Over the weekend I was looking around the Catholic Encyclopedia to see what the old definitions of heresy, schism, and modernism were, and to check what they writers said about Protestantism. It was eye opening. Roman Catholics don’t talk that way anymore about Protestants.
For instance, here’s the part of the article on justification:
This principle bears upon conduct, unlike free judgment, which bears on faith. It is not subject to the same limitations, for its practical application requires less mental capacity; its working cannot be tested by anyone; it is strictly personal and internal, thus escaping such violent conflicts with community or state as would lead to repression. On the other hand, as it evades coercion, lends itself to practical application at every step in man’s life, and favours man’s inclination to evil by rendering a so-called “conversion” ludicrously easy, its baneful influence on morals is manifest. Add to justification by faith alone the doctrines of predestination to heaven or hell regardless of man’s actions, and the slavery of the human will, and it seems inconceivable that any good action at all could result from such beliefs. As a matter of history, public morality did at once deteriorate to an appalling degree wherever Protestantism was introduced. Not to mention the robberies of Church goods, brutal treatment meted out to the clergy, secular and regular, who remained faithful, and the horrors of so many wars of religion, we have Luther’s own testimony as to the evil results of his teaching.
Then this on church-state relations (i.e. Caesaro-papism):
A similar picture of religious and moral degradation may easily be drawn from contemporary Protestant writers for all countries after the first introduction of Protestantism. It could not be otherwise. The immense fermentation caused by the introduction of subversive principles into the life of a people naturally brings to the surface and shows in its utmost ugliness all that is brutal in human nature. But only for a time. The ferment exhausts itself, the fermentation subsides, and order reappears, possibly under new forms. The new form of social and religious order, which is the residue of the great Protestant upheaval in Europe, is territorial or State Religion — an order based on the religious supremacy of the temporal ruler, in contradistinction to the old order in which the temporal ruler took an oath of obedience to the Church. For the right understanding of Protestantism it is necessary to describe the genesis of this far-reaching change.
. . . From this time forward the progress of Protestantism is on political rather than on religious lines; the people are not clamouring for innovations, but the rulers find their advantage in being supreme bishops, and by force, or cunning, or both impose the yoke of the new Gospel on their subjects. Denmark, Sweden, Norway, England, and all the small principalities and imperial towns in Germany are examples in point. The supreme heads and governors were well aware that the principles which had brought down the authority of Rome would equally bring down their own; hence the penal laws everywhere enacted against dissenters from the state religion decreed by the temporal ruler. England under Henry VIII, Elizabeth, and the Puritans elaborated the most ferocious of all penal codes against Catholics and others unwilling to conform to the established religion.
But the faculty at Catholic University of America produced a New Catholic Encyclopedia just after the Second Vatican Council. It takes a decidedly different tone. In fact, its authors offer little comment. This is a Roman Catholic version of an Encyclopedia Britannica, an effort to cover a comprehensive range of topics and provide useful and reliable information. Here is an excerpt from the NCE’s article on Luther (it does not even have one on Protestantism):
Evaluation. It is an exaggeration to identify the Reformation with the person of Luther and to equate all of Protestantism with his doctrines. Nevertheless, one must admit the enormous influence that he exercised upon the movement. The survival of Luther’s own brand of evangelicalism was greatly aided by the rise of numerous reformers elsewhere in Northern Europe, that is, by the rise of figures like Zwingli, Bucer, Calvin, and a host of others. Lutheranism’s success as a protest against the Church’s dominant teachings concerning salvation, and its later growth as a church independent of Rome, is also in part attributable to Luther’s long and productive life. He continued to exert his stamp upon the evangelical cause for a quarter century after the movements birth. And upon his death in 1546, he had trained large numbers of pastors and theologians who were prepared to carry on his legacy.
That’s it. No condemnation, not even a warning. In fact, the article even suggests that some bishops were glad to have Luther’s protest:
It is one of the strange turns of history that Luther was never officially prosecuted in his own country, although excommunication, by labeling him a heretic, made him liable to the death penalty in the Empire. A number of circumstances combined to render the ecclesiastical and civil penalties ineffective. In the first place there was strong public reaction that rebelled at the prospect of condemning a man who had become the outright spokesman for their own grievances against corruption in the Church. The conviction that until a council had actually pronounced against him, he and his followers were not definitely cut off from the Catholic Church was widespread. Finally, the majority of the German bishops, still influenced by conciliarism, were hardly inclined to stand in the way of a man whose attacks on papal claims to ecclesiastical supremacy expressed their own opposition to Romanism.
