A common charge against Protestantism is that it is rationalistic. By raising doubts about relics, candles, prayers to saints, pools of healing waters, sightings of Mary, or reports of the stigmata, Protestantism supposedly set into motion the kind of skepticism about the supernatural that brought down belief in God altogether. Robert Langbaum echoes this trope of modern intellectual history in his book on Isak Dinesen:
[T]he fundamental failing of Protestantism is the failing already identified in Isak Dinesen’s criticism of Unitarians. In trying to rationalize Christianity, Protestantism cut fact off from myth and thus lost the double vision or the ability to understand symbols. (Isak Dinesen’s Art, 216)
Whoa!
That may be true of modernist Protestants who take their cues more from the natural sciences than the Bible. But when Protestants insisted on sola Scriptura they were not exactly embracing a faith free from challenges to the intellect. Burning bush? Crossing the Red Sea? Battle of Jericho? Virgin birth? Paul’s conversion? Critters covered with eyes? The Trinity?
The Bible presents plenty of material to keep the smartest guys in the room humble, and it also supplies plenty of symbols in need of interpretation (from Hebrew vowel points to apocalyptic metaphors).
What Protestantism did was cut back on the clutter of things requiring more faith and hope than reason. Why add to all the reason-defying aspects of the Bible with the bells and whistles of saints and relics? Whatever the sufficiency of Scripture means, it involves at least the affirmation that Christians only need to swallow the contents of the Bible (the way the whale did with Jonah) and no more.
Old Life 
Why add to all the reason-defying aspects of the Bible with the bells and whistles of saints and relics?
Just to add to this, how is the belief that we have been brought from death to life through the work of the Incarnate God rationalistic. If ever we needed a naked miracle to prove to us the mysterious (or mystical or mythic for those who like to push the limits of nomenclature) working of God’s power, surely it has already been provided. One need not leave no nook un-nooked and no cranny un-crannied in historic Protestantism to find the seeds of rationalism, just look to the Enlightenment and the mixed bag of good and ill that accompanied it.
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I suppose everyone has their favorite; mine is the bilocation of Padre Pio. It’s a close second to the thunderbird but well ahead of the Loch Ness Monster.
____________
In 1946, an American family went from Philadelphia to Saint Giovanni Rotondo in order to thank Padre Pio. In fact, their son, a bombardier plane pilot (during World War II), had been saved by Padre Pio in the sky over the Pacific Ocean. The son explained; “the airplane was flying near the airport on the island where it was going to land after it had loaded its bombs. However, the airplane was struck by a Japanese attack plane. The aircraft exploded before the rest of the crew had the chance to parachute. Only I succeeded in going out of the airplane. I don’t know how I did it. I tried to open the parachute, but I didn’t succeed. I would have smashed to the ground if I had not received a friar’s help who had appeared in midair. He had a white beard. He took me in his arms and put me sweetly at the entrance of the base. You can imagine the astonishment inspired by my story. Nobody could believe it, but given my presence there, they had no choice. I recognized the friar who saved my life some days later while on home leave, I saw the monk in one of my mother’s pictures. She told me she had asked Padre Pio to look after me.”
http://www.padrepio.catholicwebservices.com/ENGLISH/Bilo.htm
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Why add “sacramental incarnation” alongside the continued humanity of Christ from heaven and now in heaven?
John 6: 35 “I am the bread of life,” Jesus told them. “No one who comes to Me will ever be hungry, and no one who believes in Me will ever be thirsty again. 36 But as I told you, you’ve seen Me, and yet you do not believe. 37 Everyone the Father gives Me will come to Me, and the one who comes to Me I will never cast out. 38 For I have come down from heaven, not to do My will, but the will of Him who sent Me. 39 This is the will of Him who sent Me: that I should lose none of those He has given Me but should raise them up on the last day. 40 For this is the will of My Father: that everyone who sees the Son and believes in Him may have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day.”
41 Therefore the Jews started complaining about Him because He said, “I am the bread that came down from heaven.” 42 They were saying, “Isn’t this Jesus the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How can He now say, ‘I have come down from heaven’?”
43 Jesus answered them, “Stop complaining among yourselves. 44 No one can come to Me unless the Father who sent Me draws him, and I will raise him up on the last day. 45 It is written in the Prophets: And they will all be taught by God. Everyone who has listened to and learned from the Father comes to Me— 46 not that anyone has seen the Father except the One who is from God. He has seen the Father.
47 “I assure you: Anyone who believes has eternal life. 48 I am the bread of life. 49 Your fathers ate the manna in the wilderness, and they died. 50 This is the bread that comes down from heaven so that anyone may eat of it and not die. 51 I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread he will live forever. The bread that I will give for the life of the world is My flesh.”
52 At that, the Jews argued among themselves, “How can this man give us His flesh to eat?”
53 So Jesus said to them, “I assure you: Unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you do not have life in yourselves. 54 Anyone who eats My flesh and drinks My blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day, 55 because My flesh is real food and My blood is real drink. 56 The one who eats My flesh and drinks My blood lives in Me, and I in him. 57 Just as the living Father sent Me and I live because of the Father, so the one who feeds on Me will live because of Me. 58 This is the bread that came down from heaven; it is not like the manna your fathers ate—and they died. The one who eats this bread will live forever.”
59 He said these things while teaching in the synagogue in Capernaum. 60 Therefore, when many of His disciples heard this, they said, “This teaching is hard! Who can accept it?” 61 Jesus, knowing in Himself that His disciples were complaining about this, asked them, “Does this offend you? 62 Then what if you were to observe the Son of Man ascending to where He was before? 63 The Spirit is the One who gives life. The flesh doesn’t help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and are life. 64 But there are some among you who don’t believe.” (For Jesus knew from the beginning those who would not[o] believe and the one who would betray Him.) 65 He said, “This is why I told you that no one can come to Me unless it is granted to him by the Father.”
Donald Mcleod, p 202, the Person of Christ, IVP, 1998– “The hypostatic union did not by itself secure the theiosis of every human being. In fact, the hypostatic union did not by itself secure the theiosis of even our Lord’s human nature. He was glorified not because He was God incarnate but because he finished the work given him to do (John 17:4). It is perfectly possible to be human and yet not be in Christ, because although the incarnation unites Christ to human nature it does not unite him to me.”
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Anything goes when flying bomber missions or stoing beachheads
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Brother Hart:
Whatever the sufficiency of Scripture means, it involves at least the affirmation that Christians only need to swallow the contents of the Bible (the way the whale did with Jonah) and no more.>>>>>
Interesting comment, Brother Hart. So, you’re not sure what the sufficiency of Scripture means. How about the doctrine of clarity – perspicuity of Scripture?
Care to elaborate?
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There are those who teach the five solas in order to avoid the five points. And then there are those who want us to keep the five solas in moderation.
p223, “Sola Fide and the Roman Catholic Church”, Faith Alone, Zondervan, 2015, Thomas Schreiner—“Someone may be saved by faith alone, even if they deny faith alone. In humility,.we must acknowledge that this matter is complex…On the other hand, if someone understands what he or she is rejecting in turning away from justification by faith alone, then such a person will not be delivered from the wrath of God. …Roman Catholics who share Augustine’s understanding of justification as transformation by grace belong to the people of God. However, matters are more complex than they first appear, for we cannot ignore the fact that 1600 years have passed since Augustine wrote…and the Roman Catholic Church has become less and Augustinian and espouse a view of free will.”
Better then not to share any knowledge with all those in the Southern Baptist Convention who believe in “freewill”. If they are never told anything about election or faith alone or justification, then they won’t be able to be condemned for rejecting the truth. Since so many of them teach that the only sin God now counts is “rejecting Jesus”, surely we should not disturb their ignorant bliss by teaching them other doctrines for them to possibly reject. Don’t ask, and certainly, don’t tell…
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Mermaid, sufficiency of Scripture means that one verse on Peter as the Rock doesn’t make for the concoction of Rome’s supremacy among bishops 1,000 years later.
It also means that Mary was a mother to more children than Jesus and that she was a sinner just like you and me.
You think I am anti-Catholic but you don’t account for your hostility to Scripture. Is it gullibility?
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Many Arminians say that Jesus died for all sins except the sin of rejecting Jesus. Why do they send out missionaries talking about Jesus? Many Calvinists say that only those who actually reject election are lost. Why do they talk about election to anybody? If you overhear RC Sproul talking about predestination in that other Sunday School class, can you still go on being an anonymous Christian?
Questions for NT Wright
If justification is not about how we “get saved”, how do we “get saved”?
What do we get saved from? Do we get saved from not being the “exceptional” elect nation (Israel) we were supposed to be?
Do we “get saved” from having to be Jews (israel) ? Since the Jews knew they were sinners and knew they needed grace, why would we need to “get saved” from that?
Since Roman Catholics also know that they are sinners and need grace, why would a Buddhist need to become a Roman Catholic in order to “get saved”
Since Jesus is already Lord, who would anybody need to confess that to “get saved”
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 3, 2015 at 8:34 am | Permalink
Mermaid, sufficiency of Scripture means that one verse on Peter as the Rock doesn’t make for the concoction of Rome’s supremacy among bishops 1,000 years later.>>>>
Ah, you do see that Scripture clearly teaches that Peter was the rock that Jesus spoke of. Good for you, Brother Hart.
BTW, good morning. I hope you are having a wonderful day. Just because we bicker doesn’t mean I don’t accept you as my brother. You know what I like about you? You spoke well of your father, and you speak well of your wife. That speaks well of you. Besides, you let us bicker with you and you challenge us to put on our thinking caps. Anyway, I am sure you will find something in what I just said to annoy you, though. 😉
You do know that the eastern Orthodox churches still regard the Bishop of Rome as having primacy among the bishops, right? It has always been so. What the Orthodox churches were and are afraid of is the pope using his position in a heavy-handed way. They don’t want the local churches to lose all control over their flocks. Otherwise, they really have no argument with Rome.
It is Protestants who reject the primacy of the Bishop of Rome. In fact, most Protestants don’t even have bishops at all.
Brother Hart:
It also means that Mary was a mother to more children than Jesus and that she was a sinner just like you and me.>>>>
Well as far as Mary goes, the Church teaches that Mary also needed grace to keep her from inheriting original sin. She was then given grace throughout her life on earth to resist sin. Yes, she was as much in need of a Savior as you or me.
So, she was sinless. No, that is not directly stated in Scripture, but as you know, the ancient teaching of the Church is that she was sinless. The immaculate conception is the how. The Eastern churches accept that she was sinless, but they also reject the doctrine of original sin as explained by St. Augustine. They arrive at her sinlessness by a little different route, but they do arrive there.
Even Calvin and Luther believed in the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It seems that Luther held to that his whole life. It is less clear in Calvin’s writings, but he held Mary in high regard throughout his ministry.
So, the tradition even of the early Reformers was that Mary was the sinless mother of God. Your tradition comes much later. As you know, Scripture does not call Mary a sinner.
As you also know, Scripture does not say that Mary had more children. So, both Catholic and Protestant rely on tradition as well as Scripture to inform them on these subjects.
Brother Hart:
You think I am anti-Catholic but you don’t account for your hostility to Scripture. Is it gullibility?>>>>>
Well, you say you are not anti-Catholic. Brother Zrim was saying that this is an anti-Catholic blog, or something. It wasn’t really clear what he was saying from the outhouse. It had to do with being a more intelligent kind of anti-Catholicism.
Maybe you could clarify.
I am neither gullible nor anti-Scripture. You do know that the Reformed teaching on the sufficiency of Scripture is not entirely perspicuous. Not everyone even agrees on what the clear teaching of Scripture is on any given point.
If Scripture is so clear, then why so much disagreement even among Biblical scholars? Heck, Presbyterians can’t even agree on which WCF to use as a guide, or which Belgic Confession. Then there is the famous opt out on certain subjects in the WCF. That is why the Auburn Ave. teaching has to be accepted within the PCA even though it is controversial.
If Scripture is so clear, why so much disagreement? Get 10 Protestants in a room, and you will have 11 different interpretations on any given doctrine. Each one will defend his or her position to the death if need be. Well, not literally to the death, but I think my meaning is clear. 😉
You do know that men like St. Thomas Aquinas had the Bible memorized. it shows in his work. In fact, theology students of his time had to pretty much memorize all of Scripture and even write a commentary on all of it. Wouldn’t that be a good thing to bring back to all seminaries?
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The Little Mermaid
Posted October 2, 2015 at 6:36 pm | Permalink
Brother Hart:
Whatever the sufficiency of Scripture means, it involves at least the affirmation that Christians only need to swallow the contents of the Bible (the way the whale did with Jonah) and no more.>>>>>
I answered you on the points you raised. Now if you would care to indulge me, please explain this statement. Oh, heck, I’ll just ask you directly. What Scripture says that the miracles written in the Bible are the only ones we should accept as valid?
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Mermaid,
You do know that the eastern Orthodox churches still regard the Bishop of Rome as having primacy among the bishops, right?
Primacy of honor, not authority. A not insignificant difference.
It has always been so. What the Orthodox churches were and are afraid of is the pope using his position in a heavy-handed way. They don’t want the local churches to lose all control over their flocks. Otherwise, they really have no argument with Rome.
?????
History shows that their fear is well-grounded. Crusades launched by the pope caused a lot of damage in the East. Then you got the papacy claiming “I am the tradition.”
And it isn’t just fear that he’ll use his position in a heavy-handed way. It is the denial that the pope has primacy of authority and infallibility. One can be infallible and not be heavy-handed (See Jesus). The East doesn’t want one bishop to be infallible under any circumstances.They’re conciliarists.
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“You do know that men like St. Thomas Aquinas had the Bible memorized.”
“I am [not] gullible…”
Hmmmm…..
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Mermaid, so you cite schismatics to support papal primacy? Wow.
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Mermaid, because revelation always attests miracles. Since the canon is closed (though you guys have revelations — I mean tradition) no more miracles in the sense that those miracles signified in Scripture. See the Bible.
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If Scripture is so clear, why so much disagreement?
Ariel, because of abiding human sin. The word of God is perfect and clear, but sinners are far from it, thus factions and divisions as to what the Bible teaches. Easy peasy.
Or is the answer really to conjure up notions of an infallible human interpreter, one born among men but somehow able to escape sin at certain moments and under certain circumstances and only on particular topics? And water is only wet in certain spots and on certain days. #ReligiousFanatsy
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 3, 2015 at 1:34 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, because revelation always attests miracles. Since the canon is closed (though you guys have revelations — I mean tradition) no more miracles in the sense that those miracles signified in Scripture. See the Bible.
Where in the Bible?
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Zrim
Posted October 3, 2015 at 2:11 pm | Permalink
If Scripture is so clear, why so much disagreement?
Brother Zrim:
Ariel, because of abiding human sin. The word of God is perfect and clear, but sinners are far from it, thus factions and divisions as to what the Bible teaches. Easy peasy.
Or is the answer really to conjure up notions of an infallible human interpreter, one born among men but somehow able to escape sin at certain moments and under certain circumstances and only on particular topics? And water is only wet in certain spots and on certain days>>>>>>>
So, the perspicuity of Scripture means that God knows what the Bible means. It is clear to Him.
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Ariel, and to those on whom he lavishes grace to see.
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Zrim,
What happened to the anti-triumphalism and anti-superiority and pro-humility?
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CvD, it’s in the point about abiding human sin even in those where the Spirit also dwells, including those gifted to govern and interpret, which precludes Prots having popes.
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Well thats strange. Its humble and non-triumphalistic to claim both abiding sin and you being lavished with grace to see unlike all the blinkered fools who disagree with your interpretation and obviously werent so lavished, but its prideful and triumphalistic to claim both sin and infallibility due to Gods protection and lavishing of grace. Hmmm.
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CvD, strange indeed–I never said any of that nor implied it. Inference much?
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Zrim,
Have you been lavished with grace to see the clear meaning of the Bible? If so, what does that mean for sincere readers who disagree with you on the meaning or even on whether the Bible is clear in the first place? Are the papacy’s claims triumphalistic and prideful?
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vd, t, from cover to cover.
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James Young, “Are the papacy’s claims triumphalistic and prideful?”
Is the pope Roman Catholic?
Do you really think we are that stupid that we don’t know Roman Catholic history? Or did you only grow up with Benedict XVI?
Remember, if you’re going to claim all that history you have to own all that history. Urban II was not Joel Osteen (nor Gregory VII).
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CvD, the question is coarse and unbecoming. It’s like asking one to comment on his election; it shouldn’t be done. But believers can disagree widely and significantly on what the Bible teaches. Grace isn’t magic and sin isn’t that simplistic. The claims the Roman magisterium makes of itself are indeed arrogant.
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Zrim
Posted October 3, 2015 at 8:32 pm | Permalink
CvD, it’s in the point about abiding human sin even in those where the Spirit also dwells, including those gifted to govern and interpret, which precludes Prots having popes.>>>>>>
What Scripture precludes Prots having popes? What Scripture tells Prots to be Prots?
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Darryl,
Of course I own all that history. Remember the thing Zrim and I agreed about – sin and grace. Apparently grace that opens one’s eyes to the clear meaning of Scripture (including the teaching that it is clear) in spite of sin is humble and anti-triumphalistic, but grace that protects the pope/church in its infallibility in spite of sin is arrogant and triumphalistic and prideful. I think asking whether the pope’s claims of infallibility are valid is coarse and unbecoming and shouldn’t be done. I’m sure you’re now intellectually satisfied.
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Robert:
And it isn’t just fear that he’ll use his position in a heavy-handed way. It is the denial that the pope has primacy of authority and infallibility. One can be infallible and not be heavy-handed (See Jesus). The East doesn’t want one bishop to be infallible under any circumstances.They’re conciliarists.>>>>
The point is that Protestantism doesn’t give the Bishop of Rome anything but grief. There is no primacy of any kind, not even of honor.
Besides, the role of the Bishop of Rome has not remained static even in his influence in the eastern church. There are times when he has had great influence on the whole church, east and west.
A recent example: it is the Catholic Church that has done more at this point in time to try to heal the breach between east and west. Sometimes the healing seems to be near, and sometimes no so much.
As for the Crusades, I really don’t think that Pope Francis is planning one anytime soon.
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D.G. Hart:
Do you really think we are that stupid that we don’t know Roman Catholic history? >>>>
We also know Protestant history. Ever heard of King Henry VII?
Besides, until sometime around 1517 it was all just Church history. In fact that is what it is usually called – Church History.
Anyway, have a wonderful Lord’s Day, Brother Hart.
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zrim, not to mention the claims made by Rome’s apologists. Oh that they would have the spirit of their Mother Mary:
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Mermaid,
Let’s see you get monarchical papacy out of that (not to mention all the genuflecting that was going on a week ago).
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James Young, like I say, own your history. You really think the claims of papal supremacy are simply affirming the grace that protects the pope/church in its infallibility.” And did you notice that the dogma of infallibility happened — wait for it — precisely at the time that the Papacy was losing its temporal rule over the papal states.
How gullible are you?
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Mermaid, actually, you don’t seem to know much history — Protestant or not.
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Webfoot,
The point is that Protestantism doesn’t give the Bishop of Rome anything but grief. There is no primacy of any kind, not even of honor.
Maybe it has something to do with the fact that traditionally, the pope thinks we’re all going to hell.
Besides, the role of the Bishop of Rome has not remained static even in his influence in the eastern church. There are times when he has had great influence on the whole church, east and west.
Sure. But the question is whether the papacy should have the role that Rome ascribes to it. And the problem isn’t necessarily outsized influence of a single person. Every tradition has that. Not every tradition says the pope is infallible whenever the pope says he is infallible.
A recent example: it is the Catholic Church that has done more at this point in time to try to heal the breach between east and west. Sometimes the healing seems to be near, and sometimes no so much.
What has been done except the normal PR stunt? When Rome is willing to say, “You know what, the pope doesn’t have jurisdictional primacy over the whole church,” I’ll believe that it is truly interested in healing the split.
As for the Crusades, I really don’t think that Pope Francis is planning one anytime soon.
Sure. But the papacy has. And how do I know that the pope was not infallible when that happened. Better yet, how did the people living at the time know that the pope was not infallible?
One of the main problems with papal infallibility is that it seems finally to be an exercise in blame shifting. Those men who followed the pope’s fallible call to a Crusade? They’re not responsible to figure out when the pope was wrong or when he was right. If it turns out he’s wrong, they can always say “I was just following orders” on the last day.
A church that cannot be corrected basically eliminates all personal responsibility. In reality, the lay RC has no real responsibility to understand his or her faith. I’ve had RCs tell me that it doesn’t matter if the individual knows the dogma; all that matters is that the church has defined dogma somewhere. All the individual has to do is give assent: “I believe whatever the RC teaches.” You don’t have to know what it teaches infallibly, and indeed, you can’t. At least not all of it. There’s no infallible list. Just go to mass and don’t put up any conscious obstacle to grace. That’s pure nominalism, and it violates biblical teaching to be ready to put up a defense for what you believe (1 Peter 3:15). But how can you believe what you don’t know, and how important is it that you know it?
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Bart is totally harshing Frank’s ecumenical mellow: https://youtu.be/FoU2o1iRN0U
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 4, 2015 at 7:48 am | Permalink
Mermaid, actually, you don’t seem to know much history — Protestant or not.
Henry VII was King of England, ruled the Principality of Wales and Lord of Ireland from his seizing the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death on 21 April 1509, as the first monarch of the House of Tudor>>>>
Good catch, Brother Hart!
Cute joke. Substitute Henry VII for Henry VIII. He is one of yours.
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Mermaid,
Cute joke. Substitute Henry VII for Henry VIII. He is one of yours.
Darryl isn’t Anglican. I’m not even sure the Anglicans want Henry VIII in any case.
Actually, the infallible pope declared Henry VIII a defender of the faith for his defense of the RCC. Was that an infallible declaration or not?
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Darryl,
I already said I own all of history. Popes have sinned, been arrogant and prideful, made poor decisions, been negligent and imprudent, etc. Not news. Sin + infallibility is no more triumphalistic than sin + lavished by grace to see clear meaning of Scripture over others. So, I guess since infallibility was only defined in response to loss of temporal power, I suppose you think Trent’s claims of authority in response to the Reformation are not triumphalistic nor arrogant right?
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Cletus,
So, I guess since infallibility was only defined in response to loss of temporal power, I suppose you think Trent’s claims of authority in response to the Reformation are not triumphalistic nor arrogant right?
Except, of course, Trent’s claims were also in response to loss of temporal power. It was the massive freakout to losing much of Germany, England and other places. No such council occurred in 1054. Maybe that’s because the pope never had any real political or spiritual power there…
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 3, 2015 at 9:52 pm | Permalink
vd, t, from cover to cover.
Pretty lame dodge, even for you.
The Little Mermaid
Posted October 4, 2015 at 3:10 am | Permalink
D.G. Hart:
Do you really think we are that stupid that we don’t know Roman Catholic history? >>>>
What you know you distort.
The Little Mermaid
Posted October 4, 2015 at 11:51 am | Permalink
D. G. Hart
Posted October 4, 2015 at 7:48 am | Permalink
Mermaid, actually, you don’t seem to know much history — Protestant or not.
Henry VII was King of England, ruled the Principality of Wales and Lord of Ireland from his seizing the crown on 22 August 1485 until his death on 21 April 1509, as the first monarch of the House of Tudor>>>>
Good catch, Brother Hart!
Cute joke. Substitute Henry VII for Henry VIII. He is one of yours.
He really tried to take advantage of a typo [Henry VII for Henry VIII]? How pathetic.
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Ariel, wrong question. The right one is what Scripture teaches popery?
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CvD, cute. Passive-aggressive but cute. But questions put to the claims of papal infallibility aren’t the same as questions about what sort of grace a person thinks he’s been given (especially when the point was that about Scripture being perfectly clear). In the former, the claim is plainly made, in the latter it never was. And if an infallible source can be sinful, then the Bible can be errant, in which case you talk about the pope the way The Jesus Seminar talks about the Bible–right sometimes, wrong others. But in both cases, if that’s so then sworn allegiance is silly and everyone should just go home to eat, drink, and be merry.
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The Little Mermaid
Posted October 4, 2015 at 3:10 am | Permalink
D.G. Hart:
Do you really think we are that stupid that we don’t know Roman Catholic history? >>>>
TVD:
What you know you distort.>>>>
Protestantism’s version of Church history is colored by Martin Luther. Protestant and enlightenment historians followed his lead.
That is the history Protestants are indoctrinated with. It suits their narrative of having been the poor downtrodden victims of the papacy. Their own dark blots on the historical timeline are excused as “sinners will be sinners”. They continue to keep 500 year-old resentments alive among them as if Pope Francis were about to unleash a Crusade or Inquisition against them.
It takes time to undo a lot of that indoctrination, but I’m working on it.
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Zrim
Posted October 4, 2015 at 6:33 pm | Permalink
Ariel, wrong question. The right one is what Scripture teaches popery?>>>>
What Scripture is used to justify Protestantism’s splintering into tens of thousands of warring sects?
If you are among the special ones who has had grace lavished on him such that you can understand the plain meaning of Scripture without any reference to traditional understandings of the texts, then my question should be easy for you to answer. Take your time. Use the original languages if you wish – and don’t forget to thank a monk for saving, copying, and preserving the ancient texts.
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TLM,
It takes time to undo a lot of that indoctrination, but I’m working on it
The unlikelihood of success certainly can’t be blamed on the sincerity or clarity of comments like this. I’m appreciating your thoughts.
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Mermaid, if your Pope hand only put asunder what only God can (think of annulments for Teddy Kennedy and Nicole Kidman), you’d be an Anglophile.
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James Young, wrong again. If not for the Western Schism, Alexander VI, and indulgences to pay for St. Peters, you might not have worked up Luther or Roman Catholic princes willing to defend him.
You’re “it’s old news” is sort of like saying “mulligan.”
Have you ever considered that such shrugs of the shoulder help an episcopate who simply transfer pedophile priests from parish to parish.
Ho hum should be woe is me.
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vd, t, yes the defender of David Barton and poser of selfies with John Fea is true blue to true history.
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Mermaid, so you think Pope Francis’ words about climate change and economics are toothless? That’s good to know.
Such a faithful follower of the Petrine ministry you are.
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DG-
“You know that the rulers of the Gentiles lord it over them, and their great ones exercise authority over them. It shall not be so among you.
But whoever would be great among you must be your servant, and whoever would be first among you must be your slave
Isn’t the natural reading of this first part that he is talking about civil authority? The rulers of the Gentiles his audience would have been thinking of were first the Roman Empire, no?
In context, he is reproaching the apostles for their error of judgment in misjudging when correction is appropriate. They were not being servants to good Mrs. Zebedee in the sense of serving her as the Church serves those who come to the faith- serving by true instruction. Instead, they were ‘lording it over her’ unjustly. The proper approach would have been to accept her intent to be faithful, and authoritatively offer true teaching.
He isn’t reproaching them in principle for offering correction – wouldn’t one have to deny Church authority to teach religion to affirm that? – just their doing so in this case. This might demonstrate that the Church can err prudentially, when it departs from the role Christ assigned it (note they weren’t teaching falsehood as divine truth, just failing in a human way to understand what to do in a given context).
Of course, this was before the Crucifixion and Pentecost, and on its own isn’t I think intended to give a description of ecclesiastical structure.
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Mermaid, what Scripture or magisterial teaching justifies lies that Roman Catholicism is unified?
Works both way, oh scaled one.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 4, 2015 at 9:36 pm | Permalink
vd, t, yes the defender of David Barton and poser of selfies with John Fea is true blue to true history.
Sez the David Barton of anti-Catholicism. You didn’t even know what’s in the Rosary.
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Ariel, that’s a big “if” and it doesn’t apply. Sola scriptura isn’t biblicism. You should try to grasp Protestantism before sounding off so freely and ignorantly:
http://www.modernreformation.org/default.php?page=articledisplay&var2=19
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 4, 2015 at 9:40 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, what Scripture or magisterial teaching justifies lies that Roman Catholicism is unified?
Works both way, oh scaled one.>>>>
Oh, my dear Brother Hart. You are in a religion that brags about being based on sola scriptura, yet you are either unwilling or unable to answer my questions using your own principles.
What Scripture do you use to justify or even explain the splintering of Protestantism into tens of thousands of different denominations?
You like to put me in the dock, and I answer many of your questions as best I can. Turn about is fair play. Your turn in the dock.
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Zrim
Posted October 4, 2015 at 10:19 pm | Permalink
Ariel, that’s a big “if” and it doesn’t apply. Sola scriptura isn’t biblicism. You should try to grasp Protestantism before sounding off so freely and ignorantly:
http://www.modernreformation.org/default.php?page=articledisplay&var2=19>>>>
Oh, of course it’s not Biblicism. It is scripture plus tradition, but you call it sola scriptura. It’s not solo scriptura after all – which is not really good Latin grammar. Sola is an adjective and solo is an adverb or a mistake of concordancia. Not sure which. You rely on Protestant tradition as encapsulated in documents like the WCF. You call yourselves confessional because the Bible is not enough. You have to have the Bible plus confessions. So it is Scripture alone, but not really alone. I mean come on. It can’t be understood alone no matter how much grace one has, right?
Now, if you could just agree on which versions of your confessions to use, that would help your case more.
Actually, I am not ignorant of your religion at all, Brother Zrim.
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Mermaid, you need to explain how Scripture teaches the church will be united institutionally. Paul didn’t know he was in submission to the pope. The Galatians were contradicting apostolic teaching. Peter betrayed Christ. Christ antagonized the chief priest. Israel and Judah were separate kingdoms. The Jewish people asked for a king when they had one. Moses couldn’t enter the promised land. God wouldn’t allow institutional unity at Babel. Cain killed Abel. Adam disobeyed God.
And you expect a united church? You think a pope unifies the church? Do you live on planet Gullible?
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“Actually, I am not ignorant of your religion at all’
Your comments here indicate otherwise.
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“What Scripture is used to justify Protestantism’s splintering into tens of thousands of warring sects?”
So who’s at war? I know the Orthodox in Russian have conspired with the authorities to suppress evangelical sects, so I guess they are at war. But here in the US I find that methodists, baptists, presbyterians, lutherans, pentecostals, etc… are at least as cordial with one another as various factions within the RC church. Further we are in communion with one another – someone from an Anglican church can take communion with us when visiting one Sunday – indeed, a part from fringe sects like the landmarks, it is mostly open communion from what I can tell. Warring indeed.
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Who’s gullible now?
http://usuncut.com/news/pope-francis-expected-to-fire-archbishop-who-set-up-the-meeting-with-kim-davis/
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Mermaid,
Oh, of course it’s not Biblicism. It is scripture plus tradition, but you call it sola scriptura. It’s not solo scriptura after all – which is not really good Latin grammar. Sola is an adjective and solo is an adverb or a mistake of concordancia. Not sure which. You rely on Protestant tradition as encapsulated in documents like the WCF. You call yourselves confessional because the Bible is not enough. You have to have the Bible plus confessions. So it is Scripture alone, but not really alone. I mean come on. It can’t be understood alone no matter how much grace one has, right?
No true Protestant has denied the importance, even the need of other authorities besides the Bible. Sola Scriptura just tells us which one has final say in the case of of an argument.
It’s like Roman Catholicism—for you all it is the Magisterium that has final say. Sola Ecclesia. Well, at least formally that’s the way it is. The reality of how your faith is practiced these days is that you can believe pretty much whatever you want, even if it’s not remotely Christian, and still be welcome to the Eucharist. You can even advocate for it if you’re not too noisy about it. Unless, of course, you’re Nancy Pelosi, in which case you can proclaim how devout you are, receive the Eucharist, and advocate for the most liberal laws on abortion and homosexuality possible. As an outsider looking at all this, it is nonsensical. That is if the viewer cares about interpreting documents in their original context. Rome could care less about this, so it actually makes sense that you have someone like Pelosi who is to be regarded as orthodox as, well, you.
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From CWU’s link, I don’t see how Mermaid can approve of the Pope’s behavior:
“the only one-on-one meeting that Pope Francis had during his time in Washington, D.C. was with Yayo Grassi, a gay man and former student of the Pope’s. But the Vatican appears to go one step further to make it clear that the Holy See in no way endorses Kim Davis’ bigotry.”
In fact, it’s fair to cut and paste all the abuse Mermaid doled out over Kim Davis and apply it to the Pope. Of course, she could repent.
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This papal visit, the media coverage of it, the doh!-tastic RC apologizing/gushing/splaining of it is bonanza of suck — a beautiful train wreck of world religion proportions. Well done, all.
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The stress of being all popes to all imaginable papists, would-be papists, the world media, and the US Congress must be enormous. Good thing the wine if plentiful and free in the Vatican.
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What Scripture do you use to justify the tens of thousands of warring Protestant sects?
What Scripture do you use to justify your cessationism?
Here is what you guys are saying on the subject of miracles. God did a lot of weird things in the past. He doesn’t do that kind of stuff anymore. Now we have the Bible, and those are the only miracles we have to accept – as though it were a chore to accept the miraculous.
Oh, He doesn’t do those kinds of things anymore? Who says so? The Bible doesn’t say so. Your rationalism says so.
Back to the topic at hand. These are real questions. What does Scripture say about divisions in the church and about miracles?
Attacking Catholicism and Catholics is not the same as answering the charge that Brother Hart began his post with.
“A common charge against Protestantism is that it is rationalistic.”
Defend your religion, guys, if it is worth defending. Can you do it without reference to the pope, papists, pietists, or Pentecostals? Can you defend your faith on its own merits?
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The Pope was a nice guy who offended no one. Just like the apostles.
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Merm, it lines up with bible, unlike your construct of legends, syncretism, and sensuality. But the accountants at the Vatican thank you for playing.
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Mermaid, we just want to know if your faith is the same as the Pope’s. Kim Davis.
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Ariel, but it’s not really “the Bible plus tradition” either, and it isn’t that the Bible is insufficient. SS means that the only *infallible* source is the Bible. Tradition is *necessary* (even binding) but not *infallible*, hence the ability to revise fallible texts and not have to scramble with the so-called development of doctrine which tries to make contradictory statements co-exist.
ps like Mike Horton puts it, I’m a cessationist who believes weird things happen in the world.
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Mermaid,
Before I begin, it looks to me as if you are demanding simplistic proof-texting, which has never been a hallmark of Reformation exegesis.
What Scripture do you use to justify the tens of thousands of warring Protestant sects?
Paul apparently believed that it would be a reality that there would be factions among professing Christians. In fact, he seems to indicate that it must be so in order to recognize the truth: “For there must also be factions among you, that those who are approved may be recognized among you.” (1 Cor. 11:19)
The question, I guess, is whether these factions should be warring. But as SDB noted, there isn’t any warring in any meaningful Christian sense among the churches represented here. Neither the OPC nor the PCA say that you have to affirm the WCF in order to be a member or be welcome at the Lord’s Table. You have to affirm the Apostles’ Creed and not be under the discipline of a local evangelical church.
“What Scripture do you use to justify your cessationism?”
Look at the NT, for one. The later books do not mention miracles. In fact, Paul in his last letter to Timothy tells him to take some medicine (wine) for his stomach issues. That’s an odd statement if the gift of miraculous healing was still taking place in the church.
“Here is what you guys are saying on the subject of miracles. God did a lot of weird things in the past. He doesn’t do that kind of stuff anymore.”
Actually, all Christians I know affirm that God performs extraordinary healings and other things at times. We just don’t often call them miracles. But an extraordinary healing is a lesser-degree miracle. We just reserve the term miracles for things that attest divine revelation and are immediately clear to be due to the agent. Who, like Jesus, is going around resurrecting the dead, restoring sight to the blind, etc. simply by speaking words or touching the person?
“Now we have the Bible, and those are the only miracles we have to accept – as though it were a chore to accept the miraculous.”
Not a chore. We just want to see things in the category of miracle that the Apostles call miracles. Partial liquifying of a saint’s blood when the pope touches the relic doesn’t count. Neither do crying statues and the other such nonsense we often hear proclaimed as RC miracles.
“Oh, He doesn’t do those kinds of things anymore? Who says so?”
Look, Benny Hinn claims to do lots of miracles but has yet to produce anything verified independently by a doctor or something like that. Where’s the independent verification of a RC priest raising the dead by proclaiming “Lazarus come forth” or something like that? Partial liquifying of blood isn’t impressive. It’s superstitious.
“The Bible doesn’t say so. Your rationalism says so.”
WCF standards of interpretation are good and necessary consequence. In Scripture, the only miracles that we see attend periods of revelation. Moses and the exodus. Isolated instances of the prophets. Jesus and the Apostles. You can’t read the biblical record and go away with the idea that people were regularly going to the temple in the post-exilic period and seeing the dead raised or the paralyzed walk. Miracles weren’t happening every day even in biblical times, and when they did happen, they were actual spectacular events.
Back to the topic at hand. These are real questions. What does Scripture say about divisions in the church and about miracles?
See above.
Attacking Catholicism and Catholics is not the same as answering the charge that Brother Hart began his post with.
“A common charge against Protestantism is that it is rationalistic.”
RCs accuse Protestants of being bare fideists for believing in the interior witness of the Spirit, and the entire Called to Communion Project is an attempt to rationally square the circle. Bryan Cross is the modern Renee Descartes. It cuts both ways.
Defend your religion, guys, if it is worth defending. Can you do it without reference to the pope, papists, pietists, or Pentecostals? Can you defend your faith on its own merits?
One of the reason why the papists, at least, are referred to is because the papists “started it.” If the conservative RC apologists would stop with the outlandish claims of papal superiority based on superior intellectual paradigms, etc., Darryl would probably leave them alone. He doesn’t attack actual RC historians. But that’s because actual RC historians are honest with the evidence and aren’t trying to find the papacy before Chalcedon because there was no such thing.
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Zrim
Posted October 5, 2015 at 9:58 am | Permalink
Ariel, but it’s not really “the Bible plus tradition” either, and it isn’t that the Bible is insufficient. SS means that the only *infallible* source is the Bible. Tradition is *necessary* (even binding) but not *infallible*, hence the ability to revise fallible texts and not have to scramble with the so-called development of doctrine which tries to make contradictory statements co-exist.>>>>
Zrim, thank you for your response.
Zrim, if the sources are fallible, then what good are they? Eventually all of the standards are abandoned, as we see happening in Protestantims. They are not binding at the end of the day, so they can be changed along the way. At the same time, everyone can be put on trial based on some ever shifting sands of fallible interpretation.
In reality, your binding traditions are just one man’s or woman’s opinion against another – which is what happens in Protestantism. Now, if Protestants, especially of the Reformed kind, were more humble in accepting that maybe the Arminians and Pentecostals could be correct, then I would be more inclined to accept your explanation.
Heck. You guys have a hard time accepting that a Baptist can be Reformed. I have mentioned Dr. Don Carson, who is Baptistic and Reformed, but I think it was sdb didn’t even recognize his name. He is an eminence in the confessing Evangelical world and a world class Biblical scholar. He is a member of The Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals. They put out materials by men like Donald Grey Barnhouse and James Boice. Have you heard of them? Listen to them. Expand your horizons a bit if you are able. Read some Dr. Carson.
I am helping you, here. Christianity is full of seemingly contradictory statements. We are dealing with the mystery of the Godhead after all. We are seeing through a glass darkly.
I have had to defend even Tim Keller on this blog, and Dr. John Piper – a fine man of God.
Why don’t you defend your own when they are attacked? Why does The Little Mermaid have to defend some of Evangelicalism’s finest scholars and general good Christian men? I’m Catholic, for goodness sake!
See, you cannot love your religion very much if all you do is attack it. I get the anti-Catholicism part. It is what some kinds of Protestants do. I don’t get the attack everyone mentality. You really believe that a very small number of Reformed guys are the sole guardians of the truth?
Zrim:
ps like Mike Horton puts it, I’m a cessationist who believes weird things happen in the world.>>>>
Weird things happen? See, that is a rationalistic statement, IMO. Weird things don’t just happen all by themselves.
If you wish, take a listen to Ed Feser on the subject of miracles. Dr. Ramelow is also excellent.
I don’t think there would be anything objectionable to a Protestant in what he presents here.
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Ethel Mermaid, Piper’s as mad as your average RC pilgrim. Good catch.
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Mermaid,
Zrim, if the sources are fallible, then what good are they?
If everything except the dogmatic definitions of the RC faith are fallible, what good are they?
Eventually all of the standards are abandoned, as we see happening in Protestantims. They are not binding at the end of the day, so they can be changed along the way. At the same time, everyone can be put on trial based on some ever shifting sands of fallible interpretation.
It isn’t news when nominal Protestants abandon something to which they only gave lip service. RCs do it all the time as well. And speaking of ever-shifting sands of fallible interpretation. People were tried for heresy, some even killed for being Protestant based on dogmatic teaching that was changed such that we’re not heretics. So apply thy same standard to thyself.
In reality, your binding traditions are just one man’s or woman’s opinion against another – which is what happens in Protestantism.
How is every heresy trial before V2 not based on the pre-V2’s opinion of whether Protestants and Protestant sympathizers were good Christian not opposed to the fact that the post-V2 church’s opinion that we’re good Christians?
Now, if Protestants, especially of the Reformed kind, were more humble in accepting that maybe the Arminians and Pentecostals could be correct, then I would be more inclined to accept your explanation.
I don’t know of any Reformed person that doesn’t accept that Arminians, Pentecostals, and even RCs are sometimes correct.
I said it before to another RC, but what is it about Romanism that makes it impossible for you guys to apply standards to yourselves that you apply to us?
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…if the sources are fallible, then what good are they?
Oh, so invent the incredible notion of papal infallibility to get around the alleged problem? But they are good for distilling and summarizing the one infallible text without having to affix that incredible notion. Does a math student really need the teacher to say he’s personally infallible, as in unable to get anything wrong startiiiiiiiiiing now, before the student can trust that when he says 2+2=4 it really is?
Re Carson, so what are you saying, that celebrity and smarts are quick passes (there’s that Roman tick)? But if someone no matter what his credentials doesn’t confess what the Reformed confess as essential then how can he be considered Reformed? Maybe you think it’s some sort of comment on one’s piety (there’s that eeeevangie tick), but it isn’t. All it is is stopping short of calling Reformed someone who opposes its essentials. How can that be controversial?
I didn’t say weird things happen autonomously. I simply said they happen. Wouldn’t rationalism deny they even happen?
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“…if the sources are fallible, then what good are they?”
You know, that is just what I was telling my wife this weekend. She said I should read the directions, but I told her that if it isn’t infallible, what’s the point?!?! She said I need a new paradigm.
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Well of course a Baptist isn’t “reformed” in the magisterial sense at least unless you want to define it so broadly to encompass all dissenters. I think it is better to restrict it to those who adhere to the WCF and/or the 3FU. That rules out particular baptists even if they do assent to the canons of Dordt (or if you want to allow every group to define itself, you can let the anglo-catholics be lumped in with what “Catholics” believe and the Apostolic Holiness groups be lumped in with those who are apostolic…surely no confusion will arise from that!). I may disagree with Baptists about fundamental issues like proper church polity and the role of the sacraments (real spiritual presences versus memorial), but I wouldn’t bar them from the table or have any qualms about taking communion there. You might scroll back and read Darryl’s reflections on his parents and his Baptist upbringing. Warring indeed…
Regarding Carson, I am very familiar with him (CT subscriber for almost 20yrs…he’s hard not to come across). My point was that his incorrect understanding of Mary’s proper title as “theotokos” is not dispositive of reformed teaching on the proper understanding of Mary as the mother of God (the magisterial reformers were not closet Nestorians) even if they balk at the idolatry surrounding much of the folk adoration of “Our Lady”. You seemed quite insistent that this couldn’t be a protestant view and went about digging up various obscure websites to make your point rather than turning to more established sources of reformed theology.
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“some of Evangelicalism’s finest scholars”
Keller and Piper may be great men, but that doesn’t make them flawless or some of their flaws particularly troublesome for the future of reformed churches. Further, as great as they are, they are not scholars. If you are interested in some of Evangelicalism (broadly defined) finest scholars, I strongly commend George Marsden, Nicholas Wolterstorff, Peter van Inwagen, Thomas Kidd, Darren Dochuk, Alvin Plantinga, etc… Of course, the fact they are fine scholars does not entail that they are are flawless, so I guess you would ask, “if [they] are fallible, then what good are they?” Sigh….
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“I am helping you, here…. I’m Catholic, for goodness sake!”
So you say…Perhaps in lieu of wasting your time with us hopelessly crabby protestants you might want to go and defend the Pope from one of your own:
Michael Brendan Dougherty seems to think that Pope Francis is about to destroy the Roman Catholic church,
I’m sure he would benefit as much as we have from your insightful defenses of the church.
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7 denials of people as Reformed and then a counterattack. Just another day at old Life.
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Denial, clarity…whatever. Who’s attacking anyone? Or is pointing out an error an attack now? Perhaps you can go help mwf straighten out MBD?
Curious though, where do you stand on the implications of the synod? If they OK divorce and communion where does that leave your understanding of Catholicism? Not asking on the likelihood – I think the Cardinals there are at least as attuned to the consequences as trads like MBD freaking out over this, and Francis is after all a master of jesuitical reasoning… surely they will find a way to DO SOMETHING without changing anything.
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Carson is of the essence of moderation and balance. He’s evangelical enough to be Arminian and Amyraldian on the atonement both at the same time. Since I am not “Reformed”, I will not presume to say if his catholic wishywashyness is “Reformed”
D A Carson, The Difficult Doctrine of the Love of God, Crossway, 76—-”If one holds that the Atonement is sufficient for all and effective for the elect, both sets of texts and concerns are accommodated.”
John Piper, Taste and See ,1999, p 325—“Christ died for all sinners, so that IF you will repent and believe in Christ, then the death of Jesus will become effective in your case and will take away your sins. ‘Died for you,’ means if you believe, the death of Jesus will cover your sins. Now, as far as it goes, this is biblical teaching.”
Doug Moo, “Justification in Galatians”, p 172,. The problem of positing a union with Christ that precedes the erasure of our legal condemnation before God ( making justification the product of union with Christ) CAN BE ANSWERED IF WE POSIT, WITHIN THE SINGLE WORK OF CHRIST, TWO STAGES OF “JUSTIFICATION”, one involving Christ’s payment of our legal debt–the basis for our regeneration–and second our actual justification=stemming from our union with Christ.”
2001: The 68th OPC GA votes to add Romans 2:6,7,13,16 as proof-texts for WLC90. It was not present in the original
2004: The 2004 OPC General Assembly reversed the proof-text change as the result of an overture by the Presbytery of Connecticut and Southern New York.
https://contrast2.wordpress.com/2015/10/04/timeline-snapshot-of-justification-debate
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sdb
Posted October 5, 2015 at 2:11 pm | Permalink
Denial, clarity…whatever. Who’s attacking anyone? Or is pointing out an error an attack now? Perhaps you can go help mwf straighten out MBD?
Curious though, where do you stand on the implications of the synod? If they OK divorce and communion where does that leave your understanding of Catholicism? Not asking on the likelihood – I think the Cardinals there are at least as attuned to the consequences as trads like MBD freaking out over this, and Francis is after all a master of jesuitical reasoning… surely they will find a way to DO SOMETHING without changing anything.
I agree. Francis opened the synod by closing the door on gay marriage.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/10/04/us-pope-synod-idUSKCN0RY0BT20151004
Contra the Old Life bleat that Catholic doctrine is as malleable as Reformed theology/ecclesiology and therefore the Catholic Church is blahblahblah.
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“Since I am not “Reformed”…”
Wait, wait, wait…. reading mwf and tvd, I thought “not Reformed” was pejorative. Does that mean you’re just in denial or that you actually know what you’re talking about? Seems to be a fine line for some around here.
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Well.. I’m pretty sure MBD would never characterize himself as an OldLife partisan. Note also, his concern is not over gay marriage but the status of divorcees in the church. Still curious about your view on the implications of a change on divorce…
“Contra the Old Life bleat that Catholic doctrine is as malleable as Reformed theology/ecclesiology and therefore the Called to Communion criticism is overdrawn.” I fixed it for you…
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Actually that isn’t quite right either. The argument made here is that the continuity of Catholic doctrine is exaggerated by CtC while the discontinuity of reformation though is exaggerated thereby undermining their criticism.
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TVD
Posted October 5, 2015 at 1:53 pm | Permalink
7 denials of people as Reformed and then a counterattack. Just another day at old Life.>>>>
Weird, but true.
Dogmatic assertions based on fallible criteria.
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sdb
Posted October 5, 2015 at 2:54 pm | Permalink
Well.. I’m pretty sure MBD would never characterize himself as an OldLife partisan. Note also, his concern is not over gay marriage but the status of divorcees in the church. Still curious about your view on the implications of a change on divorce…
“Contra the Old Life bleat that Catholic doctrine is as malleable as Reformed theology/ecclesiology and therefore the Called to Communion criticism is overdrawn.” I fixed it for you…
sdb
Posted October 5, 2015 at 2:55 pm | Permalink
Actually that isn’t quite right either. The argument made here is that the continuity of Catholic doctrine is exaggerated by CtC while the discontinuity of reformation though is exaggerated thereby undermining their criticism.
Uh huh. Whenever pressed y’all play the No True Scotsman game where you disavow anything or anyone that’s inconvenient until there’s nobody left except you and Darryl, and he’s not so sure about you.
But the fact is that with tens or hundreds or thousands of denominations, sub-denominations and sub-sub-denominations, the discontinuity of the Reformation cannot be exaggerated. The word “Reformation” is meaningless except to denote “splinter groups from Catholicism.” Even “Presbyterian” is such a mixed bag it’s barely useful.
Hence Dr. Hart’s diversionary tactic of using minor issues to allege Catholic discontinuity where there is none [parroted by his misguided flock]. The Catholic Church–and one can include the Eastern Orthodox–is sacramentally and theologically the same as it was in 1054, much to their disappointment. They wish Catholicism were as big a mess as the Reformation is, but that’s just not so.
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Robert:
I said it before to another RC, but what is it about Romanism that makes it impossible for you guys to apply standards to yourselves that you apply to us?>>>>
Actually, today I am asking that you guys apply your own standards to yourselves. Thank you for your serious answer. I may go point by point with you later, but what’s the point? We always arrive at the same, uh, spot.
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sdb
Posted October 5, 2015 at 12:47 pm | Permalink
“…if the sources are fallible, then what good are they?”
You know, that is just what I was telling my wife this weekend. She said I should read the directions, but I told her that if it isn’t infallible, what’s the point?!?! She said I need a new paradigm.>>>
Now that is funny!
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Mermaid, what about PROTESTant don’t you understand?
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vd, t, Muslims oppose same sex marriage too.
Way to set the bar high.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 5, 2015 at 5:07 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, what about PROTESTant don’t you understand?
Dr. History: A Calvinism with another withering evasion.
Unfortunately, “Protestant” was a protest against the Emperor Charles’ condemnation of Luther, not the protest against the Catholic Church itself. Swing and a miss on every level. Except the evasion part. Why don’t you answer her questions, Dr? She knows your religion a helluva lot better than you know hers.
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Of course Catholicism forgot to read 1 Crinthians 6:17 ” the one who joins himself to the Lord is one Spirit with Him. Rome’s brand of incarnationslism was soundly rejected by the early church ss idolatry. Tim Kauffman ” Novel Antiquity” enjoy the read.
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Kevin
Posted October 5, 2015 at 6:21 pm | Permalink
Of course Catholicism forgot to read 1 Crinthians 6:17 ” the one who joins himself to the Lord is one Spirit with Him. Rome’s brand of incarnationslism was soundly rejected by the early church ss idolatry. Tim Kauffman ” Novel Antiquity” enjoy the read.
I love Protestant quote-mining. In context that has absolutely zero to do with the topic. Do you people actually read the Bible or just regurgitate the same third-hand “proof quotes” over and over?
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TVD, you said that the RC and EO ate sacramrntally and theologically the same in 1064 as they are now. Well not quite. Yes and no. In 1064 they hadnt sold Christ’s merits yet. And in 1064 Nancy Pelosi wasnt receiving the Eucharist.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 5, 2015 at 5:07 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, what about PROTESTant don’t you understand?>>>>
Well, one of the usages of the word “Protestant” seems to be that you guys protest all Protestants, even ones that are confessional.
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Kevin,
TVD, you said that the RC and EO ate sacramrntally and theologically the same in 1064 as they are now. Well not quite. Yes and no. In 1064 they hadnt sold Christ’s merits yet. And in 1064 Nancy Pelosi wasnt receiving the Eucharist.
A failure to discipline and apply theology to practice isn’t a change in theology (and certainly neither the sacraments nor our understanding of them).
My understanding is that discipline is a mark that a visible body of Christians is a part of the Church. I would draw the lesson from bad discipline amongst Catholics that those concerned are failing in prudence for a number of reasons. This is a grave charge.
And in 1054 (or 1064 or most any other year) I am sure you could find political leaders engaged in behavior forbidden by the RCC, whose local ordinaries tolerated their reception of the Eucharist. It’s a simple, common, and universal human problem – the Church is not composed of God’s angels.
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Mmph, typo.
“My understanding is that discipline is a mark that a visible body of Christians is a part of the Church”
– meant to say “… is that, for the Reformed, …” I wouldn’t say it is an idea denied by the RCC, though, by any means – although I’d have to reflect on the differences in understanding.
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@TVD
“Uh huh. Whenever pressed y’all play the No True Scotsman game where you disavow anything or anyone that’s inconvenient until there’s nobody left except you and Darryl, and he’s not so sure about you.”
You misunderstand what “No True Scotsman” is. Defining who is and isn’t reformed is simply about clarity. When Dan or Mark says, “I’m not reformed”, it doesn’t make sense to insist on referring to them that way. No one is being disavowed. There were two reformations – the radical reformation and the magisterial reformation. In US evangelicalism, you see the convergence of these threads and the explosion of religious groups (Christian and otherwise) resulting from the political freedom and entrepreneurial spirit of the times. It doesn’t make any more sense to impute the beliefs of Quakers to those who identify as reformed than it does for the Orthodox to impute the views of Lutherans to those who identify as Roman Catholic.
What you identify as a diversionary tactic is simply a matter of clarity. Like I’ve said before, you have lots of facts in your head, but like a lot of autodidacts you lack analytical skill. One would think your failure to persuade anyone here might give you some pause.
My goal isn’t to convince you that protestantism is the “ONE TRUE WAY” (and I think I can safely say the same for several others here, but of course they can speak for themselves). My only goal (which you continue to obfuscate) is to point out that the triumphalism (think Susan’s assertion that the only good things in protestantism are those elements that survived from catholicism) embedded in the CtC apologetic is unwarranted and the motives of credibility are not dispositive. You keep insisting that we are making some other point and go on and on about how we haven’t succeeded. Pointing out your error is not an example of the “No True Scotsman” tactic.
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@KiN
“A failure to discipline and apply theology to practice isn’t a change in theology (and certainly neither the sacraments nor our understanding of them).”
I think this gets at something really quite fundamental. Unless one wants to use a very restrictive definition of theology to mean something like the study of the nature of God, we prots would say that discipline is absolutely a theological issue. Take for example the OT account of Eli – his failure was a lack of discipline (see also the ups and downs of the previous judges and monarchs of the N. and S. kingdoms). We see this throughout the OT and the disastrous consequences that resulted, but the more fundamental issue revealed by the disastrous consequences was what the lack of discipline said about the real state of people’s beliefs.
To put it into modern economic terms, we might talk about the difference between stated preferences and revealed preference. Every one tells pollsters that they really care about excellent customer service, but when it comes time to get a hotel room, plane ticket, etc… we always go for the lowest fare. When given the option of purchasing perks that provide better customer service, most people don’t. So why we may say we want better service even if it cost a bit more, the reality is we will put up with almost anything to save a buck. That’s the reality of our belief. In other words, those who say they care about service and then go for the cheapest possible ticket on kayak are lying (perhaps to themselves). Similarly with discipline – a church that doesn’t exercise discipline doesn’t really believe the stuff on paper (their confessions are a lie). Thus the concern that Michael Brendan Dougherty (and other trads like him) have about the upcoming Synod. Keeping the words the same but changing the meaning by changing the discipline (the favorite game of modernist reformers everywhere) is changing the doctrine.
In the RC and EO systems, the validity of a local church is determined by apostolic laying on of hands. For reformed protestants, this is important but not dispositive – the local church must be marked by orthodoxy and orthopraxy and while we are never perfect on these things (more or less pure) some churches can diverge so much as to not be legitimate expressions of the local body of believers. It may be like the infamous quip about the difference between fine art and pornography – there is no bright line, but I know it when I see it (or so I’ve heard). To be sure it is a divergence from the EO and RC understandings of the church, but I think it much more in keeping with the OT and especially NT expression.
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sdb: “Like I’ve said before, you have lots of facts in your head, but like a lot of autodidacts you lack analytical skill. One would think your failure to persuade anyone here might give you some pause.”
wow, sdb, or should I say…… ‘woe’.
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or whoa… But not sure it is all that profound. Or am I missing something? Tom’s skills and deficits align quite well with my experience with autodidacts. He knows a lot of stuff, but he doesn’t put it together very well. Is your experience different?
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woe and whoa
Woe: Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes and clever in their own sight Isaiah 5:21
and whoa: hold on – were you putting down, I mean, talking and Kevin or Tom. I think they both are analytical, perceptive, and I’ve learned from them both.
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Well, I’m not so sure about my own wisdom – what Isaiah and Proverbs mean by morally righteous judgement and am quite glad that I don’t rest in that. Not sure why that applies here though. I’m very sure I’m not so clever, so perhaps I’m missing your point.
