Thoughts on catholic/worldwide

This is from packer's great little book
Affirming the Apostles' Creed.

In the intro he writes:
Created and animated by the Holy Spirit,
the church is the community of believers living through God
and to God, the Father and the Son, in a sustained pattern
of worship, work, and witness. (This is why the church is
called “holy,” which means set apart for God.) It is the worldwide
people of God and body of Christ, in whose faith and
fellowship social, racial, gender, age, educational, professional,
and political distinctions cease to count; all are “one
in Christ Jesus” (Galatians 3:28). (This is why the church is
called “catholic,” which means comprehensive, or inclusive,
in both extent and quality.) Knowing and uniting with the
Lord Jesus Christ according to the gospel is the dynamic basis
of the church’s inner unity and togetherness.

(to see more from Packer, go to bottom of this post)

So, here's the line of thought:
1.) To say "i believe in the holy catholic church" is confusing to some (many?) in the congregation of CCC because it may mean that we are giving a shout-out only to the ROMAN catholic church.
2.) The word catholic, when the creed started, meant something far different to the average Joe than it does today.
Insert dangerous illustration here:
Imagine the creed were written back when "gay" tended to mean "happy or joyful".  And the writers said, "We believe in the gay church."
That would connote something very different to the average person in 2010.

I'm only saying something about the way words can change in their common usage.  Nothing more.

So, we'll say, "I believe in the worldwide church."  At least on Sunday.  And hope to experience together the joy of being a part of God's worldwide mission.


More from Packer:
�IIt is by strict theological logic that the Creed confesses faith
in the Holy Spirit before proceeding to the church and that
it speaks of the church before mentioning personal salvation
(forgiveness, resurrection, everlasting life). For though Father
and Son have loved the church and the Son has redeemed it,
it is the Holy Spirit who actually creates it, by inducing faith;
and it is in the church, through its ministry and fellowship,
that personal salvation ordinarily comes to be enjoyed.
Unhappily, there is at this point a parting of the ways.
Roman Catholics and Protestants both say the Creed, yet they
are divided. Why? Basically, because of divergent understandings
of “I believe in the holy catholic church”—”one holy
catholic and apostolic church,” as the true text of the Nicene
Creed has it.


􀁓􀁐􀁎􀁂􀁏􀀡􀁗􀁆􀁓􀁔􀁖􀁔􀀡􀁑􀁓􀁐􀁕􀁆􀁔􀁕􀁂􀁏􀁕
Official Roman Catholic teaching presents the church of
Christ as the one organized body of baptized persons who
are in communion with the Pope and acknowledge the
teaching and ruling authority of the episcopal hierarchy. It is
holy because it produces saintly folk and is kept from radical
sin, catholic because in its worldwide spread it holds the full
faith in trust for everyone, and apostolic because its ministerial
orders stem from the apostles, and its faith (including
such non-biblical items as the assumption of Mary and her
immaculate conception, the Mass-sacrifice, and papal infallibility)
is a sound growth from apostolic roots. Non-Roman
bodies, however church-like, are not strictly part of the
church at all.
Protestants challenge this from the Bible. In Scripture
(they say) the church is the one worldwide fellowship of
believing people whose Head is Christ. It is holy because it
is consecrated to God (though it is capable nonetheless of
grievous sin); it is catholic because it embraces all Christians
everywhere; and it is apostolic because it seeks to maintain
the apostles’ doctrine unmixed. Pope, hierarchy, and extrabiblical
doctrines are not merely nonessential but actually
deforming; if Rome is a church (which some Reformers
doubted) she is so despite the extras, not because of them. In particular, infallibility belongs to God speaking in the Bible,
not to the church or to any of its officers, and any teaching
given in or by the church must be open to correction by
“God’s word written.”1
Some Protestants have taken the clause “the communion
of saints,” which follows “the holy catholic church,” as
the Creed’s own elucidation of what the church is; namely,
Christians in fellowship with each other—just that, without
regard for any particular hierarchical structure. But it is usual
to treat this phrase as affirming the real union in Christ of
the church “militant here on earth” with the church triumphant,
as is indicated in Hebrews 12:22–24; and it may be
that the clause was originally meant to signify communion in
holy things (Word, sacrament, worship, prayers) and to make
the true but distinct point that in the church there is a real
sharing in the life of God. The “spiritual” view of the church
as being a fellowship before it is an institution can, however,
be confirmed from Scripture without appeal to this phrase,
whatever its sense, being needed.

That the New Testament presents the Protestant view is
hardly open to dispute (the dispute is over whether the New
Testament is final!). The church appears in Trinitarian relationships as the family of God the Father, the body of Christ
the Son, and the temple (dwelling-place) of the Holy Spirit,
and so long as the dominical sacraments are administered
and ministerial oversight is exercised, no organizational
norms are insisted on at all. The church is the supernatural
society of God’s redeemed and baptized people, looking back
to Christ’s first coming with gratitude and on to his second
coming with hope. “Your life is hidden with Christ in God.
When Christ who is your life appears, then you also will
appear with him in glory” (Colossians 3:3–4)—such is the
church’s present state and future prospect. To this hope both
sacraments point, baptism prefiguring final resurrection, the
Lord’s Supper anticipating “the marriage supper of the Lamb”
(Revelation 19:9).


For the present, however, all churches (like those in
Corinth, Colosse, Galatia, and Thessalonica, to look no further)
are prone to err in both faith and morals and need constant correction
and re-formation at all levels (intellectual, devotional,
structural, liturgical) by the Spirit through God’s Word.
The evangelical theology of revival, first spelled out in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and the present-day emergence
of “charismatic renewal” on a worldwide scale remind us
of something that Roman Catholic and Protestant disputers, in
their concentration on doctrinal truth, tended to miss—namely,
that the church must always be open to the immediacy of the
Spirit’s Lordship and that disorderly vigor in a congregation is
infinitely preferable to a correct and tidy deadness.
􀁕􀁉􀁆􀀡􀁍􀁐􀁄􀁂􀁍􀀡􀁄􀁉􀁖􀁓􀁄􀁉
The acid test of the church’s state is what happens in the
local congregation. Each congregation is a visible outcrop
of the one church universal, called to serve God and men in
humility and, perhaps, humiliation while living in prospect of
glory. Spirit-filled for worship and witness, active in love and
care for insiders and outsiders alike, self-supporting and selfpropagating,
each congregation is to be a spearhead of divine
counterattack for the recapture of a rebel world.
Here is a question for you: how is your congregation
getting on?

---Packer