It is curious that the papal bull itself against Luther was not sufficient to condemn him (it would have likely had not the Turks been creating distractions for the emperor, Charles V). Could it be that the editors of the New Catholic Encyclopedia were welcoming a renewal of conciliarism? Odd then and ironic that Protestants convert to Rome because of conservative popes at a time when Roman Catholicism has wiggled out of papal supremacy and returned oversight to bishops and superiors, thus rendering the Church as diverse and unruly as Protestantism itself.
196 Comments
I think some of the Reformed converts to Rome think they they have solved the problem we have as Protestants with circular reasoning and Sola Scriptura. If I could convince them of anything, I would try to convince them that they have only traded one form of circular reasoning for another. That’s o.k., we all just need to admit it. When the CTC guys tell us they have discovered the church that Christ himself founded, they need to admit that the reason Rome thinks that about itself is because Rome thinks that about itself.
Bryan Cross: Here’s the thing, at least in my experience. If I bring a Catholic paradigm to Scripture, the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral is not the same as the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral when I bring a Reformed paradigm to Scripture.
RS: That would be correct, but then the question becomes as to which one is biblical. In terms of the Gospel, if there are two contradictory statements/beliefs of the Gospel, then both paradigms cannot be correct and both views of the Gospel cannot be correct. The Bible cannot teach two paradigms that end up with two views of the Gospel that contradict each other.
Bryan Cross: Your claim presupposes that no matter which paradigm one brings to Scripture (and by which one interprets Scripture), the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral is the same. But that claim is itself paradigm-relative, and, in my experience, false.
RS: Nom that is not my view. I am trying to say that Scripture itself (by the Spirit) should develop and form the paradigm itself as one studies Scripture ” For this reason we also constantly thank God that when you received the word of God which you heard from us, you accepted it not as the word of men, but for what it really is, the word of God, which also performs its work in you who believe” (I Thess 2:13).
Bryan Cross: For the sake of simplicity, I’ll just limit the focus to the Catholic paradigm and the Protestant paradigm. In both paradigms, Mt. 22:29 is both true and fully compatible with that paradigm. In the Catholic paradigm, Mt. 22:29 doesn’t put any negative pressure on the paradigm itself, or fail to fit with the paradigm, or show itself to make more sense when viewed through the Protestant paradigm. It doesn’t show that the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral is the same no matter which paradigm one brings to Scripture.
RS: It is true that Matthew 22:29 would fit within both paradigms, but it also shows that both paradigms cannot be correct and that one or both (logically speaking) must be false (in terms of the Gospel).
Erik,
Regarding “imputation vs. infusion,” I’ve explained that in a post titled “Imputation and Paradigms: A Reply to Nicholas Batzig.” Grace and agape are infused instantly at baptism, and subsequently through the means of grace.
It is not about a particular ‘level.’ One is either in a state of grace, or not. If one is in a state of grace, then one is justified. So to know whether one is in a state of grace, one learns how to do an examination of conscience.
No, in the Catholic paradigm, the authority of the Church is not derived from Scripture. It was given to the magisterium by the Apostles, and given to the Apostles by Christ Himself.
If I could address one Protestant strawman, it is that the Catholic Church bases its interpretive authority on its interpretation of Scripture, and then bases the authority its interpretation of Scripture on its interpretive authority.
No, that’s a straw man. In the Catholic paradigm the reason the Catholic Church believes and teaches that she has divine authority is because she received this authority from Christ, not because she believes she has authority.
In the peace of Christ,
- Bryan
“If I bring a Catholic paradigm to Scripture, the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral is not the same as the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral when I bring a Reformed paradigm to Scripture. Your claim presupposes that no matter which paradigm one brings to Scripture (and by which one interprets Scripture), the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral is the same. But that claim is itself paradigm-relative, and, in my experience, false.”
In your experience? Really? Sounds mighty modern of you. Looks like the terminus of your hermeneutical spiral is, well, you.
Richard,
Yes, they can’t both be correct. But to assume that the Bible itself determines “which one is biblical” is already to have presupposed one of them (i.e. the Protestant one).