I don’t see how anything I wrote to KiN could possibly be seen as a “put down”, but please point that out if I have. I stand by my criticism of Tom’s lack of analytic skill. I don’t see why that should be taken as a “put down” though. Noting a gap in his training does not indicate anything about his moral character or his worth as a person or that there is nothing to be learned from him. In short it is not a value judgment. Rather he makes fundamental mistakes because of gaps in his education which is quite common among autodidacts. He knows lots of stuff (I would say more than me, but that isn’t saying anything), but he has serious holes in his background that undermine his ability to put things together in a convincing way.
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Witness again that the pietist evangelicals and papists are drawn inevitably together. Too bad we don’t have some Federal Visionists around to complete the ecumenical ménage à trois.
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b, sd, don’t forget that Rome has almost 950 years of doing discipline. Think Index of Books. It’s only since Vat 2 that they
got all touchy feelywent all Susan.LikeLike
Well touchy-feely with the hoi polloi anyway – certain popes and kings seemed to get away with an awful lot.
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Going back to the original question of gullibility, Calvin put it this way:
“The Popish hierarchy I execrate as diabolical confusion, established for the very purpose of making God Himself to be despised, and of exposing Christian religion to mockery and scorn.”
Brief Confession of Faith (Tracts II:134)
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Sdb :Well, I’m not so sure about my own wisdom – what Isaiah and Proverbs mean by morally righteous judgement and am quite glad that I don’t rest in that. Not sure why that applies here though. I’m very sure I’m not so clever, so perhaps I’m missing your point.
I don’t see how anything I wrote to KiN could possibly be seen as a “put down”, but please point that out if I have. I stand by my criticism of Tom’s lack of analytic skill. I don’t see why that should be taken as a “put down” though. Noting a gap in his training does not indicate anything about his moral character or his worth as a person or that there is nothing to be learned from him. In short it is not a value judgment. Rather he makes fundamental mistakes because of gaps in his education which is quite common among autodidacts. He knows lots of stuff (I would say more than me, but that isn’t saying anything), but he has serious holes in his background that undermine his ability to put things together in a convincing way.
sdb: “One would think your failure to persuade anyone here might give you some pause”
when is it the persuader, the persuadee, neither, or some combo, sdb? That would be a judgment call. And you seem to be implying there is contextualization about humility as if there might be appropriate times to be wise on our own eyes or clever in our own sight? Probably the only thing worse that pride is justifying or rationalizing it.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 6, 2015 at 1:46 pm | Permalink
b, sd, don’t forget that Rome has almost 950 years of doing discipline. Think Index of Books. It’s only since Vat 2 that they got all touchy feely went all Susan.
So what? You hate them either way. Nice racket.
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Publius
Posted October 6, 2015 at 3:36 pm | Permalink
Going back to the original question of gullibility, Calvin put it this way:
“The Popish hierarchy I execrate as diabolical confusion, established for the very purpose of making God Himself to be despised, and of exposing Christian religion to mockery and scorn.”
Brief Confession of Faith (Tracts II:134)>>>>>
Calvin was an autodidact. Just think of all the confusion and heresy a guy like Calvin unleashed on the world.
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cw l’unificateur
Posted October 6, 2015 at 1:31 pm | Permalink
Witness again that the pietist evangelicals and papists are drawn inevitably together. Too bad we don’t have some Federal Visionists around to complete the ecumenical ménage à trois.>>>>>
You say that like it’s a bad thing. Where in the Bible is the Reformed way of semper dividente justified?
Feel free to use sola scriptura, solo scriptura, the WCF, Belgic, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, or any other authoritative resource you may consider authoritative and or infallible.
Justify your divisiveness on your own terms.
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“The Popish hierarchy I execrate as diabolical confusion, established for the very purpose of making God Himself to be despised, and of exposing Christian religion to mockery and scorn.”
Ah yes Protestantism has had nothing to do with exposing Christianity to mockery and scorn either in Calvin’s time or now. Read a newspaper, then please aim for a bit more substance in your drive-bys.
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sdb:.
I’m very sure I’m not so clever, so perhaps I’m missing your point.
I don’t see how anything I wrote to KiN could possibly be seen as a “put down”, but please point that out if I have. I stand by my criticism of Tom’s lack of analytic skill. I don’t see why that should be taken as a “put down” though>>>>>
You know, when someone uses the ad hominem device it generally means that they have lost the argument. Don’t be a sore loser, sdb. You gave it your best shot. That’s all you can do. Better luck next time.
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James Young, don’t forget that Protestantism gets credit for modernizing the world, something it took until 1962 for your bishops to embrace. And you guys still haven’t changed dress.
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Ethel M, the gospel matters more than phony, moralistic unity. #nonobservantscradlesconvertschurchladiesrevivalistsMuscovitesandassortedcluelesstogether
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cw l’unificateur
Posted October 6, 2015 at 4:51 pm | Permalink
Ethel M, the gospel matters more than phony, moralistic unity.
Every schismatic says that.`
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“when is it the persuader, the persuadee, neither, or some combo, sdb? That would be a judgment call.”
I suppose, but so what?
“And you seem to be implying there is contextualization about humility as if there might be appropriate times to be wise on our own eyes or clever in our own sight?”
I do not intend to imply any such thing. Again, what does one’s assessment about another’s analytic chops have to do with “being wise in your own eyes”?
“Probably the only thing worse that pride is justifying or rationalizing it.”
I agree.
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@mwf “Calvin was an autodidact.” This is incorrect.
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@mwf
“You know, when someone uses the ad hominem device it generally means that they have lost the argument. Don’t be a sore loser, sdb. You gave it your best shot. That’s all you can do. Better luck next time.”
What’s there to lose? I’m happy to stand corrected if I’ve made a mistake – indeed, I’ve done so when TVD has corrected me (the bit about original languages in the wcf). I have nothing bad to say about TVD’s character at all. He’s a bright guy who knows lots of stuff – as I told Ali, probably more than me. What he lacks is analytic skill – it is his very arguments that I am contesting. He has consistently misconstrued the case made by several of us here as really being about something else. That’s not atypical of autodidacts – they know a lot of stuff, but they don’t synthesize it so well. The distinctions he draws among sociology, history, and theology are way off base, he misunderstands why the impact of character problems among wide swaths of the RC hierarchy on the MOC is relevant, and he buys into a sort of reverse whiggish account of the proliferation of protestant denominations rooted sola scriptura. All are analytic shortcomings.
What is ad hominem here? I’m obviously too dense to get your or Ali’s criticism.
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sdb: I suppose, but so what?
Don’t need to go around and around about it, sdb , probably we’d get nowhere, unable to persuade each other. Anyway, I do appreciate the introduction of the idea of persuasion to think on and also to consider what the Lord has to say about it.
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Mermaid – Is autodidact what passes for a popish slur these days? And no, Calvin wasn’t one in any event unless by autodidact you mean that he wasn’t a priest.
Either way, you can’t argue with the substance of what he wrote in the quote above. The question isn’t whether popery has caused mocking and scorn, it’s whether the mocking and scorn of Rome it undoubtedly has caused constitute a mockery of the Christian religion.
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Ali,
Sounds great. But I am not sure I disagree with so much that I don’t understand where you are coming from. I hope we’ll get to hash this out in another context.
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sdb
Posted October 6, 2015 at 6:10 pm | Permalink
What is ad hominem here? I’m obviously too dense to get your or Ali’s criticism.
You get it just fine, brother.
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Cletus –
Thanks for the suggestion to read a newspaper. It’s amazing what one can learn. I picked up the New York Times and found it gushing over Bergoglio, from his know-nothing screeds against free markets to his big government climate alarmism they were positively effusive. I won’t quote everything or even most of it, but for starters:
Six days ago, Pope Francis landed in Washington for his first visit to the United States — a country that he did not know and that did not know him. He flew out Sunday night, having wowed Washington and New York, while leaving behind a downtown Philadelphia transformed into a “Francisville” of pilgrims, families and hawkers selling Francis swag…
He WOWed them in NY and Washington! There was even a Francisville full of pilgrims! And Francis swag! Wait ’til he gets to River City. Or Shelbyville. (I hear they’re building a monorail just for Frank)
There was no mention of the Gospel of Christ – by Bergoglio or the Times.
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Publius
Posted October 6, 2015 at 6:33 pm | Permalink
Mermaid – Is autodidact what passes for a popish slur these days? And no, Calvin wasn’t one in any event unless by autodidact you mean that he wasn’t a priest.
Either way, you can’t argue with the substance of what he wrote in the quote above. The question isn’t whether popery has caused mocking and scorn, it’s whether the mocking and scorn of Rome it undoubtedly has caused constitute a mockery of the Christian religion.>>>>>
Calvin was a well taught lawyer. His polemical skills are unsurpassed. There is no substance in the quote. It is a well crafted, cheap head shot. If you destroy the head, you destroy the religion. I didn’t say he was unintelligent. He didn’t mess around. Cut the head off and the religion belonged to him and the Reformers – the ones who survived, that is.
If you read anything by him – and I am sure you have read it all – you will notice that he doesn’t add anything new to the Christian religion. What he does is try to take over the religion for his own purposes. He, in effect, set up a shadow Christianity and tried to call it the true church – the catholic church as opposed to papism.
We see the results after 500 years. What is it? 35,000 Protestant sects and counting?
So, now that the air is cleared, why don’t you defend the splintering of Protestantism.
It is easy to attack the Catholic Church. If she is not the one, holy, apostolic catholic church, then where is she? Is she hiding out here at Old Life?
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Mermaid – I’ll give you this, you are good sport.
What you call the 35,000 Protestant sects – and let’s not forget all of the congregationalists out there – I would just call the Church. Some are true churches and some are not. Even within the Roman church there are splinterings and sects. The fact that there are different opinions and divisions over them is not in itself noteworthy or alarming. It is in the nature of fallen man. It points to our need of Christ as well as our need to base our faith in Christ on scripture alone. As such there is no reason to defend the splintering that worries you so. All imperfection within the Church is the result of sin, but some churches are more pure and some less. And some that call themselves a church are so far removed from the Gospel as to be no church at all. And the only standard on which to judge that is the inspired, inerrant Word of God, which Word is Christ Himself. The concern is that the popish hierarchy and the doctrines created to support and justify them lead away from Christ and His Gospel and not toward them.
The Church has one head who is Christ and we will not be perfectly united until He returns to claim his bride. (amillenially, of course)
If you want a concise doctrine of the Church I will offer WCF 25:
1. The catholic or universal church, which is invisible, consists of the whole number of the elect, that have been, are, or shall be gathered into one, under Christ the Head thereof; and is the spouse, the body, the fullness of him that filleth all in all.
2. The visible church, which is also catholic or universal under the gospel (not confined to one nation, as before under the law), consists of all those throughout the world that profess the true religion; and of their children: and is the kingdom of the Lord Jesus Christ, the house and family of God, out of which there is no ordinary possibility of salvation.
3. Unto this catholic visible church Christ hath given the ministry, oracles, and ordinances of God, for the gathering and perfecting of the saints, in this life, to the end of the world: and doth, by his own presence and Spirit, according to his promise, make them effectual thereunto.
4. This catholic church hath been sometimes more, sometimes less visible. And particular churches, which are members thereof, are more or less pure, according as the doctrine of the gospel is taught and embraced, ordinances administered, and public worship performed more or less purely in them.
5. The purest churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error; and some have so degenerated, as to become no churches of Christ, but synagogues of Satan. Nevertheless, there shall be always a church on earth, to worship God according to his will.
6. There is no other head of the church but the Lord Jesus Christ. Nor can the pope of Rome, in any sense, be head thereof.
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zzzzz222222222222zzzzzzzzz WCF-bots
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Mermaid – One last thing – I couldn’t let this go by without responding:
If you read anything by him – and I am sure you have read it all – you will notice that he doesn’t add anything new to the Christian religion.
Right. I think your comment here gives away the game. The aim of the Reformers – and of all ministers of the Gospel – is not to add anything new to the Christian religion, but to faithfully proclaim Christ as He is revealed to us in His Word. And in this Calvin and others were particularly successful.
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Publius
Posted October 6, 2015 at 7:58 pm | Permalink
Mermaid – One last thing – I couldn’t let this go by without responding:
If you read anything by him – and I am sure you have read it all – you will notice that he doesn’t add anything new to the Christian religion.
Right. I think your comment here gives away the game. The aim of the Reformers – and of all ministers of the Gospel – is not to add anything new to the Christian religion, but to faithfully proclaim Christ as He is revealed to us in His Word. And in this Calvin and others were particularly successful.>>>>>
He was not justified in dividing the Church as he did. As has been pointed out before, all the great reformers stayed in the Church to reform her from the inside – and with great success.
A splintering of the church into tens of thousands of warring factions is not a success story. If you love the Word and wish to faithfully proclaim it, then please explain Ephesians 4 and defend the divisions that exist even within those who claim Calvin as their spiritual father.
It is a deplorable situation. If you want to point to anything that the devil has accomplished in ecclesiology, point to not just the schism between east and west, but also at the splintering of the western church in the name of reforming her.
That is actually something that Calvin added to Christianity. I was wrong.
Now, if Calvinists had stayed united, you may have a case to make in favor of Calvin’s contribution to Christianity. I don’t blame you if you do not respond. You guys have no idea what to do with Ephesians 4 – one Spirit, one body, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all.
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Mermaid –
Apply your understanding of Ephesians 4 to the Roman church. Apply it to divisions between Jesuits and Franciscans. Apply it to the divisions between Cardinals Raymond Burke and Walter Kasper, between JP II and Francis, between pope and anti-pope. I already explained above that division isn’t the deal-breaker for Protestants that it is for Romanists. The confessional Reformed folk already know that there are more and less pure churches and that the standard is the Word.
Now let’s see how the Rube Goldberg machine based in Rome stands up to the scrutiny of your understanding of Ephesians 4.
Seriously, try it.
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Oh, John Calvin added plenty to the Christian religion, none of it good.
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/06/how-john-calvin-made-me-a-catholic/
=;-O
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A Calvinist Discovers John Calvin
“I studied Calvin for years before the real significance of what I was learning began to sink in. But I finally realized that Calvin, with his passion for order and authority, was fundamentally at odds with the individualist spirit of my Evangelical tradition. Nothing brought this home to me with more clarity than his fight with the former Carmelite monk, Jerome Bolsec.
In 1551, Bolsec, a physician and convert to Protestantism, entered Geneva and attended a lecture on theology. The topic was Calvin’s doctrine of predestination, the teaching that God predetermines the eternal fate of every soul. Bolsec, who believed firmly in “Scripture alone” and “faith alone,” did not like what he heard. He thought it made God into a tyrant. When he stood up to challenge Calvin’s views, he was arrested and imprisoned.
What makes Bolsec’s case interesting is that it quickly evolved into a referendum on Church authority and the interpretation of Scripture. Bolsec, just like most Evangelicals today, argued that he was a Christian, that he had the Holy Spirit and that, therefore, he had as much right as Calvin to interpret the Bible. He promised to recant if Calvin would only prove his doctrine from the Scriptures. But Calvin would have none of it. He ridiculed Bolsec as a trouble maker (Bolsec generated a fair amount of public sympathy), rejected his appeal to Scripture, and called on the council to be harsh. He wrote privately to a friend that he wished Bolsec were “rotting in a ditch.”2
What most Evangelicals today don’t realize is that Calvin never endorsed private or lay interpretation of the Bible. While he rejected Rome’s claim to authority, he made striking claims for his own authority. He taught that the “Reformed” pastors were successors to the prophets and apostles, entrusted with the task of authoritative interpretation of the Scriptures. He insisted that laypeople should suspend judgment on difficult matters and “hold unity with the Church.”3”
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Publius
Posted October 6, 2015 at 8:31 pm | Permalink
Mermaid –
Apply your understanding of Ephesians 4 to the Roman church. Apply it to divisions between Jesuits and Franciscans.
between JP II and Francis,
You’re kidding, right? Even Darryl doesn’t get this ridiculous.
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tvd, That’s what I thought… Let’s see if Mermaid can do it.
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TVD
Posted October 6, 2015 at 8:57 pm | Permalink
Publius
Posted October 6, 2015 at 8:31 pm | Permalink
Mermaid –
Apply your understanding of Ephesians 4 to the Roman church. Apply it to divisions between Jesuits and Franciscans.
between JP II and Francis,
TVD:
You’re kidding, right? Even Darryl doesn’t get this ridiculous.>>>>
They just cannot defend their religion. It’s amazing.
They don’t even spend any time defending or explaining Jesus or the Gospel.
What kind of a religion is this? Amazing! Great quotes, Tom! Bolsec’s case is especially tragic. The spirit of Calvin lives on in his children I am afraid to say. Time to repent, guys. You cannot say you did not know.
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Tom and Mermaid,
For the umpteenth time, don’t complain about Protestant division when Rome is equally divided. There’s no unity of faith between Pelosi and her ilk and you (well, at least Mermaid). But if Rome is what she says she is, I can’t know who is right and who is wrong. Because both are faithful daughters of the church. Pelosi just scolded a reporter for asking her when life begins because she is a “devout Catholic.” That rolling sound is Mother Teresa in her grave.
I’ve said it before. Rome has one thing Protestants don’t: Nominal visible unity. Sorry, not impressed by a church that claims to speak with God’s voice and can’t deal with its heretics anymore.
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Robert
Posted October 6, 2015 at 9:20 pm | Permalink
Tom and Mermaid,
For the umpteenth time, don’t complain about Protestant division when Rome is equally divided.
It’s certainly not equally divided. That’s Darryl’s false premise to divert attention from Protestantism’s 100s if not 1000s of sects.
If the pope tells Cardinal Burke or Kasper to shut up, that’s the end of it. In Protestantism, they go off and start their own church.
The. End.
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The Little Mermaid
Posted October 6, 2015 at 9:14 pm | Permalink
“Apply your understanding of Ephesians 4 to the Roman church. Apply it to divisions between Jesuits and Franciscans.
between JP II and Francis,”
TVD:
You’re kidding, right? Even Darryl doesn’t get this ridiculous.>>>>
They just cannot defend their religion. It’s amazing.
They don’t even spend any time defending or explaining Jesus or the Gospel.
What kind of a religion is this? Amazing! Great quotes, Tom! Bolsec’s case is especially tragic. The spirit of Calvin lives on in his children I am afraid to say. Time to repent, guys. You cannot say you did not know.
Everything they complain about Catholicism, the Reformation eventually duplicated–often in spades. That’s why I rub their noses in it. People are people.
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Tom,
If the pope tells Cardinal Burke or Kasper to shut up, that’s the end of it. In Protestantism, they go off and start their own church.
The. End.
Um, weren’t you just the one who said that papal infallibility was an embarrassment to most recent popes and that it all depends on the sense of the faithful? You don’t have that and it being the end if the pope tells anyone to shut up.
Which RCism are you promoting again?
It’s certainly not equally divided. That’s Darryl’s false premise to divert attention from Protestantism’s 100s if not 1000s of sects.
Nominal visible unity isn’t impressive. As long as Burke and Kasper are both equally welcome; as long as Mother Teresa and Nancy Pelosi are both saints, the division is as bad in Protestantism. In fact, it’s worse because it’s dishonest.
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Tom,
If the pope tells Cardinal Burke or Kasper to shut up, that’s the end of it. In Protestantism, they go off and start their own church.
I’d also add that were this really true, there never would have been a Reformation, and no one would leave Roman Catholicism today. In Romanism, they just start a new church within the visible Roman church and wait for it to get recognized. See the Jesuits, Dominicans, SSPXers, Catholics for Choice, New Ways Ministries, the Franciscans, etc. etc. etc.
At the very least you get both Molinists and Thomists teaching radically opposed views of grace but because the pope says they’re not, they’re not. Please.
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Robert
Posted October 6, 2015 at 10:44 pm | Permalink
Tom,
If the pope tells Cardinal Burke or Kasper to shut up, that’s the end of it. In Protestantism, they go off and start their own church.
I’d also add that were this really true, there never would have been a Reformation, and no one would leave Roman Catholicism today. In Romanism, they just start a new church within the visible Roman church and wait for it to get recognized. See the Jesuits, Dominicans, SSPXers, Catholics for Choice, New Ways Ministries, the Franciscans, etc. etc. etc.
SSPXers are a few hundred priests out of 400,000. The rest of your “divisions” aren’t divisions atall: They all submit to the pope’s and their bishops’ authority.
J Gresham Machen gets put on trial, leaves and starts the Orthodox Presbyterian Church. THAT’S a division. The PCUSA ordains a lesbian couple while you sit appalled [hopefully, that is: Darryl is characteristically mute]. THAT’S a division. Your argument [Darryl’s argument] equating Protestantism’s countless schisms and divisions to Jesuits and Franciscans is a false premise, a category error.
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Robert,
In Romanism, they just start a new church within the visible Roman church and wait for it to get recognized. See the Jesuits, Dominicans, SSPXers, Catholics for Choice, New Ways Ministries, the Franciscans, etc. etc. etc.
Please tell me how any of these qualify as a “new church within the visible Roman church” -?
St. Dominic applied for permission to start his order, and it was granted according to the canonical norms of the time. The Dominicans have never divided with each other, and have arguably (I’m very much biased) made greater contributions to the RCC than any other religious order- canon law, missions, theology, universities, translation, everything really.
The Franciscans hda a problem with “Spiritual Franciscans” and saw division, but this was following their approval and isn’t obviously related to your point. More relevant is that the Franciscans were used by the papacy to get around Bishops who were too closely tied to the local political establishments.
The SSPX was established according to canonical norms with full approval, and never legally dissolved. As of this Fall, they will be officially exercising a legitimate ministry in the Church at the express declaration of Francis. In any case, the usual charge against them by the ill-informed or ill-intentioned is that they are in formal schism- i.e., not a part of the “visible Roman church” – so not sure why you’re mentioning them.
Catholics for Choice and New Ways Ministry are not a part of the RCC.
The Jesuits? My recollection is that they were founded by a group of young men before ordination, sought papal recognition fairly soon thereafter, became ordained, and spread the order.
Their suppression certainly demonstrated a problem, but perhaps other than you suggest – it was due to international political pressure and a weak and erring pope. Again, I’m missing the force of your charge.
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Robert:
For the umpteenth time, don’t complain about Protestant division when Rome is equally divided.>>>>
Robert, what I wish someone would do is explain from sola scriptura why it is okay to divide like Protestants do. I wish that someone would defend Protestantism as it is.
If you could just pretend that she didn’t exist, and that the only churches were Protestant. How would you defend all the division in light of Ephesians 4? Wouldn’t you say that Christians should try harder to get along?
I got to the point where I could no longer justify it, let alone explain it. Maybe you can, my kind Brother Robert.
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Publius
Posted October 6, 2015 at 7:55 pm | Permalink
Mermaid – I’ll give you this, you are good sport.>>>>
My dear Brother Publius, you gave me one reference to something that is Biblical – it is the nature of fallen man to what? To get into fights and divide? I guess that is what you meant.
The rest is from your version of the WCF, which is not Scripture. The original was a document drawn up by order of English parliament in order to appease the Scots.
In the NT, you did not see anything akin to the kind of division we see in our day. There is a town not far from here where on every corner there is a Reformed church. 1st Reformed. 2nd Reformed. 3rd Reformed. 4th Reformed. There’s even a United Reformed Church and an American Reformed.
There are more.
There is one Catholic Church.
Where do you find anything like that in the Bible? When Jesus delivered His messages to the 7 churches, He addressed one church in each city. He didn’t have to write to the 1st, 2,nd, 3rd, 4th, United, American, etc. churches.
How do Protestants go from one Spirit, one body, one Lord, one faith, one baptism, one God and Father of all to the kind of chaos that is Protestantism?
Even the false teachers were inside the NT local churches, not outside. If they left, forming their own groups, they were said to have left because they did not belong in the first place. See 1 John.
Do you have a Bible?
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Mermaid,
Robert, what I wish someone would do is explain from sola scriptura why it is okay to divide like Protestants do. I wish that someone would defend Protestantism as it is.
If you could just pretend that she didn’t exist, and that the only churches were Protestant. How would you defend all the division in light of Ephesians 4? Wouldn’t you say that Christians should try harder to get along?
Paul apparently believed that it would be a reality that there would be factions among professing Christians. In fact, he seems to indicate that it must be so in order to recognize the truth: “For there must also be factions among you, that those who are approved may be recognized among you.” (1 Cor. 11:19)
The question, I guess, is whether these factions should be warring. But as SDB noted, there isn’t any warring in any meaningful Christian sense among the churches represented here. Neither the OPC nor the PCA say that you have to affirm the WCF in order to be a member or be welcome at the Lord’s Table. You have to affirm the Apostles’ Creed and not be under the discipline of a local evangelical church.
As for Ephesians 4, I assume you mean this portion of it:
And he gave the apostles, the prophets, the evangelists, the shepherds and teachers, 12 to equip the saints for the work of ministry, for building up the body of Christ, 13 until we all attain to the unity of the faith and of the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure of the stature of the fullness of Christ, 14 so that we may no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness in deceitful schemes. 15 Rather, speaking the truth in love, we are to grow up in every way into him who is the head, into Christ, 16 from whom the whole body, joined and held together by every joint with which it is equipped, when each part is working properly, makes the body grow so that it builds itself up in love.
I don’t see anything in here about visible unity such that there is only one denomination. Maybe that’s the way it should be, but your assuming something you have to prove.
What I do see here is unity of faith, which may or may not include absolutely everything a Christian believes. My inclination would be to say unity of faith does mean that, but it is also clear that Paul views this as a work in progress to be completed only in the world to come. Christians can work for unity of faith, but it’s no necessary scandal if it isn’t here yet because the Apostles never say it would happen on this side of glory.
I don’t see why unity of faith, scripturally speaking, means everybody united under one home office. The fact is that churches like the PCA and the OPC are separate ecclesiastical bodies does not mean they are disunited in the faith. Both formed out of different historical situations and the emphases of each denomination tend to be different but not opposed to one another. There’s been attempts to unite under one structure, but the churches have determined that wouldn’t be best for a variety of reasons. Mainly because there are people who fear that the necessary emphases might get diluted. But that’s no scandal. In fact, it’s better in such a case to remain separate because uniting might lead to infighting between people who prefer one emphasis over another. But there’s no acrimony. Ministers can and do transfer easily between bodies, as do church members.
When you get to other bodies, such relationships are more complicated. But to take Calvinistic Baptists for example, there are plenty of Calvinistic Baptists who affirm covenant theology, they just don’t baptize babies. Do I think they’re inconsistent? Sure. But to say we affirm completely different faiths is a bit much.
And I would add again that if you apply the biblical standard, Rome hasn’t achieved unity of faith yet. Thomism and Monism have radically different views on election. What’s happened is that the Magisterium has said, “Well, that’s not important.” Given that Paul has extensive teaching on election, what right does the pope have to say that? And there’s any number of other schools of theology that are neither Thomist nor Molinist and teach different views of election.
So if unity of faith means what it seems to mean on face reading, even Rome isn’t united. It’s a nominal visible unity, a tent whose boundaries are so big to accommodate any number of wildly divergent and contradictory schools of thought.
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Mermaid, “all the great reformers stayed in the Church to reform her from the inside – and with great success”
Are you serious? Have you heard of the priest sex scandal and the bishops’ role in covering it up?
Or do you live in the Land of Chocolate?
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vd, t, “none of it good”
There goes the American founding.
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see vd, t talk out of both sides of his mouth.
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Mermaid, Rome’s authority for a long time hinged on a forgery.
Do you see what I did there?
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@tvd
Umm…. no I don’t. Don’t know why you would conclude I’m lying.
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1) Those sects are in communion. The relationship among most of them is much closer than among various factions of the RCC. We share communion, seminaries, colleges, and parachurch ministries. Whether that is a good thing or not is a different question, but it is the reality on the ground. I can go to the methodist, lutheran, presbyterian, baptist, assembly of god, anglican,… and share in communion and vice versa. I can teach at their schools and vice versa. The division is institutional not in fellowship or communion – we are many parts of one body.
2) Insofar as we are splintered, we are splintered from Rome who is splintered from EO. In what sense is the continual fracturing a consequence of Rome itself? While this line of thinking is common among the EOs, it is just as flawed as the RC assertion that sola scriptura is a causal agent leading to the proliferation of protestant sects. As I’ve pointed out, many times, this fails to account for the proliferation of sects among other religions in America on one hand and the relative stability of “book based” faiths of non-Christian religions such as Judaism and Islam prior to moving westward on the other. A much stronger case is made by Nathan Hatch in his book on the democratization of religion. The inverted whiggish view of history you allude to is incorrect.
3) It is not at all clear that deviant Cardinals just shut up and so it ends… It certainly hasn’t reigned in priests such as Kung nor other Cardinals who actively worked to undermine Benedict and put Francis in place (or so they claim).
4) More fundamentally, you haven’t adequately addressed the difference between a single RC leaving and forming a denomination of “one” versus a group of RCs leaving and forming a denomination of many versus leaving for a different established denomination. You’ve asserted before that these are totally different from what has happened among protestants. It seems our fundamental (indeed incommensurable) difference is over the significance of founding a new institution. You think it makes all the difference while I find it to be an insignificant detail. Ephesians 4 doesn’t bear on this at all.
5) Regarding MWFs challenges that you find so compelling:
a) her charge that prots have no answer for Gal 5:6 is belied by the fact that it forms the centerpiece of one of the articles in the Belgic confession.
b) The charge that Calvin brought nothing new to the table is belied by the charge that his rendering of justification by faith is a novel theological development.
c) The interpretation of John 6 was adequately laid out by Jeff previously – his grammatical breakdown of the text and why it doesn’t make sense in context there take body and blood literally is compelling. There has been no adequate challenge to his exegesis of that text that I’ve seen in the comments here. d) The claim that Eph 4, Savior’s priestly prayer, and the Apostles Creed describe a church at odds with protestantism is wanting. To be sure, we are flawed. There is no question there. The church has been divided for quite some time and there are a lot of unhealthy strains among protestantism generally and in my own conservative-reformed part of the body – the crazy stuff going on Wilson is a good example of how these things go off the rails. We are sinners and our sin keeps us from “immanentizing the eschaton”. That being said, the protestant understanding of the church as a body of many parts means that we shouldn’t expect institutional conformity – indeed efforts to maintain that at all costs results in the papering over of serious sins as well (e.g., clericalism).
Your assertion that the biggest church is the true one fails to take seriously the account of the 12 tribes. It was the largest group (10 in Israel) that went completely off the rails. Indeed it was a mere remnant that remained faithful (cf. Elijah). There always have been and always will be faithful believers on Earth in this age. The church is afflicted with weeds, but that weeding does not take place now. What we see is rather many manifestations of the local church that are more or less pure – none perfect and some so far gone as to no longer be legitimate churches.
Our table is open to all who are baptized and confess Christ – it isn’t restricted to a single nation, it isn’t restricted to a particular denomination, it is the Lord’s Table and it is available universally (one might say catholic). You are welcome. Unfortunately I am not welcome to yours as I cannot accept Aristotelian metaphysics. The division is one sided.
In short, the challenges from you and mwf are wanting. To be sure there are tough, incommensurable problems we won’t solve here. I find that the reformed faith makes the best sense of who man is (as opposed to who we want him to be), most clearly articulates the gospel, and is the most faithful to the Bible’s injunctions for how the church should be organized. It stands in the flow of Church history without idolizing the past. To be sure we aren’t perfect and I might even go so far as to say it isn’t for everyone. I would even go so far as to say that RCC and EO churches might be the best option for some. I can’t accept all that the RC or EO churches teach, but I don’t think there is something flawed with those who conclude differently….what can I say, I’m a relativist I suppose. But maybe I’m wrong about that too.
What I do not accept is the force of the MOC – the historical and sociological reality of RCC undermine them fatally. The triumphalism and “trophy-ism” engaged in by CtC is frankly beyond the pale. In the case of relatively recent converts like Susan and MWF I do worry about those who sprout up too fast with a lot of zeal (think of the parable of the sower and the seeds). I’ve seen many, many cases when converts get puffed up with all of their new found superiority only to see their pride lead to a hard crash and loss of faith. The kinds of comments I’ve read from both Susan and MWF are eerily reminiscent of how my convert friend came across before eventually losing their faith. I’ve mentioned this before not as an attack, but as a warning. I’m not going to post the private details of this on a blog which is why I point to the story of Rod Dreher and how his intellectualized Catholic faith crumbled in the midst of his investigation into the RC sex abuse scandal.
Well as usual, I’m way too long winded so I’ll stop here…I guess I’m that guy at the bar who goes on and on and everyone tries to find a (not-so?) polite excuse to avoid so as not to get trapped by a never ending monologue. I guess that’s beauty of this medium – when you get bored it is easy to move on.
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Robert: Christians can work for unity of faith, but it’s no necessary scandal if it isn’t here yet because the Apostles never say it would happen on this side of glory.
not a scandal (surprise), but it is an indictment when being divisive by not staying intent on one purpose, not maintaining love, and not being clear on the absolutes for ‘ being of the same mind’ (Phil 2:2) and thus detrimental to the world seeing God (John 17:23).
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Daryl, is it always “Ladies Night” at the Old Life Bar?
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sdb, how do you explain Old Life in light of what you say here?
“Our table is open to all who are baptized and confess Christ – it isn’t restricted to a single nation, it isn’t restricted to a particular denomination, it is the Lord’s Table and it is available universally (one might say catholic). You are welcome. Unfortunately I am not welcome to yours as I cannot accept Aristotelian metaphysics. The division is one sided.”
If the owner of this blog and its regular contributors attacked the Catholic Church only as a way of keeping people from leaving Protestantism, then I would buy what you are selling.
However, here you will find regular slams on Pietists, Baptists – or is that the same thing? – Pentecostals, Charismatics, and even Reformed pastors of your own confession. That is that part I don’t get, and the part that kind of brings down your arguments. You say that you value your Evangelical brethren of different denominations, but the actual discussion on this blog communicates a very different message.
Can you really support the message of this blog – everyone is wrong and worthy of mockery?
IOW, what are you doing here if you really believe that all Evangelicals are your brothers and sisters in Christ? There is no love lost here for anyone, really.
You say that your religion understands and accepts Galatians 5:6. I know it does. That is why the Church can call you separated brethren, but you know that.
If you believe it, then where is the practice of it here at Old Life?
You do not belong here.
Galatians 5:6English Standard Version (ESV)
6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision counts for anything, but only faith working through love.
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Mermaid,
You misunderstand what Darryl is doing. He isn’t going to bar Tim Keller, a member of an Assemblies of God church, or any other person who confesses Christ and is repentant for sin from the Lord’s Table. But Rome will bar all of these, if she is following her principles, although in practice I don’t see anyone barred. So as far as barriers to sacramental fellowship, there really are none among most conservative Protestants.
What Darryl doesn’t like is for professing Presbyterians not to follow historic Presbyterian principles. You may disagree with his tone. You may think his criticisms are beyond the pale. But he isn’t saying “those people are members of false churches and cut off from sacramental grace.” For the purposes of this blog, he just wants Presbyterians to be Presbyterians, Baptists to be Baptists, and RCs to be RCs.
Personally, I don’t agree with everything Darryl says, but he makes good and important points if one follows traditional and historic Presbyterianism. He’s not calling Keller or the broader evangelicals heretics; he’s calling Presbyterians to follow Presbyterian polity and forms of piety. He’s a historian. He wants people to rightly acknowledge the history and not try to revise it by calling something Reformed/Presbyterian that isn’t Reformed/Presbyterian historically. His problems with folks like CTC is similar. He’s basically saying, “Don’t pretend that the papacy solves all your ecclesiological problems and state that things are so much greener on the other side of the Tiber when any honest look at history demonstrates that they’re not.” That’s all.
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Mermaid,
But remember, “there’s no acrimony”. Right.
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Bless you, Brother Robert, because you are a kind Christian gentleman. You are putting the best spin you can on what Brother Hart does here. That speaks well of you.
There is some good discussion generated I will grant you that.
Now, is it possible for Protestants to give a defense of Protestantism without any reference to the Catholic Church? How about Charles Spurgeon’s A Defense of Calvinism? He comes close.
In a Providential way, this sermon helped me become Catholic. He traced the doctrines of grace from the Apostle Paul, to St. Augustine, and on to his present day. Here is what he says. Notice what is left out.
” I ask the man who dares to say that Calvinism is a licentious religion, what he thinks of the character of Augustine, or Calvin, or Whitefield, who in successive ages were the great exponents of the system of grace; or what will he say of the Puritans, whose works are full of them? ”
He did make one reference to the heresy of Rome, but what he alleges Rome teaches is actually what she anathematizes. See if you can find what that false accusation is and what canon of the Council of Trent refutes it. No matter, the tone of the sermon is love – love of God, love of the Gospel, and love of all who name the name of Christ – except Catholics, but he says little about us at all except for his reference to Augustine and church fathers.
http://www.spurgeon.org/calvinis.htm
“IT IS A GREAT THING to begin the Christian life by believing good solid doctrine. Some people have received twenty different “gospels” in as many years; how many more they will accept before they get to their journey’s end, it would be difficult to predict. “
Great summary of Protestantism.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 7, 2015 at 7:30 am | Permalink
see vd, t talk out of both sides of his mouth.
Clever dodge, Dr. Hart. Much more clever than usual. Of course it’s the part of Calvinism you disavow as true Reformed theology, which leaves you once again arguing without principle, once again no more than boring ad hom.
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sdb
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:48 am | Permalink
It’s certainly not equally divided. That’s Darryl’s false premise to divert attention from Protestantism’s 100s if not 1000s of sects.
If the pope tells Cardinal Burke or Kasper to shut up, that’s the end of it. In Protestantism, they go off and start their own church.
The. End.
1) Those sects are in communion. The relationship among most of them is much closer than among various factions of the RCC.
No. Start again with a factual premise or forget it.
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@tvd
Is too? Those sects you refer to are largely in communion. They share seminaries, colleges, etc… and we are free to take communion in one another’s churches. If I move from one church to the other I don’t need to “convert”. Contrast the relationship between modernist reformers in the church and the rad trads. The lack of institutional unity != not in communion.
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@mwf
“sdb, how do you explain Old Life in light of what you say here?”
I don’t and feel no need to. I’m just a commenter here who stumbled on this site after reading a couple of Hart’s books and having head about him from some of my historian friends.
“If the owner of this blog and its regular contributors attacked the Catholic Church… However, here you will find regular slams on…”
Well I don’t see the “attacks” or “slams” or at least I don’t interpret them as such. Seems to me that you are reading into a lot of what he writes here. Criticizing the shortcomings of the CtC apologetic and pointing out the ways that that the RCC doesn’t measure up to the claims they make for it is not an attack. Nor is it a slam to raise concerns about unhealthy trends in our own NAPARC denominations or deficiencies in other prot denominations. While you hear one message, anotherDan and Mark McCulley – both of whom note they are not reformed seem to enjoy the interaction here as well. Of course they can speak for themselves. What I find curious is that the overwhelming majority of the heat I see around here arises from one person (here’s looking at you tvd!). Sure things get heated for others on occasion, but I suspect that if tvd were to mosey on the temperature would drop here markedly…but that’s just a guess.
As far as the message of this blog, I second all that Robert said. Like him, I don’t agree with everything that Darryl says, but I find it really strange to read you insisting that he cover the topics YOU are interested in. It’s like dropping into someone’s house for dinner and complaining about the food. If you don’t like what he has to say here, I’m not sure why you insist on remaining part of the conversation. I mostly stick around in the commboxes for the same reason Susan mentioned – I enjoy chatting about this stuff and mostly find it an enjoyable experience. I’ve learned a lot from Darryl’s posts and followed links and discovered books I likely would have missed otherwise. I’ve learned a lot of great stuff from Dan, Jeff, Robert, KiN and MTX as well. So I stick around.
“You do not belong here.”
Well I disagree. I’m sorry to disappoint.
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sdb
:Is too? Those sects you refer to are largely in communion. They share seminaries, colleges, etc… and we are free to take communion in one another’s churches. If I move from one church to the other I don’t need to “convert”. Contrast the relationship between modernist reformers in the church and the rad trads. The lack of institutional unity != not in communion.>>>>>>
Don’t know what groups you mean, sdb. Most Protestant groups have membership classes for those who want to join, unless you are transferring your membership to another congregation of the same denomination or in the same network.
Many groups will not accept your baptism. The Catholic Church will accept any Christian baptism as long as you can show it was done with the trinitarian formula.
Many Protestant groups observe closed communion. Only members are allowed to partake. In the Catholic Church, non Catholics can come forward for a blessing.
This is really what interests me, though. How do you – based on your principle of sola scriptura – defend the splintering of Protestantism? Where is this taught in Scripture?
What Scripture do you use? Can defend the divisive nature of Protestantism itself without any reference to Catholicism?
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sdb
Posted October 7, 2015 at 6:00 pm | Permalink
@tvd
1) Those sects are in communion. The relationship among most of them is much closer than among various factions of the RCC.
No. Start again with a factual premise or forget it.
Is too? Those sects you refer to are largely in communion. They share seminaries, colleges, etc… and we are free to take communion in one another’s churches. If I move from one church to the other I don’t need to “convert”. Contrast the relationship between modernist reformers in the church and the rad trads. The lack of institutional unity != not in communion.
You have emptied “communion” of all meaning. You share nothing except a vague symbol.
FTR, one does not “convert” to Catholicism, strictly speaking, for Protestants are not re-baptized. They come into “full communion,” meaning the sharing of the same understanding of the Lord’s Supper, “communion,” the Eucharist. To apply the diluted Protestant lowest common denominators that have the form but not the content of the sacraments is to again begin with false premises.
Since you do not share ordinations, your various [and nearly uncountable] sects may “share” seminaries, but they are no more than Bible and theology classes, as are many or most Protestant Sunday services. To compare them to the original sacramental forms that exist in Catholicism [incl the Eastern Orthodox] is a false equivalency.
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@mwf
“Don’t know what groups you mean, sdb. Most Protestant groups have membership classes for those who want to join, unless you are transferring your membership to another congregation of the same denomination or in the same network.”
Even within denominations you are usually required to go through a new members class for at least two reasons:
1) get to know the church
2) make sure you have valid membership in a church (not under discipline elsewhere)
Seems prudent ot me and does not suggest that one is not in communion.
I’ve never had mine questioned. I know some Baptist churches require immersion for the baptism to be valid (particularly SBC, though I attended one that did recognize infant baptisms curiously enough! The times, they are a changing’). Other wise, most Lutheran, Anglican, CRC, Presbyterian, Methodist/wesleyan, etc… will take anyone.
Hmmm… I’ve never experienced this. I’ve heard of fringe groups like the landmark folks, but that’s about it. Who else?
Well if you are asking if I think it is a good thing? No. I think everyone should be a member of the PCA (the Perfect Church in America). Ok, I jest… My doctrine of the church is rooted in the WCF – you can follow the scripture proofs there (Article 25). I don’t defend much of the fractiousness among Christians – it is sinful, but organizational unity is not the answer (cf. the UCC and WCC – you thought I was going to the RCC, but no-sir-ee). But while I don’t defend it, I can explain it – the democratization of religion in the US makes us all protestants now. You can’t escape it – we all have to choose and have the option of changing our mind. There is no ecclesiastical power for better or worse (See Nathan Hatch on exactly this topic – the democratization of religion). Since scripture is the only final authority and rule of faith and practice, and I am not convinced by scripture that institutional unity is necessary for the church, I don’t need to make a case for separate institutions. However, some of the what we see is divisiveness and it plagues all human communities. Protestant churches are strengthened by greater catholicity to be sure. Peter Wallace’s views regarding catholicity are helpful and I wish they received broader circulation, though I think he give some of the new light folks short shrift. Evangelicalism is pan-denominational unity of the sort he wants I think though perhaps doesn’t realize it. I suspect the BenOp stuff Dreher is talking about will take us in that direction as well.
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Seriously Mermaid, you’re a broken record.
This is really what interests me, though. How do you – based on your principle of sola scriptura – defend the splintering of Protestantism? Where is this taught in Scripture?
What Scripture do you use? Can defend the divisive nature of Protestantism itself without any reference to Catholicism?
1. You assume that on this side of the eschaton, there is some magical land where perfect Christian unity reigns. It doesn’t exist and won’t until Christ returns. Deal with it. Division as the natural state of fallen man is shown throughout the Bible.
2. There is no need to “defend the divisive nature of Protestantism” because it’s not the nature of Protestantism – it’s the nature of man. You may as well be asking us to defend the wetness of water or show you where that wetness is taught in Scripture.
3. The Reformers didn’t leave the Church, they rescued it. You conflate Rome with Christ’s church. They’re not the same thing.
4. We get it – you like unity, real or imagined. I can’t figure out if it’s a will to power or if like Rodney King you wonder why we can’t all just get along. But unity doesn’t trump purity, it doesn’t trump the actual Gospel.
5. The issue isn’t really unity – it’s what are we to do as Christ’s church? What has been revealed in the Scriptures? That’s where this debate really needs to take place, not over something as amorphous as unity. When you ask about unity, all you mean is bowing to the extrabiblical Roman hierarchy. Listening to the Romanists here makes me more 2K than I already was – I am thankful they don’t have political power or I’d be ordering a flame retardant humpsuit.
6. The only reason there is so much reference to Romanism here is that the Romanists are constantly stirring the pot. It’s not that interesting a subject. Taking pot-shots at the idolatries of the Roman church (crucifixes, “saints,” relics, Mary-worship, etc) isn’t as fun as it used to be. It would be more interesting and edifying to be talking about Vos’ Biblical Theology or even The Wire (which I didn’t love – Sorry Darryl), but here we are.
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So, IOW, you guys can’t do it. The “we’re all sinners, so get over it” defense is actually a dodge. It is not a defense.
Imagine there’s no pope, no Catholic Church.
Here is the challenge again for anyone else who wishes to take it. I said.:
This is really what interests me, though. How do you – based on your principle of sola scriptura – defend the splintering of Protestantism? Where is this taught in Scripture?
What Scripture do you use? Can you defend the divisive nature of Protestantism itself without any reference to Catholicism?
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sdb:
Since scripture is the only final authority and rule of faith and practice, and I am not convinced by scripture that institutional unity is necessary for the church, I don’t need to make a case for separate institutions. However, some of the what we see is divisiveness and it plagues all human communities.>>>>
I am not asking you to show from Scripture that institutional unity is necessary, though I believe Scripture does show that. I am asking you to defend what could be called an ecclesiology of amputation as a way to allegedly purify the church from error.
Maybe that is a clearer way of stating my challenge. Defend the ecclesiology of dismemberment of the body of Christ. Do so without reference to the Catholic Church.
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” Many groups will not accept your baptism. The Catholic Church will accept any Christian baptism as long as you can show it was done with the trinitarian formula.”
Here in the upper South part of fly over country, that statement just doesn’t reflect reality. I feel reasonably certain that credo-Baptism is the norm around here, but we admit folks who were baptized as infants to the table, which is common in these parts. The majority of credo-baptist churches around here have at least some degree of membership open to those baptized as infants. The largest LCMS church here actively fences the table, but I have heard rumors that some aren’t as strict.
This is an odd sort of blog. I have no great interest in some of the Reformed theological disputes that go on here (administration of republished halfway covenants , anyone?☺), but I do find the more historical aspects of the Reformed expression of faith interesting. DGH seems reliable as far as I can tell, and his take on American religious history is provocative, but not so much as to be out of touch with mainstream scholars like Noll and Marsden.
As far as the Protestant/Catholic debates are concerned, I find them odd. As I have said before, I don’t know any real life Catholics that would make the arguments that pass here. And the denial that VII was not a fundamental change would cause them to fall down laughing- at least those my age (65) or older. The whole idea that there was a 1500 year reign of Christendom spoiled by Luther is about as ahistorical as anything I have encountered. I wish some more substantive aspects of Church history could be discussed in more depth and with less rancor, but you can’t have everything. But the scroll down feature on my tablet works fine.
Every now and then, TvD makes a fair point. Some of the links he posts are interesting.
Cubs- Pirates just started.
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“You share nothing except a vague symbol.”
Nope. We share belief in Christ the Son of God who died for our sins and hope in the resurrection for starters. That faith matters much more than a common organizational structure.
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“I am not asking you to show from Scripture that institutional unity is necessary, though I believe Scripture does show that. I am asking you to defend what could be called an ecclesiology of amputation as a way to allegedly purify the church from error.”
Could you ask a more loaded question? I don’t agree we have a theology of amputation. I do believe that if a church (or even apostle or angel) teaches a false gospel it is time to scoot if the false teacher won’t repent. Sin sucks and creates brokenness that won’t be fixed on this side of glory. Good thing this world is not my home! You may call it a dodge. I call it faithfulness to the gospel.
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Mwf: “However, here you will find regular slams on Pietists, Baptists – or is that the same thing? – Pentecostals, Charismatics, and even Reformed pastors of your own confession.”
If you would read DGH’s “Lost Soul of American Protestantism” you would understand that his beef is with pietism in all of its forms, particularly as it has, from Colonial days, taken over Reformed churches in America. (I don’t think he expects anything else from us Baptists.) It is a good read.
Cubs- just put Arrietta up 3-0 in the 3rd. Should be enough.
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sdb
Posted October 7, 2015 at 8:47 pm | Permalink
“You share nothing except a vague symbol.”
Nope. We share belief in Christ the Son of God who died for our sins and hope in the resurrection for starters. That faith matters much more than a common organizational structure.
That elides the point since I was speaking of your use of “communion” here, which is devoid of its actual sacramental meaning. That all Christians are welcome at your version of “The Lord’s Supper” is to say no more than they’re welcome to walk in your door.
Whatever points of unity Protestantism enjoys is from defining them downward toward the lowest common denominator. But since you can find a dozen Protestant churches within a few blocks of each other, this doesn’t amount to all that much.
Neither am I speaking of organizational structure since I include the Eastern Orthodox here under “Catholicism,” since it is sacramentally the same.
Nope. We share belief in Christ the Son of God who died for our sins and hope in the resurrection for starters
So do the Mormons. You’re not helping your case.
https://www.mormon.org/faq/atonement-of-christ
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Go Cubs!!!
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sdb
Posted October 7, 2015 at 8:53 pm | Permalink
“I am not asking you to show from Scripture that institutional unity is necessary, though I believe Scripture does show that. I am asking you to defend what could be called an ecclesiology of amputation as a way to allegedly purify the church from error.”
Could you ask a more loaded question? I don’t agree we have a theology of amputation. I do believe that if a church (or even apostle or angel) teaches a false gospel it is time to scoot if the false teacher won’t repent. Sin sucks and creates brokenness that won’t be fixed on this side of glory. Good thing this world is not my home! You may call it a dodge. I call it faithfulness to the gospel.
Not loaded atall. If you had a Biblical proof text for Protestantism’s structural penchant for schism you’d be waving it.
“I call it faithfulness to the gospel.”
So do all schismatics.
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Mermaid –
Imagine there’s no pope, no Catholic Church.
I think you’re on to something.
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You are still wrong about the unity of rome and Constantinople…orthodox do not insist on transubstantiation. Your assertion about communion is wrong as well. Check out London conf and Westminster conf. I’m done for tonight…I may check in over lunch to see where you’ve moved the goal posts….
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sdb
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:16 pm | Permalink
You are still wrong about the unity of rome and Constantinople…orthodox do not insist on transubstantiation. Your assertion about communion is wrong as well. Check out London conf and Westminster conf. I’m done for tonight…I may check in over lunch to see where you’ve moved the goal posts….
They share the same Eucharist, same apostolic succession. The goalposts are still right where they’ve been for 1000 years. Bye.
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John, it depends on if they are weak on the eyes (think Leah).
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Mermaid, “what are you doing here if you really believe. . . ”
Sounds like a question you could well ponder.
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Robert, “Rome will bar all of these”
I’m sure I could sneak through.
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b, sd, it’s especially odd that Mermaid keeps coming back to a site that scandalizes her. Is Old Life porn for Mermaid?
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vd, t, “You have emptied “communion” of all meaning.”
From a guy who doesn’t commune. That’s rich.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:40 pm | Permalink
vd, t, “You have emptied “communion” of all meaning.”
From a guy who doesn’t commune. That’s rich.
Your surrogates are gonna need a lot more help than another lame ad hom from the sidelines, Butch.
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b, sd, have you ever noticed that some of the folks who insist on ecclesiastical organizational unity are the same folks who favor the Tea Party complaint against big government? They see the danger of organizational unity in U.S. politics, but not in church politics. Odd.
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Mermaid, the “Roman Catholics are united” is denial. Tell the first part of true, good, beautiful or go home.
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Tom,
They share the same Eucharist
Not as long as the East denies transubstantiation.
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Mermaid, we only learned the theology of amputation from Rome. First 1054, then 1520.
Back when Rome had a pair, infidels suffered.
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Dan, have you ever thought that I am in the mainstream of how the historical profession looks at Protestantism?
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Publius
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:14 pm | Permalink
Mermaid –
Imagine there’s no pope, no Catholic Church.
I think you’re on to something.>>>
Funny! What would you do without the Great Whore of Babylon to unite you in a common cause? Life would never be the same for you.
I know, I know. Total depravity all the way down.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:39 pm | Permalink
b, sd, it’s especially odd that Mermaid keeps coming back to a site that scandalizes her. Is Old Life porn for Mermaid?
Even more odd that a churchgoing elder of a putatively reputable religion aids and abets that scandalizing abuse, putatively in the name of Christ?
And comparing yourself to porn, especially to a nice Catholic lady, is perhaps telling. [Like you’d let someone talk to your mother like that, Butch. That’s really really wrong, man.]
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Dan, why do you care about the Cubs? I thought you were a Braves fan. Maybe even find the Astros a little appealing.
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vd, t, surrogates or no, I got you square in the knap sack.
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vd, t, the comparison comes from one of the OL regulars. No offense taken.
The cross was a scandal after all. You’d know if you went to Mass. As it stands, The Cookies is your contribution.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:39 pm | Permalink
b, sd, it’s especially odd that Mermaid keeps coming back to a site that scandalizes her. Is Old Life porn for Mermaid?>>>>
Actually, for me, this is Protestantism detox.
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Mermaid, I’m not sure you have Roman Catholicism down sufficiently to spend time here. You really do need to read John Allen.
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Robert
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:45 pm | Permalink
Tom,
They share the same Eucharist
Not as long as the East denies transubstantiation.
Thx, Robert, but you need to do more work on this, as do your fellows. The theology is not the sacrament, which remains licit. Transubstantiation is the explanation, a footnote [and not understandable unless you know what “substance” means in Aristotelian/Thomistic metaphysics, which few Catholics do, let alone Protestants]. But the Eucharist is the same, regardless of the commentary about it.
Your “Lord’s Supper” is not the Eucharist, sorry. SDB stepped in it with his attempt to use “communion” as a theological/rhetorical weapon. The arguments about Protestant “unity” only work on the lowest common denominator level, and as we see, that lowest common denominator is quickly exceeded, which is why you can find a dozen Protestant churches within a stone’s throw of each other.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:52 pm | Permalink
vd, t, surrogates or no, I got you square in the knap sack.
You know nothing about my personal religious life, nor will I tell you because you use it only as a weapon. You treat everyone like crap regardless, anyway. Observance is irrelevant. Everything’s grist for your mill.
——-
The Little Mermaid
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:54 pm | Permalink
D. G. Hart
Posted October 7, 2015 at 9:39 pm | Permalink
b, sd, it’s especially odd that Mermaid keeps coming back to a site that scandalizes her. Is Old Life porn for Mermaid?>>>>
Actually, for me, this is Protestantism detox.
Heh. He never thought of that one. Susan and a number of others too, I bet. They get sentimental for the other side of the Tiber that they left and here’s Dr. Supercilious: A Calvinism to remind them why they fled.
Looks like you’re doing the Lord’s Work, Darryl, but as usual not the way you think.
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/06/how-john-calvin-made-me-a-catholic/
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Tom,
Thx, Robert, but you need to do more work on this, as do your fellows. The theology is not the sacrament, which remains licit. Transubstantiation is the explanation, a footnote [and not understandable unless you know what “substance” means in Aristotelian/Thomistic metaphysics, which few Catholics do, let alone Protestants]. But the Eucharist is the same, regardless of the commentary about it.
If Rome and East cannot agree on what actually happens in the sacrament, then they are as disunited on it as any Protestant. Making its validity dependent on Apostolic succession and who cares what it means is the same kind of lowest common denominator stuff you’re opposing here, regardless of whether Rome says it is or not.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 7, 2015 at 10:00 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, I’m not sure you have Roman Catholicism down sufficiently to spend time here. You really do need to read John Allen.>>>>
Brother Hart, I am intrigued by your book about pietism stealing the soul of Reformed Christianity in America. I was wondering who had done it. Now I know. 😉
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Robert
Posted October 7, 2015 at 10:19 pm | Permalink
Tom,
Thx, Robert, but you need to do more work on this, as do your fellows. The theology is not the sacrament, which remains licit. Transubstantiation is the explanation, a footnote [and not understandable unless you know what “substance” means in Aristotelian/Thomistic metaphysics, which few Catholics do, let alone Protestants]. But the Eucharist is the same, regardless of the commentary about it.
If Rome and East cannot agree on what actually happens in the sacrament, then they are as disunited on it as any Protestant.
No. Do not confuse the footnotes with the text. Sorry, Robert, but you guys are not doing your homework, unfortunately indicating there is zero interest in the truth of the matter. The Eucharist is the same.
https://blogs.ancientfaith.com/orthodoxyandheterodoxy/2013/08/14/the-doctrine-of-transubstantiation-in-the-orthodox-church/
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Robert, sdb –
[Robert:] If Rome and East cannot agree on what actually happens in the sacrament, then they are as disunited on it as any Protestant
tvd correct that the transubstantiation is a means of understanding what happens – I wouldn’t call it just “commentary” (even for rhetorical purposes), since precision of vocabulary allows the communication of precision of concepts.
