Why the Church Has all those Dogmas and Doctrines

From something by G.K. Chesterton, but it is a great reasoning on why the Catholic church does what She does. I also like it because it is familial. I might borrow this when I get to the morality lessons with my students.

The Catholic Church "is the only continuous intelligent institution that has been thinking about thinking for two thousand years. Its experience covers nearly all experiences; and especially nearly all errors. The Church makes itself responsible for warning her people against all the blind alleys and dead ends and roads that lead to destruction. She dogmatically defends humanity from its worst foes, from those devouring monsters of the old mistakes. There is no other corporate mind in the world that is on the watch to prevent minds from going wrong. The policeman comes too late, when he tries to prevent men from going wrong. The doctor too comes too late, for he only comes to lock up a madman, not to advise a sane man on how not to go mad."