If the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral depends on the paradigm one brings to Scripture, then even if the Spirit helps one arrive at the terminus of one’s hermeneutical spiral, that doesn’t show us which paradigm to adopt. But if you are claiming that the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral does not depend on the paradigm one brings to Scripture, that claim already presupposes one of the two paradigms, i.e. the Protestant paradigm.
In the peace of Christ,
- Bryan
A guy is out of commish for a day and look at what happens.
Bryan, I’ll respond to some of your direct comments as time allows.
Bryan,
“If the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral depends on the paradigm one brings to Scripture, then even if the Spirit helps one arrive at the terminus of one’s hermeneutical spiral, that doesn’t show us which paradigm to adopt.”
Right. And you have answered the question in good modern fashion: “In my experience” You are proving the paradigm relativity of a Protestant hermeneutical spiral by appealing to your experience. Choice.
wjw,
Just because I referred to my own experience, does not mean that my argument depends on my referral. And in this case, my argument does not depend on an appeal to my experience.
In the peace of Christ,
- Bryan
Bryan,
“My argument does not depend on an appeal to my experience.”
Yes it does. Your experience is the means by which you determined the falsity of “paradigm relative” Protestantism. Your experience determined the “terminus of the hermeneutical spiral” is different for Catholicism. You know which paradigm is true because your private experience made it clear. Neat, but your personalism might even make Luther blush.
I forgot who said this, but I agree with it, as a lifelong Catholic, now Lutheran;
“In Catholicism one’s relationship to Christ depends on their relationship to the Church. In Protestantism it is the opposite…one’s relationship to the church depends on their relationship with Christ.”
wjw,
I explained earlier in this thread how I compared paradigms according to their ability to explain the available evidence. But my claims and argument (just above) in response to Richard do not depend upon an appeal to my experience.
That according to the Catholic paradigm the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral informed by the light of Catholic Tradition is not Protestantism is something taught by the magisterium itself. According to the Catholic paradigm, Scripture as understood through the Catholic paradigm, supports *Catholic* doctrine. That claim is not controverted even by Protestants who know the Catholic paradigm.
In the peace of Christ,
- Bryan
Bryan,
“I explained earlier in this thread how I compared paradigms according to their ability to explain the available evidence.”
Right. “You” compared evidence. Paradigms do not explain available evidence, people do. In this case, you, subjective Bryan, compared evidence and came to see the objectivity of the magisterium. Protestants compare the available evidence and are still sadly stuck in subjectivity. Amazing how subjective Bryan broke free.
“That according to the Catholic paradigm the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral informed by the light of Catholic Tradition is not Protestantism is something taught by the magisterium itself. According to the Catholic paradigm, Scripture as understood through the Catholic paradigm, supports *Catholic* doctrine.”
Wow. And all along I thought Protestants were the fideist.
Bryan, I asked because sometimes you conflate all encyclicals, bulls, decrees, councils and theologians as if they are one voice. They don’t all agree and they don’t all have the same status. If you want evidence of how they disagree, just look at Aquinas or Lombard and their scholastic answers to objections from different church fathers. The early church is not as unified as you allege.
But I am curious about your concession, “The subject isn’t addressed directly, in the detail we see in Trent, neither in papal documents nor by ecumenical council.” If the church that Christ founded has a doohickey that protects it from error such that its sheep will never be led astray, and if justification is a fairly important truth for the faithful to know about, and if the dogma of the church is not codified until Trent, haven’t you just opened yourself up to dogmatic docetism? Where was the church’s teaching on salvation before 1550? You mean the church was without an infallible teaching on justification for 1500 years? Oh my!
And this question goes with with another that struck me in reading your exchange with Richard. You say if you have a RC paradigm when reading Scripture you’ll come to RC interpretations of the text. But again, where was the RC paradigm on justification prior to 1550? A Christian could not reach an RC conclusion on the NT regarding justification because the magisterium had yet to define.
In the wonder of Christ,
Bryan, you write: “in the Catholic paradigm, the authority of the Church is not derived from Scripture. It was given to the magisterium by the Apostles, and given to the Apostles by Christ Himself.” How do you know? Because the guys who received the authority from Christ told you? When did they tell you? Where?