But he is right to point out that the definition doesn’t pertain to the shared Orthodox-Catholic belief in what happens in the Eucharist:
That should be fairly easy for any Reformed Christian to reject, either with or without much analysis. Yet it is essential (to use an Aristotelian concept) to both the Orthodox Churches and the RCC.
Sdb, do you have the link to Jeff’s commentary on John 6 you mentioned? I was interested in it when he posted it, but lacked the time to study it, and now can’t find it.
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DG-
Mermaid, we only learned the theology of amputation from Rome. First 1054, then 1520.
Back when Rome had a pair, infidels suffered.
If you ever update your blogging software to permit proper searches of past comments, it will save your interlocutors a lot of time.
The letter of excommunication was given by legates, not the Pope.
The Pope had already died, meaning the legates had already lost authority and the letter had no force.
Only the Archbishop of Constantinople was named in the excommunication anyway, not the rest of the Eastern Church (it isn’t possible to excommunicate millions). Had he been excommunicated, upon his death his successor would not have been.
Technicalities aside, the division between the E and W was actively provoked by the E, starting in a very big way with Photius but building to a series of actions in 1053 which, I think, included closing all Roman Rite churches.
A real schism developed, of course, but that wasn’t apparent at the time.
So it really isn’t meaningful to pick 1054 and call it amputation.
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To add to Kevin and TvD, here’s canon 17 of the Confession of Dositheus confirmed by the Synod of Jerusalem:
“We believe the All-holy Mystery of the Sacred Eucharist … In the celebration whereof we believe the Lord Jesus Christ to be present, not typically, nor figuratively, nor by superabundant grace, as in the other Mysteries, nor by a bare presence, as some of the Fathers have said concerning Baptism, or by impanation, so that the Divinity of the Word is united to the set forth bread of the Eucharist hypostatically, as the followers of Luther most ignorantly and wretchedly suppose, but truly and really, so that after the consecration of the bread and of the wine, the bread is transmuted, transubstantiated, converted and transformed into the true Body Itself of the Lord, Which was born in Bethlehem of the ever-Virgin, was baptised in the Jordan, suffered, was buried, rose again, was received up, sitteth at the right hand of the God and Father, and is to come again in the clouds of Heaven; and the wine is converted and transubstantiated into the true Blood Itself of the Lord, Which as He hung upon the Cross, was poured out for the life of the world.
Further [we believe] that after the consecration of the bread and of the wine, there no longer remaineth the substance of the bread and of the wine, but the Body Itself and the Blood of the Lord, under the species and form of bread and wine; that is to say, under the accidents of the bread.
Further, that the all-pure Body Itself, and Blood of the Lord is imparted, and entereth into the mouths and stomachs of the communicants, whether pious or impious. Nevertheless, they convey to the pious and worthy remission of sins and life eternal; but to the impious and unworthy involve condemnation and eternal punishment.
Further, that the Body and Blood of the Lord are severed and divided by the hands and teeth, though in accident only, that is, in the accidents of the bread and of the wine, under which they are visible and tangible, we do acknowledge; but in themselves to remain entirely unsevered and undivided….
Further, we believe that by the word “transubstantiation” the manner is not explained, by which the bread and wine are changed into the Body and Blood of the Lord, — for that is altogether incomprehensible and impossible, except by God Himself, and those who imagine to do so are involved in ignorance and impiety, — but that the bread and the wine are after the consecration, not typically, nor figuratively, nor by superabundant grace, nor by the communication or the presence of the Divinity alone of the Only-begotten, transmuted into the Body and Blood of the Lord; neither is any accident of the bread, or of the wine, by any conversion or alteration, changed into any accident of the Body and Blood of Christ, but truly, and really, and substantially, doth the bread become the true Body Itself of the Lord, and the wine the Blood Itself of the Lord, as is said above….”
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doin’ the Lord’s Work
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dg-
Maybe you can get invincible ignorance out of Aristotle plus Aquinas, but you don’t get it out of Jesus plus Paul. We significantly disagree about sin. Your very assertion that we enter into sin through an act does not fathom original sin.
Through Adam’s fall, we sinned all. How that is true is beyond my present knowledge.
We are saved through Faith and Baptism (which requires Faith). Baptism can be by extraordinary measures (the good thief), Faith can be rather little by our measures if God so chooses, even if we might not be able to explain it (those who were saved based on the testimony of the woman at the well, perhaps).
Which is why I don’t understand why Roman Catholics come up with purgatory. Sin just doesn’t go as deep with you guys. Why not go straight to heaven? Chalk it up to some kind of ignorance.
This is the same kind of argument Robert is giving. ‘My misunderstanding of your position dictates that other positions of yours I don’t understand are false. This is moreover the case since I’m not interested in studying authoritative sources and asking the questions necessary to arrive at an understanding.’ I don’t think that’s an unfair description.
Kevin, “Do I really need to argue that Luther rejected RCC teachings, or that we can know that with all possible certainty?” That applies to vd, t too. Thanks for pointing that out.
I’m not interested in discussing the religious practice of others who aren’t interested in discussing it, and know nothing first hand of the subject. Not at some point in the past and not in October 2015.
And yet your version of Christianity allows vd, t to disagree with Rome (even on infallible teachings like BOAM), not go to church, and think he’s a good Roman Catholic.
Not commenting on the individual, but if people form thoughts contrary to the Catechism, they are fooling themselves. Parish priests used to make house calls on those who didn’t go to Mass – yet another practice which ought to be recovered, although the contemporary complexities of moving and not registering at parishes makes it impossible in most cases.
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vd, t, “Observance is irrelevant.”
That’s not what the Roman Catholic Church teaches.
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Kevin,
tvd correct that the transubstantiation is a means of understanding what happens – I wouldn’t call it just “commentary” (even for rhetorical purposes), since precision of vocabulary allows the communication of precision of concepts.
If it’s not just commentary, it’s a real and heretofore irreconcilable difference. Otherwise, one could reject transubstantiation and still be in the RC faith. But where does Rome allow you to pick and choose what conciliar declarations to believe and which to deny?
But he is right to point out that the definition doesn’t pertain to the shared Orthodox-Catholic belief in what happens in the Eucharist:
Well if there is overlap between belief regarding the Eucharist, then most Protestants should be golden as well since there are beliefs about the Eucharist we hold in common with the RCs as well.
The Orthodox Church believes the Eucharist to be a sacrifice. As is heard in the Liturgy, “Thine of Thine own we offer to Thee, in all and for all.”
At the Eucharist, the sacrifice offered is Christ himself, and it is Christ himself who in the Church performs the act of offering: He is both priest and victim.
[…]
Okay, but what does all this mean for the East?
So, what is the sacrifice of the Eucharist? By whom is it offered? and to whom is it offered? In each case the answer is Christ.
We offer for all: according to Orthodox theology, the Eucharist is a propitiatory sacrifice, offered on behalf of both the living and the dead.
I’m really trying to find evidence of the East seeing the Eucharist as a propitiation in the same sense that the West does. The East rejects Anselm’s doctrine of satisfaction, which has been important in both Roman Catholicism and Protestantism. In fact, I’ve spoken to and read stuff from more than one EO that speaks of Anselm as being one of the worst blights on the church. And yet his view of the atonement is embraced by Rome, at least in theory.
That should be fairly easy for any Reformed Christian to reject, either with or without much analysis. Yet it is essential (to use an Aristotelian concept) to both the Orthodox Churches and the RCC.
So there are some shared essential concepts between the East and Rome regarding the Eucharist? Okay. I knew that. But that doesn’t make them the same thing or obscure the differences. There’s a bit of fastness and looseness here with what’s actually going on in both camps understanding.
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James Young, since the Confession of Dositheus comes from 1672, it hardly reflects the views of the ante-Nicene or post-Nicene church. Like saying Roman Catholics have always believed in religious liberty on the basis of Vatican 2.
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Kevin, “Through Adam’s fall, we sinned all. How that is true is beyond my present knowledge.”
I’m disappointed. That shrug doesn’t show much interest in the Bible. Sorry if it’s a cheap shot, but that’s the way most serious Protestants see Roman Catholics. The Bible says? Whatever.
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Kevin,
This is the same kind of argument Robert is giving. ‘My misunderstanding of your position dictates that other positions of yours I don’t understand are false. This is moreover the case since I’m not interested in studying authoritative sources and asking the questions necessary to arrive at an understanding.’ I don’t think that’s an unfair description.
Darryl is correct that sin does not go as deep with you guys. Roman Catholicism denies that we are born guilty; all that happens is that we are born bereft of the superadded gift that makes fellowship with God possible. Thus, Rome is quite willing to accept that people who never hear of Christ and never commit a mortal sin or who commit a mortal sin and somehow avail of God’s grace go to heaven. You can only say such things if people aren’t born guilty and deserving of hell to begin with and if sin is merely a conscious, knowing act of the will. For the Reformed, sins committed in ignorance are still real sins worthy of eternal condemnation.
So Darryl’s point about purgatory is actually well-founded. If ignorance covers a multitude of sins, why is it necessary at all except perhaps for practicing RCs. Darryl, me, the good Muslim who never hears of Christ—we don’t possess enough knowledge of RC doctrine to ever commit a real sin requiring real satisfaction.
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DGH: ” Dan, have you ever thought that I am in the mainstream of how the historical profession looks at Protestantism?”
Not sure how you mean “ever.” I never have considered you a revisionist, so nothing has changed in that regard. But most of your peers seem content to fish in the same old holes that always end up in one explanation or other of the seeming marriage of evangelicals and contemporary right wing politics. As a reader, the story gets old after a while.
I am not particularly a Cubs fan. I love baseball, certainly more partial to the NL, and that would include a residual dose of good will for the Astros. Kuchel pitched a gem Tuesday– tremendous fastball/sinker command, everything on a corner all night. Nothing over about 92. Greg Maddux reincarnated as a left handed with a beard. And where did Artrieta come from? Never saw a hint of his dominance this season when he was with Baltimore.
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Arteira = Arrieta.
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Dan, can you say steroids? Sure you can.
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Darryl,
The point of citing Dositheus was to buttress Kevin and Tom’s point that the East and RCC agree on the core doctrine of the Eucharist despite Robert’s comments painting East-Rome differences on the Eucharist as something akin to or on par with the conflicting ever-growing smorgasboard we see in Protestantism on the issue.
Robert,
“Thus, Rome is quite willing to accept that people who never hear of Christ and never commit a mortal sin or who commit a mortal sin and somehow avail of God’s grace go to heaven. You can only say such things if people aren’t born guilty”
If all those in heaven “avail of God’s grace”, I fail to see how that precludes them being born in and with the stain of original sin.
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Mermaid “scandalized” at the Old Life Bar? No, she is like that chick that comes on “Ladies Night” not because she is looking for love, she comes because the drinks are free!
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DGH, never knew steroids gave you a curve ball like Arrieta has.
You are such a cynic sometimes.
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John Sizer
Posted October 8, 2015 at 11:11 am | Permalink
Mermaid “scandalized” at the Old Life Bar? No, she is like that chick that comes on “Ladies Night” not because she is looking for love, she comes because the drinks are free!>>>>
Definitely not looking for love here. Definitely not looking for free drinks.
Old Life is my Protestantism detox, actually.
The best answers I got to my – admittedly loaded – questions yesterday were.:
1. Sinners are gonna’ sin, so get over it.
2. Catholics are just as divided, so what’s your problem?
There was an attempt to use the division of Israel as a way to justify all the divisiveness in Protestantism. Actually, that analogy would fit much better when used to show why the main Reformed groups are now dwindling down to small, apostate remnants of what they once were.
Of course we are sinners, but nowhere in Scripture is our tendency to sin used as an excuse for sin.
Of course there are divisions within Catholicism, but they are not the same at all as divisions in Protestantism.
For one thing, I can say “divisions within Catholicism.” I can’t say “divisions within Protestantism.” There is no “within” Protestantism, only divisions.
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Hey John – Is it still Ladies Night? Call me when it’s Penny Pitcher Night.
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“There was an attempt to use the division of Israel as a way to justify all the divisiveness in Protestantism.”
Which is quite an odd argument for Christians to use. Guess the New Covenant and better promises and all that is just kinda “meh”.
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Cletus,
If all those in heaven “avail of God’s grace”, I fail to see how that precludes them being born in and with the stain of original sin.
The point is that you don’t think the newborn baby is guilty and deserving of hell even before he or she makes any conscious act of will. Never hearing of Christ gets one off the hook because you don’t think people are really guilty even before they know they are.
The point of citing Dositheus was to buttress Kevin and Tom’s point that the East and RCC agree on the core doctrine of the Eucharist despite Robert’s comments painting East-Rome differences on the Eucharist as something akin to or on par with the conflicting ever-growing smorgasboard we see in Protestantism on the issue.
Translation: We don’t like Protestants because they won’t give the pope even first among equals status, so we’ll paper over all substantial differences with people who are so willing.
If you reject Anselm’s view of satisfaction categorically, as the East basically does, you can call the Eucharist a sacrifice all you want, but its not the same thing. It’s like a Protestant calling the Eucharist a sacrifice of praise and then saying, “Look, sacrifice. Therefore we agree with Rome on the meaning of the Eucharist.”
And smorgasboard? You’ve got bare memorialism, real presence, and whatever the heck Luther is saying. Three do not make a smorgasboard.
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Cletus,
Which is quite an odd argument for Christians to use. Guess the New Covenant and better promises and all that is just kinda “meh”.
Trying to find that NT passage that says one of the better promises of the nc is that there will never be any division. Meanwhile, Paul says in 1 Cor. 11 that divisions must occur.
And let’s face it, God must be an utter failure on the division front in Roman Catholicism since the promises of no division he supposedly made certainly aren’t coming true. It be different if you would just say only people in full communion with Rome are true Christians, but you won’t do that.
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Dan, chalk it up to total depravity.
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Mermaid, with the papacy you’d be just like the worldwide Anglican communion. With the papacy, you are in a communion in need of serious reformation or in serious denial. I like Anglicanism’s chances.
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Mermaid,
For one thing, I can say “divisions within Catholicism.” I can’t say “divisions within Protestantism.” There is no “within” Protestantism, only divisions.
Then you can’t say Protestantism leads inherently to division. There is no such thing as Protestantism in this view. You guys need to figure out your argument.
Of course we are sinners, but nowhere in Scripture is our tendency to sin used as an excuse for sin.
And nobody here has used it as an excuse, only as a reason why people shouldn’t be surprised that divisions happen. But why do you all not notice that the NT speaks of unity of faith as something not yet attained (Eph. 4)? You all believe there was only one visible church in the first century, and yet Paul points unity of faith as a future reality. It’s something that won’t be achieved until the eschaton. That doesn’t mean we don’t work toward it; it does mean we have more realistic expectations about what that might look like.
Of course there are divisions within Catholicism, but they are not the same at all as divisions in Protestantism.
Good. Then you all should be more circumspect about posting Rome as the answer to Christian division. Fewer divisions means you all aren’t that unified to begin with. Roman (and for that matter EO) ecclesiology has not done a better job of producing unity of faith. If there’s a cure, prescribe the cure, not something that also causes division.
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Robert:
Good. Then you all should be more circumspect about posting Rome as the answer to Christian division. Fewer divisions means you all aren’t that unified to begin with. Roman (and for that matter EO) ecclesiology has not done a better job of producing unity of faith. If there’s a cure, prescribe the cure, not something that also causes division.>>>>
My dear Brother Robert, I am not telling anyone what they have to do. No, not at all. I am telling you guys why you have given me no reason to return to Protestantism. I really like being Catholic.
The cure? Well, I think part of it for Protestantism would be to try to emulate the way that Paul and Barnabas went their separate ways. They did so before they got into a huge fight. Why can’t Protestants learn that?
That would help. Putting a greater emphasis on John 17 and Ephesians 4 would also help.
It would also help if Protestants did not present themselves as the “we’re not Catholic” option. Can you defend Protestantism as it is Biblically?
Of course, you might have to thank a Catholic or Orthodox monk that you even have a Bible to bicker about. Protestants didn’t preserve it, you know. Maybe realizing the great debt Protestantism owes to Catholicism would help as well.
I mean, after all, all the good Protestant theology was lifted right out of the Catholic Church’s theologians and saints. Add Orthodox if you want to included guys like Chrysostom and Athanasius.
Be a little grateful for the heritage you received from those you criticize so much. Just a suggestion.
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“They share the same Eucharist, same apostolic succession. The goalposts are still right where they’ve been for 1000 years.”
The orthodox repudiate scholasticism and consider the west polluted by pagan philosophers (i.e. Aristotle). While they have an understanding of the eucharist that is much more in line with Rome than protestants (I never suggested otherwise), they reject the scholasticism and see that as a major fault of Rome. They have other differences as well and are decidedly not in communion. It was called the East-West schism for a reason. My understanding, and I could be wrong on this, but that transubstantiation was dogmatically defined and it is this definition that the orthodox balk at (and why my inlaws’ priest tells them they cannot take communion in a western church). Maybe he misunderstands as well or perhaps your internet research is wrong? I don’t know, but it is really beside the point. The fact of the matter is that the divide between RCs and EOs is wider than say the divide between OPC and PCA. I can’t believe you even want to argue this.
The divided between EOs and RCs stands in contrast to the relationship among the overwhelming majority of protestant churches. You may dismiss that as being due to some kind of lowest common denominator approach to the communion, but that doesn’t falsify the statement that I made that these churches are in communion (your polemics are just a distraction). I’m not claiming that protestant churches are perfect, only that:
1) institutional distinctiveness does not imply schism. As the article I linked noted, this is quite similar to much of the early church. The relationship among most protestant denominations is not entirely different from the relationship among different orders in catholicism, or between say trads, social justice warriors, or modernists. The RCs unite around the pope and a shared understanding of the sacraments despite their many, many differences and non-negligible acrimony among various factions. Prots – unite around Billy Graham and their hymn books. Ok, I exaggerate slightly, but the similarity is much stronger than you have been willing to admit. No, it isn’t identical to Rome, but that was never my point. Only that the 1000’s of denominations purportedly at war is a gross mischaracterization of the reality on the ground.
2) The positive doctrine of the church is made from scripture and summarized well in the WCF. No dodge there. It states why most of here believe – disagree if you want, but don’t pretend we have no biblical basis for our ecclesiology.
3) There is separation among protestants that is sinful. There is no defense for this. It isn’t a dodge either. Some prot groups have endorsed heresy and cease to be Christian in any meaningful sense. Some make trinitarian baptism optional – this is a big problem too. Insisting that I defend separating from those who teach a false gospel from the Bible is silly – you know what Paul says in Galatians. Just because you separate from someone doesn’t mean that person doesn’t keep going and say publish a “gospel of Thomas” or some such. Of course, some separation isn’t over heresy and is just sinful (e.g. the division of denominations over slavery). There is no defense for this. I’m not dodging anything only recognizing that sin has bad effects and that may not be rectified on this side of glory. There are movements among protestants that damaging, but in the modern era when religious freedom is guaranteed, there is no stopping it.
4) This is true for *all* religious movements in the US. There is no cost for changing religions or reinventing your religion, so people do. This is true for Jews, Muslims, Catholics, and Baptists. Again not a dodge or a justification, just the recognition of reality.
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“Sdb, do you have the link to Jeff’s commentary on John 6 you mentioned? I was interested in it when he posted it, but lacked the time to study it, and now can’t find it.”
I don’t. I just tried to track it down to no avail. It was pretty good too!
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@cvd
“Kevin and Tom’s point that the East and RCC agree on the core doctrine of the Eucharist despite Robert’s comments painting East-Rome differences on the Eucharist as something akin to or on par with the conflicting ever-growing smorgasboard we see in Protestantism on the issue.”
Just to clarify before we get down this rabbit trail too much further. My point originally was not that Prots as a whole are closer together on what the Lord’s supper means than RCs and EOs. My point was that most prot groups are in communion with one another unlike the case between RCs and EOs who are schism.
I have to renounce calvinism to join the EO church, I didn’t have to renounce by SBC beliefs to join a PCA church. But apart from membership, we allow all believers who are baptized members in good standing access to our table – it is (c)atholic (i.e. universal). I’m was not making any claims about the respective meanings of the Lord’s Supper.
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“There was an attempt to use the division of Israel as a way to justify all the divisiveness in Protestantism. ”
That was me too, but you misunderstand my point here. It was only that the bigger group wasn’t the one who was right. Israel was wrong to do what she did. Just like the prots who embrace heretical teachings, gay marriage, or puppet shows on sunday morning are wrong to do what they do. The fact that only a remnant survives shouldn’t be surprising.
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Mermaid,
My dear Brother Robert, I am not telling anyone what they have to do. No, not at all. I am telling you guys why you have given me no reason to return to Protestantism. I really like being Catholic.
The good reason to return to Protestantism is because it is true. If we’re just talking about personal preference, then why complain about Protestant disunity? You like being RC, maybe we like being arguing Protestants. Whose to say which is better?
Personally, I can understand why someone might be disenchanted with Protestant division and look somewhere else for a solution. But the way some of you present Rome, it is clear that you haven’t really thought about Rome’s problems. Rome doesn’t offer a way to unity that other denominations don’t. If it did, there would be no division.
The cure? Well, I think part of it for Protestantism would be to try to emulate the way that Paul and Barnabas went their separate ways. They did so before they got into a huge fight. Why can’t Protestants learn that?
1. Sin is always a problem.
2. Have you ever thought that maybe one of the reasons for the huge fight is because Rome never actually gave Luther a fair shot? It’s pretty easy to get hardened in your position when you’re promised one thing and given another, as Luther was. That’s not an excuse, but I see precious little from the RCs here about the sins of Rome that made the Reformation tragically necessary.
3. Paul and Barnabas also went their separate ways relatively peacefully (as far as we know, though it seems Paul and Mark had personal issues that took a long time to resolve) because there weren’t any theological issues that were a matter of life and death on the table. Is the answer, if the Magisterium were to go apostate, just to say “okay guys, we’ll all be fine here.”
That would help. Putting a greater emphasis on John 17 and Ephesians 4 would also help.
But your assumption is that the unity Paul speaks of, and Jesus, is one visible same-home-office church. I’ve seen no argument for that. What if the unity is something more along the lines of NAPARC, where there is no substantial doctrinal differences but rather different visible bodies that have different emphases?
It would also help if Protestants did not present themselves as the “we’re not Catholic” option. Can you defend Protestantism as it is Biblically?
I don’t see anyone here doing that. In fact, the ones I see doing it are Roman Catholics. You don’t get 30,000 Protestant denominations unless you count everyone who isn’t RC or EO, including those denominations that openly repudiate Reformational doctrine.
Of course, you might have to thank a Catholic or Orthodox monk that you even have a Bible to bicker about. Protestants didn’t preserve it, you know. Maybe realizing the great debt Protestantism owes to Catholicism would help as well.
We freely acknowledge our debt to the pre-Reformation church. We tend to heartily embrace guys like Athanasius, Augustine, and Anselm. What we deny is that you can classify them as either RC or EO, at least in any modern sense of the term.
I mean, after all, all the good Protestant theology was lifted right out of the Catholic Church’s theologians and saints. Add Orthodox if you want to included guys like Chrysostom and Athanasius.
Be a little grateful for the heritage you received from those you criticize so much. Just a suggestion.
But these aren’t peculiarly RC or EO saints. We think Athanasius is a saint as much as you do, we just don’t dishonor him by praying to him. I’m grateful for Athanasius, Chrysostom, et al. I deny that they were RC or EO. Those designations make no sense for that era. The best you can get is small-c catholic, which is not the same as RC. If it were, we’d all be united under the papacy.
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@mwf
You wrote,
Well true. I also haven’t convinced you to buy a Prius, but then that wasn’t my design either. Earlier in I wrote
It has never been my design to give you a reason to change your religious affiliation.
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Tom, who’s lesby now?
http://www.city-journal.org/2015/eon1002mh.html
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I found this from Peter Wallace interesting…now back to work.
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sdb,
Yes, RC unity is not borg-collective. There are plenty of other rites and liturgies besides the latin one – https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Catholic_rites_and_churches
There are plenty of religious orders with different emphases. There is plenty of diversity and subsidiarity within the umbrella. It’s a caricature and false dichotomy to assume either Protestant model or absolute uniformity stemming from Rome, or that the diversity under Rome is somehow equivalent to Protestantism’s fracturing.
Robert,
“The point is that you don’t think the newborn baby is guilty and deserving of hell even before he or she makes any conscious act of will.”
Why do you think the RCC baptizes babies? And we’re not the ones who buy into the covenant of works business – even Adam without sin needed grace.
“Never hearing of Christ gets one off the hook because you don’t think people are really guilty even before they know they are.”
RC doctrine states everyone is given sufficient grace in a way known only to God. If they reject that grace, they’re guilty.
“If you reject Anselm’s view of satisfaction categorically, as the East basically does, you can call the Eucharist a sacrifice all you want, but its not the same thing.”
Here’s what you said:
“They share the same Eucharist.
– Not as long as the East denies transubstantiation.”
But feel free to keep moving goalposts.
“Meanwhile, Paul says in 1 Cor. 11 that divisions must occur.”
Yes, and he hardly is saying divisions are peachy and should just be shrugged off. Dissent can not be prevented by any ecclesiology, just as Paul’s statement reflects. Because Rome and Protestantism and East cannot stop dissent, that hardly means all systems are therefore equivalent in facilitating and promoting unity.
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Clete, let it stand for “The Good Catholics” if you like.
https://twitter.com/ChortlesWeakly/status/652177495152816128/photo/1
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CW,
I approve – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SmRuLI6QQiY
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CVD,
Why do you think the RCC baptizes babies? And we’re not the ones who buy into the covenant of works business – even Adam without sin needed grace.
To wash away the stain of original sin. But of course you don’t believe original sin makes you guilty before God. Unless you want to tell me that an unbaptized baby who never makes a conscious act of sin with the will deserves hell and that some of them might even go there. If so, you’d be the first RC to tell me that.
And yes, I know you believe Adam needed grace. God made him defective, with the lower appetites ever striving to overcome his reason. It’s vestigial Greek philosophy that says body is bad, reason is good.
RC doctrine states everyone is given sufficient grace in a way known only to God. If they reject that grace, they’re guilty.
Are they guilty and worthy only of hell before they receive that sufficient grace in RCism? No. Thank you for proving my point. Sin doesn’t go very deep with you guys.
Here’s what you said:
“They share the same Eucharist.
– Not as long as the East denies transubstantiation.”
But feel free to keep moving goalposts.
Not moving the goalposts. After I said that, Tom said transubstantiation is no big deal, and Kevin said it doesn’t mean that the EO is not in full agreement with Rome on the core of the Eucharist, citing several passages from the EO that use the language of sacrifice. My simple point was that you don’t have the same understanding of what sacrifice is because the East rejects Anselm’s satisfaction view.
IOW, don’t tell me you aren’t divided on your Eucharistic understanding on a fundamental level when the East denies both transub. and Anselm.
Yes, and he hardly is saying divisions are peachy and should just be shrugged off.
He’s saying they are inevitable and necessary. And I’m not shrugging them off.
Dissent cannot be prevented by any ecclesiology, just as Paul’s statement reflects.
1. Then you RCs need to stop claiming that Rome is the answer to division.
2. Then you RCs need to stop asserting that Protestantism necessarily and inevitably leads to division. That claim is cited so often by the RCs here that it makes one’s head spin. Thank you for putting it to rest.
Because Rome and Protestantism and East cannot stop dissent, that hardly means all systems are therefore equivalent in facilitating and promoting unity.
It’s true. Protestants are much better at a true unity of faith. RCs are much better at visible, organizational unity. The question is which one is better when one is forced to choose. Better several separate churches each of which holds to the Trinity and other things such as an orthodox view of human sexuality than a large same-home-office denomination wherein bishops can’t agree that homosexuality is innately disordered or on whether the economic Trinity is the ontological Trinity but can agree that the ritual of the Eucharist is pretty darn important.
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sdb
Posted October 8, 2015 at 1:25 pm | Permalink
“There was an attempt to use the division of Israel as a way to justify all the divisiveness in Protestantism. ”
That was me too, but you misunderstand my point here. It was only that the bigger group wasn’t the one who was right. Israel was wrong to do what she did. Just like the prots who embrace heretical teachings, gay marriage, or puppet shows on sunday morning are wrong to do what they do. The fact that only a remnant survives shouldn’t be surprising.>>>>>
Well, maybe we missed one another’s points. Let me clarify. You cannot use the division in Israel to justify the divisions within Protestaintism.
What is the Biblical justification for Protestantism’s divisiveness? The real answer is “there is none.”
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Sdb: What I find curious is that the overwhelming majority of the heat I see around here arises from one person (here’s looking at you tvd!). Sure things get heated for others on occasion, but I suspect that if tvd were to mosey on the temperature would drop here markedly…but that’s just a guess.
sheesh again, sdb….. gives an idea for a book though,something like: From Adam Still ‘Til Now –Crisis of Blame Shifting and the Escalating Demise of Personal Accountability
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Sdb: What I find curious is that the overwhelming majority of the heat I see around here arises from one person (here’s looking at you tvd!). Sure things get heated for others on occasion, but I suspect that if tvd were to mosey on the temperature would drop here markedly…but that’s just a guess.>>>>
I like to read the Catholic comments for obvious reasons.
I especially like Tom’s comments since he has the broad perspective of religious liberty and American history. I started following his blog and have learned a lot from him and those who post there. I know that people keep baiting him to get him to declare his personal religion, but he doesn’t do it. As he states often, he is a defender of all kinds of religious liberty.
Most of the Protestants are really predictable and just kind of repeat themselves and one another. Doesn’t make me angry, but it is noticeable.
So, without Tom and the Catholics, this place would be pretty dull.
Lotsa’ inside jokes that aren’t all that funny can’t really keep the thing going, can they?
If Tom annoys you, just keep scrolling. No big deal.
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But, Ariel, will defending religious liberty defend non-communicant Brother Tom on the last day? Maybe to those who think sinful works will count. Maybe it’s true that for all the audacious claims made by Rome, confessional Prots actually have a much higher view of the church than some of her adherents (at least around here)? Tom is provoked on the question because there is no salvation outside the true church. Adherence and fidelity matter, and as long as he remains unhitched he comes off like the wandering bachelor telling married men and women how to do marriage. And his hostility and hypocrisy don’t much help.
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Zrim
Posted October 8, 2015 at 4:55 pm | Permalink
But, Ariel, will defending religious liberty defend non-communicant Brother Tom on the last day? Maybe to those who think sinful works will count. Maybe it’s true that for all the audacious claims made by Rome, confessional Prots actually have a much higher view of the church than some of her adherents (at least around here)? Tom is provoked on the question because there is no salvation outside the true church. Adherence and fidelity matter, and as long as he remains unhitched he comes off like the wandering bachelor telling married men and women how to do marriage. And his hostility and hypocrisy don’t much help.
Typical Old Life personal attack. Not a single fact or principled argument, just slime.
sdb
Posted October 8, 2015 at 1:23 pm | Permalink
@cvd
“Kevin and Tom’s point that the East and RCC agree on the core doctrine of the Eucharist despite Robert’s comments painting East-Rome differences on the Eucharist as something akin to or on par with the conflicting ever-growing smorgasboard we see in Protestantism on the issue.”
Just to clarify before we get down this rabbit trail too much further. My point originally was not that Prots as a whole are closer together on what the Lord’s supper means than RCs and EOs. My point was that most prot groups are in communion with one another unlike the case between RCs and EOs who are schism.
I have to renounce calvinism to join the EO church, I didn’t have to renounce by SBC beliefs to join a PCA church. But apart from membership, we allow all believers who are baptized members in good standing access to our table – it is (c)atholic (i.e. universal). I’m was not making any claims about the respective meanings of the Lord’s Supper.
The Eucharist and the sacraments are central to the Catholic faith and on them “Rome and Constantinople” agree. Protestantism is a Bible debating society, at best a “confessional” faith. You’re comparing apples and oranges.
Your unity is only cosmetic; you make a big deal of the most minor of Vatican doctrinal differences with the EOs like purgatory, yet the reason there are a dozen Protestant churches within a block of each other is precisely because doctrinal differences are the basis of your version of Christianity. You have dispensed with the sacramental nature of Christianity. The Catholic goalposts, the sacraments, remain in place as they have for over 1000 years.
“Protestantism” papers over its doctrinal differences when convenient, but the fact is you start entire new churches over them, which Catholicism visibly does not.
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/06/how-john-calvin-made-me-a-catholic/
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Tom,
The Eucharist and the sacraments are central to the Catholic faith and on them “Rome and Constantinople” agree. Protestantism is a Bible debating society, at best a “confessional” faith.
So it doesn’t matter what one confesses about the gospel, only that Rome and EO both say “sacrifice” in the Eucharist without agreeing on what that means?
Your unity is only cosmetic; you make a big deal of the most minor of Vatican doctrinal differences with the EOs like purgatory,
If they’re minor and Rome is so interested in one visible church, why doesn’t the Vatican just say “we could be wrong about this,” or “we were wrong about this”? Oh, they can’t. Why, because of their DOCTRINE of infallibility.
yet the reason there are a dozen Protestant churches within a block of each other is precisely because doctrinal differences are the basis of your version of Christianity. You have dispensed with the sacramental nature of Christianity. The Catholic goalposts, the sacraments, remain in place as they have for over 1000 years.
Looking for the gospel. Not finding it.
The papacy is an awfully significant doctrinal difference between Rome and the East. If it weren’t, Rome would drop its claim or the East would admit jurisdictional primacy.
“Protestantism” papers over its doctrinal differences when convenient, but the fact is you start entire new churches over them, which Catholicism visibly does not.
Perhaps, but that’s better than papering over differences by pretending they don’t exist because people tip their hat to the pope, why?
You’re papering over doctrinal differences between East and West by saying, “Hey the sacraments.” Why is that okay but Protestants can’t “paper” over the differences by saying, “Hey, justification by faith alone”?
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TVD: Not a single fact
Hope you can agree there are some facts…
fact: Zrim: defending religious liberty will not defend non-communicant Brother Tom on the last day
fact: Zrim: Adherence and fidelity matter
fact: Zrim: as long as he remains unhitched he comes off like the wandering bachelor telling married men and women how to do marriage.
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Zrim
Posted October 8, 2015 at 4:55 pm | Permalink
But, Ariel, will defending religious liberty defend non-communicant Brother Tom on the last day? Maybe to those who think sinful works will count. Maybe it’s true that for all the audacious claims made by Rome, confessional Prots actually have a much higher view of the church than some of her adherents (at least around here)? Tom is provoked on the question because there is no salvation outside the true church. Adherence and fidelity matter, and as long as he remains unhitched he comes off like the wandering bachelor telling married men and women how to do marriage. And his hostility and hypocrisy don’t much help.>>>>
Is there something in there you want me to respond to?
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Mermaid, based on what I’ve heard here, TVD, who knows the true church but neglects her, is in a more perilous situation than those who think they are conforming to a true church. Isn’t it the responsibility of you and other RC’s to confront him?
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Ali
Posted October 8, 2015 at 6:02 pm | Permalink
TVD: Not a single fact
Hope you can agree there are some facts…
fact: Zrim: defending religious liberty will not defend non-communicant Brother Tom on the last day
fact: Zrim: Adherence and fidelity matter
fact: Zrim: as long as he remains unhitched he comes off like the wandering bachelor telling married men and women how to do marriage.
Refutation of 1: Faith alone saves. Of course there’s the story of the Sheep and the Goats on the Last Day where works are mentioned but not faith. I don’t know where you’re going with this.
That religious liberty doesn’t matter? That the state will “educate” your children in moral filth? Oh well, nothing matters except sitting around waiting to die and go to heaven. You’re elect, right?
As for the personal attacks, if they could win fair and square they would, instead of…this.
Robert
Posted October 8, 2015 at 5:49 pm | Permalink
Tom,
“The Eucharist and the sacraments are central to the Catholic faith and on them “Rome and Constantinople” agree. Protestantism is a Bible debating society, at best a “confessional” faith.”
So it doesn’t matter what one confesses about the gospel, only that Rome and EO both say “sacrifice” in the Eucharist without agreeing on what that means?
Again, explanations are not essences. Theology is not God.
“Your unity is only cosmetic; you make a big deal of the most minor of Vatican doctrinal differences with the EOs like purgatory”
If they’re minor and Rome is so interested in one visible church, why doesn’t the Vatican just say “we could be wrong about this,” or “we were wrong about this”? Oh, they can’t. Why, because of their DOCTRINE of infallibility.”
Bad argument. Much of normative magisterial teaching is not put forth as infallible. There are many things were dissent and disagreement are not considered heresy. Stop getting your information on Catholicism from Darryl Hart and do some homework on the truth about “infallibility.” This lie is getting really old.
“yet the reason there are a dozen Protestant churches within a block of each other is precisely because doctrinal differences are the basis of your version of Christianity. You have dispensed with the sacramental nature of Christianity. The Catholic goalposts, the sacraments, remain in place as they have for over 1000 years.”
Looking for the gospel. Not finding it.
Sola scriptura is Luther’s invention. But if you ever actually read Aquinas or an actual papal encyclical, it’s up to the gills in the Gospel. Again, not enough primary sources, too much Darryl Hart. If you’re not finding the Gospel, you’re not looking for it. “Solo Ecclesia” is a lie.
The papacy is an awfully significant doctrinal difference between Rome and the East. If it weren’t, Rome would drop its claim or the East would admit jurisdictional primacy.
Or the papacy could recognize the Eastern Orthodox sacraments as licit despite the pope issue. Which is precisely what Rome does.
““Protestantism” papers over its doctrinal differences when convenient, but the fact is you start entire new churches over them, which Catholicism visibly does not.”
Perhaps, but that’s better than papering over differences by pretending they don’t exist because people tip their hat to the pope, why?
That doesn’t address Protestantism papering over its differences [when convenient], nor starting new churches over them [often]. I’m afraid you ducked there, and for good reason.
Since doctrine and arguing Bible is all you have, there are essential differences between sects, so much so that you start new churches over them. By contrast, the essence of Catholicism is the sacraments–therefore if there is agreement on the sacraments, doctrinal differences can be only secondary ones, are not essential differences.
You’re papering over doctrinal differences between East and West by saying, “Hey the sacraments.” Why is that okay but Protestants can’t “paper” over the differences by saying, “Hey, justification by faith alone”?
Not papering over atall, for reasons explained above. One cannot paper over essential differences, and they don’t. The Vatican has come up with a brilliant strategy: If the EOs want to separate themselves over the papacy, that’s their problem. Sort of like the Prodigal Son, who took his patrimony and split. But the father never stopped regarding him as his son.
Similar to “separated brethren.” Since you have true baptism, all is not lost. The rest of your sacramental lacunae and doctrinal differences are your problem, not Rome’s. The “separation” is your doing, not Rome’s.
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Tom, not true–I said non-communicant. Repent.
Ariel, as you wish.
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TVD:
Your unity is only cosmetic; you make a big deal of the most minor of Vatican doctrinal differences with the EOs like purgatory, yet the reason there are a dozen Protestant churches within a block of each other is precisely because doctrinal differences are the basis of your version of Christianity. You have dispensed with the sacramental nature of Christianity. The Catholic goalposts, the sacraments, remain in place as they have for over 1000 years.>>>>>>>>>>>
Exactly. It is not only okay to divide over doctrinal differences, it is expected. The differences do not have to be much of anything at all. The Arminians and Calvinists have been going at it for hundreds of years, now. There is no way to resolve their differences.
Then there are the arguments among Calvinists over the extent of the Atonement.
Then there are the divisions over which version of the WCF to follow.
Division doesn’t just happen in Protestantism. It is an ideal to aim for and a source of pride.
It is the Eucharist that is the source and summit of the Christian life.
Protestants just don’t have that.
Protestants assume that what is important to them is important to Catholics. Not exactly.
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Tom,
Bad argument. Much of normative magisterial teaching is not put forth as infallible. There are many things were dissent and disagreement are not considered heresy. Stop getting your information on Catholicism from Darryl Hart and do some homework on the truth about “infallibility.” This lie is getting really old.
You’re illustrating cafeteria Roman Catholicism. Papal infallibility is infallible (I think, one never knows for sure). No dissent is tolerated on that. The East rejects that. Purgatory is taught at Trent. You can’t dissent from Trent. The East dissents from that. You’re reducing things to the lowest common denominator. Christianity=whatever Rome and Constantinople might nominally agree on.
Again, explanations are not essences. Theology is not God.
No one is saying theology is God. Tell me, am I allowed to explain the doctrine of the Trinity is such a way that I end up with 3 gods. Of course not. Explanations matter.
Sola scriptura is Luther’s invention. But if you ever actually read Aquinas or an actual papal encyclical, it’s up to the gills in the Gospel. Again, not enough primary sources, too much Darryl Hart. If you’re not finding the Gospel, you’re not looking for it. “Solo Ecclesia” is a lie.
You mean like the encyclical regarding global warming?
Sola Scriptura is not Luther’s invention, it’s all over the NT and the early church. And Rome practices sola Ecclesia. The Magisterium is the final infallible authority. You can’t correct the papacy with the Bible once it has spoken. Rome’s belief that this would never be necessary is sheer fideism.
Or the papacy could recognize the Eastern Orthodox sacraments as licit despite the pope issue. Which is precisely what Rome does.
I can’t help it that Rome is doctrinally inconsistent.
That doesn’t address Protestantism papering over its differences [when convenient], nor starting new churches over them [often]. I’m afraid you ducked there, and for good reason.
Sorry, just looking for consistency in your argument. Rome’s happy to claim 1 billion members, but press a conservative apologist on why Pelosi is still in the church and you get “she’s not really Catholic.” And as SDB continually points out, plenty of X-Roman Catholics start their own churches. They’re called spiritual but not religious.
Since doctrine and arguing Bible is all you have, there are essential differences between sects, so much so that you start new churches over them. By contrast, the essence of Catholicism is the sacraments–therefore if there is agreement on the sacraments, doctrinal differences can be only secondary ones, are not essential differences.
1. We know the essence of Romanism is the sacraments.
2. Thank you for pointing that out, as it shows that the essence of Rome isn’t the gospel.
3. Spiritual but not religious, see above. Progressive parishes=new churches until Rome kicks them out.
4. Rome disagrees with the East on the sacraments. Everything from particulars of practice to the explanation of what is going on and how Christ is present.
Not papering over atall, for reasons explained above. One cannot paper over essential differences, and they don’t. The Vatican has come up with a brilliant strategy: If the EOs want to separate themselves over the papacy, that’s their problem. Sort of like the Prodigal Son, who took his patrimony and split. But the father never stopped regarding him as his son.
So we’ve gone from Rome being right and the one true church to Rome exercising a well-thought-out PR strategy. Brilliant.
Similar to “separated brethren.” Since you have true baptism, all is not lost. The rest of your sacramental lacunae and doctrinal differences are your problem, not Rome’s. The “separation” is your doing, not Rome’s.
Except Rome shouldn’t view any Protestant that denies baptismal regeneration as a separated brother. Or ex opere operato. Those are essential differences that make the sacraments very different. I guess we should just count ourselves lucky.
But, and I don’t mean this insultingly, you are helpfully demonstrating the mentality that Roman Catholicism generates among most of its adherents, nominal or otherwise: Don’t care about the church’s teaching on anything other than it is the only place you’re sure to get a true sacrament. Everything else is irrelevant.
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Mermaid
Division doesn’t just happen in Protestantism. It is an ideal to aim for and a source of pride.
Where the honor of Christ and His Gospel are at stake then yes, there is significant dedication to seeking the truth. Debate and disagreement do not imply a lack of brotherly love – just the opposite. Speaking the truth in love requires it.
Why does “I hate division” translate to: “You give up your beliefs and conform to mine?” I’ll make you the same offer. What you call division obviously bothers you, so drop the idol worship and join the OPC. Problem solved. In fact, we can turn all the RC parishes into OPC congregations and sell St. Peters on eBay. And with all the new congregations we’ll need loads of new ministers. Just think of all the new students at Westminster!
It is the Eucharist that is the source and summit of the Christian life.
“Another iniquity chargeable on the Mass is, that it sinks and buries the cross and passion of Christ. This much, indeed, is most certain – the cross of Christ is overthrown the moment an altar is erected. For if, on the cross, he offered himself in sacrifice that he might sanctify us forever, and purchase eternal redemption for us, undoubtedly the power and efficacy of his sacrifice continues without end.” (citing Heb 9:11, 12, 26; 10:10, 14, 16)
Institutes IV:18:3
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Webfoot,
Then there are the arguments among Calvinists over the extent of the Atonement.
There are arguments among Roman Catholics over the meaning of the atonement.
Then there are the divisions over which version of the WCF to follow.
Then there are the divisions over what has been defined infallibly and what hasn’t.
Division doesn’t just happen in Protestantism. It is an ideal to aim for and a source of pride.
Doctrinal division is everywhere in Roman Catholicism, but it’s largely irrelevant. All that matters is receiving the Eucharist. Believe whatever you want about it, its not essential. Just ask Tom.
It is the Eucharist that is the source and summit of the Christian life.
Who’s born again by receiving the Eucharist (source)? I don’t think even Rome affirms that.
Protestants just don’t have that.
My church has the Eucharist. And we actually believe Christ is present in it. Now of course, we don’t affirm transubstantiation, but according to Tom that is completely irrelevant.
Protestants assume that what is important to them is important to Catholics. Not exactly.
Actually, most of us here are pretty convinced that doctrinal orthodoxy and the gospel aren’t important to the vast majority of RCs. Virtually the only people that tend to show any slight concern for it on your side of the Tiber are former Protestants.
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Publius,
What you call division obviously bothers you, so drop the idol worship and join the OPC. Problem solved.
But then she wouldn’t be “Catholic” because “Catholic”=really, really big (even if the vast majority are nominal). Just ask Tom. In the other thread he found it laughable that Lutherans claim to be the catholic church because there’s not more than 70 million of them.
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Robert –
All that matters is receiving the Eucharist. Believe whatever you want about it, its not essential.
Bingo. Mysticism and sacerdotalism are a powerful brew.
…Pay $100 to have Father O’Riley say a mass to “St. Anne” who will intercede on your behalf with her daughter Mary who will in turn whisper in Our Lord’s ear who will in turn intercede with God the Father.
Where did that come from? What happened to Jesus our great high priest? What about coming boldly to the throne of grace? Who knew we needed all these middlemen?
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TVD: “elect”
TVD, you mention that a lot. I think it really bothers you. You can reject God on any grounds you want. Some ‘could never accept a God who allows suffering’, etc. I’m pretty sure you know salvation truths.
As for church-going, (you should follow up about your question awhile back as to reasonable expectation of it’s influence on character); Anyway, one who receives Jesus will eventually agree with Him about one’s responsibility as a body member, since He is the Head and is very persuasive.
As for sheep – let the one who is thirsty come and take the water of life without cost – if anyone enters through the door (Jesus), he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture ;so don’ t be of those who do not receive the love of the truth so as to be saved. (Rev 22:17; John 10:9; 2 Thess 2:10)
as re: TVD: “Oh well, nothing matters except sitting around waiting to die and go to heaven”. – see last sentence above
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Publius
Posted October 8, 2015 at 8:05 pm | Permalink
Mermaid
Publius:
In fact, we can turn all the RC parishes into OPC congregations and sell St. Peters on eBay. And with all the new congregations we’ll need loads of new ministers. Just think of all the new students at Westminster!>>>>
Hey, let’s play the “There is no Catholic Church, no Pope, no St. Peter’s and there never was” game.
Publius:
“Another iniquity chargeable on the Mass is, that it sinks and buries the cross and passion of Christ. This much, indeed, is most certain – the cross of Christ is overthrown the moment an altar is erected. For if, on the cross, he offered himself in sacrifice that he might sanctify us forever, and purchase eternal redemption for us, undoubtedly the power and efficacy of his sacrifice continues without end.” (citing Heb 9:11, 12, 26; 10:10, 14, 16)
Institutes IV:18:3>>>>>>
Calvin’s Institutes do not exist.
Now, what do we have? Do we have the Bible?
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@mwf
“Well, maybe we missed one another’s points. Let me clarify. You cannot use the division in Israel to justify the divisions within Protestaintism.”
I agree and would never suggest otherwise. I merely was pointing out that big doesn’t imply true.
“What is the Biblical justification for Protestantism’s divisiveness? The real answer is “there is none.””
Like I said, some is simply sinfulness and not defensible. I have no more desire to justify it than you would want to justify the celebration of Cardinal Law. But I would say following Galatians that if a church taught heresy, one has the duty to separate if the teacher won’t repent or leave. Sticking around for the tradition or ritual and mussing the thing to which the ritual points is tragic. If you are receiving the gospel in your church now that is great.
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sdb:
But I would say following Galatians that if a church taught heresy, one has the duty to separate if the teacher won’t repent or leave. Sticking around for the tradition or ritual and mussing the thing to which the ritual points is tragic. If you are receiving the gospel in your church now that is great.>>>>
Make your case from the Bible. Was there a church split in Galatia? If so, demonstrate it from Scripture.
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“As to the verity of the flesh and blood there is no room left for doubt. For now both from the declaration of the Lord Himself and our own faith, it is verily flesh and verily blood. And these when eaten and drunk, bring it to pass that both we are in Christ and Christ in us. Is not this true? Yet they who affirm that Christ Jesus is not truly God are welcome to find it false. He therefore Himself is in us through the flesh and we in Him, whilst together with Him our own selves are in God.”
– St. Hilary of Poitiers – 4th Century – Hammar of the Arians
Hilary trumps Calvin, the rationalist. Notice that Hilary’s comment here is based on Scripture alone and faith alone.
Yet Calvinists will continue to accuse all the great doctors of the Church of idolatry.
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You’re awfully demanding…. Paul instructed a local church to boot one who teaches a different gospel – an apostle even. If the apostle teaching a false gospel won’t give up the keys (perhaps even most there like having their ears tickled…see tim) then you have to move on. As paul warns in romans- weve been grafted in and will be cut out if we stray. But a remnant will always persist of course. Thus division is justified by scripture.
Unity around a ritual despite gospel unfaithfulness is the mistake of the jews and I believe is replicated by Rome. Of course rome agrees in principle even if they think I’m off my rocker in particular – they split several times over doctrine even though they might have agreed in some cases on the ritual (orthodox, copts, nestorians, arians and other heretical groups). Division was justified. I don’t like the divisions among prots but without an emporer there is no going back. Sin sucks (along with cancer, U. of Michigan, and
JesuitsFredo)…not a reason to run to Rome.LikeLike
“Make your case from the Bible.”
By the way, as I pointed out before, the slogan sola scriptura did not and does not mean that one must nake one’s case only from the bible. Only that it is the sole final authority against which doctrine and practice must be judged. It is also only source of authority that can bind faith and morals. Since scripture doesn’t forbid division under any circumstances, it can be justified. Not all divisions are justifiable.
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St. Augustine also trumps Calvin and Calvinism.
“In the sacrament he is immolated for the people not only on every Paschal Solemnity but on every day; and a man would not be lying if, when asked, he were to reply that Christ is being immolated. For if sacraments had not a likeness to those things of which they are sacraments, they would not be sacraments at all; and they generally take the names of those same things by reason of this likeness.”
Letters 98:9 [A.D. 412])
“For when he says in another book, which is called Ecclesiastes, ‘There is no good for a man except that he should eat and drink’ [Eccl. 2:24], what can he be more credibly understood to say [prophetically] than what belongs to the participation of this table which the Mediator of the New Testament himself, the priest after the order of Melchizedek, furnishes with his own body and blood? For that sacrifice has succeeded all the sacrifices of the Old Testament, which were slain as a shadow of what was to come. . . . Because, instead of all these sacrifices and oblations, his Body is offered and is served up to the partakers of it.”
The City of God 17:20 [A.D. 419]
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sdb
Posted October 8, 2015 at 10:13 pm | Permalink
“Make your case from the Bible.”
By the way, as I pointed out before, the slogan sola scriptura did not and does not mean that one must nake one’s case only from the bible. Only that it is the sole final authority against which doctrine and practice must be judged. It is also only source of authority that can bind faith and morals. Since scripture doesn’t forbid division under any circumstances, it can be justified. Not all divisions are justifiable.>>>>
Well, one more, and then I’ll let you guys rest for the evening.
I’ll ask the question this way. Which Galatian church did Paul write his letter to – the 1st, 2nd, 3rd, 4th, American, Faith Reformed, or 1st Christian Reformed church?
He wrote to one church. The church in Galatia. They were supposed to get rid of the false teachers, not run from them. True reform.
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Mermaid,
Yes the church is supposed to get rid of the false teachers. The question is what happens when they dont. Is the RC answer that the church will always cast out its false teachers? Seems to be. But that’s sheer fideism. There’s no external or internal evidence for it. Traditionally, Rome dogmatizes error. See Rome’s Mariology.
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Robert
Posted October 8, 2015 at 8:01 pm | Permalink
Tom,
Bad argument. Much of normative magisterial teaching is not put forth as infallible. There are many things were dissent and disagreement are not considered heresy. Stop getting your information on Catholicism from Darryl Hart and do some homework on the truth about “infallibility.” This lie is getting really old.
You’re illustrating cafeteria Roman Catholicism.
Um, no. You’ve been a good correspondent but I’m not going to respond to the rest until you do your homework. This is boring and only helps proliferate Darryl’s fog about infallibility. Y’all gotta start playing straight about Catholicism.
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,i>Ali
Posted October 8, 2015 at 8:43 pm | Permalink
TVD: “elect”
TVD, you mention that a lot. I think it really bothers you. You can reject God on any grounds you want. Some ‘could never accept a God who allows suffering’, etc. I’m pretty sure you know salvation truths.
I’m not sure you get me yet. Mebbe you better back off punking me until you do. 😉
As for church-going, (you should follow up about your question awhile back as to reasonable expectation of it’s influence on character);
I had a reasonable expectation on its character but Old Lifers keep acting really petty and unloving. They treat even the nice churchgoing Catholic ladies like shit. What up with that, Ali?
Not feeling the Jesus here, or the “churchgoing.” Anyone reading this blog might suspect that churchgoing, at least their variety of it, has a negative effect, and just deepens their assholiness.
[I’m not the first one to make that observation about Old Life.]
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Mermaid –
1. Augustine and Hilary were not RCs. They were Christians. Attempts to appropriate the early Church fathers as papists is unseemly and inaccurate.
2. Why do they trump Calvin? Bald assertion doesn’t make it so. That is certainly not the means by which they argued their positions. And yes, they argued for their positions which caused – wait for it – division. We’re not rooting for a baseball team here, a position is either right or it is wrong – or maybe some of each – and debate is the best way to separate the wheat from the chaff.
3. Hey, let’s play the “There is no Catholic Church, no Pope, no St. Peter’s and there never was” game. That’s what we do all week long, especially on Sunday when we go to worship.
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Robert
Posted October 8, 2015 at 8:13 pm | Permalink
Publius,
>>>>>>>>>What you call division obviously bothers you, so drop the idol worship and join the OPC. Problem solved.
But then she wouldn’t be “Catholic” because “Catholic”=really, really big (even if the vast majority are nominal). Just ask Tom. In the other thread he found it laughable that Lutherans claim to be the catholic church because there’s not more than 70 million of them.
True, I must laugh, that of 2 billion Christians, that makes 4% tops.
And since half are divorced from the other half, “Lutheran” is meaningless as a definition, and likely soon meaningless as even a description. [The irony remains that the “true” Lutheranism is closer to Catholicism than to the Calvinists hereabouts with their “election” business and abandonment of the Eucharist.]
Whose Lutheranism is it, anyway?
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/chrstuni/documents/rc_pc_chrstuni_doc_31101999_cath-luth-joint-declaration_en.html
I don’t mean to laugh, but yes, there is a way to do “Christian math.”
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Publius,
Well thats odd considering Augustine held to a soteriology and doctrines you and your cohorts deem as anti-Christian and gospel-denying.
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Publius
Posted October 9, 2015 at 12:17 am | Permalink
“Hey, let’s play the “There is no Catholic Church, no Pope, no St. Peter’s and there never was” game.”
That’s what we do all week long, especially on Sunday when we go to worship.
Good for you! And wishing Catholicism and conservatism and The Little Mermaid into the cornfield takes up the rest of the Old Life week. It’s a Good Life, Darryl.
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vd, t Typical vd,t response. Not a single fact or principled argument, just “how dare you”!
That’s so typical of the Left.
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Muddy, but Mermaid became Roman Catholic because it’s the opposite of Planned Parenthood.
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vd, t, what’s so hard about martyrdom? Religious liberty doesn’t save. If judgment day is coming, why do you care more about religious liberty (and David Barton) than going to Mass?
I don’t think you’ve actually captured the logic of sin, judgment, death, salvation. Too much Roman Catholic social teaching?
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Mermaid, “Your unity is only cosmetic.”
Have you heard the one about the Ordinary Synod?
Do you actually read anything about your church?
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Robert, “Don’t care about the church’s teaching on anything other than it is the only place you’re sure to get a true sacrament. Everything else is irrelevant.”
Roman Catholic exceptionalism like American exceptionalism.
EWTN like Fox News.
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Mermaid, “Was there a church split in Galatia? If so, demonstrate it from Scripture.”
Imagine Peter your pope doesn’t change his view when Paul corrected him “to his face.”
Paul simply does what you do? Whatever. I’ll stay with the pope.
Hah!
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Mermaid, stick to sowing. Apologetics is not in you.
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Mermaid, first you quote a lay person. Then a bishop.
Have you forgotten where authority lies in your church?
Oh, that’s right. It’s all about you. The papacy of all believers.
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Mermaid, don’t forget that Paul was writing to Galatians without affirming the perpetual virginity of Mary or the primacy of Peter.
