section_path: Saint Peter and the origin of the papal office
section_name: Saint Peter and the origin of the papal office
paragraph_text: Saint Peter and the origin of the papal office
  
  The Catholic Church teaches that, within the Christian community, the bishops as a body has succeeded the apostles as a body (apostolic succession) and the bishop of Rome has succeeded Saint Peter. Scriptural texts proposed in support of Peter's special position in relation to the church include:
  
  The symbolic keys in the Papal coats of arms are a reference to the phrase " the keys of the kingdom of heaven " in the first of these texts. Some Protestant writers have maintained that the "rock" that Jesus speaks of in this text is Jesus himself or the faith expressed by Peter. This idea is undermined by the Biblical usage of "Cephas", which is the masculine form of "rock" in Aramaic, to describe Peter. The Encyclopædia Britannica comments that "the consensus of the great majority of scholars today is that the most obvious and traditional understanding should be construed, namely, that rock refers to the person of Peter".
  
  The Catholic Church teaches that, within the Christian community, the bishops as a body has succeeded the apostles as a body (apostolic succession) and the bishop of Rome has succeeded Saint Peter. Scriptural texts proposed in support of Peter's special position in relation to the church include:
  
  The symbolic keys in the Papal coats of arms are a reference to the phrase " the keys of the kingdom of heaven " in the first of these texts. Some Protestant writers have maintained that the "rock" that Jesus speaks of in this text is Jesus himself or the faith expressed by Peter. This idea is undermined by the Biblical usage of "Cephas", which is the masculine form of "rock" in Aramaic, to describe Peter. The Encyclopædia Britannica comments that "the consensus of the great majority of scholars today is that the most obvious and traditional understanding should be construed, namely, that rock refers to the person of Peter".