Joe Heschmeyer – Catholic Answers Article –
There is one doctrine in particular that you need to get right: the papacy. If Catholics are right about the papacy, everyone should be Catholic. If Catholics are wrong about the papacy, nobody should be Catholics. It’s honestly that simple.
That’s not to say that the papacy is the most important doctrine. It’s not. Distinctiveness and importance aren’t the same thing. A truck’s bed is what distinguishes it from a car, but the truck’s engine is obviously more important. Likewise, the divinity of Christ is infinitely more important than the papacy, but believing that Christ is divine doesn’t tell you whether or not to be Catholic. Even believing in the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist isn’t quite enough: after all, what about the Orthodox?
So, if you want to know whether Catholicism specifically is correct, it all comes down to the papacy. Moreover, if what we believe about the teaching authority of the Church is true, and that teaching authority has clarified most (if not all) of the other doctrinal disputes between Catholics and Protestants, then answering this one question correctly ends up answering scores of other questions.
I start by looking at Luke 22, where Jesus speaks to his Twelve Apostles at the Last Supper. They were bickering over “which of them was to be regarded as the greatest,” and Jesus responds by laying out the nature of true Christian leadership: “The kings of the Gentiles exercise lordship over them; and those in authority over them are called benefactors. But not so with you; rather let the greatest among you become as the youngest, and the leader as one who serves” (Luke 22:24-25). Christ even explained his own authority this way, saying “I am among you as one who serves” (Luke 22:27). So, authority in the Church doesn’t primarily mean that you get to boss people around. Rather, it means that you get to serve other people, support them, and even lay down your life for them.
It’s what Jesus says after this that we tend to overlook. Immediately after explaining that leadership and authority in the Church are a call to serve others, Jesus then chooses one disciple, Simon Peter, out from among the rest. He warns him that “Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat,” and the “you” here is in the plural, referring to all of the Apostles (Luke 22:31). You might think that Jesus would then say that he’s been praying for all twelve, but he doesn’t. Instead, he switches from the plural to the singular, saying “but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” That is, Jesus’ solution is to focus on one man, Simon Peter, so that he can in turn lead the other apostles by serving them and strengthening them, just as the apostles are called to serve and build up the rest of the Church.
This is the heart of what it means to be the pope: not to exercise lordship like a pagan king, but to be a “servant of the servants of God.” And that’s what Jesus has called Peter to do. The papacy, properly understood, is biblical.