As Homer put it, “Doh!”
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Robert, they used to delegate princes to execute heretics. Think Luther’s excommunication. He had princely cover.
Today, they just wait for the Richard McBrien’s of Roman Catholic university theology departments to die.
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vd, t, if you think Mermaid is a nice church going lady, you must have it rough at home.
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vd, t, “2 billion”?
Does that include Michael Sean Winters?
Garry Wills?
vd, t?
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James Young, that’s odd since Luther and Calvin appealed to Augustine for their understanding of salvation in relation to — wait for it — the church.
You really think Augustine supports Trent? I thought you were smarter than that. Nope.
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Tom,
Much of normative magisterial teaching is not put forth as infallible. There are many things where dissent and disagreement are not considered heresy.
I’m not disagreeing with this in principle. What I’m disagreeing with is your cavalier attitude toward the few things that are supposed to have been defined as infallible—such as papal infallibility. Rejecting that is heresy. Guess what, the East rejects that. Sure, there’s all kind of hemming and hawing about what it means to reject it ad infinitum, but that just shows Rome’s horrible doctrinal inconsistency on the one hand and its arrogant demand that any true Christian is really and secretly united to her on the other.
True, I must laugh, that of 2 billion Christians, that makes 4% tops.
That’s irrelevant if, in fact, there aren’t actually 2 billion professing Christians with saving faith.
And since half are divorced from the other half, “Lutheran” is meaningless as a definition, and likely soon meaningless as even a description. [The irony remains that the “true” Lutheranism is closer to Catholicism than to the Calvinists hereabouts with their “election” business and abandonment of the Eucharist.]
You would define Lutheranism confessionally just as you would deny Romanism confessionally. This isn’t difficult. Even the bare “Roman Catholicism consists of all churches in submission to the pope” is a confessional definition.
And unless the Lutherans have a valid Eucharist, which Rome denies as far as I know, then the Lutherans have abandoned it as well.
Whose Lutheranism is it, anyway?
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/pontifical_councils/chrstuni/documents/rc_pc_chrstuni_doc_31101999_cath-luth-joint-declaration_en.html
Even Rome is squishy on whether or not this should be accepted. It certainly hasn’t led to “Alright Lutherans, you get the sacrament right.”
I don’t mean to laugh, but yes, there is a way to do “Christian math.”
And even Rome says its not by counting the largest denomination and saying—your the catholic church. For the Roman apologists its a source of pride to say 1 billion RCs, and even Rome likes it as well at times, but Rome doesn’t define the catholic church as the church with the most adherents.
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Darryl,
Robert, they used to delegate princes to execute heretics. Think Luther’s excommunication. He had princely cover.
Today, they just wait for the Richard McBrien’s of Roman Catholic university theology departments to die.
At times like this, I wish you had a like button on this blog. You just made my morning.
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TVD: “I’m not sure you get me yet. ”
does it have to be such a secret? 🙂
thought you were “doin the Lord’s work”
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Correction: 1,999,997.
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Publius
Posted October 9, 2015 at 12:17 am | Permalink
Mermaid –
1. Augustine and Hilary were not RCs. They were Christians. Attempts to appropriate the early Church fathers as papists is unseemly and inaccurate.>>>>>
They both believed and wrote about the Mass being a sacrifice and the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist – doctrines that I understand you call idolatrous.
So, why don’t you become a Christian, then? What Church still bases all its worship – the source and summit of the Christian life?
Hint. It’s not your congregation.
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Robert
Posted October 9, 2015 at 7:18 am | Permalink
Darryl,
Robert, they used to delegate princes to execute heretics. Think Luther’s excommunication. He had princely cover.
Today, they just wait for the Richard McBrien’s of Roman Catholic university theology departments to die.
At times like this, I wish you had a like button on this blog. You just made my morning.>>>>>>
Don’t be a Catholic, then. Be a Christian like Hilary and Augustine and all your church fathers . Find a Church that celebrates the sacrifice of the Mass and the Real Presence in the Eucharist.
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TVD
Posted October 9, 2015 at 12:54 am | Permalink
Publius
Posted October 9, 2015 at 12:17 am | Permalink
“Hey, let’s play the “There is no Catholic Church, no Pope, no St. Peter’s and there never was” game.”
That’s what we do all week long, especially on Sunday when we go to worship.
TVD:
Good for you! And wishing Catholicism and conservatism and The Little Mermaid into the cornfield takes up the rest of the Old Life week. It’s a Good Life, Darryl.>>>>>
Of course they pretend that there would be something called Reformed theology if there had not been a Catholic Church. Well, then they play the semantics game, calling Catholics ROMAN Catholics and papists. Occasionally they pull out the “church” defense. They are the church, not the Church.
Then they try to “evangelize” you by doing what?
There’s no better place to get over Protestantism, at least in its Reformed versions, than Old Life.
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Darryl,
The Augustine who held to baptismal regeneration, justification as infused righteousness and by faith formed by charity, concupiscence/venial/mortal sin distinction, loss of salvation for the justified, merit, synergism, distinction between operative and cooperative grace, a notion of purgatory, and so on. Hmm not at all like Trent’s soteriology.
And if Calvin and Luther’s appeals to Augustine meant he supports them, then I guess he supports Trent and the CCC since both appeal to Augustine. That was easy.
Also I guess Warfield didn’t read enough Calvin and Luther since he’s the one who quipped “For the Reformation, inwardly considered, was just the ultimate triumph of Augustine’s doctrine of grace over Augustine’s doctrine of the Church.”
But maybe he didn’t read enough Calvin on soteriology either – Institutes: “Even the sentiment of Augustine, or at least his mode of expressing it, cannot be entirely approved of. For although he is admirable in stripping man of all merit of righteousness, and transferring the whole praise of it to God, yet he classes the grace by which we are regenerated to newness of life under the head of sanctification. Scripture, when it treats of justification by faith, leads us in a very different direction.”
Commentary on Rom 3: “It is not unknown to me, that Augustine gives a different explanation; for he thinks that the righteousness of God is the grace of regeneration; and this grace he allows to be free, because God renews us, when unworthy, by his Spirit; and from this he excludes the works of the law, that is, those works, by which men of themselves endeavor, without renovation, to render God indebted to them… But that the Apostle includes all works without exception, even those which the Lord produces in his own people, is evident from the context.”
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Mermaid,
Don’t be a Catholic, then. Be a Christian like Hilary and Augustine and all your church fathers . Find a Church that celebrates the sacrifice of the Mass and the Real Presence in the Eucharist.
1. Isn’t that, like, a heretical statement or at least bad advice. If Rome is the one church Jesus founded and schism is a serious sin, shouldn’t everyone join the Roman Catholic denomination?
2. The Church Fathers didn’t celebrate the sacrifice of the Mass, at least in a propitiatory way. Just because a father says “sacrifice” doesn’t mean he means by that term what modern Rome does.
3. My Reformed church does believe in the real presence. So much so that before the sacrament is distributed, there’s always a warning for unbelievers not to partake. I don’t recall ever hearing that warning at a RC mass that I’ve been to. There’s not even a “Don’t take this if you haven’t been to confession” that I can recall. At best this is pastoral irresponsibility; at worst it shows that the Eucharist isn’t as important to Rome as it claims.
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Sorry, Mermaid. I’ve found a church that ministers God’s holy word.
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James Young, so you can play smart when you want to. But lots of scholars think Augustine goes both ways. You wouldn’t acknowledge that because you’re so on board with the Yankees.
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Glad you could get a word in edgewise Daryl…….whew! Mermaid is like the blind date that cannot stop talking about herself ! Did I just hear “Last Call!”?
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Mermaid: “For when he says in another book, which is called Ecclesiastes, ‘There is no good for a man except that he should eat and drink’ [Eccl. 2:24], what can he be more credibly understood to say [prophetically] than what belongs to the participation of this table which the Mediator of the New Testament himself, the priest after the order of Melchizedek, furnishes with his own body and blood?
don’t think so and never heard that interpretation before Mermaid. I think what Solomon meant was just what he said -here and elsewhere,e.g.Eccl 3:13 –that everyone should enjoy God’s material gifts -eating food and drinking drinks and one’s work
Not that we don’t appreciate that sacrament; but even more this: Jesus: “It is written, ‘Man shall not live on bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God Matt 4:4
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Robert –
Here’s what Mermaid really thinks as quoted from above:
So, why don’t you become a Christian, then? ..because, you know, only Romanists are Christians.
It always comes back to the same thing with the papists – kiss the ring or burn.
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Ali
Posted October 9, 2015 at 9:23 am | Permalink
TVD: “I’m not sure you get me yet. ”
does it have to be such a secret? 🙂
thought you were “doin the Lord’s work”
Actually I was giving mad props to those who actually do the heavy lifting around here and do their homework on Catholicism, from which everybody learns. Well, the honest ones. Old Life knows so much about Catholicism–very little of it true.
I was not referring to me humble self atall atall. 😉
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John Sizer – Yep. Check please.
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Publius
Posted October 9, 2015 at 5:20 pm | Permalink
Robert –
Here’s what Mermaid really thinks as quoted from above:
So, why don’t you become a Christian, then? ..because, you know, only Romanists are Christians.
It always comes back to the same thing with the papists – kiss the ring or burn.>>>>
Oh, you’re smarter than that, I think. Robert said that both Augustine and Hilary were just Christians, not Roman Catholics.
Their views on the sacrifice of the Mass and the Real Presence obviously differ from that of Protestants. So, if they were Christians, and that was Christian teaching, then why not accept it? If you don’t like what you call Roman Catholicism, then find a church or start a church that teaches what Christians have believed for a couple thousand years, now.
Really reform Protestantism, then, and restore it to what the early church taught. At least quit saying that those two doctrines are idolatrous. They cannot be both Christian and idolatrous, can they?
Go after the Catholic Church on other things if you like, since there would be no Protestantism without Catholicism to protest, evidently.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 9, 2015 at 6:32 am | Permalink
vd, t, what’s so hard about martyrdom? Religious liberty doesn’t save. If judgment day is coming, why do you care more about religious liberty (and David Barton) than going to Mass?
I don’t think you’ve actually captured the logic of sin, judgment, death, salvation. Too much Roman Catholic social teaching?
Do you have a point, Dr. Hart? Something that furthers the discussion?
No, I didn’t think so.
Publius
Posted October 9, 2015 at 5:20 pm | Permalink
Robert –
Here’s what Mermaid really thinks as quoted from above:
So, why don’t you become a Christian, then? ..because, you know, only Romanists are Christians.
It always comes back to the same thing with the papists – kiss the ring or burn.
Every word here is a lie. Well done. But you are “separated brethren” and your baptism is valid. So do some homework and stop repeating the crap you hear around here.
Robert
Posted October 9, 2015 at 7:16 am | Permalink
Tom,
“Much of normative magisterial teaching is not put forth as infallible. There are many things where dissent and disagreement are not considered heresy.”
I’m not disagreeing with this in principle. What I’m disagreeing with is your cavalier attitude toward the few things that are supposed to have been defined as infallible—such as papal infallibility.
Not cavalier. Since the Vatican sees the Eastern Orthodox priesthood and sacraments as licit, presumably they don’t think infallibility is a dealbreaker about heaven and hell.
Thus I argue that Darryl trying to turn it into a dealbreaker is ignorant, dishonest, or both. End of story–again a false premise.
But you’ve held up your end honorably, for which you have my thanks. As for the Lutherans, the Reformation has rather passed them by. Way too Catholic. Since the Catholic Church accepted many of Luther’s reforms on the egregious stuff like simony, Lutheranism has not much more reason to exist. They might as well hook up with the EOs.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ch/asktheexpert/feb08.html
_________________________________________
What was the attitude of the reformers (Martin Luther in particular) toward the Eastern Orthodox Church? Was the idea of becoming part of the Eastern church entertained?
—Jim
Luther was generally positive toward the Eastern Orthodox church, especially because it rejected many of the things he most disliked about the Roman Catholic church: clerical celibacy, papal supremacy, purgatory, indulgences, and Communion by bread alone. He frequently referred to the beliefs and practices of the “Greek church,” as he called it, as evidence that Catholics had deviated from principles upon which Christians formerly agreed.
Luther never attempted to build a bridge to the Eastern church, but some of his followers did. Philipp Melanchthon worked with Demetrios Mysos, a deacon sent by the patriarch of Constantinople to find out about the new religious movement in Germany, to complete a Greek translation/paraphrase of the Augsburg Confession, called the Augustana Graeca. Mysos was supposed to take the document back to Constantinople, but he died on the journey.
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Robert
Posted October 8, 2015 at 10:33 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
Yes the church is supposed to get rid of the false teachers. The question is what happens when they dont. Is the RC answer that the church will always cast out its false teachers? Seems to be. But that’s sheer fideism. There’s no external or internal evidence for it. Traditionally, Rome dogmatizes error. See Rome’s Mariology.>>>>>
You have to be specific, Robert. What aspects of mariology are you referring to?
Do you mean the Immaculate Conception? You must know that the Immaculate Conception is a very ancient Church teaching.
So is Mary’s sinless life and perpetual virginity as well as the Assumption of Mary. Now, you may reject all of these doctrines. Christians of all kinds have believed them all throughout Church history.
I am going on the assumption that you accept what you call the early church fathers as having been real Christians and not false teachers needing to be thrown out of the Church. Now, they could have been wrong, but you could be wrong as well.
Are you willing to call St. Augustine a false teacher that needed to be thrown out of the Church?
” He then enumerates those ‘who not only lived without sin, but are described as having led holy lives, — Abel, Enoch, Melchizedek, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joshua the son of Nun, Phinehas, Samuel, Nathan, Elijah, Joseph, Elisha, Micaiah, Daniel, Hananiah, Azariah, Mishael, Mordecai, Simeon, Joseph to whom the Virgin Mary was espoused, John.’ And he adds the names of some women, — ‘Deborah, Anna the mother of Samuel, Judith, Esther, the other Anna, daughter of Phanuel, Elisabeth, and also the mother of our Lord and Saviour, for of her,’ he says, ‘we must needs allow that her piety had no sin in it.’ We must except the holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom I wish to raise no question when it touches the subject of sins, out of honour to the Lord; for from Him we know what abundance of grace for overcoming sin in every particular was conferred upon her who had the merit to conceive and bear Him who undoubtedly had no sin (Augustine, On Nature and Grace, Against Pelagius).”
Calvin accepted her perpetual virginity. Is he also a false teacher? Well, I think he was false on many things, and foolish to leave the Catholic Church, but I would not say that everything he taught was false. After all, the good in Calvin was derived from the teachings of the Church he left.
John Calvin: “there have been certain folk who have wished to suggest from this passage (Mt 1:25) that the Virgin Mary had other children than the Son of God, and that Joseph had then dwelt with her later; but what folly this is! For the gospel writer did not wish to record what happened afterwards; he simply wished to make clear Joseph’s obedience and to show also that Joseph had been well and truly assured that it was God who had sent His angel to Mary. He had therefore never dwelt with her nor had he shared her company…And besides this our Lord Jesus Christ is called the firstborn. This is not because there was a second or third, but because the gospel writer is paying regard to the precedence. Scripture speaks thus of naming the first-born whether or no there was any question of the second.” (Sermon on Matthew 1:22-25, published 1562)
Then it is well known that Luther was devoted to Mary his whole life. Are you going to call him a false teacher? He got into trouble with the Church on other issues, but that was not one of them.
For the Reformers, mariology was not something they would have divided the Church over.
In fact, evidently John Wesley accepted Mary’s perpetual virginity.
I mean, who do you want thrown out of the Church based on mariology?
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This Mary stuff seems to be what they call Tradition. Interesting.
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vd, t, that’s bad. Even Paul said the Gentiles had the law of God written on their hearts and knew they were guilty.
Are you from Mars?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 9, 2015 at 9:14 pm | Permalink
vd, t, that’s bad. Even Paul said the Gentiles had the law of God written on their hearts and knew they were guilty.
Are you from Mars?
Clumsy dodge, Dr. History. The nice Catholic lady has you quite flummoxed.
Mermaid,
You are really overestimating the Reformers views on Mary. It is true that many if not all of them accepted her perpetual virginity. But they certainly didn’t pray to her once the Reformation got started.
But as far as Mariology:
1. I would say that perpetual virginity and even the bodily assumption are acceptable private opinions but should not be enshrined as dogma. I don’t believe in either, and there are others who experienced the latter (such as Elijah). But nothing should be enshrined as dogma that rejecting could put you out of salvation if the Apostles didn’t teach it.
2. I wouldn’t ordain anyone who held those beliefs. We know far too much now to actually believe there is a credible case for them, and there’s a real danger that in teaching them we start making Mary more than what she was. Perpetual virginity is especially problematic because it implies that only those who are really holy are virgins and that sexual relations are somehow so inherently disordered that for Mary to have them would somehow sully Jesus. The Reformers who held to that idea were able to avoid such problems because of their doctrine of the priesthood of all believers. Rome has not been so lucky. All of the really holy people are those who abstain from sexual relations. Married life is good, but it certainly isn’t the best. Those who REALLY love God will become monks and nuns. This creates a two-class Christianity wherein men and women don’t stand before God equally. It’s tremendously damaging.
3. The immaculate conception is the most problematic because of all of them it is the doctrine that most readily leads to making Mary another mediator. I wouldn’t say that those who hold it are necessarily going to hell, and Rome’s careful explanation of it is a good try, but people don’t really hold to it on the popular level. The whole God kept Mary from sin because she bore the Messiah very quickly becomes God chose Mary to bear the Messiah because she was sinless. It’s very, very dangerous and of the three doctrines I’ve thus far mentioned, it’s the one most clearly refuted by Scripture.
4. The grievous Mariological doctrines are those that make her a mediator between God and man. Same is true of the views of the saints that make them mediators. Scripture categorically denies that there is any mediator besides Jesus Christ and it calls us in our time of need not to draw near to Mary or to St. Jude but to go directly into the heavenly throne room. Further, there is not one example in the NT of the Apostles telling us to pray to the saints. And honestly, Mary really isn’t all that prominent in the NT. Outside of the birth narratives and the crucifixion/resurrection, she’s never mentioned by name in the book of Acts, and Paul’s reference to her in Galatians is quite indirect and then He doesn’t mention her to say anything about her but to say something about Jesus. In Mark 3 she even thinks Jesus is crazy. If she was as important as Rome says she is, we’d see more of her. At the very least she’d be among the people the Apostles greet or send greetings from in their letters.
What continues to fascinate me is that the two people Rome exalts as so foundational to their system, Mary and Peter, don’t have that role in the NT. Peter appears as a spokesman of sorts in the Gospels, and he plays an important role in the early chapters of Acts, but in the one place where you would expect him to act all papal—the Jerusalem council—it’s James who leads it and makes the decree. And then we have only two letters from Peter. Paul later has to correct him. And Paul is the main character in Acts, and gave us 13 letters, maybe even 14. The guys in the early church who are really spending the most of their time teaching dogma or doing what popes are supposed to do are Paul and James. The fact that Rome misses that is a pretty strong indictment of the entire system.
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Robert, no Mary, no Incarnation, no Jesus, no NT. You do understand that part, don’t you?
Let me help you focus on my question. Here is what you say.:
“2. I wouldn’t ordain anyone who held those beliefs. “
You would not ordain Augustine, Hilary, Aquinas, Luther, Calvin, Wesley, and so many more just on the basis of their acceptance of the perpetual virginity of the Blessed Virgin Mary?
Are you willing to go so far as to say that they are all false teachers based on your dogma?
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Robert:
3. The immaculate conception is the most problematic because of all of them it is the doctrine that most readily leads to making Mary another mediator. I wouldn’t say that those who hold it are necessarily going to hell, and Rome’s careful explanation of it is a good try, but people don’t really hold to it on the popular level. The whole God kept Mary from sin because she bore the Messiah very quickly becomes God chose Mary to bear the Messiah because she was sinless. It’s very, very dangerous and of the three doctrines I’ve thus far mentioned, it’s the one most clearly refuted by Scripture.>>>>
The Immaculate Conception was standard teaching for all of Christianity until about 500 years ago. It is still standard teaching of both Catholic and Orthodox Churches. It was what Luther believed. It was what Calvin believed at first, but it seems he changed his position on that point.
Well, amend that to say the Orthodox do not accept the Augustinian view of original sin, but they do accept the teaching that Mary was sinless.
Shall I list all the doctors and saints of the Church who have believed this doctrine that you find to be the most problematic?
If it so easy to refute from Scripture, then go ahead and refute it.
I could understand the Protestant position better if it were a little less dogmatic, and frankly, dictatorial. If Protestants presented the truth about the history of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, and then say you disagree with the majority opinion, then I could understand.
If you would say that this was not even a doctrine that was an issue at the time of the Reformation – or at least in the way it is now, kind of a litmus test for orthodoxy it seems – then I could understand.
However, to present the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception as the most problematic is, IMO, more than just a little problematic.
See, when I started to study the history of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, and found out that most of the great Christian thinkers and saints accepted it – even the early Reformers and still some Protestants now – then it dawned on me that I had been taught a fractured view.
Now, you can have the opinion you wish to have, and I will accept you as my brother in Christ if that means anything to you, but seriously? This is just one of the bits of evidence I uncovered to show that Protestantism really did cut itself off from the Church in so many ways.
The idea that Mary was a sinner is not what the Church has always taught, and you cannot, as you claim, prove it easily from Scripture.
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Mermaid,
Robert, no Mary, no Incarnation, no Jesus, no NT. You do understand that part, don’t you?
I get the part—to a point. What I’m saying is that there was nothing inherent to Mary that made her more worthy of bearing the Christ child than any other relatively pious girl in first-century Palestine. All of the Mariology obscures that. The problem I see in Mariology is that it ends up obscuring Christ. It’s certainly true on the popular level that you should go to Mary, she’s nicer than Jesus; or ask Mary to talk to Jesus, he’d never say no to His mama. And the sentiment has become not that Mary was somehow made worthy by being chosen for the incarnation but taht God chose Mary for the incarnation because she was worthy. That kind of idea is all over popular RC piety. It’s an inevitable consequence of your Mariology.
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Mermaid,
The simple fact of the matter is that the actual verifiable Apostolic teaching that we do have doesn’t make all that big of a deal about Mary. It says she was a virgin at the time of Jesus’s conception, and the purpose for telling us that is TO SAY SOMETHING ABOUT JESUS. Mary as Mary is largely irrelevant. We can respect and honor her as the mother of our Lord, but that gives her no better status in God’s eyes than anyone else. Any woman who obeys Jesus He regards as His mother. See Mark 3. Any other Jewish girl could have been chosen. Mary wasn’t unique before Gabriel came to her, and there’s no indication from the Apostolic witness that she played any kind of unique role once Jesus reached adulthood or that she was any different than any other good mother while Jesus was growing up. The Apostles aren’t seeking her out for her dogmatic opinion, and they’re not asking her to pray for them. From Acts 3 onward, she’s not mentioned but once, “born of a woman,” and then she’s not even named.
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Testing
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Since Mariology is not essential for salvation, this is another [Protestant, Darryl Hart, what have you] red herring. You can go on forever about it or ignore it completely and it will make no soteriological difference in the end.
And since you have no way of knowing whether prayers to Mary are passed on to Jesus or are in vain, and no Biblical proof to the contrary, what possible business is it of yours if others believe it’s not in vain?
Believe it or don’t. Makes no difference either way.
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John Sizer
Posted October 9, 2015 at 4:09 pm | Permalink
Glad you could get a word in edgewise Daryl…….whew! Mermaid is like the blind date that cannot stop talking about herself ! Did I just hear “Last Call!”?
Publius
Posted October 9, 2015 at 5:23 pm | Permalink
John Sizer – Yep. Check please.
You should leave, tough guy. With snide ridiculousnesses like
you’re a disruption to the conversation and an embarrassment to your religion. The nice Catholic lady cleans your clock on honesty and sincerity alone.
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Robert
Posted October 10, 2015 at 12:03 am | Permalink
Mermaid,
The simple fact of the matter is that the actual verifiable Apostolic teaching that we do have doesn’t make all that big of a deal about Mary. It says she was a virgin at the time of Jesus’s conception, and the purpose for telling us that is TO SAY SOMETHING ABOUT JESUS. Mary as Mary is largely irrelevant. We can respect and honor her as the mother of our Lord, but that gives her no better status in God’s eyes than anyone else. Any woman who obeys Jesus He regards as His mother. See Mark 3. Any other Jewish girl could have been chosen. Mary wasn’t unique before Gabriel came to her, and there’s no indication from the Apostolic witness that she played any kind of unique role once Jesus reached adulthood or that she was any different than any other good mother while Jesus was growing up. The Apostles aren’t seeking her out for her dogmatic opinion, and they’re not asking her to pray for them. From Acts 3 onward, she’s not mentioned but once, “born of a woman,” and then she’s not even named.>>>>>>
Motherhood? Any old womb will do?
The confusion that Protestant women tend to have, – even Reformed women,- about their role in the family, the church, and society is a direct result of your mariology. In downplaying Mary’s role in the Incarnation and even throughout Church history you leave your women without any real identity in your theology.
In honoring the Blessed Virgin Mary, all women are honored. She is blessed among women and she has a special place. Hint: Her cousin Elizabeth told her what that place would be. In downplaying the importance of her motherhood role, the importance of motherhood is also downplayed.
Well, you won’t get most of this, unfortunately, so I’ll stop there. Of course you left out any reference to the Magnificat, but I don’t blame you. I will leave you with St. Augustine. Maybe he can help you. Maybe you were trying to say something like this. I will give you that much benefit of the doubt on this.
Protestants don’t see Mary in Revelation 12, either, even though there is an obvious reference to her.
I guess I would call Protestantism truncated Christianity. It’s not that what Protestants teach and believe is not Christian or not Biblical. It is just cut off from so much of the rich heritage of the Church.
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Mary, a disciple of Christ
“But look here, my brothers and sisters, concentrate more, I beg you, on what follows, concentrate more on what Christ the Lord said as he stretched out his hand over his disciples: This is my mother and these are my brothers; and whoever does the will of my Father who sent me, that person is a brother to me and a sister and a mother (Mt 12:49-50). Didn’t the Virgin Mary do the will of the Father? I mean, she believed by faith, she conceived by faith, she was chosen to be the one from whom salvation in the very midst of the human race would be born for us, she was created by Christ before Christ was created in her. Yes, of course, holy Mary did the will of the Father. And therefore it means more for Mary to have been a disciple of Christ than to have been the mother of Christ. It means more for her, an altogether greater blessing, to have been Christ’s disciple than to have been Christ’s mother. That is why Mary was blessed, because even before she gave him birth, she bore her teacher in her womb.
Just see if it isn’t as I say. While the Lord was passing by, performing divine miracles, with the crowds following him, a woman said: Fortunate is the womb that bore you. And how did the Lord answer, to show that good fortune is not really to be sought in mere family ties? Rather blessed are those who hear the word of God and keepit (Lk 11:27-28). So that is why Mary, too, is blessed, because she heard the word of God and kept it. She kept truth safe in her mind even better than she kept flesh safe in her womb. Christ is truth, Christ is flesh; Christ as truth was in Mary’s mind, Christ as flesh in Mary’s womb; that which is in the mind is greater than what is carried in the womb.
Mary is holy, Mary is blessed, but the Church is something better than the Virgin Mary. Why? Because Mary is part of the Church, a holy member, a quite exceptional member, the supremely wonderful member, but still a member of the whole body. That being so, it follows that the body is something greater than the member. The Lord is the head, and the whole Christ is head and body. How shall I put it? We have a divine head, we have God as our head.”
St. Augustine, Sermon 72/A, 7
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Mermaid, “If it so easy to refute from Scripture, then go ahead and refute it.”
How about that Scripture is silent on the immaculate conception?
Ever noticed that Paul doesn’t mention Mary?
The Bible doesn’t mention Allah either. Do you believe in him?
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vd, t, “Since Mariology is not essential for salvation”
There’s that Calvinist spirit.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 10, 2015 at 7:05 am | Permalink
Mermaid, “If it so easy to refute from Scripture, then go ahead and refute it.”
How about that Scripture is silent on the immaculate conception?
Ever noticed that Paul doesn’t mention Mary?
The Bible doesn’t mention Allah either. Do you believe in him?>>>>
Oh, that is so clever, Dr. Hart. With one sentence you refute all the saints and doctors of the Church, including your beloved Augustine.
Truncated Christianity. Ever notice that Jesus was born of a virgin. She was chosen as God’s instrument before time began, as was Paul, as was Peter. Specific individuals chosen for specific tasks in the work of redemption.
To leave the person, Mary out of that is, well, quite irrational of you.
If the Church had been silent on the subject, and then suddenly in the Middle Ages invented this doctrine, then you might have a case to make. Your tradition sets itself against Christianity.
Check out the meaning of the phrase
ΚΑΤΑ ΛΟΥΚΑΝ 1:281881 Westcott-Hort New Testament (WHNU)
28 και εισελθων προς αυτην ειπεν χαιρε κεχαριτωμενη ο κυριος μετα σου
with special emphasis on the word κεχαριτωμενη “ and how that has been understood throughout Church history.
It should be easy for you.
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Mermaid, “To leave the person, Mary out of that is, well, quite irrational of you.”
Take it up with apostles Peter and Paul.
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Mermaid,
Sure Peter, Paul, and Mary were chosen before the foundation of the world. But your Mariology has made it impossible for you to realize that if we are going to speak in any sense of their worth, it is God’s choice of them that made them worthy. It is not that God chose them because they were worthy beforehand. If you want to claim to follow Augustine, then surely you must know that the heart of Augustine’s doctrine of unconditional election is that.
Mary certainly never ever claims that God chose her because of her worth. That being so, God could have chosen any other Jewish girl. She wasn’t special before God came to her. She was extraordinarily ordinary. So ordinary, in fact, that the Apostles don’t really say all that much about her. If she played the outsized mediatorial role in the Apostolic church that you think she did, Paul would have greeted her at Ephesus when he wrote his letter (assuming tradition is correct that she went there with John), she would appear when Paul came to Jerusalem at the end of Acts, and/or the Apostle John would have said something about her in His letters. All we get is silence. We know more about the role Priscilla played in the first-century church than we do about Mary.
She received a great honor, but she wasn’t sinless. In Mark 3, Jesus says that He regards any faithful disciple as His mother. That’s not what someone says if she has the exalted role that Rome says she does. She’s also among the family members that though Jesus was crazy (Mark 3 also), and apparently she didn’t believe what Jesus said about his resurrection beforehand because its plain that she wasn’t expecting to see an empty tomb. There goes here sinlessness.
If Mary played the role you think, you’d have more to go on then a participle from Luke 2, which your modern Vatican-approved scholars don’t think has the meaning for Luke that you think it does. You’d have more than a forced reading of John 2 that was plainly developed after the fact in order to justify practices that never should have occurred. But that’s what the non-Protestant view of tradition does. First you get a practice, then you attempt to justify it biblically.
As a consequence, you get Rome having to continually stamp down calls to make Mary co-redemptrix. Calls that will never be successful because the Mariology inevitably makes her that in popular piety. You have a 4 tiered Christianity: 1. Mary, the really, really, really holy one whom God loves the very best. 2. Saints whom are the really really holy ones. 3. Priests and nuns, the really holy ones. and 4. the laypeople who could possibly someday maybe be holy but shouldn’t shoot too high cause they aren’t special like those other people.
You end up with a Christianity that makes our redemption entirely dependent on Mary’s freewill choice to bear the Messiah. Read Mariological piety and you walk away thinking “well thank God Mary agreed. If she hadn’t, God’s hands would have been tied.” And I’m supposed to believe this stuff is glorifying to God. Please.
It’s not about a truncated Christianity. It’s about a Christianity shorn of the additional cr*p that should never have been added in the first place.
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Cletus, Mermaid, any other Roman Catholic…
Anyone else want to agree with Tom that you can be in full communion with the pope and believe that the Mary stuff is indifferent or that papal infallibility was a mistake?
I’m not trying to be rude, Tom, but you really are illustrating cafeteria RCism. And that kind of makes any kind of culture comments pointless. Abortion and gay marriage can be freely chosen or not and you’re still a golden RC. Do you not see the inconsistency of defending Rome as the true church or at least the truer church and discarding the stuff that have the best chance of being infallibly declared dogmas?
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Robert
Posted October 10, 2015 at 12:22 pm | Permalink
Cletus, Mermaid, any other Roman Catholic…
Anyone else want to agree with Tom that you can be in full communion with the pope and believe that the Mary stuff is indifferent or that papal infallibility was a mistake?
I’m not trying to be rude, Tom, but you really are illustrating cafeteria RCism.
Not really interested when Protestants presume to speak for the pope.
Show me where the Catholic Church says if you don’t believe in Mary’s Assumption you’re going to hell. Until you can, this is all Old Life false premises and red herrings, all noise, no signal.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 10, 2015 at 7:05 am | Permalink
Mermaid, “If it so easy to refute from Scripture, then go ahead and refute it.”
How about that Scripture is silent on the immaculate conception?
Apparently Dr. Hart doesn’t know what “refute” means either.
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Tom,
From the declaration of the assumption:
44. For which reason, after we have poured forth prayers of supplication again and again to God, and have invoked the light of the Spirit of Truth, for the glory of Almighty God who has lavished his special affection upon the Virgin Mary, for the honor of her Son, the immortal King of the Ages and the Victor over sin and death, for the increase of the glory of that same august Mother, and for the joy and exultation of the entire Church; by the authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul, and by our own authority, we pronounce, declare, and define it to be a divinely revealed dogma: that the Immaculate Mother of God, the ever Virgin Mary, having completed the course of her earthly life, was assumed body and soul into heavenly glory.
45. Hence if anyone, which God forbid, should dare willfully to deny or to call into doubt that which we have defined, let him know that he has fallen away completely from the divine and Catholic Faith.
46. In order that this, our definition of the bodily Assumption of the Virgin Mary into heaven may be brought to the attention of the universal Church, we desire that this, our Apostolic Letter, should stand for perpetual remembrance, commanding that written copies of it, or even printed copies, signed by the hand of any public notary and bearing the seal of a person constituted in ecclesiastical dignity, should be accorded by all men the same reception they would give to this present letter, were it tendered or shown.
47. It is forbidden to any man to change this, our declaration, pronouncement, and definition or, by rash attempt, to oppose and counter it. If any man should presume to make such an attempt, let him know that he will incur the wrath of Almighty God and of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.
http://w2.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/apost_constitutions/documents/hf_p-xii_apc_19501101_munificentissimus-deus.html
Deny the assumption and you’re under the wrath of God. At least that’s what they said in 1950. I suppose it’s possible that V2 changed that since V2 basically doesn’t think anyone is going to hell.
But based on the reading of the actual declaration, this is something which you must not deny or oppose or you have opposed the (Roman) Catholic faith and are under the wrath of God.
So Mariology really is important, and you’re a cafeteria Roman Catholic. That’s nothing to be ashamed of necessarily if you believe Rome doesn’t possess infallibility. But you can’t have “Rome is infallible and united and better than the Lesbyterians” and “I don’t have to believe in papal infallibility or the assumption of Mary in order to be RC.” Well, maybe under V2’s wild-eyed postmodernity you can.
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I have no reason to deny it. Neither do you. I wasn’t there, neither were you. Neither can the Church condemn anyone to hell; that’s up to God.
Again, this is a phony issue.
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Robert
Posted October 10, 2015 at 12:18 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
Sure Peter, Paul, and Mary were chosen before the foundation of the world. But your Mariology has made it impossible for you to realize that if we are going to speak in any sense of their worth, it is God’s choice of them that made them worthy. It is not that God chose them because they were worthy beforehand. If you want to claim to follow Augustine, then surely you must know that the heart of Augustine’s doctrine of unconditional election is that.>>>>>
Hold it right there, my dear Brother Robert. 🙂 You have not said anything that the Catholic Church has ever disagreed with. So, what is your problem with this particular aspect of Marian doctrine? You don’t accept the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. Fine. I would not expect you to, or even demand it from you, but I have come to accept it myself. I will gladly stand with St. Augustine on this, as well as all the saints and doctors of the Church.
What you say in this paragraph shows that you do not know what Church teaching actually is. The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception states, in effect, that Mary was completely sanctified from the moment of conception, and that solely on the merits of Jesus Christ. It was not based on any inherent merit in her. It was given as a gift in order to preserve the purity of her Son, Jesus Christ.
Think of it this way. All the elect will one day stand before God holy and blameless in His sight. This will not be on the basis of any inherent goodness in us, or any accumulation of good works as though we could buy our way to holiness.
God did that in Mary at the moment of her conception because of her unique role as The Mother of God. She lived a sinless life purely by the grace of God.
135 Pius IX, Ineffabilis Deus (1854): DS 2803.
“The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.135”
Pope Pius IX was echoing what St. Augustine said so many centuries before. Remember this quote? The sinlessness of Mary involves two aspects. One, being freed from the effects of original sin, and being enabled by grace to live a sinless life. It is all of grace, and nothing more. Her faith and obedience did not earn her grace, but proved that she was fully graced. She was given that grace before she was born and so her sinlessness was not based on anything she did to earn it.
“’ We must except the holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom I wish to raise no question when it touches the subject of sins, out of honour to the Lord; for from Him we know what abundance of grace for overcoming sin in every particular was conferred upon her who had the merit to conceive and bear Him who undoubtedly had no sin (Augustine, On Nature and Grace, Against Pelagius).”
——————————————————————-
The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.135The Immaculate Conception
490 To become the mother of the Savior, Mary “was enriched by God with gifts appropriate to such a role.”132 The angel Gabriel at the moment of the annunciation salutes her as “full of grace”.133 In fact, in order for Mary to be able to give the free assent of her faith to the announcement of her vocation, it was necessary that she be wholly borne by God’s grace.
491 Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, “full of grace” through God,134 was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854:
The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.135
492 The “splendor of an entirely unique holiness” by which Mary is “enriched from the first instant of her conception” comes wholly from Christ: she is “redeemed, in a more exalted fashion, by reason of the merits of her Son”.136 The Father blessed Mary more than any other created person “in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” and chose her “in Christ before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless before him in love”.137
493 The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God “the All-Holy” (Panagia), and celebrate her as “free from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature”.138 By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long.
“Let it be done to me according to your word. . .”
494 At the announcement that she would give birth to “the Son of the Most High” without knowing man, by the power of the Holy Spirit, Mary responded with the obedience of faith, certain that “with God nothing will be impossible”: “Behold, I am the handmaid of the Lord; let it be [done] to me according to your word.”139 Thus, giving her consent to God’s word, Mary becomes the mother of Jesus. Espousing the divine will for salvation wholeheartedly, without a single sin to restrain her, she gave herself entirely to the person and to the work of her Son; she did so in order to serve the mystery of redemption with him and dependent on him, by God’s grace:140
As St. Irenaeus says, “Being obedient she became the cause of salvation for herself and for the whole human race.”141 Hence not a few of the early Fathers gladly assert. . .: “The knot of Eve’s disobedience was untied by Mary’s obedience: what the virgin Eve bound through her disbelief, Mary loosened by her faith.”142 Comparing her with Eve, they call Mary “the Mother of the living” and frequently claim: “Death through Eve, life through Mary.”143
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TVD
Posted October 11, 2015 at 4:58 pm | Permalink
I have no reason to deny it. Neither do you. I wasn’t there, neither were you. Neither can the Church condemn anyone to hell; that’s up to God.
Again, this is a phony issue.>>>>>
I’ve not seen you deny the Assumption of Mary, nor have you tried to get anyone to deny it. In fact, when do you talk about it at all?
They’re the ones who keep brining it up. They’re obsessed. ;.-)
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Webfoot,
What you say in this paragraph shows that you do not know what Church teaching actually is. The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception states, in effect, that Mary was completely sanctified from the moment of conception, and that solely on the merits of Jesus Christ. It was not based on any inherent merit in her. It was given as a gift in order to preserve the purity of her Son, Jesus Christ.
Think of it this way. All the elect will one day stand before God holy and blameless in His sight. This will not be on the basis of any inherent goodness in us, or any accumulation of good works as though we could buy our way to holiness.
God did that in Mary at the moment of her conception because of her unique role as The Mother of God. She lived a sinless life purely by the grace of God.
Then why so much trouble accepting the fact that there was nothing special about Mary and that any other relatively pious girl from the first century could have been chosen? I don’t see RCs rushing out to say “Well, God chose Mary, but he could have chosen her next door neighbor Hannah, or Mary Magdalene, or Priscilla, or Joanna…”
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Tom,
I have no reason to deny it. Neither do you. I wasn’t there, neither were you.
The language doesn’t allow for agnosticism. It’s an infallible dogma. And since you have to give implicit faith, you have to believe it to be in right standing with the church.
Neither can the Church condemn anyone to hell; that’s up to God.
Well then the pope was wrong to say this, then: “If any man should presume to make such an attempt, let him know that he will incur the wrath of Almighty God and of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.”
That sounds awfully final. Now, granted, it was spoken before the church changed its dogma and became squishy at V2.
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Robert:
Then why so much trouble accepting the fact that there was nothing special about Mary and that any other relatively pious girl from the first century could have been chosen? I don’t see RCs rushing out to say “Well, God chose Mary, but he could have chosen her next door neighbor Hannah, or Mary Magdalene, or Priscilla, or Joanna…”>>>>
Well, Mary Magdalene wasn’t exactly a virgin.
The Blessed Virgin Mary was the one He chose. She was the one He enabled to bear His Son. She was the chosen vessel. Why? God’s sovereign choice.
We don’t need to rush out and say what God could have or might have done. We know what He did do. He chose Mary. She said “yes.”
Are you a Molinist? Mary could have said “no, not interested.” God did not force Himself on Mary. However, I doubt that God took a risk with such an important task.
At the very least, we are all expected to call Mary blessed. That is why even Calvin called her The Blessed Virgin. It’s in the Bible. It’s okay to be amazed at the beauty of God’s plan and amazed at how prepared Mary was for the task.
Don’t you admire any Christians who have been greatly used by God? Don’t they inspire you to follow Jesus more closely? Come on, now. Admit it. There are some Christians that you really look up to, now, aren’t there? 🙂 Why not add The Blessed Virgin Mary to your list?
Don’t expect you to go out and buy a Pope Francis souvenir rosary or anything, but maybe you could muster just a little more appreciation for the faith of this young girl, your blessed sister in Christ.
Luke 2
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
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Robert
Posted October 11, 2015 at 9:21 pm | Permalink
Tom,
“I have no reason to deny it. Neither do you. I wasn’t there, neither were you.”
The language doesn’t allow for agnosticism. It’s an infallible dogma. And since you have to give implicit faith, you have to believe it to be in right standing with the church.
“Neither can the Church condemn anyone to hell; that’s up to God.”
Well then the pope was wrong to say this, then: “If any man should presume to make such an attempt, let him know that he will incur the wrath of Almighty God and of the Blessed Apostles Peter and Paul.”
That sounds awfully final.
Not in a church that believes in purgatory. He didn’t say ‘eternal,’ now did he?
You’re trying to grab a few stray sentences and turn it into some cosmic big deal. It ain’t.
And actually, the language is against denying the Assumption, not in enforcing belief in it. You guys gotta read this “anathema” business a little more carefully. Just like when Calvin’s Geneva burned up Michael Servetus, the concern is almost always more about false teachers than false belief.
You’re just not getting where they’re coming from.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 9, 2015 at 9:14 pm | Permalink
vd, t, that’s bad. Even Paul said the Gentiles had the law of God written on their hearts and knew they were guilty.
Are you from Mars?
Oh, I wish I’d have Hart-jitsued this.
What law is written on your heart, Hart?
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@mwf
Proof texting from historical figures is not a good approach. If someone argued that understanding the Lord’s Supper as a sacrifice came along with Trent, then a quote from Augustine to the contrary would be relevant. But quoting a pair of church fathers to demonstrate that Christians always believed this or that is a terrible idea. It is the kind of thing feminists do to “prove” Christianity is inherently misogynistic (you know the quotes from Augustine about women not being made in the image of God or Tertullian? referring to women as temples over sewers). Of course the response to such quote mining is 1) context – when in their development of thought did yhey say this, what was yheir point, and was the comment indicative of their own view. 2) recognition they were flawed men and not infallible – not everything they said bevame doctrine. 3 ) historical place – quotes seen relative to common views of the time.
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@mwf Is division ever justified? Is there a biblical basis from seperation from self proclaimed Christians? Paul says yes. He warns about the rise of false teachers among the clergy and demands immoral brother be given the boot. But what happens when immoral brothers are the majority or own the meeting place and won’t give up the name? Well I think you have to separate.
The Cardinal in Belgium has pushed euthanasia, liberalized abortion law, and ssm. These shifts didn’t come because of sola scriptura prots or too low a view of Mary. These were pushed by a Cardinal who remained undisciplined by the hierarchy. Law, in the US, was no better.
Dreher, ex-RC convert to EO, writes the following,
I agree with this. 95% of RCs dissent from their church. I wonder what it is among the clergy? From what we see on the synod, it isn’t negligible. Centering on ritual builds numbers not holiness.
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“45. Hence if anyone, which God forbid, should dare willfully to deny or to call into doubt that which we have defined, let him know that he has fallen away completely from the divine and Catholic Faith.”
“Not in a church that believes in purgatory. He didn’t say ‘eternal,’ now did he?”
Like Wodehouse looking for a loophole? Purgatory is only for those who die in grace of the Church. The early church creeds had no qualms about calling out those “undoubtedly” perishing. True the RCC has changed her doctrine and now says otherwise, but it wasn’t always thus.
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MWF: Ever notice that Jesus was born of a virgin. She was chosen as God’s instrument before time began, as was Paul, as was Peter. Specific individuals chosen for specific tasks in the work of redemption.
I’m pretty sure we noticed that.
Q. 37. How did Christ, being the Son of God, become man?
A. Christ the Son of God became man, by taking to himself a true body, and a reasonable soul, being conceived by the power of the Holy Ghost in the womb of the virgin Mary, of her substance, and born of her, yet without sin. — WLC
We also notice that after Jesus is born, Mary doesn’t exactly act like someone who was completely sanctified. Not that she committed any egregious sins, certainly. But she lacked the faith that someone who had been made ontologically righteous would be expected to have.
Luke 2.48-50 Mary misses the point.
John 2.3-5: Mary misses the point again.
Mark 3.20-33: Mary thought Jesus was insane.
Good thing she was saved by grace through faith, and not by her own righteousness.
The point is that you can honor someone without putting that person on a pedestal. Mary was courageous to trust God in Luke 1. She had to have known that she was at risk for being divorced or stoned, yet she trusted in the Lord.
But she wasn’t superhuman. She didn’t have a miraculous conception that gave her the ability to trust in God in Luke 1, then left her unable to have faith in Mark 3.
The Roman doctrine of Mary points to a much deeper problem with its soteriology: The belief that in order to be declared righteous, one must be made to be actually righteous in being.
Hence, in order to honor Mary as the mother of God (which we all agree is an appropriate title), Rome believes that she must have been entirely holy in being herself.
By that logic, Anne would have to have also been miraculously conceived and without sin, and her mother, and her mother’s mother, all the way back to Eve.
And I’m pretty sure that Eve was not without sin.
MWF: Check out the meaning of the phrase
ΚΑΤΑ ΛΟΥΚΑΝ 1:281881 Westcott-Hort New Testament (WHNU)
28 και εισελθων προς αυτην ειπεν χαιρε κεχαριτωμενη ο κυριος μετα σου
We did check this out, remember? And we discovered that the Roman Catholic translators translate κεχαριτωμενη as “highly favored” and NOT as “full of grace.” The one exception is Douay-Rheims, which translates the Vulgate and not the Greek.
I’m surprised you forgot.
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Tom,
Not in a church that believes in purgatory. He didn’t say ‘eternal,’ now did he?
Typically modern RCs don’t talk about purgatory being a place of God’s wrath. So purgatory is irrelevant.
And actually, the language is against denying the Assumption, not in enforcing belief in it. You guys gotta read this “anathema” business a little more carefully. Just like when Calvin’s Geneva burned up Michael Servetus, the concern is almost always more about false teachers than false belief.
More post-V2 squishiness.
You’re just not getting where they’re coming from.
If you want to believe that the Assumption is no big deal, that’s fine. Vatican 2 changed lots of things. But there’s no hint in Piux XII’s declaration of the assumption that it’s optional or something you can believe or not, it doesn’t matter.
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Mermaid,
Well, Mary Magdalene wasn’t exactly a virgin.
Because God didn’t choose her.
The Blessed Virgin Mary was the one He chose. She was the one He enabled to bear His Son. She was the chosen vessel. Why? God’s sovereign choice.
Good.
We don’t need to rush out and say what God could have or might have done. We know what He did do. He chose Mary. She said “yes.”
We wouldn’t need to do it if you all would actually put Mary in her proper place and stop praying to her. Again, all of this emphasis on Mary’s fiat, her purity, etc. has the effect of obscuring the fact that it was God’s sovereign choice based on nothing in Mary.
Are you a Molinist?
No. Molinism is lame.
Mary could have said “no, not interested.”
So we’re back to salvation being all about Mary. Thank goodness she said yes, as it all depended on her libertarian freewill choice.
God did not force Himself on Mary.
Agreed.
However, I doubt that God took a risk with such an important task.
But you just said Mary could have said no. If that were the case, he took a huge gamble.
At the very least, we are all expected to call Mary blessed. That is why even Calvin called her The Blessed Virgin. It’s in the Bible. It’s okay to be amazed at the beauty of God’s plan and amazed at how prepared Mary was for the task.
Okay, but if you can’t admit that God could have chosen someone else, then it’s not the beauty of God’s plan or Mary’s preparation you’re amazed at. It’s Mary herself.
Don’t you admire any Christians who have been greatly used by God? Don’t they inspire you to follow Jesus more closely? Come on, now. Admit it. There are some Christians that you really look up to, now, aren’t there? 🙂 Why not add The Blessed Virgin Mary to your list?
I do admire Mary as a faithful Christian greatly used by God. I also recognize that she was a sinner. But again, Jesus will regard anyone as His mother who does His will. That puts all of the emphasis on Mary being a font of grace and other such nonsense into perspective as grossly missing the point.
Don’t expect you to go out and buy a Pope Francis souvenir rosary or anything, but maybe you could muster just a little more appreciation for the faith of this young girl, your blessed sister in Christ.
I do appreciate her faith. I also appreciate God’s sovereignty in giving her faith. I am very thankful that God saved her from all the sins she committed and that God chose a poor Jewish handmaiden to bring the Savior into this world. Non-Protestant Mariology obscures all that. It takes the focus off of God and of Christ and onto Mary herself.
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I wonder what Mary thinks about being put on such a high pedestal?
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Jeff Cagle: I wonder what Mary thinks about being put on such a high pedestal?
He must increase, I must decrease.
For His name alone is exalted; His glory is above earth and heaven.
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I said:
Well, Mary Magdalene wasn’t exactly a virgin.
Robert:
Because God didn’t choose her.>>>>>
No, actually, Mary Magdalene had a different role to play in the Gospels. Are you sure you’re not a Molinist? You are still speculating that Mary Magdalene could have been the Blessed Virgin Mary. If she had been the mother of our Lord, who would have been Mary Magdalene?
I said:
We don’t need to rush out and say what God could have or might have done. We know what He did do. He chose Mary. She said “yes.”
Robert:
We wouldn’t need to do it if you all would actually put Mary in her proper place and stop praying to her. Again, all of this emphasis on Mary’s fiat, her purity, etc. has the effect of obscuring the fact that it was God’s sovereign choice based on nothing in Mary.>>>>>
I don’t need to do that at all. You are the one questioning God’s choice, not I. You are the one claiming that God could have chosen anyone, even Mary Magdalene. Then you deny that you are a Molinist when you are presenting a Molinistic kind of argument. Nothing more lame than a lame Molinist who doesn’t know he’s one. You are in denial.
Robert:
I do admire Mary as a faithful Christian greatly used by God. I also recognize that she was a sinner. >>>>>
You disagree with St. Augustine, BTW, so maybe you really are not Augustinian. He said she was not a sinner.
You know how he felt about Pelagianism. So, why did he say Mary was the only human being who was not a sinner? Pelagius had a whole list of people who he thought were sinless. St. Augustine’s list included one person – The Blessed Virgin Mary. Well, and Jesus Christ her Son, of course.
Robert:
But again, Jesus will regard anyone as His mother who does His will. That puts all of the emphasis on Mary being a font of grace and other such nonsense into perspective as grossly missing the point.>>>
Are you saying, then, that The Blessed Virgin did not do the will of God? Generally, even by Protestants she is taken to be one of Jesus’ followers as well as His mother physically. There is no indication in the NT that Mary was an unbeliever. That is going pretty far if all you are attempting to do is knock Mary down a notch. That would knock her all the way down to hell. Are you sure you want to do that?
Then, do you think that Jesus meant to dishonor His mother in public by saying that she really wasn’t doing the will of God? It seems to me that would make Jesus a lawbreaker, since we are commanded even in the NT to honor our father and our mother.
I said:
Don’t expect you to go out and buy a Pope Francis souvenir rosary or anything, but maybe you could muster just a little more appreciation for the faith of this young girl, your blessed sister in Christ.
Robert:
I do appreciate her faith. I also appreciate God’s sovereignty in giving her faith. I am very thankful that God saved her from all the sins she committed and that God chose a poor Jewish handmaiden to bring the Savior into this world. Non-Protestant Mariology obscures all that. It takes the focus off of God and of Christ and onto Mary herself.>>>>
You do know that the Catholic Church also teaches that Mary’s faith was a gift from God, don’t you?
What is Protestant faith focused on? If this blog is any indication, it is focused on the Catholic Church with very little said about Jesus Christ at all – except when Catholics bring Him up.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 12, 2015 at 6:49 am | Permalink
I wonder what Mary thinks about being put on such a high pedestal?
Do you people even read this thing?
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Tom, working more of that lapsed RC lay charism. But why so harsh? “member, you’re above it all. Including mass.
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And besides, the pig enjoys it.
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Tom Tom Tom, sycophant to the lecherous religious says something about your piggishness. Wha’ happen’d? Come on, this is a safe place. My name is Tom………………………………….
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Mermaid,
No, actually, Mary Magdalene had a different role to play in the Gospels. Are you sure you’re not a Molinist? You are still speculating that Mary Magdalene could have been the Blessed Virgin Mary. If she had been the mother of our Lord, who would have been Mary Magdalene?
Maybe Mary the wife of Joseph. And simply saying that “It could have been another way” doesn’t make one a Molinist. God’s choice of Mary was free, which means he could have chosen another, just as he could have chosen not to create.
I don’t need to do that at all. You are the one questioning God’s choice, not I. You are the one claiming that God could have chosen anyone, even Mary Magdalene.
I’m not questioning God’s choice. I’m trying to point out that what you are assuming is that God chose Mary because she was Mary, that she had some kind of inherent worth before that choice was made. If any worth Mary had is solely due to God’s choice, then God could have easily chosen another woman and given that worth to her and not to the Mary we know. Why is it so hard to say that? It’s because you all think that Mary was somehow more worthy before God made the choice.
Then you deny that you are a Molinist when you are presenting a Molinistic kind of argument. Nothing more lame than a lame Molinist who doesn’t know he’s one. You are in denial.
Augustine said God could have chosen not to create. Did that make him a Molinist?
You disagree with St. Augustine, BTW, so maybe you really are not Augustinian. He said she was not a sinner.
To the extent that Augustine would have said that, it is the typical explanation of God intervened before hand to preserve her. While I don’t agree that such happened, I also know that Augustine’s doctrine of unconditional election means that God conceivably have chosen to do that for someone else and make that person the mother of Jesus, not Mary.
You know how he felt about Pelagianism. So, why did he say Mary was the only human being who was not a sinner? Pelagius had a whole list of people who he thought were sinless. St. Augustine’s list included one person – The Blessed Virgin Mary. Well, and Jesus Christ her Son, of course.
I’m not sure how this is relevant. Augustine wasn’t inerrant in any case. And if being Augustinian means believing everything Augustine ever said, then the only Augustinian who ever lived was Augustine.
Are you saying, then, that The Blessed Virgin did not do the will of God?
No, why would you think that I am saying that.
Generally, even by Protestants she is taken to be one of Jesus’ followers as well as His mother physically. There is no indication in the NT that Mary was an unbeliever. That is going pretty far if all you are attempting to do is knock Mary down a notch. That would knock her all the way down to hell. Are you sure you want to do that?
Um, I don’t know where you are getting any of this. Of course Mary was one of His followers, at least after the resurrection. Mark 3 indicates that at one point she thought He was insane. Whether she was a follower at that point is harder to say. But no I’ve never said Mary was an unbeliever.
Then, do you think that Jesus meant to dishonor His mother in public by saying that she really wasn’t doing the will of God? It seems to me that would make Jesus a lawbreaker, since we are commanded even in the NT to honor our father and our mother.
Jesus doesn’t say specifically that Mary wasn’t doing the will of God in Mark 3, although its hard to conceive of how she was doing God’s will at that very point if she though he was crazy. But in any case, Jesus’ point is not that Mary wasn’t doing God’s will, it is that being Jesus’ relative according to the flesh is completely irrelevant to one’s position in the kingdom. And that is born out in the rest of the New Testament. Not one of the Apostles is looking to Mary for help for anything. The only one of his relatives who has any prominence in the Apostolic church is James and maybe Jude (because he wrote a letter). If the Apostles cared anything about Mary besides the fact that she gave birth to Jesus, they kept it to themselves. Which is strange, because if you want to talk about effective prayer, that would be a great place to tell us to pray to Mary.
You do know that the Catholic Church also teaches that Mary’s faith was a gift from God, don’t you?
