as though by a system of ligaments and joints (John 15:16; Colossians 2:19).

•Through them, too, the Church has its growth and increase, growing in extension as it spreads through the world, and intensively as the individual Christian develops in himself the likeness of Christ (John 15:13-15).

•In virtue of this union the Church is the fulness or complement (pleroma) of Christ (Ephesians 1:23). It forms one whole with Him; and the Apostle even speaks of the Church as "Christ" (1 Corinthians 12:12).

•This union between head and members is conserved and nourished by the Holy Eucharist. Through this sacrament our incorporation into the Body of Christ is alike outwardly symbolized and inwardly actualized; "We being many are one bread, one body; for we all partake of the one bread" (1 Corinthians 10:17).

Answer 3

Roman Catholic AnswerJesus Christ is the source of the teaching of the Catholic Church. His teachings have been handed down to us through the Church and are found in Sacred Tradition and the Bible.