The inquiry is rigged.
wjw, ding ding ding ding. Say hello to Rome’s version of Van Tillianism on steroids. And Bryan has the nerve to suggest he is not a presuppositionalist.
Bryan – No, in the Catholic paradigm, the authority of the Church is not derived from Scripture. It was given to the magisterium by the Apostles, and given to the Apostles by Christ Himself.
Erik – What is your source for this belief? Who or what did you learn it from? If Scripture, then you are deriving the Church’s authority from Scripture. If from another source, then the church’s authority is derived from that source. If the Church itself tells you, then the church is engaged in circular reasoning. The idea has to originate from somewhere.
Darryl, you ask, “But again, where was the RC paradigm on justification prior to 1550?”
***Talk about begging the question. Hah! “Justification” talk only came about because Protestants pushed the question because of certain, ahem, infallible teachings that had arisen in Western Christendom. The East never wrestled with this, nor does it now. I imagine the East just doesn’t care because it’s not in our “paradigm.”–which, as far as I can tell around here means that I’m right, because from within my own paradigm it can’t be disproven (as long as I can assert proper authority and charism; I think I can)? This is primarily why I think Bryan’s journey to Rome was always probably an act of question-begging because he came to it with certain theological baggage. But, again, this insight is not a matter of logic and only speculation and also is ad hominem, so I will leave it at that and retract it all.
Erik, makes the apostles sound like the Masons, doesn’t it.
Bryan – So to know whether one is in a state of grace, one learns how to do an examination of conscience.
Erik – Oh my. Old-Lifers hear this same type of thing from Reformed Christians enthused about revivalism. See the Old Side/New Side debate of the 1700′s within American Presbyterianism, for instance.
D.G. – I proved that mediocre minds and great minds sometimes think alike. Same question 6 minutes apart and I hadn’t seen yours yet.
Justin – The East never wrestled with this (justification), nor does it now.
Erik – So where are you going when you die and why?
“Erik – So where are you going when you die and why?”
***To our Creator, to Whom all return. What form this takes (bliss or suffering) I do not know. I keep my mind in Hell and despair not. I don’t really want to peel all of the layers of this onion. Talk about paradigms.
Darryl’s laughing because now I’ve stepped in it. But at least he didn’t run me over.
@DGH Back as a grad student at ND I found a lot that I greatly admired about their church (including her football team). However, I could never get over the papal authority bit – ultimately, I found Garry Wills’ critique convincing (ironically it was his “Why I am a Catholic” that convinced me I could never be). I recall reading several criticisms of his work by more traditionalists catholics, but none were particularly convincing at the time (but I’m certainly no historian). Have you read “Papal Sin” and/or “Why I’m a Catholic”? If so, how would you assess these as a historian? I know his follow-up book wasn’t a history per se, but I’m curious about whether or not you thought they were fair critiques of early church history.
Justin,
Is that a normal Eastern Orthodox view? If so, it’s not much more optimistic than Timothy McVeigh. Before he was executed I remember him saying something like if he went to hell he felt confident his military training had prepared him for whatever he would face there. O.K…
It’s also not much better than the atheist I interacted with awhile back who said she envisioned her remains someday becoming part of a tree. That made her feel pretty good.
Erik,
Yeah, I don’t know what to tell you. Don’t become Orthodox? O.K. I don’t do the whole apologetics/evangelical thing. Sometimes the truth is a bitch.
I answered your question simply, which is new around here. I can try again, but if you’re trying to get assurance out of me, well, you don’t know me.
“Erik – So where are you going when you die and why?”
***To our Creator, to Whom all return. What form this takes (bliss or suffering) I do not know. I keep my mind in Hell and despair not. Because God created man in his image and likeness, and then became man and assumed man’s nature, He united us to Him. Whether we like it or not, we are connected to God, though not necessarily in communion, and so will in some way (this is a mystery) be connected to Him. One experiences the Immutable God as a Divine fire–as the Seraphim in bliss or as in the lake of fire in pain. There is an objective truth/judgment in God Himself to whom we are joined (in communion or not) but a subjective experience of that relationship–depending on one’s disposition towards God.
In short, for you “atonement” is a forensic statement, for the East an ontological one–at-one-ment (which etymologically speaking, is far older than atonement, which Tyndale appropriated incorrectly and rendered forensically; but this is neither here nor there). At-one-ment is about recapitulation (a literal Greek translation) not about foresnic justification. But again, onions and peels.