Then you can freely admit that God could have chosen someone else—Joanna, Hannah, Susan, whoever—and give such faith and such honor to bear the Christ to her. That’s really all I’m looking for. I don’t think your Mariology will allow you to do that. It’s really a simple question:
1. Could God have chosen not to create? Yes.
2. Could God have chosen not to make Robert? Yes
3. Could God have chosen not to give Mary the honor of bearing the Savior? Yes.
If you can’t say yes to #3, then you don’t believe God’s choice of Mary was all of grace.
What is Protestant faith focused on?
Christ
If this blog is any indication, it is focused on the Catholic Church with very little said about Jesus Christ at all – except when Catholics bring Him up.
Actually, a good many posts about the RC Church by Darryl point out the problem with Rome is that her accretions take the focus off of Christ.
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MWF: Check out the meaning of the phrase
ΚΑΤΑ ΛΟΥΚΑΝ 1:281881 Westcott-Hort New Testament (WHNU)
28 και εισελθων προς αυτην ειπεν χαιρε κεχαριτωμενη ο κυριος μετα σου
We did check this out, remember? And we discovered that the Roman Catholic translators translate κεχαριτωμενη as “highly favored” and NOT as “full of grace.” The one exception is Douay-Rheims, which translates the Vulgate and not the Greek.
I’m surprised you forgot.>>>>>
I do remember how you totally interpreted the word according to your bias. It was a title. She is the kecharitomene” (κεχαριτωμενη). Maybe you forgot that part.
“The having been graced one”. When was she graced? It was before the Holy Spirit came upon her.
Now, does it prove the Immaculate Conception? It doesn’t disprove it, which is what you are alleging.
Another sola scriptura irrefutable proof text bites the dust.
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Jeff Cagle:
We also notice that after Jesus is born, Mary doesn’t exactly act like someone who was completely sanctified. Not that she committed any egregious sins, certainly. But she lacked the faith that someone who had been made ontologically righteous would be expected to have.
Luke 2.48-50 Mary misses the point.
John 2.3-5: Mary misses the point again.
Mark 3.20-33: Mary thought Jesus was insane.>>>>
Engaging in a little eisegesis, are you, Brother Jeff?
As for Luke 2, notice that Jesus had to grow in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man. Why would His mother be any different? You are saying, in effect, that it is sinful to not understand something. Notice that Mary pondered these things in her heart. She was open to gaining understanding.
The question that she asks her son when they finally find Him is legitimate. How is it sinful or ignorant for a mother to ask her son where he has been and what he has been doing? Is it sin to show parental concern for the welfare of your child? I dare say it would be sinful not to be concerned. Instead you are looking for reasons to criticize Mary, the Mother of God.
No one is saying that Mary is omniscient. She had to learn stuff like any other human being, including her Son, Jesus.
Notice, too, that Jesus submitted to her.
John 2:3-5 – Is this one a joke? You think that Mary gave bad advice here?
““Do whatever he tells you.”
The Son of God had to learn obedience according to Hebrews 5:8. According to you, He would be sinful because He had to learn something He didn’t understand before. .
Mark 3 – Where did Mary say her son is insane? Adding words to Scripture are we, Brother Jeff?
Luke 2
48 And when his parents[f] saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.” 49 And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”[g] 50 And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them. 51 And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart.
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Jeff Cagle:
The point is that you can honor someone without putting that person on a pedestal.>>>>
The point is that God put Mary on a pedestal. What do you think it means when God exalts a person?
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
—————————————————————–
Mary’s Song of Praise: The Magnificat
46 And Mary said,
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”
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Nice Catholic lady makes her case sola scriptura. Not a Catholic-ism in sight.
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TVD
Posted October 12, 2015 at 10:11 pm | Permalink
Nice Catholic lady makes her case sola scriptura. Not a Catholic-ism in sight.>>>>
Mermaids travel in schools.
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Mermaid, I thought God put Peter on a pedestal. Which is it?
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Mermaid,
Another sola scriptura irrefutable proof text bites the dust.
First, sola scripture isn’t simply a matter of prooftexting. It’s a matter of taking what the Scripture actually teaches both specifically and thematically. And one of the central themes is that all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. The only exception ever made is Jesus (see 1 Peter 2, for example). There is so much contortion that has to be done to make Mary sinless in light of that general theme that it finally becomes untenable.
I do remember how you totally interpreted the word according to your bias.
That’s a loaded statement of what Jeff has done. I could say that you have totally interpreted the word according to your bias.
It was a title. She is the kecharitomene” (κεχαριτωμενη). Maybe you forgot that part.
“The having been graced one”. When was she graced? It was before the Holy Spirit came upon her.
The fact that it is a participle doesn’t make it a title. Participles are used all the time to talk about previous action. You can find ones in the NT that go something like “Having gone from there, Jesus…” But interestingly enough, nobody gives the Jesus the title the “Having Gone from There One.”
You are assuming that grace is something you pour into somebody instead of a disposition of favor. That has to be proved exegetically.
Now, does it prove the Immaculate Conception? It doesn’t disprove it, which is what you are alleging.
Actually, since the only people in Scripture who receive grace are sinners, the burden is not on us to disprove the Immaculate Conception. It’s on you to prove it, and that is especially so in light of what else the NT says about Mary:
As for Luke 2, notice that Jesus had to grow in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man. Why would His mother be any different? You are saying, in effect, that it is sinful to not understand something. Notice that Mary pondered these things in her heart. She was open to gaining understanding.
Jeff doesn’t mention Luke 2:52, so the point is not relevant to begin with.
It is not necessarily sinful to misunderstand something, but misunderstanding also does not excuse one automatically for sin.
Jesus expects her to know what He was doing, and rightly so because Mary was told that her son was the Son of God. Could Jesus have a false expectation of what she was supposed to know? Her ignorance here is culpable and while perhaps not an outright heinous sin, is still blameworthy.
The question that she asks her son when they finally find Him is legitimate. How is it sinful or ignorant for a mother to ask her son where he has been and what he has been doing? Is it sin to show parental concern for the welfare of your child? I dare say it would be sinful not to be concerned. Instead you are looking for reasons to criticize Mary, the Mother of God.
If Mary had never been told that her son was the Son of God, it would not be sinful. But again, Jesus expected her to know where He would be. So if Mary was not sinning, then Jesus was in expecting Mary to live up to expectations that she should have known. So we can exalt Mary and make Jesus a sinner if you want, but I tend to shy away from that.
No one is saying that Mary is omniscient. She had to learn stuff like any other human being, including her Son, Jesus.
Actually, by positing that Mary can hear billions of prayers simultaneously in heaven, Rome does attribute a kind of omniscience or omnipresence to her. Now in heaven, she has none of the limitations that are inherent to humanity.
Notice, too, that Jesus submitted to her.
Not sure what the referent is here, but there was an appropriate way that Jesus could submit to Mary as a man. He never submitted to her as God. He is her Lord.
John 2:3-5 – Is this one a joke? You think that Mary gave bad advice here?
““Do whatever he tells you.”
The use of John 2 to prove Marian intercession is especially heinous. It’s just absolutely horrible exegesis. Rome should be embarrassed. At the very least, there’s no evidence that the servants went to Mary in order to get to Jesus.
The Son of God had to learn obedience according to Hebrews 5:8. According to you, He would be sinful because He had to learn something He didn’t understand before.
As the old saying goes, ignorance of the law is no excuse for breaking the law. And the question here is what did Jesus actually learn? It seems the learning has to do with the existential reality of what it means to obey God under suffering. In any case, Jeff and any other Protestant is not asserting that needing to learn something is necessarily sinful.
Mark 3 – Where did Mary say her son is insane? Adding words to Scripture are we, Brother Jeff?
Mark 3:21: “And when his family heard it, they went out to seize him, for they were saying, “He is out of his mind.”
In context, the family to which Mark refers includes Jesus mother and brothers (see v. 31).
Further, Jesus predicted his resurrection many times, but is clear that Mary was not expecting it to happen. She showed up at the tomb with spices, which wouldn’t be necessary for a resurrected body. So that is evidence of disbelief, which is sin.
The point is that God put Mary on a pedestal. What do you think it means when God exalts a person?
Actually, the Magnificat is very clearly modeled on Hannah’s prayer of thanksgiving when she learned that she would bear a son. Two phrases from that prayer are particularly noteworthy in regard to this subject:
“my [Hannah’s] horn is exalted in the Lord.” (1 Sam. 2:1)
“The Lord makes poor and makes rich;
he brings low and he exalts.
8 He raises up the poor from the dust;
he lifts the needy from the ash heap” (vv. 7–8)
If exaltation means what you think it means, we should be treating anyone whom God has ever exalted like you treat Mary. But Rome doesn’t do that. It’s inconsistent theology grounded in horrible biblical interpretation. It’s so bad that if you read a modern RC NT commentator, they aren’t going to be treating the text as the Roman church traditionally has. They know it’s not tenable.
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Mermaid:The point is that God put Mary on a pedestal. What do you think it means when God exalts a person? 52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones and exalted those of humble estate;
…”And, you see, none of this supports the foolish notion that Mary herself ought to be an object of adoration. Mary does not identify herself as being the object of adoration, but rather she adores God. Tragically, ironic it is that somebody would make her the object of adoration, make her the object of praise. On one occasion a woman in a crowd tried to do that, recorded in Luke 11. In the middle of a crowd a woman cried out to Jesus, “Blessed is the womb that bore you and the breasts which you nursed.” And that was true. She was blessed but Jesus’ response immediately was not to elevate Mary. His response in Luke 11:27 and 28 was this, “Yes…Yea rather blessed are they that hear the Word of God and keep it.” The path of blessing is the path of obedience to the Word of God. That was true for Mary, that’s true for anybody and everybody.”
“Although she does say she was a woman of low estate, and that does refer to her sort of humiliation as a state of being, it isn’t limited to her social status. It has more to do with her spiritual character. She recognizes she is a sinner. She recognizes she is a sinner. She’s unworthy. How can God, the Mighty One, who is perfectly holy, link up with this woman? It’s just… It’s more than she can comprehend. She doesn’t have an exalted view of herself; she has an exalted view of the Lord in a humble view of herself. It just staggers her that God would come to her, this humble nobody, this bond slave. It staggers her that all generations in the future are going to look back at her and note the unique and singular blessing that God bestowed upon her when the Mighty One did this great thing of planting the Messiah in her womb. And staggering thought of all thoughts, He’s holy and He still is interacting with a sinner. Just beyond comprehension.”That’s the stuff; that’s the kind of humility that makes for true worship. When you’re overwhelmed with your sinfulness and you’re knowledgeable about God’s holiness, and you’re blessed to know that a holy God would work in your life. That’s humility. If Mary was to be exalted, if she was to be blessed, as verse 42 says, it was because God saw her unworthiness, her sinfulness, her lowliness and gave her singular mercy.”
“You know, you can travel all over the world and you’ll see idols and shrines to Mary everywhere. I mean, I’ve seen them in churches, cathedrals, in houses, and I’ve seen them in hotel lobbies, I’ve seen them in hotel rooms. I’ve seen them in restaurants. I’ve seen them along the highways, byways and paths up in the mountains in the most remote places. This is a result of the Roman Catholic Church exalting Mary, saying that she was immaculately conceived, that she was living a sinless life, that she was a perpetual virgin, that therefore because of her sinlessness she didn’t die but was ascended into heaven, called the assumption of Mary. They teach that she is now the queen of heaven and that she is the co-redemptrix with Christ. All of this is foreign to Scripture, none of this is in the Bible at all and it all convolutes the true understanding of Mary. Mary is not one to be worshiped. Mary is one who was the true and pure worshiper of God. What you get from this in all the legacy that Mary leaves us is an example of what a model believer is like. She is a model of the true worshiper who worships the only One worthy to be worshiped. She is not the worshiped, she is the worshiper.” http://www.gty.org/Resources/Sermons/42-14
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You know, guys, this has been good. It is always good to dig into Scripture to see what message it is actually communicating.
I have not said anything that a Protestant should have trouble with. In fact, your sola scriptura arguments are easily refuted from Scripture itself. Yes, yes, I know you don’t REALLY mean Scripture alone. I mean, come on, right? You’re not biblicists – as though that were a bad thing.
So, you resort to your traditions in order to refute Scripture! Brothers, it should not be like that. Either you are sola scriptura or you are not. I know you are not, because your scriptura is never sola. It is always accompanied by your 21st Century, Reformed Protestant traditions.
I know that you convince yourselves with these arguments. In doing so you stray farther and farther away from both Scripture and the teachings of the Church fathers you say you hold in high regard, including St. Augustine.
I think the goofiest argument has to do with the idea that Mary Magdalene could have been chosen to be the Mother of God.
I have never heard an argument like that used to say that Paul could have actually been Barnabas or John Mark or Onesimus or Philemon instead of the man that God actually chose to be Paul, the Apostle. I have never heard an argument like that at all! I really don’t think that God lives in the pluperfect subjunctive.
In fact, in arguing that way, you are undermining the meaning of your own dogma of irresistible grace. In an effort to knock Mary of what you believe to be a pedestal where she does not belong, you actually present an argument that refutes one of the 5 points of Calvinism. Amazing.
So, it’s been good, but seriously? You need to rethink your Mariology, which is actually an anti-theology.
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JRC: 28 και εισελθων προς αυτην ειπεν χαιρε κεχαριτωμενη ο κυριος μετα σου
We did check this out, remember? And we discovered that the Roman Catholic translators translate κεχαριτωμενη as “highly favored” and NOT as “full of grace.” The one exception is Douay-Rheims, which translates the Vulgate and not the Greek.
I’m surprised you forgot.
MWF: I do remember how you totally interpreted the word according to your bias. It was a title. She is the kecharitomene” (κεχαριτωμενη). Maybe you forgot that part.
Then you mis-remember. Just to recap the results of our investigation at that time:
* ALL translations from the Greek, including the Catholic ones, translate κεχαριτωμενη as “highly favored” and NOT as “full of grace.”
* The Catholic translators from the Greek do NOT indicate κεχαριτωμενη to be a title.
E.g.: “28 And coming to her, he said, “Hail, favored one! The Lord is with you.” ” (NABRE).
“28 And he came to her and said, “Greetings, favored one! The Lord is with you.”” (NRSVCE)
No Capital Letters. No title.
The bias is not mine. I’m just reporting what the knowledgeable translators have said, including the Catholic ones. I hope you can agree that they do not have a Protestant bias.
Now, given that you remembered the conversation so badly, I have to ask something: Do facts cause you to change your mind when you’re wrong?
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TVD: Nice Catholic lady makes her case sola scriptura. Not a Catholic-ism in sight.
That is definitely an improvement. Keep it up!
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JRC: I wonder what Mary thinks about being put on such a high pedestal?
TVD: Do you people even read this thing?
28And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.
Do you check your sources? Some of that text is a later addition and not in the original.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 13, 2015 at 5:17 pm | Permalink
JRC: I wonder what Mary thinks about being put on such a high pedestal?
TVD: Do you people even read this thing?
28And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.
Do you check your sources? Some of that text is a later addition and not in the original.
KJV. This is like thumbwrestling in jello.
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You do realize that the KJV, based on the Textus Receptus, has several passages that have since been shown to be later additions?
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 13, 2015 at 5:16 pm | Permalink
TVD: Nice Catholic lady makes her case sola scriptura. Not a Catholic-ism in sight.
That is definitely an improvement. Keep it up!>>>>
My dear Brother Jeff, I always argue with you guys based on sola scriptura, and you guys always lose but declare yourselves the winners.
Funny how that works. You said that Mary called Jesus insane. You said that it is sin to not know everything if one is sinless – making Jesus out to be a sinner in your sloppy eisegesis. You are the one who thinks that Mary’s advice “Do whatever He asks” is bad advice.
So, please acknowledge your sloppy work.
Jeff, you are now alleging that κεχαριτωμενη means just a teeny, weeny, bit graced, but let’s not make a big deal out of it already. Tell me that’s not a biased interpretation. Take a look at this if you will.
I didn’t make up the title thing. “… “full of grace” is a just title for Mary”
http://digilander.libero.it/domingo7/Mary.htm
—————————————-
[1] “Highly favoured” (kecharitomene): perfect passive participle of charitoo and means endowed with grace ( “charis”), enriched with grace as in Ephesians. 1:6, non ut mater gratiae, sed ut filia gratiae. The Vulgate gratiae plena is right, if it means’ full of grace which thou hast received ‘; wrong, if it means’ full of grace which thou hast to bestow’. A. T. Robertson, Word Pictures in the New Testament, Nashville, 1930, vol. II, p. 13.
“Gratia plena” of the Vulgate seems also shared by versions as Vetus Latina, Syriaca Peshitta, Arabian, Egyptian and Ethiopian. In addition:
Wyclif’s Version [1380] has “full of grace”;
Tyndale’s Version [1534] has “full of grace”;
Cranmer’s Version [1539] has “full of grace”;
Geneva Bible [1599] said in the margin notes “might be rendered full of grace and favour”,
Douay Rheims [1610] has “full of grace”;
Authorized Version or KJV [1611] said in the margin notes “much graced or graciously accepted”;
Revised Version [1881], American Standard Version [1901] and Scofield Edition [1909, 1914] have in a margin note “Or Endowed with Grace”;
New American Standard Bible [1971, 1977] has in a footnote “Or, O woman richly blessed”;
English Peshitta Translation of Etheridge [1849] has “Peace to thee, full of grace”;
English Peshitta Translation of Murdock [1852] has “Peace to thee, thou full of grace”;
English Peshitta Translation of Lamsa [1933] has “Peace to you, o full of grace”;
English Peshitta Translation of Younan [2000] has “Peace to you, full of grace”.
Grace and favour are always and only by God (1 Peter 5:10 and Ephesians 1:6), but the translation “full of grace” in the sense of “beautiful, loved and always full of divine grace ” seems without any doubt correct, accurate and applicable to Mary by all Christians, given that not only Jesus (John 1:14) but also the deacon Stephen (Acts 6:8) was clearly said πλήρης χάριτος namely” full of grace “. The fullness of grace of Mary is obviously different from the fullness of grace of Jesus and Stephen, but “full of grace” is a just title for Mary, as “Son of God” is a just title for Jesus, given that even the judges were called “gods” (Psalm 82.6 and John 10.34). The opposition shown by non catholic people towards the translation “full of grace” therefore seems rather due to theological prejudices (Marian Devotion, Immaculate Conception, Perpetual Verginity) than to logical, linguistic and grammatical reasons (Song of Songs 4:7).
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 13, 2015 at 5:42 pm | Permalink
You do realize that the KJV, based on the Textus Receptus, has several passages that have since been shown to be later additions?
I have no idea what you believe. Sounds like the Bible is infallible and inerrant except when it isn’t.
This goes back to philology and canonicity. See also the Pericope Adulterae. Take a razor to your Bible for all I care.
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Mermaid,
I have never heard an argument like that used to say that Paul could have actually been Barnabas or John Mark or Onesimus or Philemon instead of the man that God actually chose to be Paul, the Apostle. I have never heard an argument like that at all! I really don’t think that God lives in the pluperfect subjunctive.
I don’t think God lives there either. The point is that nothing in Mary caused God to choose Mary and nothing in Paul caused God to choose Paul. His choice of them was all of grace. This really shouldn’t be difficult, unless you hold assumptions that make it fundamentally impossible for you to actually believe God chose Mary entirely apart from any merits in her. It should be no issue to say God could have chosen Barnabas for the role that Paul fulfilled, in which case we would have the first epistle of Barnabas to the Corinthians or something like that. If God had chosen Mary Magadalene, it would be Mary from Mandala, wife of Joseph and mother of Jesus.
Christian theologians have always said that God just as well could have chosen not to create. This isn’t hard. There is nothing intrinsic about Mary that led Him to choose her; rather, it was His choice of her that resulted in her being a fit vessel. If that is so, he could have chosen to make any other first-century Jewish young woman fit for that role.
In fact, in arguing that way, you are undermining the meaning of your own dogma of irresistible grace. In an effort to knock Mary of what you believe to be a pedestal where she does not belong, you actually present an argument that refutes one of the 5 points of Calvinism. Amazing.
What are you talking about. If God had chosen Mary Magdalene, the irresistible grace would have been given to her and she would have been the mother of Jesus.
Could God have chosen any other first-century Jewish young woman to bear the Messiah. If you can’t answer yes to that, then you can’t also believe that God chose Mary by grace. He chose her because of some inherent worth. And that is what your Mariology lends itself to.
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So Tom,
You believe that the Textus Receptus is identical to the original autographs?
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I said:
In fact, in arguing that way, you are undermining the meaning of your own dogma of irresistible grace. In an effort to knock Mary of what you believe to be a pedestal where she does not belong, you actually present an argument that refutes one of the 5 points of Calvinism. Amazing.
Robert:
What are you talking about. If God had chosen Mary Magdalene, the irresistible grace would have been given to her and she would have been the mother of Jesus.>>>>>
Yes, and if God had given pigs wings, they could fly.
Well, Mary Magdalene was given grace to believe in Jesus. She was not a pig, but maybe you get the point.
So, you are saying that God looked at all the possibilities of young virgins who were going to live in Palestine at the time His Son was to be born, and He picked Mary.
When did God learn that Mary would be available?
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“You do realize that the KJV, based on the Textus Receptus, has several passages that have since been shown to be later additions?”
Semper reformanda. And SS is supposed to be a tenable position why again?
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Mermaid, ” I always argue with you guys based on sola scriptura”
So much for the sufficiency of Scripture.
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Mermaid,
So, you are saying that God looked at all the possibilities of young virgins who were going to live in Palestine at the time His Son was to be born, and He picked Mary.
Quit trying to make me into a Molinist. I’m saying that God picked Mary but that there was nothing inherently special about Mary that prompted His choice. His choice of her made her fit to be the mother of Christ.
But He could have chosen another, in which that case His choice would have made that person worthy. And in any case, that choice of another would not be based on some kind of Molinist Middle Knowledge.
We know He didn’t choose another. The question is, could he have? It’s not a silly question. Theologians have asked if God could have chosen not to create and answered in the affirmative without being a Molinist.
So I’ll say it again, your Mariology apparently makes it utterly conceivable to you that God could have, if he had so chosen, picked someone else to bear the Messiah. Whether He did do that or not is irrelevant to my point. The fact that you can’t accept that God’s choice of Mary was free (meaning He could have chosen someone else just as well) betrays a belief that you think Mary was worthy before the choice was made, that she had some kind of intrinsic value that made her and no other woman fit to bear the Messiah.
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Cletus,
Semper reformanda. And SS is supposed to be a tenable position why again?
Oh please, as if Rome and her defenders have never gone back and said “That statement we expected everyone to obey as if it were infallible, turned out it wasn’t infallible.”
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@ Cletus:
Suppose you define SS first before we discuss?
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Robert:
So I’ll say it again, your Mariology apparently makes it utterly conceivable to you that God could have, if he had so chosen, picked someone else to bear the Messiah. >>>>
Your argument makes no sense.
The last time I had one of these arguments about what might have been it was with egalitarian feminists. They like to speculate on the possibility that Jesus could have been female.
To me, both your argument here and their argument back then are on the level of God having been able to make pigs fly if He had wanted to.
He wanted to grace a young girl named Mary, and that’s what He did. Since that time we all call her blessed. She is blessed among women.
It was not a snap decision that made God choose her, and it required some special preparation. Part of that preparation involved her lineage. God did not look down the corridor of time and see that maybe Mary would be willing to help Him out.
He prepared her ahead of time, long before the angel appeared to her. Please read carefully the CCC on this. You will notice the references to the grace of God and nothing about how God picked out Mary because He saw something inherent in her He liked.
————————————————-
The Immaculate Conception
490 To become the mother of the Savior, Mary “was enriched by God with gifts appropriate to such a role.”132 The angel Gabriel at the moment of the annunciation salutes her as “full of grace”.133 In fact, in order for Mary to be able to give the free assent of her faith to the announcement of her vocation, it was necessary that she be wholly borne by God’s grace.
491 Through the centuries the Church has become ever more aware that Mary, “full of grace” through God,134 was redeemed from the moment of her conception. That is what the dogma of the Immaculate Conception confesses, as Pope Pius IX proclaimed in 1854:
The most Blessed Virgin Mary was, from the first moment of her conception, by a singular grace and privilege of almighty God and by virtue of the merits of Jesus Christ, Savior of the human race, preserved immune from all stain of original sin.135
492 The “splendor of an entirely unique holiness” by which Mary is “enriched from the first instant of her conception” comes wholly from Christ: she is “redeemed, in a more exalted fashion, by reason of the merits of her Son”.136 The Father blessed Mary more than any other created person “in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” and chose her “in Christ before the foundation of the world, to be holy and blameless before him in love”.137
493 The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God “the All-Holy” (Panagia), and celebrate her as “free from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature”.138 By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long.
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Tvd
It was you who pointed out to me that the wcf makes claim for original text. Not strange at all that virtually all biblical scholars from rc to cp agree that textus rcptus (and vulgate) had short comings and better manuscripts are now available.
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Mermaid,
It was not a snap decision that made God choose her, and it required some special preparation. Part of that preparation involved her lineage. God did not look down the corridor of time and see that maybe Mary would be willing to help Him out.
Agreed. So, could God have prepared another lineage from David (assuming that Luke 3 gives a Davidic genealogy) that ended with some other woman whom God prepared to make the mother of God. The only answer consistent with your above quote is yes.
He prepared her ahead of time, long before the angel appeared to her. Please read carefully the CCC on this. You will notice the references to the grace of God and nothing about how God picked out Mary because He saw something inherent in her He liked.
I know what is said; my quibble is what the reality is in practice. This is not a hard question. Could God have prepared a different lineage or even the same lineage as Mary’s but ending with Mary’s sister and make the sister the mother of Christ?
If it’s all of grace, God could have done with another woman what He did with Mary. There’s no biblical revelation that says it had to be Mary. The OT simply says that she had to be a virgin. Mary wasn’t the only virgin girl in Palestine. If God had so chosen, could he have still made everything the same, including granting Mary extraordinary piety, but only change the outcome so that Susan or Jodie became the mother of Jesus and not Mary?
This isn’t a hard question. We know that he didn’t do that, just as we know that He didn’t choose not to create. But we also know that God could have chosen not to create.
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Robert
Posted October 13, 2015 at 9:53 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
It was not a snap decision that made God choose her, and it required some special preparation. Part of that preparation involved her lineage. God did not look down the corridor of time and see that maybe Mary would be willing to help Him out.
Agreed. So, could God have prepared another lineage from David (assuming that Luke 3 gives a Davidic genealogy) that ended with some other woman whom God prepared to make the mother of God.
Then that other woman would be “Mary” with all the same attributes [incl the attending “Mariology”]. You’re not getting anywhere with this. The argument is that Mary was special from her conception, not from the Annunciation–including being “full of grace.” [Grace originates with God, not the human being.]
Nobody’s disagreeing with you.
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sdb
Posted October 13, 2015 at 9:53 pm | Permalink
Tvd
It was you who pointed out to me that the wcf makes claim for original text. Not strange at all that virtually all biblical scholars from rc to cp agree that textus rcptus (and vulgate) had short comings and better manuscripts are now available.
I have no idea what you people believe. Not that I ever get a straight answer around here but are you going to cut out the story of the adulteress? No trace of it before the 2nd century CE.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/aprilweb-only/117-31.0.html
Cletus van Damme
Posted October 13, 2015 at 8:17 pm | Permalink
“You do realize that the KJV, based on the Textus Receptus, has several passages that have since been shown to be later additions?”
Semper reformanda. And SS is supposed to be a tenable position why again?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 13, 2015 at 8:28 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, ” I always argue with you guys based on sola scriptura”
I didn’t make up the title thing. “… “full of grace” is a just title for Mary”
http://digilander.libero.it/domingo7/Mary.htm
So much for the sufficiency of Scripture.>>>>
So, you guys can quote authoritative sources and call it sola scriptura, but I can’t.
Jeff can butcher passages of Scripture, and call it sola scriptura.
This is eye opening for me. It’s not that I don’t like you guys, because I do. It is just kind of, well, like I said, eye opening for me.
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I actually find myself agreeing with TVD here. It seems like a lot of folks are intentionally misconstruing Catholic doctrine simply for the purpose of condemning it. Something about that seems to be a bit unchristian to me.
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cvd
As I noted before ss (meaning final and only infallible authority on matters of faith and morals) is similar to science. Data and theory are intertwined, but data is the final judge. Sure theories are in principle falsifiable, but eventually that isn’t so in practice. No need for central authority or proof to arrive at certainty or consensus.
You didn’t like that analogy because the subject matter is different. To be sure, one comes from observation of world and the other from observation of word. But otherwise I see no reason why analogy doesn’t work.
One might be tempted to point to the purported ecclesiastical chaos of prots to which I respond:
1) lots of religions without central authority do pretty well – islam comes to mind.
2) in US where we have wealth, freedom, and consumerism every religion bifurcates.
3) the diffs aming prots are greatly exaggerated. Overwhelming majority agree on the so-called essentials that comprise the faith statements of cccu institutions and nae members and refer to divergences as distinctives. Not crazy about this myself, but coupled with open communion among most congregations the relationship among prots is more similar to relationship among groups in communion with Rome and in some cases far less acrimonious!
4) On almostevery measure prots score higher on what they believe and practice (even including the mainline).
5) Even with magisterium that purportedly settles everything you have significant divergence amongthe Cardinals. Perhaps just tge results of sin and not clarity? Maybe true for prots as well. But it seems to me submission to a cardinal who works with government to expand abortion access, implement euthanasia, and advocate ssm is a high price to pay for institutional unity (and to think Daneels isn’t even the most radical). Dreher gets at this in the beginning of this post.
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Tvd – wcf is a pretty good summary. No, ss=/=kjv-only. Yes story of woman caught in adultry probably not legit. Did I get doctrine/dogma distinction right in other thread?
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Bobby
Posted October 13, 2015 at 11:11 pm | Permalink
I actually find myself agreeing with TVD here. It seems like a lot of folks are intentionally misconstruing Catholic doctrine simply for the purpose of condemning it. Something about that seems to be a bit unchristian to me.
That’s fairly brilliant, man. What if we were to turn the tables and there were only 30,000 or so “Roman Catholics” in the whole world claiming to be the true Church, and not only that, could trace their “apostolic succession” at least back 1900 years?
Not a bad truth claim on earth, better than most. And that’s not even getting into the theology of the Holy Spirit and “I will always be with you,” one of the Catholic proof texts.
And thx, Bobby for the other part. Read through my history at this here blog and find more referee than litigant. Per Dennis Prager, to love God is to love truth; clarity over agreement.
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Tom,
Then that other woman would be “Mary” with all the same attributes [incl the attending “Mariology”]. You’re not getting anywhere with this. The argument is that Mary was special from her conception, not from the Annunciation–including being “full of grace.” [Grace originates with God, not the human being.]
Nobody’s disagreeing with you.
Finally a straight answer. The whole discussion began with Mermaid questioning how Mary’s person and character could be irrelevant to God’s choice of her. (Also Peter and Paul). The catechism could be read to be stating that, but the problem is with how things work out in popular piety. It’s very easy to go from God’s choice made Mary worthy to God chose Mary because she was worthy even without the extra Mariology. The Mariology makes it harder on the street level.
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sdb
Posted October 13, 2015 at 11:25 pm | Permalink
Tvd – wcf is a pretty good summary. No, ss=/=kjv-only. Yes story of woman caught in adultry probably not legit. Did I get doctrine/dogma distinction right in other thread?
Din’t see it yet. I trust you did.
What to do about the Bible, I dunno. I liked the Jesus Seminar. Bigtime. 😉 Entirely reasonable.
Did I agree with a word of it? Ah, there’s the rub. “Inspired,” inscripturated,” “canonized.” What if instead of digging up the Gospel According to Thomas of 300 CE they dig up a new scroll from 55 CE that contradicts half the synoptic Gospels?
http://gnosis.org/naghamm/gosthom.html
Dude, I’m not here to convert anyone to anything. Protestants know little about each other, and far far less about what they’re actually “protesting.”
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Robert
Posted October 13, 2015 at 11:35 pm | Permalink
Tom,
“Then that other woman would be “Mary” with all the same attributes [incl the attending “Mariology”]. You’re not getting anywhere with this. The argument is that Mary was special from her conception, not from the Annunciation–including being “full of grace.” [Grace originates with God, not the human being.]
Nobody’s disagreeing with you.”
Finally a straight answer. The whole discussion began with Mermaid questioning how Mary’s person and character could be irrelevant to God’s choice of her.
Tom, the Unificator. Who knew, or even suspected.
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sdb,
“data is the final judge.”
Right. And the identified “data” (that is, what is recognized as comprising the “final and only infallible authority”) remains provisional and ever in-flux as we see here. Then multiply this out to not just the extent/scope of your canon, but its inerrancy, inspiration, authority, closure, and the doctrine of SS itself. But given the built-in disclaimers of your confessions and every proposed teaching by a Protestant body, this is not surprising – semper reformanda. There’s no way for your system to identify the unchanging standard for all things to be judged against because of the very nature of your disclaimers in the first place. So my question remains.
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Remind me what your question is?
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Mermaid, Ever noticed that you believe in papal supremacy and don’t spend much time quoting the papacy?
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Bobby, how about bringing up the parts (lots of them) of Roman Catholic theology that its defenders prefer to ignore? It’s not a Call to Cafeteria after all.
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James Young, “But given the built-in disclaimers of your confessions and every proposed teaching by a Protestant body, this is not surprising – semper reformanda.”
So what explains the wide ignorance and disregard of Roman Catholic theology and practice in your circles since you have such an air-tight system? Might it be that you don’t have the state to threaten unbelief with — say — an Inquisition?
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James Young, indeed. What did happen to anti-triumphalism and pro-humility?
Is this Jesus or Francis’ church?
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James Young, “There’s no way for your system to identify the unchanging standard for all things to be judged against because of the very nature of your disclaimers in the first place.”
And here’s “your” way of identifying the unchanging standard:
In other words, we’ll make it up as we go. Sort of like how the bishops handled the sex scandal.
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James Young, and how do you reconcile this bishop with Cardinal Kasper?
Some standard.
When your church sets the standard, let us know. Until then, maybe you don’t preen about how bad Protestantism is.
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Darryl,
So what explains the wide ignorance and disregard of Roman Catholic theology and practice in your circles since you have such an air-tight system?
After many conversations with James, I think the ultimate answer is that for all of the vaunted claims that the Magisterium provides all this irreformable certainty, it really does no good except for the Magisterium. People are just supposed to implicitly trust the Magisterium. They know the answers. They have the certainty. Ignorance and disrespect of RC theology and practice is finally irrelevant to the system because the system doesn’t care one whit about laypeople knowing and believing. All it cares about is nominal assent. Trust the heavy lifting of theology to the Magisterium. As long as you say you believe what it says, you don’t have to know it; indeed, you can’t really know it.
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Bottom line, though, mermaid, sincere question – what would be your suggestion to end the error of Mary idolatry and return the focus to Jesus . Aren’t you jealous for that.
“You know, you can travel all over the world and you’ll see idols and shrines to Mary everywhere. I mean, I’ve seen them in churches, cathedrals, in houses, and I’ve seen them in hotel lobbies, I’ve seen them in hotel rooms. I’ve seen them in restaurants. I’ve seen them along the highways, byways and paths up in the mountains in the most remote places”
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Robert, except that James knows they didn’t have the answers when it came to the sex scandal. So James is really his own pope — he knows when to believe the magisterium and when not. And Protestants are individualistic.
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Darryl,
And that’s why all of the claims of Rome’s epistemological superiority ring hollow. James and others want to make a big deal that Rome proposes infallible dogma and therefore is more credible, but if you can’t finally know what that is with the kind of absolute certainty they want, what good is it? You’re still left to do all the interpreting on your own if you want to be a thoughtful religious person. At the end of the day, you are still submitting to your own understanding. And since your own understanding isn’t infallible, you are in the same boat.
What one submits to in Romanism is at least as shaky as James thinks the Protestant canon is because it’s self-evident what it is that we should submit to, the point at which the true church ends and a false church begins, what is discipline and what is doctrine/dogma, discipline cannot be bifurcated from dogma, etc. One RC once admitted as much to me implicitly. After pressing him, it became “Well, at least Rome has the mechanism for solving these questions even if she never uses it and we can’t be absolutely certain of when it has been used.”
IOW, if you’re the Magisterium you might be able to know something, but it’s no guarantee that you will. Now that’s a solid foundation. No wonder Francis is going all postmodern on us.
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Robert, from what I’ve seen of late, people talk way more about Rome’s mechanism than the Vatican actually uses it. Do these people actually follow what happens at Synods when bishops gather?
And how well did that mechanism work back when the Western Church had three popes?
Nothing to see here. Move along.
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sdb,
My question was:
“You do realize that the KJV, based on the Textus Receptus, has several passages that have since been shown to be later additions?”
Semper reformanda. And SS is supposed to be a tenable position why again?
Darryl,
“So what explains the wide ignorance and disregard of Roman Catholic theology and practice in your circles since you have such an air-tight system?”
Sloth, dissent, sin. Just like people disregarded the prophets and Christ and the apostles. Not news.
“Might it be that you don’t have the state to threaten unbelief with — say — an Inquisition?”
Ignorance and disregard still occurred when heresy was viewed as a crime against the state. So this thesis explains nothing.
“Is this Jesus or Francis’ church?”
Jesus’ church shepherded by Francis.
“In other words, we’ll make it up as we go.”
Or in other words, we’ll distinguish between principles and pastoral application of principles.
“Some standard.”
Bishops with differing stances is nothing new. Read the history of Trent, or any ecumenical council really. So similar dynamics in a synod is not news.
“When your church sets the standard, let us know.”
It’s already been set over and over. STM-triad. What’s the standard in Protestantism? Just provisional opinion – the “final standard” that everything is to be judged against remains ever tentative and subject to change. Not a great foundation, in fact not a foundation at all.
Robert,
“I think the ultimate answer is that for all of the vaunted claims that the Magisterium provides all this irreformable certainty, it really does no good except for the Magisterium.”
That’s odd, considering the history of Rome exercising magisterial authority in responding and stamping out heresies. I guess the laity never hear about it – it’s all done in secret.
“Trust the heavy lifting of theology to the Magisterium. As long as you say you believe what it says, you don’t have to know it; indeed, you can’t really know it.”
Hmm non-theologians are doctors of the church. More oddness. And no, ignorance is not a virtue commended by Rome – faith seeks understanding.
“James and others want to make a big deal that Rome proposes infallible dogma and therefore is more credible, but if you can’t finally know what that is with the kind of absolute certainty they want, what good is it? You’re still left to do all the interpreting on your own if you want to be a thoughtful religious person. At the end of the day, you are still submitting to your own understanding. And since your own understanding isn’t infallible, you are in the same boat.”
And once again we see the undermining and dismissal of Christ and the Apostles’ claims to authority. We’re all human and interpret – that’s not news, nor is that fact justification for a system and rule of faith based on a changing “unchanging standard” that can’t yield divine truths by its own disclaimers.
“Well, at least Rome has the mechanism for solving these questions even if she never uses it and we can’t be absolutely certain of when it has been used.”
Of course she’s used it. Just one infallible dogma is enough to demonstrate that.
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Why does provisional imply untenable? Is it untenable to believe things the church teaches but does not declare infallibly? The ordinary teaching of your bishops commands your full assent, yet they are fallible. I don’t see the problem.
The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional, that is not the case in practice (again the analogy with science works quite well here – there is a hierarchy of certainty and while it is possible in principle that certain theories could be falsified, we don’t work that way in practice).
As an empirical matter, is the range of beliefs among protestants wider than the range of beliefs among RCs? I see little evidence that is the case on either theological or moral questions.
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You guys have convinced yourselves that Catholicism is not the way to go. I don’t find your nit-picking convincing, but you you guys do. You have erected high walls against anything Catholic. That’s fine. That is your right. She still considers you brethren, as I do. There are some fine Protestant Bible scholars and preachers who present the Gospel without feeling a need to trash Catholicism as they do it.
However, that is not the same as making a case for your views. Why not defend sola scriptura, for example? Why not explain how an ever changing view of what Scripture even is can be trusted? Why not explain why even the ESV had to use some gender inclusive language so it could be marketed to a post modern culture where gendered language is becoming more and more offensive?
Why not explain why you do not insist that your members learn Greek and Hebrew so they can really know Scripture in the original languages? Since you guys like to Greek the alleged ignorant, impressing them with your superior linguistic skills, why do you keep the masses in the dark about Biblical languages? Bring them up to speed.
Why not do what the Jewish community does and teach its people Hebrew? They don’t use Bible translations.
If you really believe that the Bible is the only rule of faith and practice, why do you keep your people in the dark?
Why do you quote Calvin in translation as well? Make your people learn French.
I know you’re not going to do any of that. Your people are dependent on your pastors and elders for their understanding of Scripture. Just admit that you really do not believe the Bible to be the only rule of faith and practice. That fact is evident to those looking on from the outside, or even from the inside.
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sdb,
So divine revelation (infallible by definition) is reduced to “shrug, this is the best we can do at the moment”. So we see two sides of the coin Protestantism reduces to based on its disclaimers and principles – sheer fideism or stark rationalism. Neither should be compelling options to any rational person. A “final judge” that remains ever provisional and tentative by your own admission hardly merits the description.
And diversity or unity of beliefs is a secondary issue. Even if Protestantism was reduced to just one individual who was by definition perfectly unified in his beliefs, the problem outlined above would still remain.
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@mwf
“You guys have convinced yourselves that Catholicism is not the way to go.”
Well I can’t speak for any one else here, but as I told you a few threads back I explored the RCC pretty carefully when a student at ND. I have a great deal of respect for much of RCC, but ultimately I found too many items unconvincing.
“…feeling a need to trash Catholicism as they do it…” Pointing out that all is not well in the RCC is not trashing it. I’m sorry you feel that way.
“However, that is not the same as making a case for your views. Why not defend sola scriptura, for example?”
First, much of the response on this blog is not a defense of protestantism as it is a critique of a dishonest and triumphalist apologetic coming from CtC. Not every comment, post, or blog has to do everything.
Second, I have sketched out several (probably too long) outlines of why I find SS compelling. You may find them wanting – that’s fine, but that isn’t the same as not making a positive case. Perhaps they were too long and you just weren’t interested in reading them. I understand (I bore me too!), but then it seems rather unfair to make the kind of harsh charges you make here.
“Why not explain how an ever changing view of what Scripture even is can be trusted? Why not explain why even the ESV had to use some gender inclusive language so it could be marketed to a post modern culture where gendered language is becoming more and more offensive?”
Maybe because I’m not a huge of fan of the ESV? That being said, I don’t see any major doctrinal issues coming from the ESV. The textual criticisms I find to be mostly overblown. I’m pretty sure the bit about the woman caught in adultery was not originally part of the gospel, the ending of Mark was a later addition, the part in John’s epistle was an add-on, etc… Taken as a whole I don’t see that this undermines the message coming from scripture. I don’t see any doctrines that hinge on these questionable elements of the TR. Some critics seem to think this totally undermines the authority of scripture, but I find that criticism by folks like Bart Ehrman completely overblown.
“Why not explain why you do not insist that your members learn Greek and Hebrew so they can really know Scripture in the original languages? Since you guys like to Greek the alleged ignorant, impressing them with your superior linguistic skills, why do you keep the masses in the dark about Biblical languages? Bring them up to speed.”
Speaking as one who knows no greek or hebrew, it isn’t given to everyone to be a teacher (who I think should know the languages in play). I submit to the teaching authority of my session. I don’t think they are infallible and I do believe that the main thrust of the gospel is sufficiently clear even without a grasp of original languages. After all, the Holy Spirit is the final interpreter who opens our eyes to the gospel. Like the blind man who was healed, there is a lot I don’t know, but I know I was blind but now I see.
“If you really believe that the Bible is the only rule of faith and practice, why do you keep your people in the dark?”
Who believes that the Bible is the only rule of faith and practice? Here is what the WCF says:
I would note three things in response:
1) The Bible is the rule of faith and life.
2) It is not the only rule – common issues like worship of God, government of Church, etc… are ordered by the light of nature even though there are boundary conditions imposed by the Bible.
3) Not everything in the Bible is clear – that’s why we need teachers.
You keep misinterpreting sola scriptura (which I don’t think you’ll find in the WCF). It is the only final authority, not the only source of guidance. That is in the confession. Your repeated insistence that we fess up to not believing something we don’t believe is like someone badgering you about the fact a pope could get something wrong.
It seems to me that Jeff has given you something to ponder. You may disagree, but I think dismissing it as trashing the catholic church is dishonest. You may not be sure what to do with that even if you remain convinced of the RCC’s teaching on Mary. That’s fine of course. We can’t all know everything about everything.
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Ariel, everything you say can easily be said in return to you.
The difference is that you say we’re still in fellowship with you, while we maintain that cleaving to a true church is necessary for salvation. In which case, the irony is that for all the audacity over there a higher ecclesiology prevails over here. Per our formulation, you have more to lose staying over there than we have of staying over here per your formulation. Can you up the ante and give us an equal incentive? Not so far.
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“So divine revelation (infallible by definition) is reduced to “shrug, this is the best we can do at the moment”. ”
I don’t think that is implied at all! Rather, divine revelation is infallible, but it is always possible that I misunderstand or get it wrong. There are somethings that I find so well established that there is no way I’m going to doubt them (and there are vast areas where prots and RCs agree after all). I see no fideism or rationalism – again would you make that charge about the tentative nature of what you know from science? Of course not. You seem to have this binary understanding of knowledge – it is either absolutely secure and unassailable or utterly unreliable. I disagree.
The reduction to a single person doesn’t work by the way. If lots of people end up at the same spot on something, it seems to me there isn’t as much epistemological chaos as you think the stance implies.
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sdb,
“Rather, divine revelation is infallible, but it is always possible that I misunderstand or get it wrong. ”
Right, and given your disclaimers, you never get past that. Buying into Protestantism doesn’t get you anywhere – you’re no better off than before. It’s a bad deal, thus you get stuck with fideism or rationalism.
“You seem to have this binary understanding of knowledge – it is either absolutely secure and unassailable or utterly unreliable.”
Nope. But divine revelation by definition must be taken on the authority of another. Protestantism can’t ever cash that check, by its own disclaimers.
“The reduction to a single person doesn’t work by the way.”
Let’s say you’re the only Protestant in the world. Nothing has changed in the argument.
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Cletus: Right, and given your disclaimers, you never get past that. Buying into Protestantism doesn’t get you anywhere – you’re no better off than before. It’s a bad deal, thus you get stuck with fideism or rationalism.
Cletus, you seem to be stuck in one or more fallacies somewhere. Let’s unpack that by considering a parallel argument that is obviously bad.
Me: The physical world is infallible in the sense that objects are what they are and do what they do. There hypothetically could be an actually correct description of the physical world.
However, man’s understanding of the physical world, aka science, is always fallible in the sense that we cannot perfectly apprehend it. Hence, scientific understanding is a provisional understanding of an absolute truth.
You: … the identified “data” (that is, what is recognized as comprising the “final and only infallible authority”) remains provisional and ever in-flux as we see here. Then multiply this out to not just the extent/scope of your [data but also to your measurements and models themselves.] But given the built-in disclaimers of your [scientific journals] and every proposed teaching by a [scientific] body, this is not surprising – [provisional acceptance of everything]. There’s no way for your system to identify the unchanging standard for all things to be judged against because of the very nature of your disclaimers in the first place. (from your earlier post)
Why is the argument bad? Well, it is informal for one thing. You don’t state clearly what you’re arguing for, which is suitable for a blog. But we can infer that anti-science-you is arguing that the scientist cannot make truth claims. Instead, truth claims come from the pronouncements of infallible authorities.
And this is wrong because it dismisses induction improperly, and because it trades on the fallacy of argument from authority, which is your “unchanging standard.”
When put like this, the nature of your fallacies become clear.
(1) You confuse absolute truth with absolute knowledge of truth.
Protestants claim that the Word of God is absolutely true, but that it is highly likely beyond any reasonable doubt that the Protestant canon is the correct identification of the Word of God.
The first claim is absolute truth; the second is provisional.
You want to argue that provisional truth claims are not actually truth claims. We see the same error from the Clarkians. They are discontent with merely having the word of God; they also want absolute certainty for their interpretation of it.
So how to describe the fallacy? It is a kind of induction/deduction confusion. When you (correctly) observe that Protestants do not claim infallibility for their theology, you believe that this destroys the value of any of their truth claims.
But inductive systems are not that brittle. You need to spend some time working with scientific data to really understand this point, I think.
(2) You wrongly believe the Roman Catholic escapes provisionality by accepting the authority of the church as absolute.
However, the Roman Catholic system is every bit as provisional as the Protestant.
First, because the individual RC must rely on his own understanding of church doctrine, which is taught to him by priests who are relying on their own understanding of church doctrine, which in turn is enforced by bishops who rely on their own understanding of church doctrine, who in turn are accountable to a pope who relies on his own understanding of church doctrine, and who only rarely exercises the gift of infallibility — and whose infallible pronouncements cannot be positively identified.
That’s a lot of points of failure in the system. All it takes is one pope, one bishop, one priest going off the rails to make the believer’s whole train go off course.
A special and important example of this is Vat I’s doctrine of infallibility. What if Pius just flat-out misunderstood church history and doctrine, and thought he was speaking ex cathedra when he was not in fact doing so?
In that case, the doctrine that undergirds your confidence would be simply wrong. How do you know that this is not so? You have only two options: either to simply assert that God wouldn’t let the Church get it so wrong (which is fideist), or to assert that your research supports Vat I (which is crypto-Protestant).
Second, because the individual RC’s possession of the truth in RC doctrine is always provisional, contingent upon the correctness of his belief (a) that truth comes from authority [a fallacy of itself], and (b) that he has correctly identified the RC church as that infallible authority.
(BTW: The entire rest of the Christian church believes that the RC has gotten this wrong. Jus’ sayin’)
So we could describe your fallacy as a sophisticated appeal to authority. It is one which fails to recognize that the authority is not self-validating, hence cannot be infallibly known; hence, all pronouncements from the authority are provisional.
In other words: tu quoque. Welcome to provisionality, which is the state of things in the real world.
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Cletus,
That’s odd, considering the history of Rome exercising magisterial authority in responding and stamping out heresies. I guess the laity never hear about it – it’s all done in secret.
It’s not an issue of never hearing about it. It’s an issue that if you aren’t the Magisterium and gifted with the charism of infallibility, and if such infallibility is necessary to be a non-fideist or non-rationalist, the whole thing doesn’t help the laity. They aren’t infallible.
Hmm non-theologians are doctors of the church. More oddness. And no, ignorance is not a virtue commended by Rome – faith seeks understanding.
Yes, because implicit faith, forbidding the Scriptures in the language of the common people, etc., etc. is all about encouraging people to seek understanding.
And once again we see the undermining and dismissal of Christ and the Apostles’ claims to authority..
Not a dismissal. Just pointing out that Rome doesn’t get to claim to have that kind of authority when she can’t claim the same kind of inspiration for it.
We’re all human and interpret – that’s not news, nor is that fact justification for a system and rule of faith based on a changing “unchanging standard” that can’t yield divine truths by its own disclaimers.
Who’s trying to change the Bible? If the best you can give me is “textual variants,” that’s lame. Even Roman Catholics accept that textual variants exist.
And who says the system can’t yield divine truth. Whenever we’ve interpreted Scripture accurately, we’ve yielded divine truth. You just want someone to be able to say “Look, here we know for sure for sure we’ve done it rightly.”
Of course she’s used it. Just one infallible dogma is enough to demonstrate that.
Really. It is so plain what has been infallibly defined and what hasn’t? Tom hasn’t gotten the memo.
And if one is enough, then here we go:
23 Thus says the Lord: “Let not the wise man boast in his wisdom, let not the mighty man boast in his might, let not the rich man boast in his riches, 24 but let him who boasts boast in this, that he understands and knows me, that I am the Lord who practices steadfast love, justice, and righteousness in the earth. For in these things I delight, declares the Lord.” (Jer. 9:23–24)
Explicit claim to being from God, so an explicit claim to divine authority. You’re all about claims. On what grounds is the claim here insufficient to make me non-fideist.
You said to Jeff, regarding his comment that it is always possible that he misunderstands it:
Right, and given your disclaimers, you never get past that. Buying into Protestantism doesn’t get you anywhere – you’re no better off than before. It’s a bad deal, thus you get stuck with fideism or rationalism.
Really. So you get past the fact that it is always possible that YOU might understand what Rome has said? You are infallible? By the same standard, buying into Roman Catholicism doesn’t get you anywhere unless you become infallible. Thus my point about it not really mattering what you know about what Rome believes. You think buying into Rome puts you into a better position even though you’ll admit that you might be mistaken about what Rome teaches. That’s only the case if misunderstanding is made completely irrelevant—implicit faith. Let the church believe for for you.
Nope. But divine revelation by definition must be taken on the authority of another.
By whose definition? If God says something to me, do I have to look for another to confirm it? What about Jesus. Why do I need Rome now but Jesus didn’t think it was necessary in his day?
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Robert
If God says something to me, do I have to look for another to confirm it? What about Jesus. Why do I need Rome now but Jesus didn’t think it was necessary in his day?
There are three persons in the Trinity. You guys constantly talk as if there are only two.
“The reduction to a single person doesn’t work by the way.”
Neither does the Catholic Church. No pope ignores the bishops and the sensus fidei. To say otherwise is a lie. Neither does the Church operate on the authority of men, as the Protestants are forced to concede they do.
So we could describe your fallacy as a sophisticated appeal to authority.
No fallacy. It’s an appeal to authority, alright, per Jesus’s promise to send the Holy Spirit to the apostles in John 15, and the descent of the Spirit at Pentecost, which is considered the actual birth of the Church. To discuss the Church in any fashion without the centrality of the Holy Spirit is the only fallacy here.
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James Young, “Sloth, dissent, sin. Just like people disregarded the prophets and Christ and the apostles. Not news.”
And we wonder why reform never happens. Sin? Shrug. Big deal. Holiness? So what.
If the bishops who confronted Luther had thought the way you did, they wouldn’t have gathered at Trent.
And are you so placid about sin when it means surreptitiously moving around sexually active priests (and hiding assets)?
Remember, you’re supposed to be calling us to a higher standard. Yours seems to be, whatever. Yup.
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Mermaid, and why do you trust bishops who are untrustworthy? Do you really know which ones covered up for wayward priests?
You haven’t made any case for the superiority of episcopacy. So there.
One point in favor of sola scriptura — Christianity is a revealed religion. If God speaks, if God has revealed himself, studying and paying heed to what he says/reveals seems pretty important. On your side, you dissect matters by church officers on any number of matters not revealed in Scripture and come to how many interpretations? A lot (Woody Allen’s favorite number).
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Zrim, “Can you up the ante and give us an equal incentive?”
I’ve never heard of a Protestant converting to Rome to gain eternal life. I have heard of Roman Catholics converting to Christ and finding him preached and followed in a Protestant church.
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James Young, buying into Roman Catholicism gets you the bodily assumption of Mary and not an infallible pope but the doctrine of papal infallibility. Those are the only two infallible dogma for all those millennia of Petrine ministry and papal supremacy.
At least the Bible gives you a lot more to consider.
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Jeff, Comment of the day (after my quote from the sermon about Lepanto). LIKE.
I think James Young is ultimately a fideist who argues as if he is reasonable.
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Tom,
There are three persons in the Trinity. You guys constantly talk as if there are only two.
What are you talking about? Cletus is the one who says appealing to the witness of the Spirit is fideistic. We’re not the ones who believes the Spirit speaks only when the Magisterium opens its mouth.
Neither does the Catholic Church. No pope ignores the bishops and the sensus fidei. To say otherwise is a lie. Neither does the Church operate on the authority of men, as the Protestants are forced to concede they do.
You’re responding to something I didn’t say, but it this is a plainly false statement. The continued railing against birth control is an example of the pope ignoring the census fidei, unless you define the sensus fidei as being whatever the Magisterium says, in which case the sensus fidei is a meaningless concept.
And then, of course, there Pius “I am the tradition” IX. Yeah, no ignoring of the Magisterium there.
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What is your specific claim about Pius IX?
As for birth control it’s an interesting point. It’s generally thought not to be an infallible teaching, such as the one on capital punishment. Again, you guys seem to make everything black and white when it suits your polemical purpose.
Regardless, Cletus has you in quite a pickle about the fact that you have no authority whatsoever. Even the Bible is up for grabs between interpretation and canonicity.
I notice nobody’s dared to attempt to answer about the story of the adulteress in John 7, of which there’s no trace until the 2nd century.
http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/aprilweb-only/117-31.0.html
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@ Bobby:
Say more. The desire is to clarify the truth, not to score points. So accurate corrections are welcome.
Which Catholic doctrines have been distorted?
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@ MWF:
I don’t think at all that you made up the notion that “highly favored” is a title. I know that that reading goes back to Jerome, and I don’t begrudge your opinion that he’s right.
I just want to you to acknowledge that yours is the minority view, even amongst Catholic translators. Your enthusiastic self-confidence on this matter is out of proportion to the scholarly consensus.
So you’ve laid out your fact base, which provides different supporting evidence. Let’s add that to what I’ve already laid out. Now both us, presumably seekers of truth, have to determine which pieces are the most important and most reliable, and what the best inference from the evidence is.
We aren’t looking for a way in which our position could possibly be true. We’re looking for the best bet as to what Luke meant, given the totality of evidence.
You win the coin toss, so you may choose to go first or second.
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MWF:
You said that it is sin to not know everything if one is sinless
You are the one who thinks that Mary’s advice “Do whatever He asks” is bad advice.
