Who has the “true” church?

Pope Benedict’s recent approval of a document from the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith “correcting” what he says are erroneous interpretations of the Second Vatican Council and asserting that all other Christian communities are either defective or not true churches has caused a great deal of concerned, even outraged, discussion. But in fact this has been the historic position of the Catholic Church through the centuries, so it really is nothing new. The Catholic Church bases its claim on the words of Jesus in Matthew 16:18 “…you are Peter and upon this rock I will build my church…”. There are alternate interpretations of this passage in which the rock referred to is Peter’s confession of faith, not Peter himself, with a play on words since rock in Aramaic is petros, and in Greek is petra. And it is not clear how this passage sorts with Jesus’ words in Matthew 5:18 "For assuredly, I say to you, till heaven and earth pass away, one jot or one tittle will by no means pass from the law till all is fulfilled." That would seem to imply that Jesus thought the true religion was Judaism.

But Catholics are not the only ones to hold the view that theirs is the only true religion. That is certainly at the core of orthodox Islamic beliefs, though Muslim teachings do accord Christians and Jews some status as “People of the Book”, believers in earlier but incomplete or defective revelations from God. Mormons are pretty sure that the “latter day” revelations to Joseph Smith make theirs the true religion. And a good many Protestant religions, especially on the fringes, are just as certain that the rest of us will spend an uncomfortable afterlife for not adhering strictly to their views.

This sort of intolerant certainty seems to go with monotheistic believers, because I don’t get the impression that the polytheistic and non-theistic religions of the East carry this sort of absolute certainty and condemnation of non-believers. In fact, among many Eastern religions there seem to be a comfortable “live and let live” approach, with Hindus and Buddhists even sharing temples in some places, just as some temple precincts in Japan are shared by Buddhists and Shintos.

In any case, all these raucous claims to absolute religious certainty put me in mind of the words of the King of Siam in Rodger’s and Hammerstein’s 1951 hit musical “The King and I” :

And it puzzle me to learn
That tho' a man may be in doubt of what he know,
Very quickly he will fight...
He'll fight to prove that what he does not know is so!