I’m not following your McVeigh reference. I don’t do much past Rodney Dangerfield.
“That made her feel pretty good.”
***Yeah, that’s my intent, to feel pretty good. Let’s see which one of us can blink before we get to the absolute assurance of Christ. “keep your mind in hell and despair not” says exactly this. Yeah.
Sorry, Erik, it cut me off again.
“That made her feel pretty good.”
***Yeah, that’s my intent, to feel pretty good. Let’s see which one of us can blink before we get to the absolute assurance of Christ. “keep your mind in hell and despair not” says exactly this sentiment that I feel good. Wasn’t I just being chastised by you for not being optimistic enough? I’m used to this charge. Being happy? Not so much.
Justin,
Well, I can offer you this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=171FURqSIQc
Eric,
Whereas, you clearly should have gone with: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X48G7Y0VWW4
And because I realize some of you non-2K-Prots. are adverse to modern media and dirty talk, I’ll give you a transcript (in case you’re afraid to click on the youtube/satanpixels). If the Dude comes up, well, hide the women and children; I take no prisoners.
“A looper, you know, a caddy, a looper, a jock. So, I tell them I’m a pro jock, and who do you think they give me? The Dalai Lama, himself. Twelfth son of the Lama. The flowing robes, the grace, bald… striking. So, I’m on the first tee with him. I give him the driver. He hauls off and whacks one – big hitter, the Lama – long, into a ten-thousand foot crevasse, right at the base of this glacier. Do you know what the Lama says? Gunga galunga… gunga, gunga-lagunga. So we finish the eighteenth and he’s gonna stiff me. And I say, “Hey, Lama, hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know.” And he says, “Oh, uh, there won’t be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consciousness.” So I got that goin’ for me, which is nice.”
Bryan Cross: Yes, they can’t both be correct. But to assume that the Bible itself determines “which one is biblical” is already to have presupposed one of them (i.e. the Protestant one).
RS: Instead of presupposing that belief, however, I would argue that it is taught in the Bible. While no one comes to the Bible with a blank slate, they should come and be willing to bow to the God who speaks in and through the Scriptures.
Bryan Cross: If the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral depends on the paradigm one brings to Scripture, then even if the Spirit helps one arrive at the terminus of one’s hermeneutical spiral, that doesn’t show us which paradigm to adopt.
RS: The Scriptures teach us that we cannot understand the Scriptures apart from the Spirit and apart from Christ the real and true Prophet. That does teach us something of our hermeneutical spiral and something of the paradigm we are to bow to.
Bryan Cross: But if you are claiming that the terminus of the hermeneutical spiral does not depend on the paradigm one brings to Scripture, that claim already presupposes one of the two paradigms, i.e. the Protestant paradigm.
RS: But again, while I do presently hold to the Protestant paradigm, I did not have that paradigm when I started reading the Bible and hearing it preached. It even took a few years for that to develop. I would argue that based on the teaching of Scripture and my experience that my paradigm was formed by Scripture itself. For example, can a person from your paradigm hear the voice of Christ? Is it possible for your paradigm to admit that the Divine voice “speaks” in and through the Scriptures rather than understanding being totally a rational and deductive process? Is John 5:24 (“Truly, truly, I say to you, he who hears My word, and believes Him who sent Me, has eternal life, and does not come into judgment, but has passed out of death into life”) historical only or is there a way to “hear” the call of God? Is there a way of beholding the Son in and through the teaching of Scripture (see John 6:40 below) that a approach that is exclusively rational and deductive will miss? If the heavens declare the glory of God and that apart from a rational and deductive system, couldn’t the Scriptures by the Spirit also declare the glory of God in that way as well?
Revelation 3:20 ‘Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone HEARS My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me.
John 6:40 “For this is the will of My Father, that everyone who beholds the Son and believes in Him will have eternal life, and I Myself will raise him up on the last day.”
“Atheist…said she envisioned her remains someday becoming part of a tree.”
RS: A person that envisions her remains as becoming part of a tree after death is going out on a limb regarding her eternal destiny.
“A person that envisions her remains as becoming part of a tree after death is going out on a limb regarding her eternal destiny.”