Jeff, you are now alleging that κεχαριτωμενη means just a teeny, weeny, bit graced,
I said none of that. Here, you really did make stuff up. Bad form! -10 points for Hufflepuff!
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MWF on Oct 13: My dear Brother Jeff, I always argue with you guys based on sola scriptura…
MWF on Oct 14: ————————————————-
The Immaculate Conception
490 To become the mother of the Savior, Mary “was enriched by God with gifts appropriate to such a role.”132 The angel Gabriel at the moment of the annunciation salutes her as “full of grace”.133 In fact, in order for Mary to be able to give the free assent of her faith to the announcement of her vocation, it was necessary that she be wholly borne by God’s grace.
Always is longer than that, dear Webfoot.
…and you guys always lose but declare yourselves the winners.
Can you remind me where I’ve declared myself the winner? I don’t recall it, although I did get pretty frustrated at Bryan once for being triple-stubborn.
We won’t know who has won or lost until the judgment.
TVD, take note. You as a partisan are disqualified from being a referee.
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Not atall. I sort out the lies. I don’t claim the Catholic Church is the true one here, only clarify its truth claims. I don’t make truth claims of any sort.
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Partisan is as partisan does. No-one believes for a moment that you are an impartial referee.
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Jeff,
“You confuse absolute truth with absolute knowledge of truth.”
No, which is why I specifically said “the identified “data” (that is, what is recognized as comprising the “final and only infallible authority”) remains provisional and ever in-flux as we see here.” The qualifiers of “identified” and “recognized” were purposeful to distinguish from the data itself. The argument has nothing to do with being “anti-science”. That you would make this assertion even after I specifically called out these distinctions in an earlier thread you supported is disappointing:
“CVD: There needs to be a distinction between the existence/ontology of the canon, and the recognition/identification of that canon.”
Jeff: @ CVD: Agreed.”
“Protestants claim that the Word of God is absolutely true, but that it is highly likely beyond any reasonable doubt that the Protestant canon is the correct identification of the Word of God. ”
Why should I even buy the first claim as absolute truth based on Protestantism’s disclaimers? And saying your identification of the canon is “highly likely” just buttresses the point – nothing rises above tentative opinion. “The Word of God is absolutely true…we kinda think we know what it is, well at least for right now”. And this is the bedrock for SS?
“They are discontent with merely having the word of God; they also want absolute certainty for their interpretation of it.”
You’ve already claimed your identification of the Word of God remains provisional and tentative, so your “having” the word of God is just as tentative as anything else.
“When you (correctly) observe that Protestants do not claim infallibility for their theology, you believe that this destroys the value of any of their truth claims.”
For supernatural and divine truths? Yes. If you’d like to keep reducing faith to scientific analysis, you just buttress the point again – stark rationalism.
“However, the Roman Catholic system is every bit as provisional as the Protestant. ”
This is the same error Robert and others continue to make. I’ve never claimed RCs are not human or do not interpret and make judgments. That does not mean the tu quoque applies because such an observation is freely and readily admitted. This argument makes Christ and the Apostles claims to authority useless and superfluous – believers in the NT had to interpret them and choose to submit to them. That does not mean such people would have been just as warranted or justified in submitting to random Jew on the street offering admitted opinions on divine revelation and interpretation of the OT.
“The entire rest of the Christian church believes that the RC has gotten this wrong. Jus’ sayin'”
That’s fine. That doesn’t mean Protestantism wins by default. Inconsistency is a sign of falsehood. Consistency is necessary, though not sufficient condition. So maybe Rome is consistent, but wrong. Doesn’t get Protestantism off its own hook it planted itself.
“So we could describe your fallacy as a sophisticated appeal to authority”
As I said before, divine revelation and supernatural truths by definition are to be accepted by an authority. Protestantism cannot ever meet that demand, by its own claims and admission. So your left with sheer fideism or stark rationalism, pick your poison.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 14, 2015 at 5:45 pm | Permalink
Partisan is as partisan does. No-one believes for a moment that you are an impartial referee.
Most of my observations are formal–practically all since I eschew cosmic truth claims. Cletus has you here, not via truth claim, but by your own standards, not his.
“The entire rest of the Christian church believes that the RC has gotten this wrong. Jus’ sayin’”
That’s fine. That doesn’t mean Protestantism wins by default. Inconsistency is a sign of falsehood. Consistency is necessary, though not sufficient condition. So maybe Rome is consistent, but wrong. Doesn’t get Protestantism off its own hook it planted itself.
See, that’s just a formal and valid observation. It’s you litigating the truth claim here, Cletus simply pointing out that attacking Catholicism does nothing to validate your own religion. [An observation made about the Old Life game by numerous others.]
“So we could describe your fallacy as a sophisticated appeal to authority”
As I said before, divine revelation and supernatural truths by definition are to be accepted by an authority.
He’s got you there too, with a duh. Truth claims are not litigatable. If your church claimed your Confessions are the work of the Holy Spirit, that’s the end of it. [But you avoid that.] Instead, however, you attack the Catholic Church’s claim of the Spirit guiding the magisterium. But that truth claim is not litigatable, and your attack on it makes your religion no more true.
Protestantism cannot ever meet that demand, by its own claims and admission. So your left with sheer fideism or stark rationalism, pick your poison.
Again, how do you know your canon is the correct one, your translations and interpretations of it true? You don’t, and indeed within Protestantism–leave out the Catholic Church–the disagreements [and resulting theologies] are rife.
These are all formal [and undeniable] observations.
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TOMMY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Quick! Scan CA for ‘Impartiale referea’ Make sure you query it up with lapsed internet 1.5 yr old self-deluded, wanna be. Tick Tock Tick Tock
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and besides the pig likes it
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Robert,
“They aren’t infallible.”
Right. And neither were those who followed the prophets, Christ, the apostles, or other divinely authorized teachers sent out. So personal fallibility of the submitting agent is a red herring.
“And once again we see the undermining and dismissal of Christ and the Apostles’ claims to authority..
– Not a dismissal. Just pointing out that Rome doesn’t get to claim to have that kind of authority when she can’t claim the same kind of inspiration for it.”
Again, you said “You’re still left to do all the interpreting on your own if you want to be a thoughtful religious person. At the end of the day, you are still submitting to your own understanding. And since your own understanding isn’t infallible, you are in the same boat.”
So yes, it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer.
“Who’s trying to change the Bible? If the best you can give me is “textual variants,” that’s lame. Even Roman Catholics accept that textual variants exist.”
“You do realize that the KJV, based on the Textus Receptus, has several passages that have since been shown to be later additions?” And it’s not like textual criticism is now a dead field.
“And who says the system can’t yield divine truth. Whenever we’ve interpreted Scripture accurately, we’ve yielded divine truth.”
Okay, so are any of these interpretations offered as irreformable and infallible by any of your bodies?
“And if one is enough, then here we go:”
Okay, so Protestantism has offered this as infallible dogma right? Oh, no, it hasn’t actually because it can’t without violating its own disclaimers. Semper reformanda. Provisional identification of the canon. Tentative teaching on inspiration and inerrancy. Very likely it has authority. Best we can do right now. Etc.
“Really. So you get past the fact that it is always possible that YOU might understand what Rome has said? You are infallible? By the same standard, buying into Roman Catholicism doesn’t get you anywhere unless you become infallible.”
Oy vey. My personal fallibility and your personal fallibility and being human has *nothing* to do with the argument, once again. Grant Rome’s claims are true. If so, I’m in a better position after buying into it – it was a good deal in that regard. Grant Protestantism’s claims, and more importantly, disclaimers are true. If so, I’m no better off after buying into it – nothing changed – it’s a bad deal.
“You think buying into Rome puts you into a better position even though you’ll admit that you might be mistaken about what Rome teaches.”
Yup. An NT believer who bought into Christ or the Apostles or those they ordained was in a better position even though they might be mistaken about what they teach at times. Your argument continually undermines the authority claims we see in the NT.
“By whose definition? If God says something to me, do I have to look for another to confirm it? What about Jesus. Why do I need Rome now but Jesus didn’t think it was necessary in his day?”
Sure, you could claim you are being spoken to by God and a modern day prophet. I would then have reason to consider submitting to you – you make a worthwhile claim at least. Of course then I would need to investigate the credibility of your claims (faith works with reason). That might sour things.
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Come on ponytail, don’t be like you are. Just remember back when you weren’t a deluded lapsed RC with an axe to grind. That brief period right after your baptism. Do you still have your confirmation picture? Maybe use that for a reference.
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sdb:
You keep misinterpreting sola scriptura (which I don’t think you’ll find in the WCF). It is the only final authority, not the only source of guidance. That is in the confession. Your repeated insistence that we fess up to not believing something we don’t believe is like someone badgering you about the fact a pope could get something wrong.>>>>>
It may be in the confession, but what is the confession? It is the confession that defines sola scriptura, not Scripture itself. I do understand sola scriptura, and I have come to realize it is something you guys made up. If it can’t be found in Scripture itself, then it cannot be a real thing.
No one lives by sola scriptura. There is no such animal. There is a bread alone, as in no one lives by bread alone, but by every Word that proceeds from the mouth of God. The One who said that to Satan is also the One who established the Church with its apostles, teachers, and other gifted men who were to teach others also.
Right there you have a Scripture plus a teaching magisterium set up by Christ Himself. It’s in the Bible.
You know, I have said that the pope can sin. Hence he must go to confession. That is Church teaching.
I have said that the pope is not always right. The idea that Catholics believe the Pope is always right about everything is a Protestant fabrication. Catholics do not believe that the pope is always right about everything all the time. You know that, yet you keep making that claim. Why do you do that? It’s kinda’ crazy, actually, and I generally ignore it because, well, it’s such a lame thing to allege.
No matter how many times you are told that, you keep trotting that claim out – Catholics think the pope is never wrong. Heck! The pope doesn’t even think that about himself!
Yet this will continue to be thrown up in my face.
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Ali
Posted October 14, 2015 at 9:19 am | Permalink
Bottom line, though, mermaid, sincere question – what would be your suggestion to end the error of Mary idolatry and return the focus to Jesus . Aren’t you jealous for that.
“You know, you can travel all over the world and you’ll see idols and shrines to Mary everywhere. I mean, I’ve seen them in churches, cathedrals, in houses, and I’ve seen them in hotel lobbies, I’ve seen them in hotel rooms. I’ve seen them in restaurants. I’ve seen them along the highways, byways and paths up in the mountains in the most remote places”>>>>>>
Howdy, Ali,
I don’t know who you are quoting, here. Is that something you wrote? Yes, there are images of Christ and of the saints all over the world. It shows where the Catholic Church has been – all over the world preaching the Gospel.
What is not seen very often are Presbyterian churches. They are pretty scarce. Maybe you need to get to work. I am serious, here. There are billions of people on the earth, many of whom have never even heard the name of Jesus.
If you have the Gospel, then why not share it with others? I do not see much zeal for the Gospel here among the Old Lifers. Maybe you could change the culture around here by introducing people to Jesus.
Now, on to your challenge. First of all, I have noticed that you guys would rather call pretty much all of Christianity pagan false religion than learn what the Church teaches. So, that is the place to start. What does the Church teach? She does not encourage or condone idolatry in any way, shape, or form.
Then, like I have said, you guys are idolators. Why do I say that? You accept the Church’s teaching that the human heart is an idol factory. Calvin picked up on that. You know what? Even after removing what he considered to be idols, the human heart is still an idol factory. So, maybe the problem was not the images after all. The problem is the human heart.
Why not focus on your own idolatry?
What would I suggest you do about your own idols? Admit that you have them. Listen to the words of Jesus and focus on your own heart and your own religion’s failings. I think that by focusing so much on what you consider to be the failings of others you are in danger of missing out on who Jesus is in your own lives and churches. If you are always running others down, finding fault, and twisting the words of others as is done her on this blog, then how could Jesus be pleased with that?
Elizabeth Scalia wrote a good little book on idolatry. Why not read it? It is called Strange Gods : Unmasking our Everyday Idols. You may find her words helpful. It may show you what Catholics actually believe about idolatry.
“The book explores many idols that enslave and ensare us, false gods that are more familiar than we first think. Each day we devote ourselves to glowing iPhones and charismatic leaders, well-crafted plans and the allure of popularity. We obsessively chase friendships, approval, and comfort while reserving most of our attention for that greatest idol of all: ourselves. To paraphrase Flannery O’Connor, the idol we favor may be our own.”
Unmasking Our Everyday Idols: An Interview with Elizabeth Scalia – Brandon Vogt
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Darryl, right, in the the words of The Bryan “it all came down to submitting to the church that Jesus Christ founded,” a common refrain among cradles and callers alike. Ecclesia over scriptura. But what happens when the bare apostolic chain gets broken? Like Chinese Whispers, the gospel spoken into the ears of the apostles sounds very different by the time you get to Francis. But who cares, so long as one can say he’s got the right hand of fellowship with the one who gave Jesus his left foot?
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MWF: The idea that Catholics believe the Pope is always right about everything is a Protestant fabrication. Catholics do not believe that the pope is always right about everything all the time. You know that, yet you keep making that claim.
I understand. Catholics do not believe that the pope is always right about everything all the time.
What I don’t understand is how a Catholic is supposed to tell when the pope is right and when not.
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TVD,
Your statements are neither formal (in that they don’t consist of valid syllogisms) nor are they undeniable (in that I deny them).
Far better to admit to your partisan ways. We all see them. You can come out from behind the tree now.
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“Right there you have a Scripture plus a teaching magisterium set up by Christ Himself. It’s in the Bible.”
Sola Scriptura is a slogan. The doctrine is defined in the WCF. As part of the *magisterial* reformation we do not reject history, tradition, teaching authority of church, or light of nature as seen in item I quoted for you. Belgic conf says the same. You are still misconstruing the reformed doctrine of scripture as defined by our confessions.
“Catholics do not believe that the pope is always right about everything all the time. You know that, yet you keep making that claim. Why do you do that? It’s kinda’ crazy…”
I did not make that claim. I said that your repeated misconstrual of the reformed doctrine of scripture is equivalent to the false claim that RCs believe the pope can never err. I wrote,
” Your repeated insistence that we fess up to not believing something we don’t believe is like someone badgering you about the fact a pope could get something wrong.”
Maybe our impartial referee can decide if this statement is making up a claim about the pope.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 14, 2015 at 8:10 pm | Permalink
MWF: The idea that Catholics believe the Pope is always right about everything is a Protestant fabrication. Catholics do not believe that the pope is always right about everything all the time. You know that, yet you keep making that claim.
I understand. Catholics do not believe that the pope is always right about everything all the time.
What I don’t understand is how a Catholic is supposed to tell when the pope is right and when not.>>>>
You can’t understand everything, Brother Jeff. 😉
Just kidding! You do know a lot, so it’s good to see you admit you can’t figure it all out.
I think Pope Francis is pretty fantastic myself. Of course his Peronismo shows at times, and that is not so great. He loves Evangélicos, and that is great.
His Laudato Si’ is pretty fantastic. It reminds me a lot of what Francis Schaeffer tried to do with his Pollution and the Death of Man.
In general, I think people are pleasantly surprised to find out that the Pope is Catholic.
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@cvd
Science isn’t rationalism.
Divine revelation always seemed to accompanied by signs and wonders. Christianity is fundamentally empirical- prophecies come true, jesus rises from the dead and appears toba bunch of people, and apostles point to this event as evidence. We have to trust their testimony.
Science also relies on trust. You have to take experts at their word. You aren’t measuring the charge of a quark.
Science is provisional but makes absolute statements I can trust. “Energy is conserved” and other lawsvof thermodynamics. No conflict with accepting (and living by) an absolute accepted provisionally.
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@ Cletus:
Sure, I understand that you recognize at some level that there is a difference between ontology and epistemology. However, your subsequent comments show that you have an inconsistent understanding of that difference.
So I’m not dinging you for being wrong in all your principles, but for not seeing the implications of your principles.
Here’s one example:
JRC: “Protestants claim that the Word of God is absolutely true, but that it is highly likely beyond any reasonable doubt that the Protestant canon is the correct identification of the Word of God. ”
CVD: Why should I even buy the first claim as absolute truth based on Protestantism’s disclaimers?
Your skepticism is an ontological/epistemological confusion. The word of God is true because God cannot lie. Selah.
The disclaimers are all at the epistemological level. That you would take the disclaimers as evidence against God’s truthfulness shows your confusion.
CVD: And saying your identification of the canon is “highly likely” just buttresses the point – nothing rises above tentative opinion. “The Word of God is absolutely true…we kinda think we know what it is, well at least for right now”. And this is the bedrock for SS?
And this shows that you really have a hard time wrapping your thoughts around inductive inference. You believe, wrongly, that all provisional truth rises no further than the level of “we kinda think, well at least for right now.”
That’s a completely wrong understanding of the nature of induction. What’s missing is an understanding of degrees of confidence. An inductively derived proposition with 99.9999% confidence (which is the confidence level required in particle physics) is not certain, but neither is it “well kinda sorta.”
Let’s take two examples to help clarify.
And the point here is that provisional knowledge is not necessarily “kinda knowledge.” Your conflation of those two concepts shows a significant misunderstanding.
And the point here is that provisional knowledge can be modified by new information without entirely invalidating the old. As an extension, the more severe the proposed modification, the stronger the evidence needed for it.
So it is with Scriptural study. The discovery that John 8.1-11 is not found in early manuscripts modifies our understanding of what the original text of John was. But it does not throw out the entire Gospel, nor does it make our general knowledge of the canon a “kinda” knowledge.
If you want to talk intelligently about sola scriptura, you must first master the language of inductive inference.
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So there’s your answer Jeff on how to tell whether the magisterium is correct or not: “In general, I think people are pleasantly surprised to find out that the Pope is Catholic.”
The nice little naive Roman Catholic mermaid says so.
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Jeff, I bow to your intelligence and charity.
The blog is yours if you want it.
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JRC: “However, the Roman Catholic system is every bit as provisional as the Protestant. ”
CVD: This is the same error Robert and others continue to make. I’ve never claimed RCs are not human or do not interpret and make judgments. That does not mean the tu quoque applies because such an observation is freely and readily admitted.
OK, I’ll put it in formal syllogistic form, and you can identify the error.
First, the axioms.
(1) The RC believes that whatsoever the pope teaches ex cathedra is infallible (Vat 1.4.4) and that the canons of ecumenical councils ratified by popes are infallible:
— Lumen Gentium 25.
(2) The ground of the Catholic’s belief are the words of the Catholic church about itself.
(3) The Catholic has confidence in those words because of various Motives of Credibility.
Now, the argument
Theorem: The Catholic’s knowledge is always provisional, meaning contingent upon knowledge not known with absolute certainty, and which might be revised upon new information
More precisely: If a Catholic believes proposition P upon the authority of the Church, his knowledge of P can be no more certain than (1-p(~1))*(1-p(~2))*(1-p(~3))*(1-p(M))
where p(~1) is the probability that lumen gentium and Vat 1 are incorrect,
p(~2) is the probability that the Catholic has misunderstood lumen gentium and/or Vat 1,
p(~3) is the probability that the Catholic has incorrectly accepted the Motives of Credibility,
and p(M) is the probability that the Catholic has incorrectly understood the church to teach P when it does not.
Why? Well, because 1-p(x) computes the probability that x is correct. And if each of 1, 2, 3, and ~M are uncorrelated events (which they are), then the probability of all being correct is given by the standard multiplication law. QED.
What does this mean? It means that if new information comes that disproves the Motives of Credibility, then the Catholic will revise his belief in P (or the grounds of his belief). Say hello to Robert and Sean.
Or if new information comes that shows the Catholic he has misunderstood the church teaching, then he will revise his belief in P.
If new information comes that shows that Vat 1 is a defect in the Church’s understanding of itself (wouldn’t that be fun papal encyclical?), then he will revise his belief in P.
These are the hallmarks of provisional knowledge: less than mathematical certainty, and the potential for revision. You can’t escape them by making a move to “accept church authority and get infallible teaching.” All that does is to rest your provisional knowledge on a single foundation whose weakest point is your understanding of the Motives of Credibility.
Tu. Quo. Que.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 14, 2015 at 9:46 pm | Permalink
JRC: “However, the Roman Catholic system is every bit as provisional as the Protestant. ”
CVD: This is the same error Robert and others continue to make. I’ve never claimed RCs are not human or do not interpret and make judgments. That does not mean the tu quoque applies because such an observation is freely and readily admitted.
OK, I’ll put it in formal syllogistic form, and you can identify the error.
First, the axioms.
(1) The RC believes that whatsoever the pope teaches ex cathedra is infallible (Vat 1.4.4) and that the canons of ecumenical councils ratified by popes are infallible:
Bishops, teaching in communion with the Roman Pontiff, are to be respected by all as witnesses to divine and Catholic truth. In matters of faith and morals, the bishops speak in the name of Christ and the faithful are to accept their teaching and adhere to it with a religious assent. This religious submission of mind and will must be shown in a special way to the authentic magisterium of the Roman Pontiff, even when he is not speaking ex cathedra; that is, it must be shown in such a way that his supreme magisterium is acknowledged with reverence, the judgments made by him are sincerely adhered to, according to his manifest mind and will. His mind and will in the matter may be known either from the character of the documents, from his frequent repetition of the same doctrine, or from his manner of speaking.
— Lumen Gentium 25.
(2) The ground of the Catholic’s belief are the words of the Catholic church about itself.
(3) The Catholic has confidence in those words because of various Motives of Credibility.
Now, the argument
Theorem: The Catholic’s knowledge is always provisional, meaning contingent upon knowledge not known with absolute certainty, and which might be revised upon new information
More precisely: If a Catholic believes proposition P upon the authority of the Church, his knowledge of P can be no more certain than (1-p(~1))*(1-p(~2))*(1-p(~3))*(1-p(M))
where p(~1) is the probability that lumen gentium and Vat 1 are incorrect,
p(~2) is the probability that the Catholic has misunderstood lumen gentium and/or Vat 1,
p(~3) is the probability that the Catholic has incorrectly accepted the Motives of Credibility,
and p(M) is the probability that the Catholic has incorrectly understood the church to teach P when it does not.
Why? Well, because 1-p(x) computes the probability that x is correct. And if each of 1, 2, 3, and ~M are uncorrelated events (which they are), then the probability of all being correct is given by the standard multiplication law. QED.
What does this mean? It means that if new information comes that disproves the Motives of Credibility, then the Catholic will revise his belief in P (or the grounds of his belief). Say hello to Robert and Sean.
Or if new information comes that shows the Catholic he has misunderstood the church teaching, then he will revise his belief in P.
If new information comes that shows that Vat 1 is a defect in the Church’s understanding of itself (wouldn’t that be fun papal encyclical?), then he will revise his belief in P.
These are the hallmarks of provisional knowledge: less than mathematical certainty, and the potential for revision. You can’t escape them by making a move to “accept church authority and get infallible teaching.” All that does is to rest your provisional knowledge on a single foundation whose weakest point is your understanding of the Motives of Credibility.
Tu. Quo. Que.
You keep leaving out the truth claim of guidance by the Holy Spirit on which the Catholic Church’s truth claims for its magisterial authority. You just wasted your time and anyone else’s who bothered to watch you labor mightily under your false premise.
That’s a formal critique. 😉
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TVD: You keep leaving out the truth claim of guidance by the Holy Spirit on which the Catholic Church’s truth claims for its magisterial authority.
That’s (1) in different words.
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Tom,
Suppose you explain for us all how the “truth claim of guidance by the Holy Spirit” would somehow make all of the other uncertainties go away?
That’s a formal request.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 14, 2015 at 10:37 pm | Permalink
Tom,
Suppose you explain for us all how the “truth claim of guidance by the Holy Spirit” would somehow make all of the other uncertainties go away?
That’s a formal request.
I imagine that’s exactly why infallibility remains more a theological extrapolation [aside from a thimbleful of items] rather than a list of dozens or hundreds of ex cathedras.
[Pardon my Wiki.]
I was reading up on the Assumption thing, and in that case, it seemed the faithful were asking for some sort of ruling, and Pope Pius the Whatever canvassed the bishopry and his pronouncement leans heavily on Tradition dating back to the early church.
“Thus, the Magisterium can be exercised by the People of God in its entirety (under certain conditions), by the entire College of Bishops, and by the Pope. When Pope Pius wrote Munificentissimus Deus, he invoked all three. A few years earlier, he had written a letter to the bishops titled Deiparae Virginis Mariae, in which he reviewed the fact that many people, religious and lay, had asked various Popes over the previous hundred years to make the belief in the Assumption into a matter of dogma. He asked the bishops what they and their dioceses thought:
Apparently, this was answered with a strong “Yes”; in Munificentissimus Deus the Pope reports:
And again, Jeff, I submit you guys are making theological dealbreakers out of what are not dealbreakers. Until you come up with an official pronouncement that you’re going to hell if you don’t believe in the Assumption, once again it’s schism over trivia. I don’t think you have a very strong Biblical warrant for that.
The real question remains why your version of the Christian religion differs so radically from the Eastern Orthodox–the sacraments, Eucharist, priesthood, etc. The real case for your [radical] Reformation needs to be made against the Catholic Church as of 1053. The papal primacy issue is not foundational–you don’t have the Eucharist.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 14, 2015 at 9:41 pm | Permalink
So there’s your answer Jeff on how to tell whether the magisterium is correct or not: “In general, I think people are pleasantly surprised to find out that the Pope is Catholic.”
The nice little naive Roman Catholic mermaid says so.>>>>
Aw! How sweet! That’s the nicest thing you’ve ever said to me.
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Jeff:
I just want to you to acknowledge that yours is the minority view, even amongst Catholic translators. >>>>>
How post modern of you, Jeff, to think that the wisdom of this century trumps the wisdom of the ages and centuries of the Holy Spirit’s leading. I am supposed to trust Protestant scholarship why?
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Mermaid,
How post modern of you, Jeff, to think that the wisdom of this century trumps the wisdom of the ages and centuries of the Holy Spirit’s leading. I am supposed to trust Protestant scholarship why?
How about we go back to the fact that you are supposed to trust your church and your church hasn’t excommunicated any RC scholar for making the same conclusions regarding the text that Jeff is talking about.
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Tom,
V1:
Wherefore, by divine and catholic faith all those things are to be believed
which are contained in the word of God as found in scripture and tradition,
and which are proposed by the church as matters to be believed as divinely revealed,
whether by her solemn judgment
or in her ordinary and universal magisterium.
Since, then, without faith it is impossible to please God [21] and reach the fellowship of his sons and daughters, it follows that
no one can ever achieve justification without it,
neither can anyone attain eternal life unless he or she perseveres in it to the end.
The RC must believe all that the church teaches or one cannot reach the fellowship of his sons and daughters, be justified, or attain eternal life.
The Assumption certainly qualifies as one of those things declared (it seems, one never can be too sure when it comes to Rome).
So while Rome has an out for non-RCs, if you’re a RC, you MUST believe in the Assumption to go to heaven. Reject it or treat it as a matter indifferent, and there is no justification for you and no heaven.
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JRC: ..,yours is the minority view, even amongst Catholic translators.
MWF: I am supposed to trust Protestant scholarship why?
Underwater life is hard on the eyesight.
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Robert, but that’s from when they believed the doctrine. The doctrine hasn’t changed. But no one believes it (and don’t have to).
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Cletus,
Cletus,
Right. And neither were those who followed the prophets, Christ, the apostles, or other divinely authorized teachers sent out. So personal fallibility of the submitting agent is a red herring.
No it’s not. If you can’t get me out of the human condition in which I lack omniscience and my beliefs are in some sense always provisional until I see God face to face, then by submitting to Rome you aren’t doing anything different or less provisional than me submitting to the words of Christ. If you advocated blind obedience, then maybe you might be doing something different, but that’s not what you’re advocating (directly, at least).
And the fundamental problem with your argument is that you think that I have no rational, non-fideistic reason to submit to Scripture or even affirm the canon apart from somebody saying, “Here is my infallible declaration of what the canon is.” We have “motives of credibility” for the Bible that are no less certain or uncertain than the ones Rome offers. The Roman church’s claim to infalliblity doesn’t make things less fideisti or less rationalistic. It’s just another claim you have to take into account and which, if true, the witness of the Spirit must finally convince you of if you don’t want to make yourself the real authority.
What I find quite ironic is that in you and many other RC apologists want to pooh-pooh Protestants as having provisional submission to whatever agrees with their own interpretation of Scripture when that is EXACTLY what you have when you deny the self-authentication of the Holy Spirit. You are submitting to your best understanding of the evidence, and then when you ask the church for illumination/faith, she gives it to you in baptism. The priority in submission, however, is your understanding. That’s actually not the Protestant way. The Spirit self-authenticates in and through the evidence, so faith and reason really do work together in Protestantism in a way that is simply impossible for Roman Catholicism. For Rome, it seems that at least when it comes to epistemological matters, first reason does its thing, then you make a choice to join the church, and then the Holy Spirit starts His work. If anything, that seems to be the logical order of things epistemologically if not the order in time.
The whole idea of natural law building an entire system of thought using unaided human reason apart from the illumination of the Holy Spirit confirms my point.
So yes, it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer.
In one sense yes, in one sense no. The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes. But since you are all about claims here, the NT believer was in a far different position. The claims to which He submitted were not only divine authority but also special Holy Spirit inspiration—which was the very mechanism that grants authority to the Apostles. Further, the Apostles had actual real miracles to back up that claim. Not invisible Eucharistic transformations, crying statues, or partially liquefying relic blood. Actual he-was-dead-and-now-he’s-alive miracles.
I’m dismissing Rome’s claim, in part, because they’re too weak.
One thing I still don’t get is why if the claim itself is so important to be neither a rationalist nor a fideist, you don’t automatically disregard Rome as well because Rome doesn’t make the strongest claim (at least officially) possible. It would seem better to find all the candidates that claim to speak with divine authority and divine inspiration on all matters and then look at their so-called motives of credibility. Rome shouldn’t be able to get out of the gate if the claim to making authoritative pronouncements is as necessary as you say it is.
I said: “And who says the system can’t yield divine truth. Whenever we’ve interpreted Scripture accurately, we’ve yielded divine truth.”
You said: Okay, so are any of these interpretations offered as irreformable and infallible by any of your bodies?
Um, it’s a self-evident proposition. If God speaks in Scripture and He always speaks truth, then the right reading of His speech yields truth. If God speaks to Abraham and He obeys, then Abraham has rightly read what God has said. He has yielded the divine truth that you must obey God. And what is interesting is that God didn’t say to Abraham: “I am hereby making an infallible statement.” Abraham just knew that he should just leave Ur and go to Canaan. Does that make Abraham a fideist?
Okay, so Protestantism has offered this as infallible dogma right? Oh, no, it hasn’t actually because it can’t without violating its own disclaimers. Semper reformanda. Provisional identification of the canon. Tentative teaching on inspiration and inerrancy. Very likely it has authority. Best we can do right now. Etc.
Why does Protestantism have to preface it with: “This verse here is infallible dogma”? If Jeremiah is the Word of God, that is enough. It’s God speaking after all. God doesn’t need our help. When a prophet claimed to have received a message from God, were you the guy saying, “excuse me Jeremiah, can you please tell me whether you are offering this as infallible and irreformable dogma or not,” or “unless you formally present this as infallible and irreformable dogma, I can’t believe it because then I’d be a fideist”?
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Cletus,
Oy vey. My personal fallibility and your personal fallibility and being human has *nothing* to do with the argument, once again. Grant Rome’s claims are true. If so, I’m in a better position after buying into it – it was a good deal in that regard. Grant Protestantism’s claims, and more importantly, disclaimers are true. If so, I’m no better off after buying into it – nothing changed – it’s a bad deal.
Rome’s claims are insufficient to even be granted as true in theory. You don’t get to claim Apostolic authority without inspiration; it’s the inspiration that grants the infallibility of Scripture. Just ask Paul. And you certainly don’t get to claim that something has changed in your submission when you can’t infallibly identify what is infallible and what is not. And simply put, you can’t. As long as wildly divergent theological positions are all acceptable under Rome’s big tent—and they are—then I have no way of knowing with the certainty you demand what Rome has declared as infallible. At best I have “I’m probably correct that the Assumption has been infallibly determined as something I must believe for salvation.” But Tom is telling me that I’m wrong about that, and I’m quite certain that Tom could easily take the Eucharist anywhere. Heck, I’ve admitted that I’m a Protestant and have been welcome with open arms by RC priests.
The question isn’t what is better in theory. In theory, best of all is to see Jesus face to face. But that isn’t what Jesus has given us right now. You know what would be even better in theory than Rome’s claims—it would be for me to be God Himself because then I’d personally be omniscient. I guess that my deity is necessary for certainty, then. Your insistence on a concrete infallible declaration finally reduces to absurdity.
Yup. An NT believer who bought into Christ or the Apostles or those they ordained was in a better position even though they might be mistaken about what they teach at times. Your argument continually undermines the authority claims we see in the NT.
No, because I don’t make specious authority claims such as “we have divine authority, sometimes, but we’re not inspired like Jesus, Peter, or Paul was.”
No, because Jesus expected the Jews to know Isaiah was infallible even though there was no infallible canon declaration and even though not every manuscript of Isaiah was identical in the first century.
No, because I don’t affirm that submitting to Christ or the Apostles is the same as submitting to the church. And as long as Rome denies Apostolic interpretation, I don’t even have warrant to believe that submitting to the church is in any way identical or demands the same kind of “I’ll obey even when I don’t understand” submission.
I do believe that submitting to Jesus and the Apostles puts me in a better position than the Jew who didn’t, but it’s a great leap from that to putting my trust in a church that claims infallibility puts me in a better position than in Protestantism. You have to first establish that Jesus and the Apostles require the church to make claims of infallibility for itself. Even before we get off the ground in granting Rome’s claims in theory, we first have to figure out if Jesus believes they are necessary. Pretty much everybody agrees that if we are going to find the authentic words of Jesus anywhere, it’s going to be in the 4 Gospels. Even liberal scholars, though some of them might add a few words from the Gospel of Thomas. Okay, show me anywhere in that where Jesus said a church must make a claim of infallibility for you to be in a better position or to have irreformable dogma or to have non-fideistic or non-rationalistic warrant for faith.
And if you want to draw the parallel, I’m doing nothing different than that first-century person by submitting to the Apostles teaching in their writings than the first-century person did in submitting to them in person. In fact, in many ways I am better off than the first-century person. If I lived in the first-century, I might forget what was preached if I never received a letter. I don’t have that problem now. I have it in writing.
“Oh, but how do you know those were writings.” How did the first century believer know that Paul actually wrote Romans. The courier, even if he was Paul’s friend could have been lying. You could send someone to ask Paul, but maybe you die before you can get confirmation. Maybe Paul wrote it but was out of his mind at the time. Maybe you misheard Paul and he actually said, “No, I actually didn’t write Romans.” Maybe we’re living in the matrix and neither Paul, nor Jesus were real. I mean, if you want to be a radical skeptic and demand that “We hereby infallibly say X” is necessary to be a non-rationalist or a non-fideist, it gets really absurd after a while.
Sure, you could claim you are being spoken to by God and a modern day prophet. I would then have reason to consider submitting to you – you make a worthwhile claim at least. Of course then I would need to investigate the credibility of your claims (faith works with reason). That might sour things.
Good. So then a Protestant has every reason to consider submitting to the Bible. Or at least to consider submitting to any passage of the Bible where the speaker is clearly God, or we get a “Thus saith the Lord” or something like that. That might give us a truncated canon, but hey, you’re the one that says that Rome is better if it can propose even one infallible dogma.
“But textual criticism” Oy vey! Jesus expected the Jews to submit to the OT even apart from His own telling them to, and there were textual issues back then. Did Jesus endorse pure rationalism or fideism? If he did, then you’re in trouble cause you keep arguing against it.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 15, 2015 at 7:28 am | Permalink
JRC: ..,yours is the minority view, even amongst Catholic translators.
MWF: I am supposed to trust Protestant scholarship why?
Underwater life is hard on the eyesight.>>>>>
Jeff, if your theology specifically – and Christian theology in general – depends on a newer translation into English of an ancient Greek word, then you have a problem.
See the way that egalitarians are working hard to influence Bible translation so they can change your theology. They understand the game that is being played, and they are playing it. Go back even into the ancient Greek texts, add usages that were never understood to be there, and then reflect that in post modern translations.
They even achieved some success with more gender inclusive language in the ESV. Now, it may be justified linguistically, but that is not the only reason egalitarians push for gender inclusive language. Change the translation, and you change the theology as well. That is how it works in Protestantism.
Anyone can play that game, and all kinds of people do. Of course, the JWs are the worst, but they do it, too. Modernists do it. Remember how they translated the word “virgin” from Isaiah 7:14 as “young girl” so as to water down the doctrine of the virgin birth?
The Church doctrine of the Immaculate Conception is not dependent on English translations of the word “kecharitomene”, not even Catholic ones.
Remember what Paul said about bickering about the meanings of words.
2 Timothy 2:14
14 Remind them of these things, and charge them before God[a] not to quarrel about words, which does no good, but only ruins the hearers.
Click to access kephale-article.pdf
You know, ad hominem is not becoming to you, Jeff. I expect it from Brother Hart, but from you? Well, you have a wonderful day, Brother Jeff. You are helping me become a stronger Catholic, so I thank you.
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Mermaid, theology actually depends for Jeff on the Bible (not what some pontificus maximus says). In that case, finding and using the best manuscripts matters.
It’s not a matter of interpretation.
So when exactly were you a Protestant?
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Looks like gullibility makes it way all the way to the top of the hierarchy:
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/what-francis-does-vs-what-he-says/
Sure, invite a cardinal who has been squishy on moral issues and the family to a Synod on the Family.
I guess we can be comforted that one could probably argue that the synod isn’t infallible.
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Mermaid,
The proper translation of the term in question is actually a secondary issue. Any number of words can be used to translate terms from other languages. There is no mathematical correlation of this word in Greek must be and can only be translated by this term in English.
Jeff’s point isn’t that we should base our theology on the new English translation but on what the actual meaning of the Greek word is. And even modern RC scholars agree that you can’t get “full of grace” in the traditional RC sense from the term. That’s the point. And since they haven’t been excommunicated, their view must be completely acceptable.
Which means you should stop using the word as some kind of airtight proof for the case.
Of course you are right that the Immaculate Conception depends on more than just the one word. Now, make your biblical case for the doctrine and explain why “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God” actually means “all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God—except Mary.”
There’s absolutely no theological or biblical reason why Mary had to be sinless in order to be the mother of the Son of God. The only reason for it is Mariology that developed apart from any sound tie to the actual words of the apostles.
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Robert, I appreciate your zeal and your concern. I really do. I will let you have the last word for now, dear brother. Thank you for your comments.
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sdb,
I agree faith works with reason – that’s not rationalism so pointing out apostles and Christ gave evidence for their credibility does not speak to the issue – if they hadn’t given such evidence for their claims (or refused to make the claims in the first place), it would be irrational and fideistic to assent to them in faith, just as it would have been if someone randomly submitted to them blindly and just happened to get lucky because they ended up being correct – I wouldn’t have been justified in doing so. Now, are supernatural truths and divine revelation equivalent to natural truths and revelation? Do supernatural truths and divine revelation have to be taken on the authority of another?
Jeff,
“The word of God is true because God cannot lie.”
You’re positing the Word of God exists in that statement. That was my point. You’re then claiming the identification of it is what remains provisional. But you can’t just exempt your first statement from the same parameters. Your confessions teach the Word of God exists just as much as they teach the identification of the canon. Both teachings remain provisional and tentative, by the confessions’ own disclaimers.
“An inductively derived proposition with 99.9999% confidence”
Divine revelation and supernatural truths are infallible. They are not matters of opinion or likelihood, nor are they equivalent to natural revelation. Saying the best you can ever get with Protestantism is “highly likely probability” gives up the game already – nothing proposed can ever rise above probable opinion by its own admission.
“And the point here is that provisional knowledge can be modified by new information without entirely invalidating the old.”
Sure it “can be” but Protestantism gives no guarantee that it actually will be modified without invalidating the old. Semper reformanda does not exclude abrogation or nullification.
“The discovery that John 8.1-11 is not found in early manuscripts modifies our understanding of what the original text of John was”
Right. So the identified “final judge” changed and remains ever in-flux – a changing final standard is no standard at all. Scripture interprets scripture and yet changes in the identification of Scripture is supposed to be taken as irrelevant or immaterial to that doctrine – I fail to see why anyone should buy that position as coherent. You want to have the identified canon as the final standard for doctrines to be judged against, yet the extent, scope, authority, inspiration, inerrancy of that identified canon (all doctrines in and of themselves) cannot be judged against it.
“The Catholic’s knowledge is always provisional, meaning contingent upon knowledge not known with absolute certainty, and which might be revised upon new information”
Yup.
“Tu. Quo. Que.”
Once again, we all interpret and judge and are human. This has been admitted repeatedly yet for some reason you and Robert can’t get past it. Grant Protestantism’s claims are true. I buy into it but I am no better afterwards than I was before. Grant RCism’s claims are true. I buy into it and am better that I was before. Observe a random NT person. He grants the Apostles’ claims are true and buys into it. He’s better off than he was before – he’s not just “likely sure” what they then teach by virtue of their authority is right, even as he obviously must interpret their teaching – if he was only “likely sure”, that would nullify the very nature of the authority claims he submitted to in the first place. Now another random NT person submits to random street corner Jew admitting he can offer nothing better than provisional opinion and tentative interpretations and teachings of divine revelation and the OT. The NT person buys into it – he’s no better off than before given the teacher’s upfront disclaimers. That’s the point as our impartial observer pointed out – “You keep leaving out the truth claim of guidance by the Holy Spirit on which the Catholic Church’s truth claims for its magisterial authority.” Protestantism rejects the claim.
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It seems the OL cycle is past due for a 2K post, so allow me to interject a sincere question regarding the following from the Heidelblog today….”Sovereign Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church, Davenport, IA will be hosting a “Modern Art and Ancient Faith” conference…. The presentation will focus on appreciating and understanding modern art from a Christian perspective.”
Wouldn’t the notion that there is, or could be, a distinctly “Christian” perspective on modern art cause some heartburn amongst 2K folks?
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Robert,
“The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes.”
Bingo. Game over. Now we can move on from the red herrings.
“The claims to which He submitted were not only divine authority”
Bingo again. Divine authority was one of the claims. Which Protestantism rejects.
“Um, it’s a self-evident proposition.”
So why then is Protestantism so hesistant to infallibly or irreformably define anything, including these “self-evident propositions”? Because it cannot without violating its own disclaimers.
“Does that make Abraham a fideist?”
So Protestants are claiming to interact and communicate with God as Abraham did?
“If Jeremiah is the Word of God, that is enough.”
And Protestantism refuses to infallibly or irreformably identify Jeremiah as the Word of God. Because it can’t given its disclaimers.
“When a prophet claimed to have received a message from God,”
Yep he made the claim. Then he gave evidence for the credibility of those claims.
“Rome’s claims are insufficient to even be granted as true in theory.”
Oh lovely. So we’ll just beg the question to disprove the other position.
“No, because I don’t make specious authority claims such as “we have divine authority, sometimes, but we’re not inspired like Jesus, Peter, or Paul was.””
More evasion. Your argument was “people misunderstand, therefore RC authority claims cannot be true or provide any surer ground than Protestantism”. Such an argument undermines the authority claims in the NT.
“I do believe that submitting to Jesus and the Apostles puts me in a better position than the Jew who didn’t,”
Bingo again. So we can move on from the red herrings.
“Pretty much everybody agrees that if we are going to find the authentic words of Jesus anywhere, it’s going to be in the 4 Gospels. Even liberal scholars, though some of them might add a few words from the Gospel of Thomas.”
More articles of faith reduced to probable opinion. “Pretty much everyone agrees (well except for those who don’t)”. That’s the best your system can hope to offer. Semper reformanda. Provisional identification of the canon. Tentative teaching on inspiration and inerrancy. Very likely it has authority. Best we can do right now. Etc. And of course words that were previously considered “authentic” by Jesus are now asterisked in the bible. So your argument cannot even get off the ground in the first place given your principles, let alone demand interaction or refutation.
“If I lived in the first-century, I might forget what was preached if I never received a letter. I don’t have that problem now. I have it in writing.”
So the church was useless and anchorless from Pentecost to 100AD until all of Scripture was written down and thoroughly disseminated, then it could actually kick into gear and activate. More fascinating implications from the SS position.
“Jesus expected the Jews to submit to the OT”
Rome expects Christians to submit to Scripture. That hardly gets you SS or Protestant claims.
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Cletus van Damme
Posted October 14, 2015 at 1:14 pm | Permalink
So divine revelation (infallible by definition) is reduced to “shrug, this is the best we can do at the moment”. >>>>
To summarize. In Reformed theology we have 1.) fallible rules of faith and practice alongside the infallible Word of God. 2.) A Bible that is not all that clear in its meaning, except on some things. 3.) A Bible that includes only the books that the WCF fallibly decided belong in the canon of Scripture. What else?
We have fallible manuscripts that are judged according to how early in Church history they were produced. We have doctrines based on translations that ignore the input of the early Greek fathers – the ones who would be the best resource for showing how those texts are to be understood, since they were the native speakers, after all. The majority has decided to over ride such tradition.
So, what is Protestant faith based on again? The Holy Spirit seems to be missing in action during the whole process, but post modern linguistic theory is pretty important.
Noam is smiling with approval.
…and I am either dishonest, stupid, or both for noticing.
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Cletus pitches a shutout. Formally speaking, of course.
Cletus van Damme
Posted October 15, 2015 at 2:52 pm | Permalink
Robert,
“The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes.”
Bingo. Game over. Now we can move on from the red herrings.
“The claims to which He submitted were not only divine authority”
Bingo again. Divine authority was one of the claims. Which Protestantism rejects.
“Um, it’s a self-evident proposition.”
So why then is Protestantism so hesistant to infallibly or irreformably define anything, including these “self-evident propositions”? Because it cannot without violating its own disclaimers.
“Does that make Abraham a fideist?”
So Protestants are claiming to interact and communicate with God as Abraham did?
“If Jeremiah is the Word of God, that is enough.”
And Protestantism refuses to infallibly or irreformably identify Jeremiah as the Word of God. Because it can’t given its disclaimers.
“When a prophet claimed to have received a message from God,”
Yep he made the claim. Then he gave evidence for the credibility of those claims.
“Rome’s claims are insufficient to even be granted as true in theory.”
Oh lovely. So we’ll just beg the question to disprove the other position.
“No, because I don’t make specious authority claims such as “we have divine authority, sometimes, but we’re not inspired like Jesus, Peter, or Paul was.””
More evasion. Your argument was “people misunderstand, therefore RC authority claims cannot be true or provide any surer ground than Protestantism”. Such an argument undermines the authority claims in the NT.
“I do believe that submitting to Jesus and the Apostles puts me in a better position than the Jew who didn’t,”
Bingo again. So we can move on from the red herrings.
“Pretty much everybody agrees that if we are going to find the authentic words of Jesus anywhere, it’s going to be in the 4 Gospels. Even liberal scholars, though some of them might add a few words from the Gospel of Thomas.”
More articles of faith reduced to probable opinion. “Pretty much everyone agrees (well except for those who don’t)”. That’s the best your system can hope to offer. Semper reformanda. Provisional identification of the canon. Tentative teaching on inspiration and inerrancy. Very likely it has authority. Best we can do right now. Etc. And of course words that were previously considered “authentic” by Jesus are now asterisked in the bible. So your argument cannot even get off the ground in the first place given your principles, let alone demand interaction or refutation.
“If I lived in the first-century, I might forget what was preached if I never received a letter. I don’t have that problem now. I have it in writing.”
So the church was useless and anchorless from Pentecost to 100AD until all of Scripture was written down and thoroughly disseminated, then it could actually kick into gear and activate. More fascinating implications from the SS position.
“Jesus expected the Jews to submit to the OT”
Rome expects Christians to submit to Scripture. That hardly gets you SS or Protestant claims.
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” are supernatural truths and divine revelation equivalent to natural truths and revelation?”
Similar but not identical. Epistemic frameworks warranted for deriving knowledge from nature are warranted for deriving knowledge from special revelation.
“Do supernatural truths and divine revelation have to be taken on the authority of another?”
Depends. If you are Abraham, no. Same with science. If you are the one who collected the data no. If you are reading the scientific paper. Yes.
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James Young, “Grant Protestantism’s claims are true. I buy into it but I am no better afterwards than I was before.”
You have assurance of eternal life and don’t have to worry about purgatory. Yup.
Funny how your side doesn’t worry about sin.
Actually, it’s not funny.
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Cletus,
Bingo again. Divine authority was one of the claims. Which Protestantism rejects.
We don’t reject divine authority, we just don’t demand that you submit to the church simply because the church says so, or that divine authority requires a specific claim from the church. The understanding is that divine authority is invested in His Word because the Word says “Thus saith the Lord.” The logical implication of that is that an interpretation of that Word has divine authority when it is a correct one, not because of the interpreter but because of the nature of that Word itself.
What you want is some kind of infallible certainty as to when the church has rightly interpreted the Word, but that is something that not even Rome can’t give you. At best it can offer you a claim that this was rightly interpreted and this wasn’t, but since it is so hard to determine when such a claim has been made, that’s really not a meaningful advantage. So maybe when Rome can come back with an infallible canon of statements we can talk about the advantage. As long as “well, Rome can give at least one,” I can do the same thing.
It strikes me in this discussion how very insecure Rome is. Rome can’t issue a proclamation and then trust the Spirit to convince His people that they’ve done their work rightly. No, Rome needs to add a claim of infallibility. It’s evidence of a lack of faith in the Spirit’s work when God’s Word is preached. But then again, the preaching of the Word of God is largely irrelevant to the Roman system anyway. You could probably do away with it entirely and still go on just fine.
So why then is Protestantism so hesistant to infallibly or irreformably define anything, including these “self-evident propositions”? Because it cannot without violating its own disclaimers.
A self-evident proposition does not need to be infallibly or irreformably defined. It defines itself. That’s the nature of a divine proposition. God doesn’t have to preface His statement “I am the Lord, there is no other” with “I’m offering this as an irreformable and infallible statement.
So Protestants are claiming to interact and communicate with God as Abraham did?
To have the Word of God is to have God Himself. We interact and communicate with God as Abraham did to the extent that we have His Word.
And Protestantism refuses to infallibly or irreformably identify Jeremiah as the Word of God. Because it can’t given its disclaimers.
We don’t have to infallibly or irreformable identify Jeremiah as the Word of God. He’s perfectly able to do it Himself:
Jer. 1:9–10 Then the Lord put out his hand and touched my mouth. And the Lord said to me,
“Behold, I have put my words in your mouth.
10 See, I have set you this day over nations and over kingdoms,
to pluck up and to break down,
to destroy and to overthrow,
to build and to plant.”
Yep he made the claim. Then he gave evidence for the credibility of those claims.
When Rome can raise someone from the dead, walk on water, or some other such real miracle that those in whose stead she claims to stand did, then we can talk motives of credibility.
Oh lovely. So we’ll just beg the question to disprove the other position.
Not begging it. Just pointing out that I have no reason to credibly consider your claim, if the claim is necessary, unless you claim the EXACT same inspiration for Rome that you claim for the apostles. You don’t have Apostolic authority without Apostolic inspiration.
More evasion. Your argument was “people misunderstand, therefore RC authority claims cannot be true or provide any surer ground than Protestantism”. Such an argument undermines the authority claims in the NT.
No it doesn’t, because the Spirit authenticates the message of Jesus and the Apostles. Does the Spirit authenticate, confirm, and clarify the speaking of Rome when Rome speaks?
More articles of faith reduced to probable opinion. “Pretty much everyone agrees (well except for those who don’t)”. That’s the best your system can hope to offer.
Typically I do not like arguments of probability. But surely it would be fideistic for me to simply accept Rome’s claims because Rome says so. Rome claims to represent Jesus. I’m just looking for a non-viciously fideistic way to find out where Jesus says that only a church that makes a claim of infallibility for itself can give the individual more than provisional opinion, especially since the non-infallible individual only can have provisional opinion of what the church is and what it teaches.
The only way to do that is to give me the actual words of Jesus that tell me such a thing. And the only place to have any certainty that we have the words/teachings of Jesus is the Bible, a topic that the vast majority of scholars accept, even RC ones.
What you are showing is that you can’t give me any place where Jesus says that faith is only proper if His church makes a claim of infallibility. Since you claim to follow Jesus, you have just ruled out Rome as a plausible candidate for demanding something that Jesus didn’t. Again, Jesus expected the Jews to receive the OT without an explicit claim to infallibility in every book.
Semper reformanda. Provisional identification of the canon. Tentative teaching on inspiration and inerrancy. Very likely it has authority. Best we can do right now. Etc.
You really like the word provisional don’t you. I think that word does not mean what you think it means. Your choice that Rome is the true church is provisional, so you can’t make a leap from there to certainty. The only institute that can have certainty is the Magisterium, so you aren’t helping me because you’re not the Magisterium and neither am I.
And of course words that were previously considered “authentic” by Jesus are now asterisked in the bible.
They’re asterisked in your Bible as well. Was the Vulgate then wrong to consider John 8:1–11 the words of Jesus. Looks like it. What happened to infallibility?
So your argument cannot even get off the ground in the first place given your principles, let alone demand interaction or refutation.
Then why are you talking to me?
So the church was useless and anchorless from Pentecost to 100AD until all of Scripture was written down and thoroughly disseminated, then it could actually kick into gear and activate. More fascinating implications from the SS position.
No. My point is that for the individual believer, it’s actually far better to have the Word written. The average believer in the first century didn’t have immediate access to the Apostles, and by your own system the people ordained after them did not have the same inspiration or infallibility as the Word written. So a system in which I can merely ask the local fallible bishop a question, if I’m lucky, is less effective than one in which I have the actual Words of the Apostle written. This is so clear just from history itself. As soon as the Apostles wrote a letter, it was copied and kept.
In fact, if the church really can do what you say it can do, then Scripture is completely irrelevant. The Apostles wasted their time. Which just goes to show that this idea that the church must be infallible is a later addition. If the church is infallible, there’s no real need for a written record of anything. And yet from the beginning the church kept and submitted to the Word, and said you had to do so in all circumstances. Not so with the church.
Looks like SS is turning out to be more tenable than we thought.
Rome expects Christians to submit to Scripture. That hardly gets you SS or Protestant claims.
Rome expects Christians to submit to Scripture based not on the claims of Scripture but on Rome’s own claims. Jesus did not ever say “submit to Isaiah because I say so.” He assumed that the Jews understood that they had to submit to Isaiah apart from Him saying anything about it. After all, there was no infallible canon declaration before Jesus came.
Whether or not it can specifically give us everything SS or Protestantism, it does obliterate this idea that you must have an infallible declaration of canon in order to be warranted in giving the assent of faith to the teaching of Scripture. And it does lift up the notion that God doesn’t need the help of an infallible declaration from His church. What Isaiah said was enough. He didn’t need the pope running around after Him.
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Peter, tmi if you think I’m going to talk about my bowels.
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Mermaid,
…and I am either dishonest, stupid, or both for noticing.
Not dishonest or stupid. But ignorant of what is actually taught and practiced. But the good thing is because you are intelligent, you can learn:
We have fallible manuscripts that are judged according to how early in Church history they were produced.
That’s not correct. A manuscript produced at a later date may be better than one produced earlier. In and of itself, the date when a manuscript was copied doesn’t tell you how good it is. Textual criticism isn’t a matter of saying, “Well, where this 2nd century manuscript disagrees with the 4th century manuscript, the 4th century one must be wrong.” In many cases, in fact, a later manuscript is better. And on this text critics agree no matter their theological persuasion.
We have doctrines based on translations that ignore the input of the early Greek fathers – the ones who would be the best resource for showing how those texts are to be understood, since they were the native speakers, after all. The majority has decided to over ride such tradition.
This is also wrong. Textual criticism makes ample use of the early Greek and Latin Fathers. Manuscripts of the Vulgate, the Ehtiopic, the Syriac, and many other early translations are consulted for assistance in rendering the languages into modern languages. Biblical quotes from the Fathers are a very important source for confirming manuscripts.
So, what is Protestant faith based on again? The Holy Spirit seems to be missing in action during the whole process, but post modern linguistic theory is pretty important.
None of the founding text critics were postmoderns. Many of them were Roman Catholics (Erasmus), and there principles are followed today. But in any case, this is a strange criticism given that you theological tradition is largely indebted to Plato and Aristotle.
At least in the Reformed tradition, the Holy Spirit is all over the place. He works to illumine His Word, confirm His truth, and so on. If you really were Reformed at one point, you should know this.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 15, 2015 at 4:42 pm | Permalink
James Young, “Grant Protestantism’s claims are true. I buy into it but I am no better afterwards than I was before.”
You have assurance of eternal life and don’t have to worry about purgatory. Yup.
Funny how your side doesn’t worry about sin.
That’s a lie, Dr. Hart.
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p3s1c1a8.htm
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(Petros, yes. Hiccup.)
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Z – understood. Thx. Just wanted to give a heads-up on that to the 2K police.
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Robert, you are a very nice gentleman, and I appreciate your efforts and your kind words. Don’t mean to blow you off when you have tried so hard to communicate with me.
I would rather just leave our conversation as is. No offense meant.
Just to clarify. I have said this before, but let me say it again. I have studied Reformed theology, but never officially joined a Reformed church or officially declared myself to be Reformed. I liked and still like a lot of what I have learned from guys like you. I have been an Evangelical all my life, and I am pretty sure I said that. I am now a Catholic and see no reason to go back. It’s not your fault. 🙂
Hey, thank you.
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Petros, believe it or not, none of us card actual cards or have secret hand shakes.
