Universal, Indeed

I believe exactly what the Catholic Church teaches about the Biblical foundation of the Papacy. But it might it be that the whole question should be approached, initially, from a different angle.

Jesus had something very forceful to say about those who call good evil.

Well, look at the providential role of the See of Rome in defending and explaining the coherence of faith and reason, or metaphysical realism, or Biblical reliability, or the doctrinal essentials of historic Christianity, or the sanctity of human life, or sexual morality, or social justice (a term originating in Catholic Social Teaching), or environmental responsibility, or world peace. Who, even in the Free Presbyterian Church of Scotland, or the Southern Baptist Convention, or the Independent Evangelical-Lutheran Church of Germany, or the True Orthodox Church of Greece, could possibly disagree with any of that?

And look at the providential role of the See of Rome, particularly under the present Pope, in promoting a classical liturgical life. Among some Orthodox, there is a simple horror of the Western liturgical tradition, and that is that. But many Anglicans, Lutherans and Old Catholics, as well as others, can only possibly add this to the list of good points given above. Can't they?

Incidentally, there must be, one would have thought, Old Catholics who are mortified that a body founded on the Canon of Saint Vincent of Lérins (quod ubique, quod semper, quod ab omnibus creditum est - that which has been believed everywhere, always and by all) should no be "ordaining" women, blessing same-sex unions, and so forth. Where are they? And can they not see that this is what happens to those who set off down the cul-de-sac of "Catholicism without the Pope"? Discontented Anglican and Scandinavian Lutherans, in particular, take note.

And both they and Old Catholics, take note that the 1999 Lutheran-Roman Catholic Joint Declaration on Justification, since it recognises that even the heretical position anathematised at Trent as held by Luther was not actually held by him and is not that of classical Protestantism (although it does exist, and is heretical), can certainly be seen as applicable to the positions attributed to Baius, Jansenius and Quesnel. (Again, there must be Old Catholics who are mortified at how very far from Augustinianism their church now is. Where are they?)

Those discontented Anglicans, Lutherans and Old Catholics (and there may also be others) who would wish to order their affairs episcopally should be looking for ways in which they might involve the Pope in their episcopal appointments, as Patriarch of the West, and as the providential protector of the coherence of faith and reason, of metaphysical realism, of Biblical reliability, of the doctrinal essentials of historic Christianity, of the Augustinian patrimony of the West (including as set out in the Lutheran-Roman Catholic Joint Declaration on Justification), of classical liturgical life generally and that of the Western tradition in particular, of the sanctity of human life, of sexual morality, of social justice, of environmental responsibility, and of world peace.

And the Holy See should be magnanimous in response to any request for such involvement.