***Just leave this one alone, people. No doubt his crowning achievement sprung from the fruit of his depravity.
Justin
“A person that envisions her remains as becoming part of a tree after death is going out on a limb regarding her eternal destiny.”
***Just leave this one alone, people. No doubt his crowning achievement sprung from the fruit of his depravity.
RS: The fruit of something, speaking of fruit trees, but not necessarily depravity.
“The fruit of something, speaking of fruit trees, but not necessarily depravity.”
***Punning is the depravity of the joke world; there is nothing lower, more delicious, and irresistible. And I speak as someone who rejects total depravity.
Justin ***Punning is the depravity of the joke world; there is nothing lower, more delicious, and irresistible. And I speak as someone who rejects total depravity.
RS: What you reject intellectually I cannot reject the reality of. The sinful mind, the sinful affections, and the sinful will makes for quite a bit of depravity. If Bryan ever grasped that one, he would become a Protest-ant in an inst-ant. But then again, so would virtually all people. Once a person accepts depravity, that person sees that only grace alone can change the heart and give it the perfect righteousness in Christ that it must have.
Justin, that is my sense. The way Islam provoked Europe into world conquest, Luther rattled the pope’s cage.
Justin, I won’t run you over (I mean slide on the ice) until you know (or have a hunch) where you’re going to spend eternity.
sbd, I haven’t read those books by Wills. I have them. Does that count?
RS: A person that envisions her remains as becoming part of a tree after death is going out on a limb regarding her eternal destiny.
You got a chuckle out of me on that one!
Justin is kind of a caffeinated me on steroids…
For anyone who is still interested, here’s a link to early church father’s referencing salvation by grace through faith alone apart from sanctifying works. http://www.rpts.edu/media/DoctrineofJustification-Buchanan.pdf
It starts in lecture 3.
Here’s the deal though; Tridentine Thomistic RC wasn’t around in the early church fathers, neither was the magisterium as constituted at Trent. Furthermore, if Paul and the apostles are fighting degradation of the gospel within years of promulgation, whether in Galatia or Corinth or even Peter himself struggling with Jew and Gentile ramifications, I’m not sure why it’s corruption or incompleteness, to the extent it existed early on or to this day, has much bearing on apostolic authority. There’s been false prophets and false Christ’s from the beginning.
Hi Bryan,
In reference to my syllogism:
“Jesus prayed, “Sanctify them in the truth, Thy word is truth” (John 17:17).
1. The truth that sanctifies is God’s Holy Word, the Bible.
2. The RCC Magisterium is not the Bible.
3. The RCC Magisterium cannot sanctify.
you wrote:
If premise 1 means that the *only* truth that sanctifies is the Bible, then this premise begs the question, i.e. presupposes precisely what is in question. But if premise 1 does not mean that Scripture is the *only* truth that sanctifies, then the conclusion does not follow from the premises. So either way, the argument is not a good argument.
On the contrary, (in proper Thomistic/Aristotilian format, of course),
The One speaking these words (John 17:17) is omniscient and unlike a created being. Since He does not ever claim in His word, the Bible, that the church sanctifies, nor does He aver anywhere that any other created thing sanctifies (including the Church), He is falsely worshipped when other things are said to sanctify.
You wrote,
If the Church is the “pillar and ground” of truth, as Scripture itself testifies, then it is not an either/or, but the Scripture as guarded and explicated by the Church can be instrument of sanctification, and thus both together are means of sanctification. (And we could note the sacraments are instruments of sanctification, and thus point to the role of the Church in the administration of the sacraments, and thus in our sanctification.) There is a role for *grace* in our sanctification, not just the knowledge of truth, and therefore insofar as we receive grace through the sacraments, the Church is thereby a means of sanctification.”
On the contrary,
The church is born of the truth as witnessed to by the Spirit; the church is not born of the church (James 1:18, 1 Peter 1:22-23). Only in this way can it be the pillar and ground of the truth.
Sean, thanks. I’ll need to check this out. The more I think about this, it looks like Development of Doctrine is one big end run around history. Apparently, at CTC it scored. I guess is was wearing a gold-domed helmet.
And the hits just keep on coming. Cheap shot from a philly fan, whoulda thunk it. Though being a mormon at a catholic university apparently gives you an appetite for catfish.
Darryl, you gotta keep the metaphor mixing under two otherwise It’s a crapshoot, but I’m still swinging away. Like Howard.