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MWF: Jeff, if your theology specifically – and Christian theology in general – depends on a newer translation into English of an ancient Greek word, then you have a problem.
That’s fine, but you have major facts that need to be addressed, not dodged, for your own peace of mind. Those are
(1) All Catholic translations from the Greek translate κεχαριτωμένη as “highly favored.”
(2) Those Catholic translations bear the imprimatur of the Church. The NABRE in fact is also approved by the USCCB for liturgical use.
So “Protestant bias” and “post modern egalitarian translations” are beside the point.
For several rounds now, you have dodged (1) and (2) by attacking the messenger. Come, let us reason together. Let facts shape your opinions.
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JRC: “The word of God is true because God cannot lie.”
CVD: You’re positing the Word of God exists in that statement.
No, actually, that’s not so. The quoted statement is the major premise of an argument, distinct from the minor premise: “There exist written copies of the Word of God.”
As a general rule of logic, declaration of a predicate does not entail existence. Such declarations can be vacuously true.
E.g.: “All people on Mars need food to live.”
This statement is true, but currently has no referents.
E.g.: “All cell phones in the room should be turned off”
This statement does not presume that there are any cell phones in the room.
So go back and re-read that discussion keeping in mind the distinction between predication and declaration of existence. Or what amounts to the same, the distinction between major premise and minor. I think you’ll find that the statement “the word of God is true because God cannot lie” is a predicate, not a declaration of existence. As such, it does not depend upon any particular method of finding the Word of God.
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CVD: Once again, we all interpret and judge and are human. This has been admitted repeatedly yet for some reason you and Robert can’t get past it. Grant Protestantism’s claims are true. I buy into it but I am no better afterwards than I was before. Grant RCism’s claims are true. I buy into it and am better that I was before.
We’re definitely at an impasse here, because you are finding that you have to repeat yourself (frustrating for you) and Robert and I are finding that we have to repeat ourselves (frustrating for at least me). Let me try to articulate the impasse from my POV.
(1) We three agree that Catholic knowledge of truth is provisional — subject to refinement based on new information, and fallible because of multiple potential points of failure in understanding.
(2) It seems clear to me, and I think Robert, that if Catholic knowledge of truth is provisional, it follows that the Catholic does not have absolute certainty of truth. For if he did, then his knowledge would not be provisional.
(3) And you seem to argue that because the Protestant has provisional truth knowledge, he “is in no better position than before”; that is, that he has only “sorta” knowledge.
(4) It would then follow that the Catholic, who also has provisional knowledge, should be assessed by you as being “in no better position than before” (before what? coming to faith is my guess?) and having only “sorta” knowledge.
(5) But you balk and claim instead that the Catholic is in a better position than before.
And that’s the impasse from my POV. You seem to not notice that your argument applies to yourself.
So where are we not communicating?
CVD: Observe a random NT person. He grants the Apostles’ claims are true and buys into it. He’s better off than he was before – he’s not just “likely sure” what they then teach by virtue of their authority is right, even as he obviously must interpret their teaching – if he was only “likely sure”, that would nullify the very nature of the authority claims he submitted to in the first place.
I’m seeing a lot of unclarity in this paragraph. Let’s take our random NT person — say, Simon Magus. He (apparently) grants the Apostles’ claims are true and believes them (Acts 8.13).
But also apparently, he misunderstood Peter’s teaching (Acts 8.17-24).
So he believed a set P of propositions that was different from the set A of propositions actually taught be the apostles. And he was not alone — there are many instances in the Gospels and epistles where followers of Christ simply misunderstood him. (E.g., the comi-tragic discussion of bread in Matt 16.11).
So, no. The act of accepting an authority as an absolute authority does not give the believer absolute truth knowledge of any proposition that he believes has been taught.
Your paragraph that I quoted conflates the sentences that the authority teaches with the sentences that the hearer thinks he understands.
You can imagine that since I teach highschoolers, I deal on a regular basis with people who hear me say “draw a free-body diagram for each force problem” and think it means “draw a free-body diagram only in problems where the directions explicitly say to do so.”
Hardness of hearing is not limited to spiritual matters.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 15, 2015 at 11:49 pm | Permalink
MWF: Jeff, if your theology specifically – and Christian theology in general – depends on a newer translation into English of an ancient Greek word, then you have a problem.
That’s fine, but you have major facts that need to be addressed, not dodged, for your own peace of mind. Those are
(1) All Catholic translations from the Greek translate κεχαριτωμένη as “highly favored.”
(2) Those Catholic translations bear the imprimatur of the Church. The NABRE in fact is also approved by the USCCB for liturgical use.
So “Protestant bias” and “post modern egalitarian translations” are beside the point.
For several rounds now, you have dodged (1) and (2) by attacking the messenger. Come, let us reason together. Let facts shape your opinions.>>>>>>
Jeff, don’t mean to annoy you. It just happens.
1.) I understand about newer Catholic translations. I read the NABRE every day, following the daily Bible readings for Mass. I have discovered that Catholics are encouraged to read the Bible every day.
2.) The problem isn’t so much the translation as the interpretation of certain passages. Now maybe I misunderstood you, but it sure seemed like you were trying to say that since the proper translation that everyone now uses of κεχαριτωμένη is “highly favored”, there is no justification to continue insisting that it means “full of grace.” I explained why I disagree.
3.) Protestant bias and post modern translations are another point. I think it was a good point. Protestants tend to think that the meaning of a doctrine is in the word itself somehow. Change the meaning of the word, and you can change the doctrine. That’s a Protestant thing.
4.) Attack the messenger? I felt like you were attacking me! Your attitude surprised me. Apologies accepted. 🙂
5.) You know, Jeff, my mind is so at peace, you would not believe it. I’m under that Catholic spell you guys like to talk about. It makes me happy! To my way of thinking, a spell has been broken. I hope that puts your mind at peace, and I do thank you for your concern.
So, if you respond, I will let you have the last, last word – probably.
You have a wonderful rest of the evening, Brother Jeff
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Jeff, isn’t the debate between us and James Young simply two competing systems that the other side won’t accept and we don’t have an umpire to adjudicate.
James Young has a theology of papal infallibility that results in provisional knowledge for him and that is dubious to us.
You/I have a theology of Scripture’s infallibility and the sovereignty of the Holy Spirit that results in provisional knowledge for us and that is dubious to James Young.
But here is why the Bible-only argument is superior. First, Roman Catholics also believe the Bible is infallible. Timothy Cardinal Dolan just appealed to the Bible minus tradition last week about marriage.
Second, Protestants believe that the papal argument is inferior because historical research of the papacy shows how arbitrary papal authority is.
If Roman Catholics want to argue that biblical authority is arbitrary, then they violate teaching of the magisterium.
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I have to comment on this:
Protestants tend to think that the meaning of a doctrine is in the word itself somehow.
Actually, that’s not exactly true. The meaning of a doctrine, at least for Reformed Christians, is drawn from the meaning of the word in its context, the wider biblical teaching on the same theme, the good and necessary consequences of such passages, etc. In other words, we’re not traditional dispensationalists.
Change the meaning of the word, and you can change the doctrine.
If a doctrine is built on the meaning of a particular word, but it turns out that our understanding of the word is incorrect, then that means the doctrine has no grounding in that particular word. That doesn’t necessarily entail that the doctrine is incorrect, just that you can’t use that word or passage anymore to support it.
The fact that κεχαριτωμένη does not mean “full of grace” in the traditional RC sense does not in itself invalidate the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. It means that if you want to believe that doctrine, you can’t use the term as biblical proof for the dogma. If you want to ground it biblically, you have to look elsewhere.
But of course, such biblical grounding is impossible, as far as I can tell.
But this illustrates a fundamental problem when you make the church infallible. The church develops a doctrine/dogma, it’s supporting evidence is found to be non-existent, but you keep the dogma anyway. A great example is how much the understanding of the papacy depends on the Donation of Constantine. Everyone agrees that the document is a forgery, but instead of altering the doctrine, it just hangs there.
Rome wants to talk about motives of credibility, evidences of truth. But the fact that they hold onto dogma after the evidence has been invalidated proves that evidence is really irrelevant.
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Petros, you think we have 2k police? Hurl, we don’t even have blog moderators. And that confab is in Iowa. Can anything good come out of Iowa?
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“Ken Golden, organizing pastor of Sovereign Grace Orthodox Presbyterian Church, will be the speaker. He holds a Masters in Fine Arts from Pratt Institute, Brooklyn, New York.”
Pastor Golden is an exceptional preacher and I’m sure he will have some interesting things to say. Notice that he is educated in the field, and not pretending he knows stuff because he has worldview. I may attend.
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@CW – hey, I surf OL because I’m looking for absolute 2K, Reformed, purity. Then, lo and behold, DGH opts out and Muddy gets squishy. Egads, what’s an eeeevangelical to think?
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Pete, Unification happens.
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Petros, MG will be getting a home visit soon. Ve have our vays.
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Zrim: murdering
most Christ-denying probably is much more subtle than that
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“what’s an eeeevangelical to think.”
The next time will be the first time.
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Ali would be a grammar Nazi if not for her lack of grammar.
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ha. 🙂 true probably
but doesn’t that make you the grammar Nazi, Muddy (though with partiality,of course) 🙂
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@Zrim – quick, please, do something to protect DGH’s bowels. The good Pastor Golden says (on HB) “This is an exciting opportunity…. will tackle questions such as…“what constitutes good Christian art?”
Next thing you know, Muddy will be leading the conference in a rousing rendition of “Shine, Jesus, Shine”!
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In Pastor Golden’s defense, the BCO requires pastors of church plants to use the word “exciting.”
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Contra many RCs who want to absolutely bifurcate doctrine and practice/discipline, looks like this RC Bishop gets what we’ve known for a long time as a result of dealing with liberals:
Chapati: “Practice inevitably shapes belief.”
http://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2015/10/16/us-bishop-warns-of-anxiety-at-popes-family-summit
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Robert:
If a doctrine is built on the meaning of a particular word, but it turns out that our understanding of the word is incorrect, then that means the doctrine has no grounding in that particular word. That doesn’t necessarily entail that the doctrine is incorrect, just that you can’t use that word or passage anymore to support it.>>>>>>
Explain the meaning of ἐδικαίωσεν in Romans 8:30.
That word in that context a problem for Reformed theologians. Hence the internal debates – strife, actually – about the relationship of faith vs. works.
Now, the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception is an important dogma, but it what is found in Romans 8:30 is essential for our salvation. Wouldn’t you agree?
When we stand before Christ, we will not be asked if we accepted the traditional translation ofκεχαριτωμένη – which is a direct address, hence the idea that it is a title is certainly not out of the question, and tradition is not by definition a bad thing.
We will have to face this. The judgment will be based on our good works. With them, you get heaven. Without them, you get hell Your standard theology on justification by faith alone is not qui”te right and no one can really articulate it coherently and consistently.
Yes, I know you believe that good works follow justification by faith along, but you still have trouble accepting the broader usage of “justification” that it obviously has.
Even here, where guys should have it clear that good works are a necessary result of justification, just drop in the idea that you have to do good works or you won’t get into heaven, and watch the fur fly.:
Matthew 25:31-46English Standard Version (ESV)
The Final Judgment
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 And he will place the sheep on his right, but the goats on the left. 34 Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, I was a stranger and you welcomed me, 36 I was naked and you clothed me, I was sick and you visited me, I was in prison and you came to me.’ 37 Then the righteous will answer him, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you drink? 38 And when did we see you a stranger and welcome you, or naked and clothe you? 39 And when did we see you sick or in prison and visit you?’ 40 And the King will answer them, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did it to one of the least of these my brothers,[a] you did it to me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me no food, I was thirsty and you gave me no drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not welcome me, naked and you did not clothe me, sick and in prison and you did not visit me.’ 44 Then they also will answer, saying, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or naked or sick or in prison, and did not minister to you?’ 45 Then he will answer them, saying, ‘Truly, I say to you, as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to me.’ 46 And these will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”
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Robert,
“We don’t reject divine authority”
By your own disclaimers you do. If you actually claimed divine authority, your bodies would claim it and by virtue of that authority infallibly or irreformably define articles of faith. They would not admit the best they can do is give provisional teachings and highly likely human opinions nor give constant caveats of semper reformanda.
“The understanding is that divine authority is invested in His Word because the Word says “Thus saith the Lord.””
Here are the claims and teachings presupposed in that statement: God’s Word exists. It only exists in written form. The scope and extent of that written form is the identified Protestant canon and the verses contained therein Robert today takes as authentic. This canon is inspired. This canon is inerrant. This canon is closed and public revelation has ended. This canon is sufficient and authoritative. This canon is the sole final infallible authority. The question as to the truth of these statements is all answered by extra-Scriptural means. Yet all extra-scriptural means are fallible, tentative, and provisional by your own admission, so the answering of these questions can yield nothing more than opinion. To avoid that, there would need to be an extra-Scriptural source or sources identified as divinely protected from error, infallible. But again, Protestantism rejects that possibility. Without a divine authority to promulgate these teachings, there is no reason to think any of these teachings are divinely protected from error and thus none of them reach above human opinion. Taught within the context of Protestantism, that’s all you can ever hope to get.
“So maybe when Rome can come back with an infallible canon of statements we can talk about the advantage. As long as “well, Rome can give at least one,” I can do the same thing.”
But you can’t do the same thing is the problem. If you could, Protestantism wouldn’t make its disclaimers.
“No, Rome needs to add a claim of infallibility.”
Of course it does. That’s inherent to divine authority and articles of faith. That you think this is meaningless or “insecure” just proves the point – articles of faith are impossible to define in Protestantism, only opinions.
“We interact and communicate with God as Abraham did to the extent that we have His Word…We don’t have to infallibly or irreformable identify Jeremiah as the Word of God. He’s perfectly able to do it Himself:”
More question begging.
“When Rome can raise someone from the dead, walk on water, or some other such real miracle that those in whose stead she claims to stand did, then we can talk motives of credibility.”
Not relevant at the moment. Making the claim in the first place is the relevant point.
“Just pointing out that I have no reason to credibly consider your claim, if the claim is necessary, unless you claim the EXACT same inspiration for Rome that you claim for the apostles. ”
Nope. If you want to evaluate the merits or consistency of a system, you grant the truth of the claim it makes and then examine it, as I’ve been doing with both systems. You don’t beg the question and run off with your marbles.
“No it doesn’t, because the Spirit authenticates the message of Jesus and the Apostles.”
And people still misunderstood the message. Therefore Jesus and the Apostles had no authority or those who submitted to them were no better off than the Jew submitting to a random teacher on the corner. That’s your argument.
“But surely it would be fideistic for me to simply accept Rome’s claims because Rome says so.”
Yes, of course it would be. The assent to Rome’s claims is a mean between fideism and rationalism. It can’t be proven and compel assent (such would empty the act of faith of any merit and reduce articles of faith to nothing different than mathematical proofs), it can only be shown as reasonable given multiples converging threads of evidence to still give room for the assent of faith. The former avoids rationalism, the latter fideism.
“especially since the non-infallible individual only can have provisional opinion of what the church is and what it teaches.”
Oy vey. You’re doing it again. I thought we were done with the red herrings.
“And the only place to have any certainty that we have the words/teachings of Jesus is the Bible, a topic that the vast majority of scholars accept, even RC ones.”
More question begging. And the “vast majority of scholars” don’t have divine authority, as you would readily admit, so again, we see the identification of the words/teachings of Jesus in the Bible is nothing more than a matter of opinion in your system.
“Your choice that Rome is the true church is provisional, so you can’t make a leap from there to certainty.”
The Red Herring strikes again. NT believers made a choice to submit to Christ or the Apostles and had to interpret their teachings. Therefore Christ and the Apostles could only teach provisional opinions. This is your argument.
“The only institute that can have certainty is the Magisterium, so you aren’t helping me because you’re not the Magisterium and neither am I.”
So only Christ and the Apostles were certain of their teaching. This is exactly what I mean by nothing changing before or after assent in Protestantism – there’s no “certitude of faith” warranted in the system, by its own claims and admission (and arguments by its defenders).
“Then why are you talking to me?”
I was referring to the specific point you raised. Which is why I didn’t engage it.
“The average believer in the first century didn’t have immediate access to the Apostles”
Nope, but he had access to the church.
“is less effective than one in which I have the actual Words of the Apostle written.”
So the church wasn’t very effective until 100AD.
“In fact, if the church really can do what you say it can do, then Scripture is completely irrelevant.”
Not at all. Church, Scripture, and Tradition are parallel authorities (again).
“Rome expects Christians to submit to Scripture based not on the claims of Scripture but on Rome’s own claims. ”
Have to identify Scripture first. More question begging.
“Jesus did not ever say “submit to Isaiah because I say so.””
So Jesus didn’t teach with divine authority or make authority claims?
“After all, there was no infallible canon declaration before Jesus came. ”
Correct. Which is why we unsurprisingly see different Jewish sects with very different understandings of the extent/scope of the canon as well as its interpretation. Sounds familiar.
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Mermaid,
Why is the meaning of ἐδικαίωσεν a problem in Romans 8:30 for Reformed theologians? I’ve never heard that before. In fact, I can read the Greek New Testament and I have no idea what you’re talking about. I just looked it up.
In fact, the problem is for RCs. It’s in the aorist, which generally refers to a punctiliar moment, i.e., one justification and that’s it. That does not fit with growth in justification or the notion of falling in and out of justification. Further, the entire verse states that if you have one of any of those elements, you have them all. Thus, there is no such thing as a justified person whom God does not glorify. But in RCism, hell is full of people who were once justified but then committed mortal sin and never returned.
We will have to face this. The judgment will be based on our good works. With them, you get heaven. Without them, you get hell Your standard theology on justification by faith alone is not qui”te right and no one can really articulate it coherently and consistently.
Actually, the Reformed confessions affirm a judgment according to works:
5. We cannot by our best works merit pardon of sin, or eternal life at the hand of God, by reason of the great disproportion that is between them and the glory to come; and the infinite distance that is between us and God, whom, by them, we can neither profit, nor satisfy for the debt of our former sins, but when we have done all we can, we have done but our duty, and are unprofitable servants: and because, as they are good, they proceed from his Spirit; and as they are wrought by us, they are defiled, and mixed with so much weakness and imperfection, that they cannot endure the severity of God’s judgment.
6. Notwithstanding, the persons of believers being accepted through Christ, their good works also are accepted in him; not as though they were in this life wholly unblamable and unreprovable in God’s sight; but that he, looking upon them in his Son, is pleased to accept and reward that which is sincere, although accompanied with many weaknesses and imperfections.
WCF 16
What we deny is that you can speak of works meriting forgiveness or eternal life, even works done in a state of grace. It’s the whole idea of meriting that we recoil against. In Roman Catholicism, at least if Ludwig Ott is to be believed, you can merit an increase in grace condignly (i.e., growth in justification) and you can merit congruently the grace of justification after mortal sin, the restoration of sanctifying grace, and they can merit congruently for others these things AND the first actual grace for a nonbeliever.
Grace that is merited is not grace. Grace and merit are opposing concepts in justification, at least according to Paul.
Yes, I know you believe that good works follow justification by faith along, but you still have trouble accepting the broader usage of “justification” that it obviously has.
This is unclear. The theological doctrine of justification is held in common across Scripture—faith alone, no merit in the individual even when the merit is by grace. David had grace and the Spirit and he was justified apart from works. The actual Greek term for justification (from the dikai-word group) may have different meanings depending on its context—a legal declaration in Paul, for example; in James it refers to demonstration of faith/belief/living faith. But the Greek term translated “justify, justification, justified” is not equivalent to the doctrine of justification. That’s not the way Protestants read the Bible, at least in the Reformed tradition.
Even here, where guys should have it clear that good works are a necessary result of justification, just drop in the idea that you have to do good works or you won’t get into heaven, and watch the fur fly.:
It all depends on what you mean by “do good works or you won’t get into heaven.” Calvin talked about good works as the way in which we come into possession of heaven. Think about it like a path: justification puts you on the path, but the path still must be traveled to get to your destination. The real question is whether justification puts you on the path permanently or whether you can jump off of it and need a new or recovery of justification to get back on. The other question is whether while you are on that path you can chose alternative paths of superogatory merit so as to become a saint in the end.
No one will be justified without good works. The question is whether the believer’s good works are in any sense meritorious for their justification. Scripture is adamant that the answer to that question is no.
In justification (assuming you don’t die immediately, in which case you’d go to heaven straight away), God pardons us fully and puts us on the path. He puts us on it in such a way that we will go forward. At times we may go a step back, but we will never go so far back that we are off the path. And when we get to the door of heaven, God isn’t going to say, because you walked that path of good works, I’m letting you in. You’re walking of the path has nothing to do with meriting your heavenly citizenship in the first instance or the last. God declares you a citizen of the kingdom, and because of that, you press toward the kingdom, and you don’t stop because God won’t let any eternal ruin come to His children. He really does love us that much. He really isn’t this cosmic failure who really wants to some people to maintain their justification but then won’t do what is necessary for them to maintain it.
You don’t get heaven without your doing good works, but the reason you get heaven is not because of your good works. Rome denies this, except in the case of babies who die, as far as I can tell.
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Robert
Posted October 16, 2015 at 2:22 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
Why is the meaning of ἐδικαίωσεν a problem in Romans 8:30 for Reformed theologians? I’ve never heard that before. In fact, I can read the Greek New Testament and I have no idea what you’re talking about. I just looked it up.>>>>>
Where is sanctification?
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Mermaid,
Where is sanctification?
Why does Paul have to mention sanctification specifically, and why do you think it’s a problem that Paul doesn’t?
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Robert:
In fact, the problem is for RCs. It’s in the aorist, which generally refers to a punctiliar moment, i.e., one justification and that’s it.>>>>>
Why is sanctification often in the aorist tense, then, since it is an ongoing process until we become like Christ?
See, my point is that some dogmatic insistence that the aorist always be a punctiliar action – and that’s it – doesn’t really fit in many, many NT cases. Of course, you know that.
Take a close look at the text I mentioned – Romans 8:29,30. Notice that the golden chain passes from effectual calling, to justification, and then right on to glorification.
Isn’t it clear that the process of being conformed to the image of God’s Son by the grace of God and the power of the indwelling Holy Spirit is in view, but the word “justified” is used instead of “sanctified”?
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Jeff,
Again, “Protestants claim that the Word of God is absolutely true, but that it is highly likely beyond any reasonable doubt that the Protestant canon is the correct identification of the Word of God.
The first claim is absolute truth; the second is provisional….The word of God is true because God cannot lie.”
You’ve made 4 claims Protestantism makes. The Word of God is absolutely true. The Word of God exists. God cannot lie. The Protestant canon is the correct identification of it. You assert the 4th claim is provisional while the 3 others are not. I’d like to know why the other 3 are not subject to the same disclaimers you give the 4th.
“But you balk and claim instead that the Catholic is in a better position than before.”
Yes, because of the claims of the system adhered to. One system claims divine authority to identify and define articles of faith (infallible and irreformable by definition), i.e. it claims infallibility. One system does not only not make that claim, it actively rejects it. Hence one system asserts any teaching it offers is provisional, highly probable, likely, tentative, and so on – it never will, nor can it, assert any teaching as divine revelation over and instead of mere human opinion. One system asserts semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. One system rejects semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. That is why I said a person buying into one system is better off than before, while another buying into the other is no better than before, despite the fact that both persons must choose and judge beforehand, as well as interpret afterwards.
Notice in all of this, that the fallibility of the submitting agent or the fact he must interpret said teachings has *nothing* to do with the argument, any more than the fallibility of the submitting agent or the fact he must interpret teachings had *anything* to do with the divine authority of prophets, Christ, the apostles, and those that were sent in their promulgating of infallible and irreformable teaching and articles of faith, as opposed to merely provisional or “highly likely” teachings and opinions.
“there are many instances in the Gospels and epistles where followers of Christ simply misunderstood him.”
Precisely. That you still think this observation is germane shows the argument is either still not being conveyed properly by myself or not grasped by you.
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Cletus van Damme:
You’ve made 4 claims Protestantism makes. The Word of God is absolutely true. The Word of God exists. God cannot lie. The Protestant canon is the correct identification of it. You assert the 4th claim is provisional while the 3 others are not. I’d like to know why the other 3 are not subject to the same disclaimers you give the 4th.>>>>
I say there is a 5th tacit assertion. The Church got it wrong about the canon for hundreds of years.
How do Protestants avoid saying something like: The Holy Spirit, in effect, allowed the Church to be mistaken and misled all that time until clearer heads prevailed.
Even more than that, the Holy Spirit allowed the NT writers and even Jesus Himself to quote from and refer to non canonical books as though they were the very Word of God.
What would the Holy Spirit have done if the Reformers had not come along to fix things. Why, most of Christianity would still be using the wrong canon if they had not settled things once and for all.
Wait a minute…
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Robert
Posted October 16, 2015 at 4:19 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
Where is sanctification?
Why does Paul have to mention sanctification specifically, and why do you think it’s a problem that Paul doesn’t?>>>>
Oh, come on, Robert. It messes up your nice, neat ordo.
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Mermaid,
Why does it mess up my ordo. We don’t claim and have never claimed that Romans 8:30 gives a comprehensive ordo, nor is that the only text we use. So, no it doesn’t mess up our ordo.
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Robert
Posted October 16, 2015 at 6:39 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
Why does it mess up my ordo. We don’t claim and have never claimed that Romans 8:30 gives a comprehensive ordo, nor is that the only text we use. So, no it doesn’t mess up our ordo.>>>>
So, what good is the Golden Chain, then, as a way to defend your ordo? It is not complete. It is a broken chain with a missing link if sanctification is left out.
R.C. Sproul realizes that is a problem, but he solves it by going to v. 29 to claim that sanctification is found there. It would seem that it is much easier to say that “justification” has a broader meaning than just the forensic act at the time when a person believes in Christ. It can include sanctification as well, which in this passage it clearly does.
Your use of Scripture and even the Greek language is way, too slick. It does not seem like you want to discover the truth, but rather to use Scripture to defend your fallible rules of faith and practice. One of those rules is that thou shalt never confuse justification and sanctification. Well, the Apostle Paul was not familiar with that rule. Saint James even less so.
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Mermaid,
So, what good is the Golden Chain, then, as a way to defend your ordo? It is not complete. It is a broken chain with a missing link if sanctification is left out.
I’m trying to be nice, but this is one of the most ridiculous comments I’ve ever seen. I’t like saying, don’t use John 1 to defend the doctrine of the Trinity because the personhood and deity of the Holy Spirit isn’t mentioned there.
R.C. Sproul realizes that is a problem, but he solves it by going to v. 29 to claim that sanctification is found there. It would seem that it is much easier to say that “justification” has a broader meaning than just the forensic act at the time when a person believes in Christ.
I don’t care what is easier, I care what is right.
It can include sanctification as well, which in this passage it clearly does.
Let’s assume R.C. is correct. How does that mean we have to place sanctification into justification? He clearly would not think so.
Your use of Scripture and even the Greek language is way, too slick.
Does this, translated, mean “I, Mermaid can’t read Greek so now I have to start making stuff up?”
It does not seem like you want to discover the truth, but rather to use Scripture to defend your fallible rules of faith and practice.
Now I cry foul. Jeff has pointed it out to rightly that approved RC translations don’t render Luke 1 with “full of grace” anymore. You pass by that because it doesn’t fit your narrative of the IC, and now you accuse me of not wanting to discover the truth! You need to come up for air.
One of those rules is that thou shalt never confuse justification and sanctification. Well, the Apostle Paul was not familiar with that rule. Saint James even less so.
And ironically, I own at least one commentary by a Roman Catholic scholar who agrees that Paul and James are not teaching the same thing.
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James/Cletus,
By your own disclaimers you do.
Where do Protestant confessions say “we do not believe divine authority exists”? What is denied is that a statement of the church has divine authority automatically simply because the church says it is.
If you actually claimed divine authority, your bodies would claim it and by virtue of that authority infallibly or irreformably define articles of faith.
We don’t claim automatic divine authority for our statements, but that hardly means we reject it. And as far as articles of faith, we don’t need to infallibly or irreformably define them, as if that is something that the church must do. We have “thus saith the Lord.” Where does Jesus say such declarations are required in order to believe the church has divine authority?
But you are getting at something here: And that is that unlike Rome, Protestants do not ask believers to put their faith in the church. Part of the reason you are getting all hung up is that you think we have to put our faith in the church. That’s assumed without being proven.
They would not admit the best they can do is give provisional teachings and highly likely human opinions nor give constant caveats of semper reformanda.
What’s the alternative? Give infallible statements that the church doesn’t really understand, which no one follows or is expected to follow, and then later on interpret them in a way clearly at odds with what the Magisterium said in the original historical context?
I said: “The understanding is that divine authority is invested in His Word because the Word says “Thus saith the Lord.””
You replied: Here are the claims and teachings presupposed in that statement: God’s Word exists.
It’s a claim that Jesus evidently endorsed, because He expected the Jews to know and believe God’s Word existed even though there had been no infallible declaration: God’s Word exists.
It only exists in written form.
Actually, my statement itself doesn’t say that. But since in theory both you and I agree it does exist in written form, the burden is on you to prove that it exists elsewhere, especially since you’ve yet to give me a canon of tradition.
The scope and extent of that written form is the identified Protestant canon and the verses contained therein Robert today takes as authentic.
Actually, for the purpose of this discussion, since you think being able to proffer only one infallible dogma is sufficient, I’ll be happy to limit it to all specific statements “Thus saith the Lord.”
This canon is inspired. This canon is inerrant. This canon is closed and public revelation has ended. This canon is sufficient and authoritative. This canon is the sole final infallible authority. The question as to the truth of these statements is all answered by extra-Scriptural means. Yet all extra-scriptural means are fallible, tentative, and provisional by your own admission, so the answering of these questions can yield nothing more than opinion.
The Holy Spirit self-authenticating His Word is not an extrascriptural means, for He works in and through it. Tell me, why is the self-authentication of the Spirit insufficient for the Bible but the self-authentication of the church is sufficient for the church? Motives of credibility? We have those too. Are the motives of credibility infallible?
To avoid that, there would need to be an extra-Scriptural source or sources identified as divinely protected from error, infallible.
The extrascriptural source being infallible won’t help ME. I’m still fallible. This is not a red herring, as Jeff has demonstrated. People mishear things all the time, they misinterpret all the time, and aren’t always convinced if the one they misunderstand goes out of his way to explain himself. So, the extrascriptural means just gives more stuff to potentially misinterpret and misunderstand. It’s not the cure-all you think it is, as evidenced by the fact that the RC laity, by and large, clearly don’t believe the Magisterium or think the Magisterium really means something different.
But again, Protestantism rejects that possibility.
We don’t reject the possibility. It is logically possible for God to provide such a thing. The question is whether He has and whether He has said it is necessary. We don’t reject that it is possible for an extrascriptural (ie, non-written) source to be infallible. In fact, we know from Scripture that God has provided infallible, non-written revelation at various times (the call of Abram, for example). What we reject is that God has provided that in the form of the church and that we must have an infallible extrascriptural body in order to have sufficient warrant for faith or to recognize the voice of God when He speaks to these people.
Without a divine authority to promulgate these teachings, there is no reason to think any of these teachings are divinely protected from error and thus none of them reach above human opinion. Taught within the context of Protestantism, that’s all you can ever hope to get.
You aren’t better off in your system. Only the system, IE, the Magisterium is divinely protected from error, and then only on occasions that really can’t be discerned very easily. Further, the vast majority of RCs are not the Magisterium. This creates the problem that only the church/system can have certainty, not its members. So you, by trusting the church as an infallible source, only have provisional opinion of what the church teaches. The fact that the church offers it as infallible or irreformable to you doesn’t make your opinion of what the dogma is or means any more irreformable or infallible than mine. It doesn’t provide the extra help that you think it does.
But you can’t do the same thing is the problem. If you could, Protestantism wouldn’t make its disclaimers.
I’ve given you the word from Jeremiah. But here’s another one, since you like the whole irreformable/infallible thing:
“Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” (Matt. 24:35)
Protestantism doesn’t have to proffer the claim to you regarding the infallibility or irreformable nature of this statement because the statement itself does it. We can just say, “pick it up and read it; isn’t this interesting; isn’t this right” or some other such thing. I’m not offering this to you as authoritative based on the divine infallibility of the church, nor do I have to. I just need to present it to you and trust the Holy Spirit to convince you or not. I can present motives of credibility as to why you should believe this statement or accept it as Scriptural, but I don’t need to make the specific claim “here ye, here ye, this is irreformable.” The statement itself says that. Jesus doesn’t need my help.
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James/Cletus,
Of course it does. That’s inherent to divine authority and articles of faith.
Okay, so again for the sake of argument we will limit the canon to any statement that says “Thus saith the Lord.” So the claim has been made, and I have at least one infallible, irreformable statement to which I submit. Easy. Quit trying to believe you’re not in the same boat just because you’re over on that side of it.
That you think this is meaningless or “insecure” just proves the point – articles of faith are impossible to define in Protestantism, only opinions.
It’s not meaningless; it’s more that we just feel no need to help God out. He has told us what is infallible very directly. For the sake of argument, let’s just limit the canon to the aforementioned statements since that is all that will satisfy you.
Article of faith for Robert: The words of Jesus will never pass away. Jesus makes that claim, and I have motives of credibility to believe it.
Article of faith for James: The church of Rome is the only church Jesus personally founded. Rome makes that claim, and you have motives of credibility to believe it.
Looks like the same boat to me.
More question begging.
Why is it question begging? You want the claim, and in that verse from Jeremiah I gave, he claims to be called by God to speak for God. Why do I need to hand you the book and say, take this on the infallible authority of the Protestant church? Read it and decide for yourself. I’m not a fideist, if you want some motives of credibility, I can give them to you. I can even give them to you from Jesus Himself.
Not relevant at the moment. Making the claim in the first place is the relevant point.
And Protestantism doesn’t have to make the claim to make the warrant of faith sufficient. The written word makes the claim for itself. Pick a truncated canon if you like; you just said Rome only had to offer one article infallibly in order to be better off. I’ve produced several now, and I’m not offering them on my authority or on the authority of the church. That’s because Protestants don’t put faith in the church for salvation; we put it in Christ.
Nope. If you want to evaluate the merits or consistency of a system, you grant the truth of the claim it makes and then examine it, as I’ve been doing with both systems. You don’t beg the question and run off with your marbles.
But Rome doesn’t have any merits epistemologically. All you do is increase the articles of faith that must be believed for salvation. When you can give me a system that makes me infallibly certain, then we can talk about advantages.
And consistency—I see precious little. I see a big tent that amalgamates a large number of biblical and non-biblical elements to produce a system in which the faithful don’t have clarity on all that has been infallibly defined, in which the average layperson can’t hope to be any better off epistemologically in my church, and in which the rote performance of ritual is far more important than anything else.
And people still misunderstood the message. Therefore Jesus and the Apostles had no authority or those who submitted to them were no better off than the Jew submitting to a random teacher on the corner. That’s your argument.
No. My argument is that I submit to words that claim divine authority for themselves so I don’t need the church to come along and say “These words that say they are infallible are infallible.”
Another problem is that you can’t get your head around the fact that Protestants don’t place their faith in an institution or system. If we did, then the parallels between Rome’s infallible claims for itself vs. Protestantism’s not making such claims would perhaps have more merit. But we’re placing our faith in the Words of Jesus and the Apostles, and I have texts that purport to be those very words. So I have the claim. I also have motives of credibility for it. I don’t see how that is different from Rome except one authority wears hats and holds a Synod on the family that might or might not be infallible, who knows, and the other authority—at least in its present form—consists of words and pages.
Yes, of course it would be. The assent to Rome’s claims is a mean between fideism and rationalism. It can’t be proven and compel assent (such would empty the act of faith of any merit and reduce articles of faith to nothing different than mathematical proofs), it can only be shown as reasonable given multiples converging threads of evidence to still give room for the assent of faith. The former avoids rationalism, the latter fideism.
Well at the very least I can do exactly the same for Scripture, so we’re back to the same boat.
Oy vey. You’re doing it again. I thought we were done with the red herrings.
It’s not a red herring. You are the one that says trusting in Rome puts YOU in a better place epistemologically than the Protestant. It doesn’t unless it can overcome your infallibility.
More question begging. And the “vast majority of scholars” don’t have divine authority, as you would readily admit, so again, we see the identification of the words/teachings of Jesus in the Bible is nothing more than a matter of opinion in your system.
For you, the identification of the church is nothing more than a matter of opinion because YOU don’t have divine infallible authority. Presenting a church that claims such a thing doesn’t take its truth out of being nothing more than an opinion for YOU. At best, it makes it more than a matter of opinion only for the Magisterium.
The Red Herring strikes again. NT believers made a choice to submit to Christ or the Apostles and had to interpret their teachings. Therefore Christ and the Apostles could only teach provisional opinions. This is your argument.
No, that’s not my argument. My argument at this particular juncture is that you don’t have a greater warrant for faith than Protestants do simply because Rome claims to be infallible.
Let’s say it again: Protestants don’t trust the church the way you trust the church. Protestants trust Christ the way you trust the church. It’s not logically impossible for Rome to teach infallible truths. The Holy Spirit could guide her in such a way. He can guide anyone in such a way. The question is whether He has and whether the claim of infallibility somehow automatically gives you a more certain grounding.
So only Christ and the Apostles were certain of their teaching. This is exactly what I mean by nothing changing before or after assent in Protestantism – there’s no “certitude of faith” warranted in the system, by its own claims and admission (and arguments by its defenders).
You’ve admitted that it’s possible for you to misunderstand church teaching, even church teaching deemed infallible. So that means you don’t have absolute certainty of what the church teaches. It’s obvious in the fact that none of you RCs can agree on what it is infallible and what isn’t.
What changes after assent to Christ is your eternal destiny. You don’t automatically become infallibly certain.
Nope, but he had access to the church.
Yes, but not everything the church says is infallible. And where do we have evidence of what the church was declaring is infallible in the first century apart from perhaps Acts 15?
So the church wasn’t very effective until 100AD.
No. But the church is better off and more effective when it has all of Scripture. A church with a full Bible is better off than a church with no Bible and governed by someone who was ordained by someone who was ordained by someone else. If that weren’t so, there would be no reason to have Scripture.
Not at all. Church, Scripture, and Tradition are parallel authorities (again).
No, the way you guys talk about Scripture and the way you don’t talk about it reveals how much you believe it to be a dead letter. It can’t authenticate itself because you all really don’t believe it is living and active. It has no power apart from a Magisterium saying it has power. Meanwhile, plenty of people pick up a Bible, read it, and are converted to Christ. Nobody picks up a Bible, having no access to Christianity beforehand, and then says, “Gee, I’ve got to find a church with Apostolic Succession and Peter’s chair.”
Have to identify Scripture first. More question begging.
You just want one infallible statement. I’ve given you several. You said Rome has to be able to give only one infallible and irreformable statement to be a better choice epistemologically. I can give one. I’ve given more than one. You don’t think Scripture can stand on its own. You think it requires something outside of itself to authenticate it. You don’t think Rome needs that.
For the sake of argument, I’ll limit my canon to “Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will not pass away.” from Matthew 24:35
There’s my irreformable statement. I’ve produced one. I’m not offering it to you on my own authority or on the church’s authority. The statement speaks for itself.
So Jesus didn’t teach with divine authority or make authority claims?
Of course he did. My point is that he expected to know Isaiah was Scripture without him saying “Here ye, here ye, Isaiah was Scripture.”
Correct. Which is why we unsurprisingly see different Jewish sects with very different understandings of the extent/scope of the canon as well as its interpretation. Sounds familiar.
Actually, this is not correct about different extent of canon. The old view that the Sadducees only accepted the law as Scripture has been shown to be less than accurate, as has the idea that the Alexandrian Jews had one canon and the Palestinian Jews another. The best you can probably do is point to the Essenes, but then it is not clear that they actually received as Scripture those extra writings found with the Dead Sea Scrolls.
You do find different interpretations, but when Jesus refers to the canon, he refers to the Protestant/Jewish canon and expects people to know what that is apart from an infallible declaration. “Law, Prophets, and Psalms” (Luke 24:44) is the Law, Prophets, and Writings. Jesus doesn’t have to tell people what the canon is. He expects them to know it apart from any authoritative pronouncement. And Jesus made lots of authoritative pronouncements, just never one on the canon. He took it as a given that the people to whom He spoke already knew what the Bible was. He just guided them into its true meaning.
If Jesus could expect Jesus to know what the canon was apart from an infallible declaration, how DARE the church that claims to be the one he founded demand that such an infallible declaration is necessary.
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“This reaction confirms the ancient Byzantine and Slav tradition of the immaculate conception. Only after Pope Pius IX defined the dogma in 1854 did opposition to the doctrine solidify among most Orthodox theologians. The Orthodox Church, however, has never made any definitive pronouncement on the matter. When Patriarch Anthimos VII, for example, wrote his reply to Pope Leo XIII’s letter in 1895, and listed what he believed to be the errors of the Latins, he found no fault with their belief in the immaculate conception, but objected to the fact that the Pope had defined it.”
https://www.ewtn.com/library/ANSWERS/IMCONCEP.HTM
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Mermaid, English Standard Version? Not Douay?
Poser.
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James Young, “Yes, because of the claims of the system adhered to. One system claims divine authority to identify and define articles of faith (infallible and irreformable by definition), i.e. it claims infallibility. One system does not only not make that claim, it actively rejects it.”
Wrong again. Protestants claim the Holy Spirit will apply and use Scripture and officers to lead the church into all truth.
Like I say, our theory is as coherent as yours. And our pastor are more godly. Plus, they don’t shrug when other pastors aren’t.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 16, 2015 at 10:01 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, English Standard Version? Not Douay?
Poser.
Doesn’t much matter. Your surrogates won’t stand behind any version. Fallible. [The irony being exposed that it leaves sola scriptura some very rickety legs to stand on. Forget faith–you’re at the mercy of philology.]
Plus she’s attempting to talk to them in their own language, something you don’t even bother with unless it’s some crank you google up from somewhere on the Catholic fringes. Anything but the real thing, that’s Darryl. Semper deformata.
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Darryl,
Excellent. So can you give me an example of Protestant officers and churches and confessions defining infallible and irreformable dogma and claiming the authority to do so? Or will we get provisional stuff thats “the best we can do right now” and is “probably” true along with a disclaimer of semper reformanda thrown in for good measure?
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Darryl,
So Protestant pastors can be ungodly, they are just less ungodly and thats supposed to be a selling point. Thats great they dont shrug at ungodly pastors. Do they shrug at elders who spend an inordinate amount of effort and time tearing down pastors and officers in good standing as this blog does? Gotta keep fighting the good fight I suppose.
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Robert
Posted October 16, 2015 at 8:07 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
So, what good is the Golden Chain, then, as a way to defend your ordo? It is not complete. It is a broken chain with a missing link if sanctification is left out.
I’m trying to be nice, but this is one of the most ridiculous comments I’ve ever seen. I’t like saying, don’t use John 1 to defend the doctrine of the Trinity because the personhood and deity of the Holy Spirit isn’t mentioned there.>>>>
You are nice, Robert. 🙂
No, I am saying that sanctification is there in what you call the Golden Chain. You are saying it is not. I am saying that here, the word justification includes sanctification. The concept of sanctification is certainly in v. 29, though not mentioned by name.
Are you able to see that in Romans 8:30, justification might include all of salvation between effectual calling and glorification? A kind of shorthand way of talking about our salvation, even.
I said:
Your use of Scripture and even the Greek language is way, too slick.
Robert:
Does this, translated, mean “I, Mermaid can’t read Greek so now I have to start making stuff up?”>>>>
Maybe I am suspicious of arguments based on the verb tense of ancient Koiné. It’s more like you guys are saying “I know Greek, so that makes me the authority.”
Yet your whole line of argumentation as far as I can tell is meant to undermine the Catholic Church. When that is your goal, then your opinions have to be biased. Why should I trust you when you see no good at all in Catholicism, only bad? All of your arguments are colored by that anti Catholic bias.
I don’t trust you, IOW.
I said:
It does not seem like you want to discover the truth, but rather to use Scripture to defend your fallible rules of faith and practice.
Robert:
Now I cry foul. Jeff has pointed it out to rightly that approved RC translations don’t render Luke 1 with “full of grace” anymore. You pass by that because it doesn’t fit your narrative of the IC, and now you accuse me of not wanting to discover the truth! You need to come up for air.>>>>
I have plenty of air. I agree with the minority position. I did not pass by that at all. Can you allow for disagreement? The modern RC translations follow the newer linguistic style. The older versions are still okay to use. It’s not like the older translation “full of grace” has been banned or anything.
You’re not infallible, you know. A Bible translation is not infallible, either. Your rules of faith and practice are fallible, so you must allow that others will disagree with you no matter how sure you are of the truth of your position.
I said:
One of those rules is that thou shalt never confuse justification and sanctification. Well, the Apostle Paul was not familiar with that rule. Saint James even less so.
Robert:
And ironically, I own at least one commentary by a Roman Catholic scholar who agrees that Paul and James are not teaching the same thing.>>>>
You would have to explain what you mean. Do you think it is acceptable to confuse justification with sanctification?
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Hi All.
I read this and thought of the discussion here. I posted on the wrong thread though and am reposting. http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/benedict-option-memory-forgetting/
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Mermaid,
You are nice, Robert. 🙂
My wife and children seem to think so. I have them fooled, I guess. 🙂
No, I am saying that sanctification is there in what you call the Golden Chain. You are saying it is not. I am saying that here, the word justification includes sanctification. The concept of sanctification is certainly in v. 29, though not mentioned by name.
But the fact that the concept is mentioned in v. 29 does not mean that it is included under justification. Why not predestination, calling, or—and this is the best option if you think —glorification.
My point is twofold: Just because Paul might refer to it in v. 29 doesn’t necessarily mean he’s pouring it into one of the concepts in v. 30. But even if he is, everything he has said in Romans up to this point means that wherever you put it in those terms, it can’t be justification, because Paul has been insistent that justification is not based on works, even those good works done in the Spirit by men such as David.
Since sanctification is the means by which we become like Christ in practice, if you want to say it is not merely assumed and unspoken in verse 30 but is subsumed under one of those stages, glorification is best. Glorification is the culmination and end of sanctification. To put it in EO terms, sanctification is equivalent to theosis, which begins in this life and is completed when we are glorified. But however you phrase it, justification refers to a legal reality and not an ontological one. The legal declaration: “Robert is righteous” is never based on anything other than what Christ did from the incarnation to His ascension. It’s not based on what He does in me now or on my cooperation with Him.
Are you able to see that in Romans 8:30, justification might include all of salvation between effectual calling and glorification? A kind of shorthand way of talking about our salvation, even.
No, because Paul doesn’t see it that way in the chapters leading up to this or in his other letters. I’m not going to read Paul in a way that makes him say: “That justification stuff based on works; I really only meant that justification is not by works in the first case (and baptism) but then you can merit rejustification for yourself and merit your final justification by cooperating with the Spirit.” That contradicts everything Paul says about grace and ultimately all of salvation. We have been saved by grace through faith, not by works (Eph. 2). We have saved not by works done in holiness of heart (Titus 1).
Maybe I am suspicious of arguments based on the verb tense of ancient Koiné. It’s more like you guys are saying “I know Greek, so that makes me the authority.”
But that is how language works. If you want to know what the term actually means, you can’t ignore the grammar. I’m not putting myself as an authority, this is standard Greek interpretation that isn’t the province merely of Protestantism.
If I’m listening to my wife speak and she says “go to the store, we need milk” but I misread her grammar, we’re not going to have milk and my wife won’t be happy with me. You can’t just read the Bible and pretend as if the tense doesn’t matter—especially when you are happy to lean on the tense in Luke 1 to call Mary the “having been graced one.” It is inconsistent.
Yet your whole line of argumentation as far as I can tell is meant to undermine the Catholic Church. When that is your goal, then your opinions have to be biased. Why should I trust you when you see no good at all in Catholicism, only bad? All of your arguments are colored by that anti Catholic bias.
I don’t trust you, IOW.
1. Go ask a RC NT scholar about the Greek, then.
2. I hear lots of anti-Protestant bias—because the Protestant church didn’t say this with a declaration of infallibility, it must be wrong. That’s a misunderstanding of what the word infallibility means.
3. Yes, I have grave concerns about Rome. I believe there are many people in the RCC who are saved, but they are saved in spite of their doctrine. In fact, I don’t believe you can be saved and knowingly embrace Trent.
4. But that doesn’t mean I don’t see any good in RCism. RC theologians consistently produce good works on the Trinity, divine impassibility, and commentaries to name but a few. To the extent that Rome advocates against abortion, I think that is good. The problem I have is with your doctrine of salvation and the fact that Rome is hard to pin down because the Magisterium, at least since V2, uses slippery language. And I put no stock in the idea that the Magisterium gives you a meaningful advantage epistemologically.
I have plenty of air. I agree with the minority position. I did not pass by that at all. Can you allow for disagreement? The modern RC translations follow the newer linguistic style. The older versions are still okay to use. It’s not like the older translation “full of grace” has been banned or anything.
That’s irrelevant. If your own scholars are saying that the passage in question doesn’t support Mary being infused with grace and those works have the church’s imprimatur, then you must take that seriously. At least it means that Magisterium thinks it is acceptable to believe that the passage in question doesn’t support the passage. The doctrine could still be correct, you just can’t use that passage to support it.
You’re not infallible, you know. A Bible translation is not infallible, either. Your rules of faith and practice are fallible, so you must allow that others will disagree with you no matter how sure you are of the truth of your position.
Sure others will disagree with me. This is one of the issues with “an infallible church is better.” People will disagree with the church as well, and if Rome doesn’t discipline them, I don’t have any advantage over Protestantism in figuring out what is infallible and what isn’t.
Disagree if you wish; just understand that you can’t rest your belief in the IC on Luke 1 anymore. It can really be grounded only in the Magisterium and tradition.
You would have to explain what you mean. Do you think it is acceptable to confuse justification with sanctification?
No. It leads to grave error, makes assurance impossible, and makes the work of Christ insufficient to save.
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Hi Robert( and Mrs. Webfoot),
I’m following your conversation, and would like to interject concerning justification. Robert, if protestantism has no infallible understanding/teaching about what justification is, and if then it is only a matter of finding the understanding that seems to be biblical and has the wisdom of The Holy Spirit through time, I might add), then why would anyone disagree with how Catholicism understands it? The only way one can disagree with the Catholic( and EO) understanding of the doctrine is because of an antiCatholic bias. The infallible-ness of a doctrine in relation to a person’s subjection to that doctrine, just means that whether through man’s search or without his search, a true knowledge about any teaching does exist out there, and when you find it( or never do) the truth still remains unchanged. If a tree falls in the forest but there is nobody to hear it does it make a sound? 🙂
To this I would add that Protestantism doesn’t believe in theosis, thus making justification something that exists parallel to some other starting point towards glorification. What would that other starting point( “initial” justification) be?
So the Catholic Church, like the Bible and like some Protestants, teaches that justification is a process. It is something that begins when we first become a Christian, which continues in our life, and which will be completed when we stand before God at the end of our life and on the last day.
“We can divide up this process into a number of stages: first, there is an initial justification which occurs at conversion; second, there is a progressive justification which occurs as a person grows in righteousness; and lastly there is a final justification which occurs on the last day. There is also the possibility of a loss of justification and a subsequent re-justification which occurs when a believer returns to the faith. We will examine each of these four aspects of justification in subsequent chapters. For now, let it be noted that justification, like salvation in general, has past, present, and future dimensions.” http://www.ewtn.com/library/ANSWERS/JUSTIF.htm
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I said:
You would have to explain what you mean. Do you think it is acceptable to confuse justification with sanctification?
Robert:
That’s irrelevant. If your own scholars are saying that the passage in question doesn’t support Mary being infused with grace and those works have the church’s imprimatur, then you must take that seriously. At least it means that Magisterium thinks it is acceptable to believe that the passage in question doesn’t support the passage. The doctrine could still be correct, you just can’t use that passage to support it.>>>>>
As far as I know, St. John Chrysostom, doctor of the Church, is still part of the tradition that the magisterium respects. So is St. Jerome.
Notice that the ESV recognizes and also hides the fact that kecharitomene is in the vocative case, making it a kind of title. They do capitalize the “O” for some reason, but not “favored one”. Weird. “Hail, O favored one, “
What would happen to you Reformed guys if they had been consistent? You would not buy their product, for one thing. So, they fudge and capitalize the letter “O”. Everyone is happy, and the fact that this is a title for The Blessed Virgin and has always been understood as such is hidden. If they are called on it, they can say something like “look at the commas and the capital O.”
Does that prove the Immaculate Conception? No, but it does show that modern translations are heavily influenced by the market and what academia is willing to accept. Good thing in a way, since it keeps us in Bibles.
Robert:
No. It leads to grave error, makes assurance impossible, and makes the work of Christ insufficient to save.>>>>
Defend your statement from your only infallible source, the one I also accept as infallible.
You are quoting one of your fallible sources. Now, do it from the infallible source.
I would love to see that.
…and you are nice, and I am nice. That is why we can even have this conversation. 🙂
You have a wonderful day, dear Brother Robert
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Susan,
I’m following your conversation, and would like to interject concerning justification. Robert, if protestantism has no infallible understanding/teaching about what justification is, and if then it is only a matter of finding the understanding that seems to be biblical and has the wisdom of The Holy Spirit through time, I might add), then why would anyone disagree with how Catholicism understands it?
Because the text has a meaning that is at least as clear as what the Magisterium has said. What I don’t understand is why you all think the Magisterium is clearer than the Bible. Tom’s a living example who doesn’t believe that the Assumption has been defined as something that MUST be believed for salvation if you’re Roman Catholic. But when I read the Magisterial documents, it says the other thing, or at least it seems to. But Tom could walk right into any Roman Church and take the Eucharist.
I just don’t get why you all think that you can read another text and be confident of what it means but then when you get to the Bible its all out the window. You all don’t treat the Constitution that way. You’re fairly certain that it doesn’t endorse gay marriage. But lots of people disagree with you. Why is the Bible such a puzzle for you?
The only way one can disagree with the Catholic( and EO) understanding of the doctrine is because of an antiCatholic bias.
If this were so, then it would be impossible for any Roman Catholic scholar to write a commentary arguing that James isn’t advocating justification by works.
The infallible-ness of a doctrine in relation to a person’s subjection to that doctrine, just means that whether through man’s search or without his search, a true knowledge about any teaching does exist out there, and when you find it( or never do) the truth still remains unchanged. If a tree falls in the forest but there is nobody to hear it does it make a sound? 🙂
I’m not sure the point of this. Of course true knowledge about any teaching does exist out there. The mistake is thinking that the Magisterium saying “this is true” or “this is certain” gives you a better grounding. You’re not the Magisterium.
To this I would add that Protestantism doesn’t believe in theosis, thus making justification something that exists parallel to some other starting point towards glorification. What would that other starting point( “initial” justification) be?
This is incorrect. We don’t typically use the word theosis, but if theosis really means what EO’s and RC’s keep saying it means, then the word we use for theosis is glorification. The concept is essentially the same.
The other starting point would be regeneration/definitive sanctification.
So the Catholic Church, like the Bible and like some Protestants, teaches that justification is a process. It is something that begins when we first become a Christian, which continues in our life, and which will be completed when we stand before God at the end of our life and on the last day.
Yes. You believe you are justified by your works done in faith. You confuse justification and sanctification, making assurance and peace with God impossible, particularly since you believe people can fall away. You never get peace with God (Rom. 5:1). You get a cease-fire that can erupt into full-scale war the minute you make the wrong step and fall into some mortal sin (but good luck on figuring out what a mortal sin might be except maybe the murder of an adult. Abortion apparently isn’t a mortal sin because you can freely advocate for it and still receive the Eucharist.)
That’s the problem—Roman Catholic soteriology simply cannot be squared with Scripture. For Scripture doesn’t present for us a sacramental treadmill.
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Robert,
The sacraments shouldn’t be viewed as a treadmill.Thinking of it that way would be confounding it with works, and it is impossible to be saved by works. Loving God is our is what comes first and since our lives aren’t lives on a one man island, loving our neighbor who shares(as do I) the image of God we will love Our neighbor.This doesn’t mean that we have to go out everyday and give $5 to each homeless person we come across for fear if we don’t we are going to go to hell. Although we are guilty for not doing what we can if we do come across the man on the road who fell among theives. God will forgive us if we pass by somebody and dont help or return 37th means to help, but we still had a Christian obligation to do something. I dont know if we lose grace if we pass by, but surely we aren’t being conformed(sanctified) if we dont recognize our lack of love. The Pharisees miss the while law of love. Love along with faith is what justifies a sinner. It’s faith without love that will make our Lord reject us at the judgement. what do you think we will be judged for if not love for God and neighbor?
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Hopefully you can make out what I wrote. Autocorrect on this phone is driving me nuts!
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@ Susan:
Autocorrect on this phone is driving me nuts!
Ain’t vat the tooth!
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Jeff,
🙂
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Susan Vader
Posted October 17, 2015 at 11:59 am | Permalink
Hi Robert( and Mrs. Webfoot),
I’m following your conversation, and would like to interject concerning justification. Robert, if protestantism has no infallible understanding/teaching about what justification is, and if then it is only a matter of finding the understanding that seems to be biblical and has the wisdom of The Holy Spirit through time, I might add), then why would anyone disagree with how Catholicism understands it? The only way one can disagree with the Catholic( and EO) understanding of the doctrine is because of an antiCatholic bias.
“We aren’t sure about anything although we’re absolutely sure about the things we aren’t sure about.”
