Is there any sure repository of Holy Tradition?
Certainly, the Holy Scriptures are a uniquely reliable and authoritative repository of Holy Tradition, on account of their nature as theopneustos, “God-breathed”: “Every Scripture is God-breathed, and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for instruction in righteousness, so that the man of God may be fully qualified, completely equipped for every good work” (2Ti 3:16–17; see Q031, Q056).
It can be said, therefore, that the Holy Scriptures contain all that is necessary for the proclamation of the Gospel of salvation in Jesus Christ (what St Basil called the kērygma), but only provided that they are rightly interpreted and lead the believer to unity with Christ Jesus in the mystery of His Church. St Athanasius writes that “the divine Scripture is sufficient above all things” (St Athanasius, On the Councils, 6; see Q033, Q095), while insisting in the same breath that “our faith is right, and starts from the teaching of the Apostles and the tradition of the fathers, being confirmed both by the New Testament and the Old” (St Athanasius, Letter to Adelphius, 6; see Q033, Q095). Likewise, the great missionary of Alaska, St Innocent, writes: “Certainly all that is necessary for us to know for our salvation is revealed quite clearly and in detail in the Scriptures” (St Innocent of Alaska, Indication of the Way into the Kingdom of Heaven, 1).
This sufficiency of the Scriptures with regard to the Gospel of Christ must not, however, be equated with the slogan of Sola Scriptura, which isolates the Bible from the Body in which it was written, canonized, and is rightly read, and which has in practice proved a cause of fragmentation. The Scriptures function as the rule of faith within the local church and the communion of the holy apostolic Churches, for the Church is the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit who inspired them. Moreover, as St Basil teaches, the proclamation of the kērygma is fulfilled by entrance into the life of the Church, which is informed and regulated by Holy Tradition for the administration of the saving Mysteries of Christ is handed down through the apostolic ministry (1Co 11:23; 2Th 2:15; St Basil the Great, On the Holy Spirit, 27.66; see Q023, Q274). Scripture is therefore not self-sufficient: separated from Holy Tradition, it cannot serve by itself as the criterion of truth, as the heresies that have appealed to it alone have always shown.
As for the Apostle’s teaching that the Scriptures make one “complete” (2Ti 3:16–17; see Q031, Q056), we must remember that it is said of “the man of God”, one who lives and ministers within the Church. Furthermore, the Church herself, with her ministers and Mysteries, is also “God-breathed”: “When he had said this, he breathed on them and told them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit’” (Joh 20:22; see Q115, Q351).
The Church in the biblical sense, the local Church gathered around her bishop, in communion with all the apostolic Churches and all true believers, united collectively and successively by the holy tradition of the faith, is therefore, by the will of God, the sure repository of Holy Tradition; or, as St Paul expresses it, “the Church of the living God, the pillar and foundation of the truth” (1Ti 3:15; see Q010, Q017). St Irenaeus writes:
We should not seek the truth elsewhere, since we may obtain it by asking from the Church. In her, as in a rich treasure-house, the Apostles have laid up in its fullness all that pertains to the truth, so that whoever seeks may receive from her the food of life. She is the door of life. (St Irenaeus, Against Heresies, III.4.1; see Q024, Q090)
Is Scripture, then, the highest authority in the church? Scripture holds the first place among the witnesses of the one apostolic Tradition, and nothing contrary to it can be true. It is not, however, an authority apart from the church. The same Holy Spirit who inspired the Scriptures guides the church into all truth and opens the minds of the faithful to understand them (Jn 16:13; Lk 24:45). The dogmatic definitions of the Ecumenical Councils add nothing to the deposit of faith; they confess its meaning without error, because the Spirit who spoke through the prophets speaks in the consensus of the Churches (Acts 15:28).
In this catechism, we shall therefore also discuss what the Church is and how to identify her marks and characteristics.