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Cletus van Damme
Posted October 16, 2015 at 10:14 pm | Permalink
Darryl,
Excellent. So can you give me an example of Protestant officers and churches and confessions defining infallible and irreformable dogma and claiming the authority to do so? Or will we get provisional stuff that’s “the best we can do right now” and is “probably” true along with a disclaimer of semper reformanda thrown in for good measure?
called his bluff
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Robert:
Yes. You believe you are justified by your works done in faith.>>>>>>
James 2
24 You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone.
Robert:
You confuse justification and sanctification,>>>>>>
Do you allow for growth in righteousness?
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MWF: Your use of Scripture and even the Greek language is way, too slick.
Robert: Does this, translated, mean “I, Mermaid can’t read Greek so now I have to start making stuff up?”
MWF: Maybe I am suspicious of arguments based on the verb tense of ancient Koiné. It’s more like you guys are saying “I know Greek, so that makes me the authority.”
Let’s pause right here for an important point. I am not attempting to claim any authority over you, neither on the academic-linguistic side, nor on the ecclesial side.
On the linguistic side, I am trying to provide you with some factual information to inform your judgment. I do not claim to be a linguistic authority. I’ve had three semesters of grad-level Greek, and 25 years’ experience translating for study and sermons and reading critical commentaries. That makes me some kind of a journeyman, but not an academic authority. I would fall in the bantam-weight class among serious translators. In no sense do I want to say “I’m smarter than you, so there.” I fully expect you to do your own research and come to your own conclusions.
In fact, that’s why I suggested above that you examine the evidence for and against your position on Luke 1 and explain why you find certain evidences more credible than others.
I still think that would be a very productive way to advance the conversation.
Likewise on the ecclesial side, I expect you to take the side of your church. It shows appropriate loyalty. Still and all, I also expect you to have ultimately loyalty to the Triune God. And if it were to turn out that your church (or mine) deviates from the truth of His word, then I would expect you (or me) to acknowledge it.
Truth matters, and that’s why I’ve been hard on you both in regard to Luke 1 and also in regard to how you re-word my statements.
MWF: Yet your whole line of argumentation as far as I can tell is meant to undermine the Catholic Church. When that is your goal, then your opinions have to be biased. Why should I trust you when you see no good at all in Catholicism, only bad? All of your arguments are colored by that anti Catholic bias.
You expressed irritation above at my “ad hominem” when I teased you about your eyesight. I do apologize if it was overly harsh. My intent was to make you look twice at what I said.
But it wasn’t an ad hominem in the classic sense of dismissing an argument based on who is saying it.
Your statement quoted here is a true ad hominem. You dismiss the argument because of the alleged bias of the arguer.
That works in politics, but it is a poor guide to truth. Of *course* I have a bias! So do you. (Meaning: that you see the world in a non-objective way, try as you might). The fact of your own bias does not make you dismiss all your own arguments. Why then should the fact of my bias cause you to dismiss mine?
My bias is real, but the arguments themselves are anonymous. They could be written by anyone. Engage with *them*, not with me as a person.
MWF: I don’t trust you, IOW.
I don’t blame you. I hope you don’t take it amiss that I don’t trust you entirely.
Still, to the extent that you can prove a fair arguer, presenting positions fairly and representing your opponents fairly, that increases your credibility as an opponent.
MWF: I said:
It does not seem like you want to discover the truth, but rather to use Scripture to defend your fallible rules of faith and practice.
That’s a pretty harsh judgment. Are you sure you’re not just frustrated because you haven’t persuaded us?
MWF: I agree with the minority position.
Good. This is a new and helpful development in the coversation.
MWF: Can you allow for disagreement? The modern RC translations follow the newer linguistic style. The older versions are still okay to use. It’s not like the older translation “full of grace” has been banned or anything.
You’re not infallible, you know. A Bible translation is not infallible, either. Your rules of faith and practice are fallible, so you must allow that others will disagree with you no matter how sure you are of the truth of your position.
Absolutely there can be disagreement. The argument has gotten tortuous, so let’s untangle where we stand.
(1) At some point, you wanted to make the case that IC is taught by the Scripture. Thus surpised me in that I’ve usually heard Catholic defenses of IC that relied on Church tradition.
(2) You then adduced Luke 1 for evidence. This doubly surprised me because I was aware of what we have since discussed: most translations don’t take it your way.
(3) Now that we agree, I think, that both Protestant and Catholic translations do not take it that way (though some allow it as a B-choice possibility), where we stand is this:
* IC cannot be defended using Sola Scriptura, but
* It can be defended (for a Catholic) by appealing to tradition.
And that’s where most Catholic defenders of IC land.
So I don’t think I’ve disproved IC with my arguments about Luke. All I’ve done is to establish a narrow point, that Luke 1.28 is not sound Scriptural evidence for IC.
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Jeff, to refresh your memory, here is some of what I have said. I am not sure what you think I said. Could you explain your confusion about what I have said? No offense meant, but I had a hard time figuring out what you were responding to in your comment above.
——————————————————————————————
The Little Mermaid
Posted October 12, 2015 at 9:17 pm | Permalink
MWF: Check out the meaning of the phrase
ΚΑΤΑ ΛΟΥΚΑΝ 1:281881 Westcott-Hort New Testament (WHNU)
28 και εισελθων προς αυτην ειπεν χαιρε κεχαριτωμενη ο κυριος μετα σου
We did check this out, remember? And we discovered that the Roman Catholic translators translate κεχαριτωμενη as “highly favored” and NOT as “full of grace.” The one exception is Douay-Rheims, which translates the Vulgate and not the Greek.
I’m surprised you forgot.>>>>>
I do remember how you totally interpreted the word according to your bias. It was a title. She is the kecharitomene” (κεχαριτωμενη). Maybe you forgot that part.
“The having been graced one”. When was she graced? It was before the Holy Spirit came upon her.
Now, does it prove the Immaculate Conception? It doesn’t disprove it, which is what you are alleging.
Another sola scriptura irrefutable proof text bites the dust.
The Little Mermaid
Posted October 12, 2015 at 9:40 pm | Permalink
Jeff Cagle:
We also notice that after Jesus is born, Mary doesn’t exactly act like someone who was completely sanctified. Not that she committed any egregious sins, certainly. But she lacked the faith that someone who had been made ontologically righteous would be expected to have.
Luke 2.48-50 Mary misses the point.
John 2.3-5: Mary misses the point again.
Mark 3.20-33: Mary thought Jesus was insane.>>>>
Engaging in a little eisegesis, are you, Brother Jeff?
As for Luke 2, notice that Jesus had to grow in wisdom and stature and in favor with God and man. Why would His mother be any different? You are saying, in effect, that it is sinful to not understand something. Notice that Mary pondered these things in her heart. She was open to gaining understanding.
The question that she asks her son when they finally find Him is legitimate. How is it sinful or ignorant for a mother to ask her son where he has been and what he has been doing? Is it sin to show parental concern for the welfare of your child? I dare say it would be sinful not to be concerned. Instead you are looking for reasons to criticize Mary, the Mother of God.
No one is saying that Mary is omniscient. She had to learn stuff like any other human being, including her Son, Jesus.
Notice, too, that Jesus submitted to her.
John 2:3-5 – Is this one a joke? You think that Mary gave bad advice here?
““Do whatever he tells you.”
The Son of God had to learn obedience according to Hebrews 5:8. According to you, He would be sinful because He had to learn something He didn’t understand before. .
Mark 3 – Where did Mary say her son is insane? Adding words to Scripture are we, Brother Jeff?
Luke 2
48 And when his parents[f] saw him, they were astonished. And his mother said to him, “Son, why have you treated us so? Behold, your father and I have been searching for you in great distress.” 49 And he said to them, “Why were you looking for me? Did you not know that I must be in my Father’s house?”[g] 50 And they did not understand the saying that he spoke to them. 51 And he went down with them and came to Nazareth and was submissive to them. And his mother treasured up all these things in her heart.
The Little Mermaid
Posted October 12, 2015 at 9:45 pm | Permalink
Jeff Cagle:
The point is that you can honor someone without putting that person on a pedestal.>>>>
The point is that God put Mary on a pedestal. What do you think it means when God exalts a person?
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
—————————————————————–
Mary’s Song of Praise: The Magnificat
46 And Mary said,
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”
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Mermaid: The point is that God put Mary on a pedestal. What do you think it means when God exalts a person?
Re: Luke 11: 27-28
“As Jesus was speaking, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said, “Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the breasts at which You nursed.” It is interesting that right in the context of Jesus’ teaching about demons, this woman extols Mary! She may have been well-meaning, but clearly she was misguided. She was trying to give praise to Jesus by saying, “Your mother is a woman truly blessed to have a son like you.” Of course, that was true;”
“Mary was blessed by God to be the mother of Jesus. His response does not deny this, but He does correct the direction of this woman’s thoughts. He says in effect, “Natural family ties to Me are not the point; the point is to hear God’s Word and do it.”
“The person who is decidedly with Jesus doesn’t just mouth pious platitudes; rather, he hears what Jesus says and acts on it.This is not to teach salvation by works because the Word of God that we must obey clearly teaches that we are saved by grace through faith alone. But the Bible is also clear that saving faith is obedient faith (Rom. 15:18; 16:26).”
Click to access 030799m.pdf
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Susan, but you beg the question. You assume (have faith) that Rome has an infallible understanding. And that comes from who? Oh, the office that supposed to be infallible.
A tad circular and self-serving, there. Even the primacy of Peter (one verse) doesn’t get you infallibility.
So prove the pope is infallible. I dare you.
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Susan, if you don’t think of sacraments as a treadmill, then how do you have assurance that you won’t go to hell? Have you confessed all your sins? Have you listened to Jesus in the Sermon on the mount and considered all the sins in your heart? Do you go to confession 24/7?
This isn’t just about getting a bigger older (less unified) church. It’s about judgment day. How do you know you’ll be righteous? How long will you have to spend in purgatory? Do you even know that you’re going there?
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James Young, oooo. So Protestantism fails on a blogger.
That’s the best you have for the sex scandal? yup.
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James Young, why would anyone claim infallibility for themselves when they have the infallible word of God?
Don’t you see how you keep showing disdain for God’s holy word?
Not cool.
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Okay, I think I know what Jeff and all of Protestantism is doing. Modern, even post modern scholarship and ways of understanding language and interpreting and translating Scripture are more valid than ancient ways. So, the wisdom of the ages and the testimony of the Church for some 2,000 years now about the meaning of Luke 1:28 is invalidated.
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Ali, thank you for the interesting comment, but you really did not acknowledge the fact that God exalted Mary and gave her a place of blessing. I know that Protestant Mariology is mostly about proving that Mary is nothing special at all, but please comment on what the Bible actually says about her.
God exalted her, along with all His people. All generations do call her blessed. You as a Protestant can do that without fearing demonic possession, you know. You can even acknowledge her titles like The Blessed Virgin and Mother of God without having demons jump on you.
You call Paul The Apostle Paul and John The Beloved Disciple. You even call Thomas, Doubting Thomas. Why not call Mary the Blessed Virgin or The Mother of God? Also, accepting for the moment the ESV rendering of Luke 1:28, O Favored One would not be out of the question. Those are not demon-inspired titles.
Mary’s Song of Praise: The Magnificat
46 And Mary said,
“My soul magnifies the Lord,
47 and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior,
48 for he has looked on the humble estate of his servant.
For behold, from now on all generations will call me blessed;
49 for he who is mighty has done great things for me,
and holy is his name.
50 And his mercy is for those who fear him
from generation to generation.
51 He has shown strength with his arm;
he has scattered the proud in the thoughts of their hearts;
52 he has brought down the mighty from their thrones
and exalted those of humble estate;
53 he has filled the hungry with good things,
and the rich he has sent away empty.
54 He has helped his servant Israel,
in remembrance of his mercy,
55 as he spoke to our fathers,
to Abraham and to his offspring forever.”
———————————————————————–
I said:
The point is that God put Mary on a pedestal. What do you think it means when God exalts a person?
Ali quoting some random preacher:
Re: Luke 11: 27-28
“As Jesus was speaking, a woman in the crowd raised her voice and said, “Blessed is the womb that bore You, and the breasts at which You nursed.” It is interesting that right in the context of Jesus’ teaching about demons, this woman extols Mary! She may have been well-meaning, but clearly she was misguided. She was trying to give praise to Jesus by saying, “Your mother is a woman truly blessed to have a son like you.” Of course, that was true;”>>>>
Well, which is it? Are we supposed to call Mary blessed as she prophesied in the Magnificat, or are we supposed to call anyone who blesses her demon possessed? If the woman blessing the one who bore Jesus had a demon, why didn’t Jesus cast it out? The preacher is reading something into the text that is not there.
Random preacher:
“Mary was blessed by God to be the mother of Jesus. His response does not deny this, but He does correct the direction of this woman’s thoughts. He says in effect, “Natural family ties to Me are not the point; the point is to hear God’s Word and do it.”>>>>
Okay. Mary was a disciple of her Son. She was a believer, one who heard God’s Word and did it. She heard His word in the mouth of the angel. Mary consented to bear the Son of God. She was obedient and continued to be obedient.
She raised Him. She loved Him. She cared for Him. She listened to His teaching. She followed Him around and was even at the foot of the cross when He died. She was with the disciples in the upper room, waiting for the descent of the Spirit in the book of Acts. She is the first Christian, even – the first one to believe that her Son is the Messiah. Her words and her obedience are evidence of that. At least give her that much.
He was telling the woman who spoke up that she could be like that as well. The blessing is not limited to His mother, Mary. It extends to all who bear Christ, in effect – to all who receive Him and follow Him in obedience and faith.
Random preacher:
“The person who is decidedly with Jesus doesn’t just mouth pious platitudes; rather, he hears what Jesus says and acts on it.This is not to teach salvation by works because the Word of God that we must obey clearly teaches that we are saved by grace through faith alone. But the Bible is also clear that saving faith is obedient faith (Rom. 15:18; 16:26).”>>>>
At what point does faith become saving faith? Is saving faith ever a dead faith, IOW?
BTW, there is nothing in that last paragraph that a Catholic would disagree with.
Have a wonderful Lord’s Day, Ali
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Just jealous for the exaltation of God alone, mermaid, that’s all, as I’m sure you are as well.
Please know your devotion to His word and His understanding is inspiring.I know we both agree on this:
And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. Heb 11:6
You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. Jer 29:13
You too have a good day, mermaid (don’t know your actual name.)
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Ali
Posted October 18, 2015 at 11:42 am | Permalink
Just jealous for the exaltation of God alone, mermaid, that’s all, as I’m sure you are as well.
Please know your devotion to His word and His understanding is inspiring.I know we both agree on this:
And without faith it is impossible to please Him, for he who comes to God must believe that He is and that He is a rewarder of those who seek Him. Heb 11:6
You will seek Me and find Me when you search for Me with all your heart. Jer 29:13
You too have a good day, mermaid (don’t know your actual name.)>>>>>
Mermaid is fine. I’m getting used to it. Yes, I agree whole heartedly with what you say here. 🙂
Yes, Mt. 5:16. God is glorified in our good works if they are truly done in Him and for His glory. We try to figure out the best ways to express that concept, and our words fail us.
Seeing how God’s grace has operated in the lives of others encourages us to keep on. They are the cloud of witnesses in the stands, cheering us on to keep our eyes on Jesus as we run this crazy race. Sometimes it feels like we are running blind, or at least with dim eyesight and even dimwitted. However, we are not alone. We are in this together, and many have gone before us. Heb. 11,12. It’s like they say to us, “Look what God did in and for me, a sinner like you. If He can do it in me, He can do it in you if you will only run the race with endurance. We’re testimony of the fact that He saves sinners Keep your eyes on Jesus. You can’t miss Him. He is the Way, the Truth, the Life, and the Light.”
We can seek Him with all our heart because He sought us with all His heart.
Don’t forget.
John 15:16 (ESV)
16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide, so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you.
…and this.
1 John 4:19 (ESV)
19 We love because he first loved us.
…and this.
Luke 19:10 (ESV)
10 For the Son of Man came to seek and to save the lost.”
…and this.
Jeremiah 31:3 (ESV)
the Lord appeared to him from far away. I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.
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Darryl,
First of all, I take note that Protestantism has things similar to Catholicism so I can recognize that the closer it is to Catholicism( and EO) the more orthodoxy it has. Neither Catholicism nor EO or any other liturgical rites in those areas that the disciples took the gospel and founded churches, recognizes anything close to a doctrine of imputed righteousness. As appealing and comforting as it is, it simply doesn’t exist in the rest of Christianity. It is very clearly a 16th century novelty. For it to be true there shouldn’t be any altars in churches in any ancient churches. So I had no reason to trust the supposed findings of Luther since none of the physical evidence nor the writings of the church father’s confirm what he said. Just the parenthesis explanation alone( ie.it was always there but no one found it again until Luther) was enough to make me doubt the Protestantism as viable option.
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Susan,
Neither Catholicism nor EO or any other liturgical rites in those areas that the disciples took the gospel and founded churches, recognizes anything close to a doctrine of imputed righteousness. As appealing and comforting as it is, it simply doesn’t exist in the rest of Christianity. It is very clearly a 16th century novelty. For it to be true there shouldn’t be any altars in churches in any ancient churches.
Whole books have been written on this subject, so I just want to comment on the bolded portion:
This is a non sequitur. Lutheran and Anglican churches both have altars, and they affirm JBFA. I’m not sure what Methodists call the piece at their sanctuaries’ fronts, but I assume they probably call them altars as well. They affirm JBFA.
The mere presence of an altar does not mean anything. The idea of the Eucharist being a propitiatory sacrifice DOES NOT go back to the beginning.
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Mermaid,
Okay, I think I know what Jeff and all of Protestantism is doing. Modern, even post modern scholarship and ways of understanding language and interpreting and translating Scripture are more valid than ancient ways. So, the wisdom of the ages and the testimony of the Church for some 2,000 years now about the meaning of Luke 1:28 is invalidated.
You aren’t paying attention. Even Roman Catholics say what we have been saying about Luke 1:28. It doesn’t mean that IC is necessarily wrong; just that you can no longer use Luke 1:28 to support the dogma. If Roman Catholicism thought your argument was all that, they’d have tighter rein on modern RC translators.
There may be other support for IC in tradition, and even in Scripture. This verse isn’t part of it. If you hang the doctrine on that, you’re in trouble.
Further, the idea that the old ways are automatically better is fallacious. For hundreds of years, the papacy was built on the Donation of Constantine. The document was finally revealed to be a forgery. But instead of correcting the papacy, you all just kept on going with it even though it had no support for many of its claims.
This is the problem for Rome. It has to maintain doctrines even when it is discovered that such doctrines have no support except the bare fiat of the Magisterium.
One legged stool-the Magisterium. Tradition and Scripture really don’t matter. That’s the problem.
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I wouldn’t have been able to follow the crumbs if Reformed theology didn’t believe in a sacramental existence, so I am grateful that Reformed theology retained some orthodoxy. But knowing what I knew I couldn’t stay Reformed because it meant also staying Protestant. So it wasn’t that I was trusting in asserted papal infallability, it was that I found protestant explanations materially untentable. Whatever orthodoxy was it wasn’t even Reformed Protestantism at it’s most pure state. After that it has been a matter of trusting that the Catholic Church is unchanged in it’s faith and moral teaching. As far as my personal salvation goes, well it is up and down but I am learning to keep my age off of the idea of a forensic righteousness, and you know what this causes me to put my attention on the Lord Jesus in the Eucharist. Now, I am truly for working out my salvation with fear and trembling. You might ask ” who then can be saved?” The answer is ” with God all things all things are possible”.
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Robert,
Take Luther’s theological novelty and force fit it into the ancient church and you have a sensless sacramental system. You are begging the question that Luther was right. There simply is no historical evidence. On a side note, do Lutherans worship Jesus in the Eucharist?
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Susan
Posted October 18, 2015 at 2:33 pm | Permalink
Robert,
Take Luther’s theological novelty and force fit it into the ancient church and you have a senseless sacramental system. You are begging the question that Luther was right. There simply is no historical evidence. On a side note, do Lutherans worship Jesus in the Eucharist?
And the Reformed are staking their salvation on whether Calvin’s right with his theology of “election.” They’re taking much bigger chances than the Catholics are, showing a lot more faith in theology than in the Holy Spirit.
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Robert,
I just want to say that I understand your well meaning objections, because I too took what I was taught as a protestant for the truth. I had discrepancies in teaching and practice that I don’t know what to do with, things that now fall perfectly into place.Things like, why is there an altar when there is no sacrifice? Or why did the altar begin to be called a table the more removed from Lutheranism? If there is no sacrifice how is it not a memorial? How is the bread and wine treated after consecration in presybeterian and Reformed churches? I also had cognitive dissonance because I would hear my former pastor retell a laughingly tell a story of a minister who tried to Chase down a bird that has snatched a consecrated piece of bread, but in the other hand I would witness a sweet eldely lady lovelingly pick up any bread(the used pita bread) from off the floor. I dont know whether she consumed it or three it away( which would be problematic to her whole witness),but the fact remains there exists a discrepancy between the teaching and the beliefs of an old women raised in the Dutch Reformed tradition. Something was amissin the pastor’s theology or something had changed.
It would be best if you understood Catholic theology from the source. https://www.ewtn.com/library/ANSWERS/REALLYSC.HTM
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Hi Tom,
I know that you have been sorely abused her at OK and I dont blame you for being angry and hurt. I mean cswitching your initials so that he can refer to you as a venerial disease is juvenial and low, but you should stop goading him as you do. It’s none of my business, but I would love to see you two just have some semblance of civility. I pray you can one day grab a beer together. Love one another as Christ has loved us, please.
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And I wasn’t referring to your last comment which is exactly correct about Reformed epistemology. Maybe all of us Cats should exist OLTS once and for good?
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Susan
Posted October 18, 2015 at 3:33 pm | Permalink
Hi Tom,
I know that you have been sorely abused her at OK and I dont blame you for being angry and hurt. I mean cswitching your initials so that he can refer to you as a venerial disease is juvenial and low, but you should stop goading him as you do. It’s none of my business, but I would love to see you two just have some semblance of civility. I pray you can one day grab a beer together. Love one another as Christ has loved us, please.
I’m just giving himself a mirror on his own actions, and revealing his rhetorical tricks and misrepresentations of the Catholic faith to the unsuspecting, which I consider contrary to Mt 18:6. It’s not personal, Susan. I’ve attempted numerous olive branches on the personal level, and some of his former acolytes and I get along just great, thanks.
The fact here is that the various Protestant versions of Christianity have indeed staked a lot on the musings of some rather crabby 16th century theologians, and on the proposition that the Holy Spirit left the Church that Jesus founded in error for well over 1000 years. This much is undeniable.
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Susan,
Take Luther’s theological novelty and force fit it into the ancient church and you have a sensless sacramental system.
You are assuming that the sacramental
treadmillsystem as Rome has it goes back to the ancient church. Just the idea of the Eucharist as a propitiatory sacrifice alone won’t fit.You are begging the question that Luther was right. There simply is no historical evidence.
You need to do more reading. A good place to start is with the essays on the early church in this book:
http://www.amazon.com/Justification-Perspective-Historical-Developments-Contemporary/dp/0801031311/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1445199452&sr=8-1&keywords=justification+in+perspective
On a side note, do Lutherans worship Jesus in the Eucharist?
You’d have to clarify what this means. If this means genuflecting for the bread and wine, then no. But again, you’re assuming that’s a practice that goes back to the beginning.
But for me personally, I worship Jesus every time I participate in the Eucharist.` But I don’t adore bread and wine. Quite frankly, that’s pagan.
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Tom,
I have read you in the past to say that you actually lile Darryl, so I do believe that you want a friendship, but calling him butch isn’t gonna win him over.Hear that Darryl, Tom like you? Maybe you can time it down a little and maybe Darryl will follow suit?
Completley agree with you that Catholicism is misrepresented and Reformed theology taken for granted. Let’s just keep it respectful since we are called to recognize the dignity of ourselves and the other. Keep offering that olive branch!
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Tom,
The fact here is that the various Protestant versions of Christianity have indeed staked a lot on the musings of some rather crabby 16th century theologians, and on the proposition that the Holy Spirit left the Church that Jesus founded in error for well over 1000 years.
This is just wrong. First of all, even Roman Catholics believe that the church can teach error. It’s only in selected statements, that nobody can really identify, that are protected from error. About the only ones you can be halfway sure of are the Assumption, the IC, and papal infallibility.
Second the Reformed doctrine means that the true church, in every generation, teaches some truth and some error. So it’s not that the Holy Spirit “left the church in error.” It’s that church leaders are hard of heart and don’t listen. But if the HS couldn’t get through to the medieval popes with their harems and other such nonsense, why does Rome get a pass from you?
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Robert,
I go to a Lutheran chuch 28th my family and they do genuflect. Did you read the article I linked? If altars were at the beginning then a sacrifice understood in some kind of way was also there at the beginning. You dont get more liturgicaly complex with time you get less.
Anyways I noticed you are getting touchy so I will back off. Take your time.
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Robert
Posted October 18, 2015 at 4:26 pm | Permalink
Tom,
“The fact here is that the various Protestant versions of Christianity have indeed staked a lot on the musings of some rather crabby 16th century theologians, and on the proposition that the Holy Spirit left the Church that Jesus founded in error for well over 1000 years.”
This is just wrong.
Of course it’s not wrong. Your version of Christianity–if it ever existed at all–hadn’t existed since 100 AD.
First of all, even Roman Catholics believe that the church can teach error. It’s only in selected statements, that nobody can really identify, that are protected from error. About the only ones you can be halfway sure of are the Assumption, the IC, and papal infallibility.
And it’s your obsession with hunting error instead of seeking truth that brings every discussion down to the trivial and nonessential issues of the Assumption, the IC, and papal infallibility. And endless bleating on “justification,” as though a person needs to know the first thing about your theology to be saved.
Second the Reformed doctrine means that the true church, in every generation, teaches some truth and some error.
No, you tossed the sacraments and invented a new rabbinical religion. To categorize Protestantism’s re-invention of the Christian religion as merely one more sorting of 2000 years of “truth and error” defies the reality. While the Eastern Orthodox, Anglicans and Lutherans keep the general frame of the sacramental religion, the Reformed and their successors have demolished it in favor of theological debate of the scriptures.
So it’s not that the Holy Spirit “left the church in error.” It’s that church leaders are hard of heart and don’t listen. But if the HS couldn’t get through to the medieval popes with their harems and other such nonsense, why does Rome get a pass from you?
The “medieval popes” game is BS. You can’t explain why you invented a religion so radically different from the Eastern Orthodox, who have nothing to do with the medieval popes or the Inquisition or the The Marian dogmas or papal infallibility or the whole Old Life prosecutorial laundry list.
None of that stuff makes your religion the least bit true.
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Mermaid, “Modern, even post modern scholarship and ways of understanding language and interpreting and translating Scripture are more valid than ancient ways.”
Did you hear the one about Vatican 2?
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Susan, Not sure you really have read through all the ante- and post-Nicene fathers.
But at what point does Paul stop you from making such rash statements? Don’t apostles trump bishops?
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“Susan, Not sure you really have read through all the ante- and post-Nicene fathers.
But at what point does Paul stop you from making such rash statements? Don’t apostles trump bishops?”
No I haven’t, but your own people admit that Luther’s doctrine was a theological novum. This was the accepted conclusion of my former pastor too.
Paul never wrote that Christ’s righteousness was imputed; circumcision of heart was and is what is required and it happens by baptism. So the bishops and the apostles are not at odds. And the apostles themselves taught apostolic succession.
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Susan,
No I haven’t, but your own people admit that Luther’s doctrine was a theological novum. This was the accepted conclusion of my former pastor too.
That’s actually a false statement that comes from prooftexting McGrath. It can’t be a theological novum if it is taught in the New Testament.
Paul never wrote that Christ’s righteousness was imputed; circumcision of heart was and is what is required and it happens by baptism.
The fact that you can say this, Susan, demonstrates mounds of ignorance. I’m not trying to be mean, but if you think that imputation of righteousness means that circumcision of heart is unnecessary, then you don’t know Protestantism or Reformed Theology. You could have been in a Reformed church for 50 years for all I care, the statement shows sheer ignorance. Maybe you didn’t mean it the way I just interpreted it, but if you did, that’s just ignorance. There can be no imputation without circumcision of heart because circumcision of heart is regeneration and without regeneration there is no faith by which righteousness can be imputed.
And the idea that baptism is how our hearts are circumcised is simply to repeat the old covenant error that one is regenerate and part of God’s people simply by having the sign administered.
So the bishops and the apostles are not at odds. And the apostles themselves taught apostolic succession.
They taught that what they proclaimed should be handed on to trustworthy men. That in now way gives you Apostolic succession, Petrine primacy, or infallible authority.
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Mermaid,
Do you allow for growth in righteousness?
Of course I do. The question is at the end of the day whether my growth in righteousness is what gets me into heaven when I die. Rome answers that question with a yes. If you aren’t perfect in righteousness when you die, it’s straight to purgatory where you can pay for all those sins that Jesus’ death was insufficient to cover.
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Robert
Posted October 18, 2015 at 7:56 pm | Permalink
Susan,
No I haven’t, but your own people admit that Luther’s doctrine was a theological novum. This was the accepted conclusion of my former pastor too.
That’s actually a false statement that comes from prooftexting McGrath. It can’t be a theological novum if it is taught in the New Testament.
If it’s instituted as a theological norm–and central to the religion–1500 years after the birth of Christianity where it had never been the norm, yes, it qualifies as a “novum,” a “new thing.” The word is only a description.
Denial of the Trinity had been around since the beginning, but when Unitarianism tried to make it the Protestant norm, yeah, it was a “novum,” in fact less of one than Luther’s.
When was Luther’s view ever normative?
And this is not to say a ‘novum’ is a necessarily a bad thing, or that Luther’s view is false. Newton didn’t invent the Law of Gravity, since gravity was always there, but his work on gravity was definitely a new thing, a ‘novum.’
The criticism that Catholicism took theological “nova” [novum, pl.] and incorporated them in Tradition is denied by nobody.
Catholicism unapologetically claims the authority of the Holy Spirit and apostolic succession for incorporating theological ‘nova’ as Tradition. The question is by what authority Luther, Calvin, et al., did so.
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Robert
Posted October 18, 2015 at 7:59 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
Do you allow for growth in righteousness?
Of course I do. The question is at the end of the day whether my growth in righteousness is what gets me into heaven when I die. Rome answers that question with a yes. If you aren’t perfect in righteousness when you die, it’s straight to purgatory where you can pay for all those sins that Jesus’ death was insufficient to cover.>>>>
Okay. So, you allow for growth in righteousness, but not for progressive justification.
I’m not sure why you think growth in righteousness is payment for one’s sins. Isn’t it more like working out your salvation with fear and trembling?
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Mermaid,
I’m not sure why you think growth in righteousness is payment for one’s sins. Isn’t it more like working out your salvation with fear and trembling?
I don’t think that growth in righteousness is payment for one’s sins. I know that failure to grow far enough in righteousness (i.e., die with some venial sins not satisfied) gets you into purgatory. That’s the problem—the idea that you have to make satisfaction for your sins; that Jesus’ satisfaction was insufficient.
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MWF: Okay, I think I know what Jeff and all of Protestantism is doing. Modern, even post modern scholarship and ways of understanding language and interpreting and translating Scripture are more valid than ancient ways. So, the wisdom of the ages and the testimony of the Church for some 2,000 years now about the meaning of Luke 1:28 is invalidated.
It’s not about me.
It’s about reckoning with the fact that Catholic translations with the imprimatur of the Catholic church disagree with your translation. I had nothing to with it, being rather in my youth when those translations were penned.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 18, 2015 at 9:25 pm | Permalink
MWF: “Okay, I think I know what Jeff and all of Protestantism is doing. Modern, even post modern scholarship and ways of understanding language and interpreting and translating Scripture are more valid than ancient ways. So, the wisdom of the ages and the testimony of the Church for some 2,000 years now about the meaning of Luke 1:28 is invalidated.”
It’s not about me.
It’s about reckoning with the fact that Catholic translations with the imprimatur of the Catholic church disagree with your translation. I had nothing to with it, being rather in my youth when those translations were penned.
Actually, you’re arguing Protestant uncertainty as a certainty of its own. But Ms. Mermaid is not arguing Lk 1:28 as definitive scriptural proof. That comes from exegesis and theology, no different than what Protestantism does for its own tenets.
To illustrate:
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2006/07/luke-128-full-of-grace-immaculate.html
That is the assertion, and indeed it is an assertion, not a fact. But the arguments to the contrary are not definitive either, because they can take no more of the customary form of “I’m not convinced,” itself a subjective statement. Again, you’re using the Protestant hermeneutic [strict textualism, cessationism, the Immovable Object] and not the Catholic one [the Holy Spirit, the “wisdom of the ages and the testimony of the Church,” the Unstoppable Force].
Formally speaking, of course. This is not to evaluate the truth of the actual Marian dogmas, just to set straight what Ms. Mermaid’s actually saying here. she is not playing dueling Biblical scholars with you. That’s a Protestant thing.
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Tom, you’re in the wrong ballpark. “Cessationism”? “Immovable object”? You’re making stuff up.
The point is simple: If Catholic translators have unanimously seen fit to translate Luke 1.28 as something other than “full of grace”, then there is probably a reason for it.
An honest arguer needs to address that fact.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 18, 2015 at 9:56 pm | Permalink
Tom, you’re in the wrong ballpark. “Cessationism”? “Immovable object”? You’re making stuff up.
The point is simple: If Catholic translators have unanimously seen fit to translate Luke 1.28 as something other than “full of grace”, then there is probably a reason for it.
An honest arguer needs to address that fact.
You didn’t read what I linked and C&Ped, not that I expected you to. You’re trying to reduce the issue solely to philology on Lk 1:28. Ms. Mermaid isn’t doing that; neither does Catholicism.
Even if true, you certainly haven’t remotely established that, nor have I seen that claim anywhere in my reading up on this. I didn’t even know you’re arguing “unanimously.”
And even if true, the Catholic case doesn’t rest solely on “full of grace.” There’s plenty more and you do the truth and Ms. Mermaid a disservice by concentrating your demurral solely upon it.
What is more, a solid deductive and exegetical basis for belief in Mary’s sinlessness, and thus her Immaculate Conception, can be drawn from Scripture alone.
is the claim. More, much more. You may disagree with the assertions of Marian dogma, but you have not nearly addressed the sum of their actual foundation, which is more theological than textual.
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Tom,
You may disagree with the assertions of Marian dogma, but you have not nearly addressed the sum of their actual foundation, which is more theological than textual.
Jeff (and I) recognize that it’s not solely a matter of exegesis. Protestant exegesis can be correct and the dogma could still be correct, you just can no longer appeal to Luke 1 for support. You’re essentially left with tradition and the bare fiat of the Magisterium (based on shoddy theological reasoning, but that’s another matter).
The IC is not supported by the 3-legged stool of Scripture-Tradition-Magisterium. It’s supported by the Magisterium determining that the parts of tradition that support the IC are tradition and the parts that don’t, aren’t tradition. It’s a one-legged stool argument for something that must be believed for salvation.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 18, 2015 at 9:25 pm | Permalink
MWF: Okay, I think I know what Jeff and all of Protestantism is doing. Modern, even post modern scholarship and ways of understanding language and interpreting and translating Scripture are more valid than ancient ways. So, the wisdom of the ages and the testimony of the Church for some 2,000 years now about the meaning of Luke 1:28 is invalidated.
It’s not about me.
It’s about reckoning with the fact that Catholic translations with the imprimatur of the Catholic church disagree with your translation. I had nothing to with it, being rather in my youth when those translations were penned.>>>>>
It is about your claim that the Word of God – as defined by your fallible rule found in the Westminster Confession of Faith – is the only infallible rule of faith and practice.
You do know that the older translations are authorized translations, so saying that the newer ones are authorized is saying nothing about the authority of the older ones.
You don’t even do that in Protestantism. Your people are free to use whatever translation they please. You are not going to ban the KJV, for example, thought the ESV is now the preferred version among the elect.
The Catholic Church has a long list of authorized translations that can be used freely by her members. The NABRE – which is an excellent translation – is what is read during Mass. That doesn’t mean that it is the only authorized version that can be used.
You are also trying to say that “O Favored One” cannot mean the kind of favor that saints and doctors of the Church have understood since the very early Church. So, if the Church continues to teach the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception and the sinless life of the Blessed Virgin Mary, it proves that she is fallible and unable to come to terms with the truth.
this is what you are actually doing, though. You are using your traditional Protestant interpretation and reading it back into the text.
You do have to acknowledge that your tradition is the minority view. If you are willing to do that, then maybe you can establish greater credibility. You may be right, but you are definitely in the minority.
What is this, really? A battle of traditions. You can go with the new kids on the block if you wish. You are free.
I will stick with St. Augustine, St. Chrysostom, and a whole host of witness throughout Church history – from the early Church fathers to the present – who disagree with you.
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Robert
Posted October 18, 2015 at 10:16 pm | Permalink
Tom,
You may disagree with the assertions of Marian dogma, but you have not nearly addressed the sum of their actual foundation, which is more theological than textual.
Jeff (and I) recognize that it’s not solely a matter of exegesis. Protestant exegesis can be correct and the dogma could still be correct, you just can no longer appeal to Luke 1 for support. You’re essentially left with tradition and the bare fiat of the Magisterium (based on shoddy theological reasoning, but that’s another matter).
If this is your reply and demurral, I don’t think you’ve read up on it enough. Which was rather my point. There’s Genesis, Revelations, and a bunch of other stuff. Further there is indeed theology involved, based on other stuff in scripture about why Mary is necessarily sinless, even Immaculately Conceived.
Do I find it convincing? That’s not the point. My point is that as with most of these attacks on Catholicism, the Vatican has 7 shelves filled on the subject while its critics are armed only with thumbing open a KJV [or ESV] and 10 minutes worth of googling.
Perhaps you’ll catch Catholicism in error but you won’t catch it lazy or unprepared. That’s how this Protestant argues with that Protestant and how they get the better of each other, but Catholicism is the theological major leagues.
The best you can hope for is a draw, and as I note above, only on Immovable Object terms of “I’m not convinced.” I’m not convinced.
Only by assigning the benefit of the doubt to your side and not the other can you pretend to claim victory.
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Oh, and Jeff, it’s the whole post modern trend, as I said before, to rely on experts as a way to establish truth. In this case, you are saying that the alleged experts in linguistics and grammar are kind of an infallible magisterium.
Reminds me of the whole Global Warming thing. You know. All the scientists agree that human activity is causing the temperature of the earth to rise so that means the US has to give its money to the UN or something like that.
According to my linguist daughter, the linguists and the grammarians can’t even agree about who has the right to dominate how language is understood. Do the linguists get to do that, or the grammarians?
So, if you want to try to establish some kind of linguistic-grammar nazi infallible translation magisterium to define Biblical doctrine, have at it.
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Tom,
If this is your reply and demurral, I don’t think you’ve read up on it enough. Which was rather my point. There’s Genesis, Revelations, and a bunch of other stuff. Further there is indeed theology involved, based on other stuff in scripture about why Mary is necessarily sinless, even Immaculately Conceived.
If you want to go into Revelation and Genesis, I’m definitely game. Off the top of my head I can tell you that the US Conference of Catholic Bishops says that the woman whom the dragon pursues in Revelation isn’t Mary but Israel.
Additionally, as both Jeff and I have demonstrated, there are declarations that Mary sinned in the gospels. So again, if Rome wants to believe in the IC, it can’t do it based on Scripture.
Do I find it convincing? That’s not the point. My point is that as with most of these attacks on Catholicism, the Vatican has 7 shelves filled on the subject while its critics are armed only with thumbing open a KJV [or ESV] and 10 minutes worth of googling.
Bull. The Protestant case against Mary’s IC is more than 10 minutes of googling. This is a blog, not a rigged audience with the Magisterium where they promise you safe conduct and the right to present your case and then when you get there tell you to recant or die.
Perhaps you’ll catch Catholicism in error but you won’t catch it lazy or unprepared. That’s how this Protestant argues with that Protestant and how they get the better of each other, but Catholicism is the theological major leagues.
Yeah, it won’t be lazy or unprepared, but neither were the Arians.
The best you can hope for is a draw, and as I note above, only on Immovable Object terms of “I’m not convinced.” I’m not convinced.
Most Protestant thinkers and opponents of Catholic doctrine would, I think, assume that the Immaculate Conception could easily be disproven from Scripture. But from an analysis of the verses cited, we see that, although it cannot be absolutely proven from Scripture alone, it cannot be ruled out on the basis of Scripture, either.
It absolutely can be ruled out based on Scripture. Mary sins in Mark 3. There goes the IC.
Only by assigning the benefit of the doubt to your side and not the other can you pretend to claim victory.
It’s up to Rome to prove from Scripture the IC, if it can’t it is free to accept the dogma even though it is contrary to God’s Word. And thankfully, we’re free to reject it without fear of getting our heads cut off, even though Rome once infallibly thought that was okay.
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Mermaid,
Oh, and Jeff, it’s the whole post modern trend, as I said before, to rely on experts as a way to establish truth. In this case, you are saying that the alleged experts in linguistics and grammar are kind of an infallible magisterium.
Wait. The Magisterium aren’t experts? Augustine and Chrysostom aren’t expert theologians?
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OK, so former Prots in the Roman Catholic churches do it because the have a need for certainty; that certainty needs to come from a man. But what if they tried Doug Wilson first?
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Tom,
Catholicism unapologetically claims the authority of the Holy Spirit and apostolic succession for incorporating theological ‘nova’ as Tradition. The question is by what authority Luther, Calvin, et al., did so.
Ah, but Luther and Calvin did not claim that we should take their word based on their authority (as Rome does) but on the authority of the Holy Spirit working through His Word. If that is indeed what the Word teaches, it validates and incorporates itself.
The question is why Rome thinks the Spirit needs its help to do His work. This is the fundamental issue—for Rome the Scriptures are a dead letter incapable of bearing witness to their own authority. The church on the other hand is so capable. Why that’s the case continues to be unclear except for the fundamental assumption that a living institution is superior to a living Word from God.
It’s a fundamental denial of God’s ability to reveal and verify Himself apart from the church’s say-so. But of course, that means the Jews were wrong to trust God before Christ came, and creates other problems such as who verified Christ in when He was walking the earth. If Christ can validate Himself, why can the Word not verify itself.
Inquiring Protestant minds want to know.
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Good Morning Robert:)
You said to Tom: “Ah, but Luther and Calvin did not claim that we should take their word based on their authority (as Rome does) but on the authority of the Holy Spirit working through His Word. If that is indeed what the Word teaches, it validates and incorporates itself.”
But Luther and Calvin believed that they both interpreted God’s written word correctly while believing that the Catholic Church had failed to, and you know from interaction with Dr. Anders that Calvin did claim that his was the right interpretation against all others. Whether or not they were both correct( while at odds with each other) remains the question. You say yes even though that yes means a departure from 1500 years of tradition.
If there is no historical record of justification by faith alone in what way would you say that this doctrine informed the church’s tradition? Why would Protestant theologians say it was a theological novum if it was at the same time implicitly understood? I mean, Luther gets the credit for this rediscovery, but why should he if the father’s of the church already owned it somewhere? Maybe I’m wrong but there seems to be something Gnostic about this idea. And please, this is not towards you personally or any other protestant Christian, it’s just my mind trying to make sense of protestant’s curious claims.
I have a lot to do today, so I won’t be checking in for your response until probably tonight.
Have a wonderful Monday!
Susan
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So relying on authorities outside of one’s own area of expertise is postmodern? Hmmmm, who knew that the pre-modern RCC that has since adopted modernism was post-modern all along?
Being right doesn’t entail infallibility.
So obscurantism? Human activity has changed the opacity of the atmosphere and that has resulted in an increase of the average temperature of the atmosphere (and ocean). The long term consequences as well as the winners and losers are uncertain as is what (if anything) we should do in response. I seem to recall a certain German religious leader recommending that “technologically advanced societies must be prepared to encourage more sober lifestyles, while reducing their energy consumption and improving its efficiency”. Francis had something to say about that as well as I recall. Post-moderns both…relying on expertise and all that.
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@tvd
“Only by assigning the benefit of the doubt to your side and not the other can you pretend to claim victory.”
So you’re saying that we schlubs won’t definitively settle 500yrs of theological debate by the best minds in the west in comments to a blog post? I mean its almost like that isn’t the point or something…
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Hi, Susan,
But Luther and Calvin believed that they both interpreted God’s written word correctly while believing that the Catholic Church had failed to, and you know from interaction with Dr. Anders that Calvin did claim that his was the right interpretation against all others. Whether or not they were both correct( while at odds with each other) remains the question.
Of course Calvin thought his interpretation was right, but this statement assumes the ongoing critique of Protestantism: “but how do you know”? My question for you is “how do you know your interpretation of the Magisterium is correct?” Let’s look at a simple statement such as “Abortion is a mortal sin.” We have major swaths of professing RCs who disagree with that. How do you know that your reading of it, which presumably differs from theirs, is correct? The Magisterium has continued to make the statement, even clarifying it. But there is still dissent. How do you know it is correct?
I assume the answer is that words have meaning that can be discerned from their context and use. That’s exactly what we say about Scripture. Why does the Magisterium get to be clear and Scripture doesn’t? Because people disagree over what Scripture means? People also disagree over what the Magisterium means.
You say yes even though that yes means a departure from 1500 years of tradition.
But I don’t agree that “yes” means a departure from 1500 years of tradition. It is taught in the New Testament and affirmed in extra biblical writings such as the Epistle of Diogenetus. Further, I would argue that it is necessary to the doctrine of salvation by grace alone and thus present in seed form wherever salvation by grace alone was consistently affirmed. (I can do doctrinal development as well. 🙂 )
If there is no historical record of justification by faith alone in what way would you say that this doctrine informed the church’s tradition?
But it is present in the historical tradition, though not always stated in such terms as the Protestants put it. You have to argue the same thing for the papacy if it goes back to the beginning; why do we not get to argue the same thing for JBFA.
Even Benedict XVI said that the Protestant understanding isn’t wrong as long as it doesn’t ignore the love of God poured in our hearts. Which in traditional Protestant understanding, it doesn’t. What the Protestants are saying is that the love we have for God does not justify us but that faith inevitably bears fruit in love. The problem with the Roman Catholic understanding is that things have been warped so that we are finally justified by our love for Christ but not by Christ Himself.
Why would Protestant theologians say it was a theological novum if it was at the same time implicitly understood? I mean, Luther gets the credit for this rediscovery, but why should he if the father’s of the church already owned it somewhere?
To the extent that the Church Fathers believed in intrinsically efficacious grace, it’s implicitly understood. If grace is intrinsic by virtue of what it is and not by virtue of how well we cooperate or don’t cooperate with it, then you have set aside human effort as constituent for justification either in its initial or final aspect. As far as I can tell, both Aquinas and Augustine affirmed intrinsically efficacious grace, or what we would call finally irresistible grace. For both of those men, grace will not fail to achieve God’s intent for it in those to whom it is given. Unfortunately, theie writings on ecclesiology are not always consistent with this. Which is why you can follow out the implications of their doctrines of grace into Protestantism or you can follow out the implications of their doctrine of the church into Roman Catholicism. Thus, we see Protestants embracing the notion of intrinsically efficacious grace and election while most RCs condemn Calvin for teaching essentially same things about election as those doctors of the church did. It’s because Rome has adopted their ecclesiology while only paying lip service to their doctrine of sovereign grace. What you don’t really have is either body affirming both their teachings on grace and their ecclesiology. Even Rome doesn’t follow Aquinas all the way because Molinism is just as acceptable as Thomism even though their teachings on grace differ.
But even Augustine’s ecclesiology, at least, sows the seeds for it’s own destruction. Once you admit that even one person can be regenerated apart from baptism, then you have separated the efficacy of baptism from the rite itself. Augustine didn’t live long enough to work this all out, but such a notion taken to its logical end destroys non-Protestant sacramentalism as the means of grace.
To make a long story short, if you affirm intrinsically efficacious grace, you are saying in essence what Luther, Calvin, et al are trying to get across with the notion of imputed justification, and that is that Christ Himself justifies, not the quality of our cooperation with Christ. So no one has to say “imputed justification” before 1517 for it to be present; you simply have to affirm intrinsically efficacious grace. Many, many, many church fathers affirmed this.
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sdb:
So relying on authorities outside of one’s own area of expertise is postmodern? Hmmmm, who knew that the pre-modern RCC that has since adopted modernism was post-modern all along?>>>>
No. The ones that now control how we view language itself have been steeped in post modern linguistic theory. So, they, in effect, become the authorities not only in their areas of expertise, but also authorities on Christian doctrine.
And the Holy Spirit? And Church tradition, even non Catholic Christian tradition? It all must submit to the linguists and grammarians. So, the battle for you guys is really over the lexicon itself.
The issue is authority and who we allow to determine what we believe.
That is always the underlying issue here at Old Life.
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Mermaid,
<i.No. The ones that now control how we view language itself have been steeped in post modern linguistic theory. So, they, in effect, become the authorities not only in their areas of expertise, but also authorities on Christian doctrine.
The problem is that Protestants were making these linguistic arguments long before there was such a thing as postmodern linguistic theory. Roman Catholic biblical scholars are being convinced of them in many cases. But that’s because they aren’t as beholden to the church as Protestant converts seem to be. Cradle RCs don’t have as much invested in the infallibility of the church; they didn’t convert in order to gain the certainty they didn’t think they had in Protestantism.
You seem to be waving away the reality. Either the translation of Luke 1:28 has been wrong for a long time, or the modern RC scholars are violating the faith by agreeing with Protestants. Either way, Rome is no longer a sure guide. In the first case because they taught error or at least erroneously interpreted a text to prove a dogma that might be true based on other evidence or in this case for allowing dogma to be undermined by modern scholars in their own church.
Either way, Rome proves herself not to be a light in the dark.
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Mermaid, but the Bible is also your infallible rule of faith and practice. Otherwise the Synod on marriage wouldn’t be turned in knots.
So why don’t you try to find support from the Bible for Mary or infallible pope? Too hard?
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The issue is authority and who we allow to determine what we believe.
Ding. But why is it that when Catholics allow “The Church that Jesus Christ Founded©” to determine what they believe it’s kosher but when Protestants look to the Bible it’s rugged autonomy? It ends up sounding like you can have private judgment because you conclude what you do, but we can’t because we conclude what we do.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 19, 2015 at 3:57 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, but the Bible is also your infallible rule of faith and practice. Otherwise the Synod on marriage wouldn’t be turned in knots.
So why don’t you try to find support from the Bible for Mary or infallible pope? Too hard?
There’s support. You’re not listening. Your version of Christianity cut out the Holy Spirit. All you have is the authority of men voting on Confessions and scholars interpreting the original Greek infallibly 2000 years after the fact. Where Jesus invested the Church in language scholars is not in the Bible, but Pentecost is.
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Tom,
There’s support. You’re not listening. Your version of Christianity cut out the Holy Spirit. All you have is the authority of men voting on Confessions and scholars interpreting the original Greek infallibly 2000 years after the fact. Where Jesus invested the Church in language scholars is not in the Bible, but Pentecost is..
Translation: Who cares what the language actually means in its context. The HS speaks a special language only the Magisterium can understand. Sounds rather gnostic.
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Robert
Posted October 19, 2015 at 4:43 pm | Permalink
Tom,
There’s support. You’re not listening. Your version of Christianity cut out the Holy Spirit. All you have is the authority of men voting on Confessions and scholars interpreting the original Greek infallibly 2000 years after the fact. Where Jesus invested the Church in language scholars is not in the Bible, but Pentecost is..
Translation: Who cares what the language actually means in its context. The HS speaks a special language only the Magisterium can understand. Sounds rather gnostic.
You’re trying to reduce all Marian theology to a single reference in Lk 1:28. 2000 years after the fact. And ignoring everything else. Your religion is built on theology too, you just don’t admit it.
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Tom,
You’re trying to reduce all Marian theology to a single reference in Lk 1:28. 2000 years after the fact. And ignoring everything else.
Um, no we are not. Both Jeff and I have said that the IC could still be true; you just can’t use Luke 1:28 to support it anymore. There may well be other texts. You mentioned Genesis and Revelation. That’s vague. If someone wants to argue that Mary’s IC is taught elsewhere in Scripture, they are welcome to try.
Your religion is built on theology too, you just don’t admit it.
I don’t know who you are talking about. One of the entire points of Sola Scriptura is to recognize that our religion is built on theology and that said theology should be biblical. Thus, the theology on which our religion is to be built should be subject to examination. IOW, we don’t say “Thus saith the Magisterium, so you can ignore what texts like Luke 1:28 actually mean in their original context.” That’s the RC approach.
Every Reformed person I know is well aware that we bring our theology to bear on the text. SS, ideally, provides a means to discern whether we are doing so in line with the biblical witness or not. Rome has no such means as far as I can tell.
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Inquiring Minds want to know:
Why do the Evangelical churches in America, which have no set form of worship, and no authoritative teaching office, do a better job of holding on to many of the moral teachings of normative, historical Christianity than Catholic churches in America? That is, why is a Catholic who believes in the Roman church’s moral teaching more likely to find Christians who agree with him in the average Evangelical church than in the average Catholic parish?
http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/mysteries-of-religious-authority/
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Robert
Posted October 19, 2015 at 5:06 pm | Permalink
Tom,
You’re trying to reduce all Marian theology to a single reference in Lk 1:28. 2000 years after the fact. And ignoring everything else.
Um, no we are not. Both Jeff and I have said that the IC could still be true; you just can’t use Luke 1:28 to support it anymore.
You’ve elevated modern linguists to the level of infallibility. Ms. Mermaid is right.
There may well be other texts. You mentioned Genesis and Revelation. That’s vague. If someone wants to argue that Mary’s IC is taught elsewhere in Scripture, they are welcome to try.
Obviously you haven’t been doing any homework on your own. I did and saw the arguments. I’m not interested in this trivial subject and am certainly not going to do your homework for you. I’m simply pointing out that Ms. Mermaid is quite right about your arguing modern linguistics 2000 years after the fact. That cuts out the Holy Spirit and puts human scholarship in its place.
That may be your religion, but it’s a, well, it’s a novum.
“Your religion is built on theology too, you just don’t admit it.”
I don’t know who you are talking about. One of the entire points of Sola Scriptura is to recognize that our religion is built on theology and that said theology should be biblical. Thus, the theology on which our religion is to be built should be subject to examination. IOW, we don’t say “Thus saith the Magisterium, so you can ignore what texts like Luke 1:28 actually mean in their original context.” That’s the RC approach.
Every Reformed person I know is well aware that we bring our theology to bear on the text. SS, ideally, provides a means to discern whether we are doing so in line with the biblical witness or not. Rome has no such means as far as I can tell.
You’re not reading enough authentic Catholic source documents then, and too much Old Life. No teaching may contradict the Bible.
http://w2.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/apost_constitutions/documents/hf_p-xii_apc_19501101_munificentissimus-deus.html
uses 20 Biblical passages to make its case. You may not agree with the case, but it’s no different than what the self-appointed Sanhedrin that composed your Confessions has done.
And FTR, sola scriptura’s not in the Bible either so you’re already one down. Your hermeneutic is circular, and of course what’s ironic is that most of Protestantism disagrees with Calvin’s double predestination theology, which presumably claims to be “sola scriptura.” So if anyone is, it’s actually you who are the gnostics.
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Robert:
There may well be other texts. You mentioned Genesis and Revelation. That’s vague. If someone wants to argue that Mary’s IC is taught elsewhere in Scripture, they are welcome to try.>>>>
Actually, no one said that there were passages in Genesis and Revelation that give support to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. There are passages in both books that refer to Mary. There are other OT prophesies about her as well.
This started out as a discussion of Marian doctrine, and then became a discussion of Luke 1:28.
Besides, I never said that IC is based soley on Scripture alone. It is based on Scripture plus tradition. I have provided quotes even from St. Augustine that spoke of Mary’s sinlessness. There are scores of such quotes from throughout Church history going way back to the earliest Church fathers that speak of Mary’s sinlessness. It is not a new doctrine invented in the 19th Century.
Now, IC is not the only explanation for how Mary could have been sinless. It is the one that the Catholic Church specifically endorses. The CCC also allows for the EO understanding to be legitimate, even though theirs is not the official dogma of Catholicism. It is not said to be false, either, and is included in the CCC.
493 The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God “the All-Holy” (Panagia), and celebrate her as “free from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature”.138 By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long.
“Let it be done to me according to your word. . .”
So, this is a case of Scripture plus tradition. The Church also allows for other traditions that maintain the sinlessness of the Mother of God.
When you guys say that Luke 1:28 cannot be used to support IC, you really have no authority to do so. You can express it as a personal opinion and nothing more. It is an opinion formed by your theology in this case, and you cannot claim authoritatively that yours is the one and only way of interpreting this verse. Your theology tells you that, not Scripture itself.
It could be that you are right and the whole Church from the early days of Christianity has been wrong, but you do need to admit that yours is the minority opinion. Not for my sake, but for your own peace of mind and credibility.
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Tom,
Obviously you haven’t been doing any homework on your own. I did and saw the arguments. I’m not interested in this trivial subject and am certainly not going to do your homework for you. I’m simply pointing out that Ms. Mermaid is quite right about your arguing modern linguistics 2000 years after the fact. That cuts out the Holy Spirit and puts human scholarship in its place.
That may be your religion, but it’s a, well, it’s a novum.
It only cuts out the Holy Spirit if you think the church is incapable of mishearing the Spirit, which is the assumption that needs to be proven.
You’re not reading enough authentic Catholic source documents then, and too much Old Life. No teaching may contradict the Bible.
http://w2.vatican.va/content/pius-xii/en/apost_constitutions/documents/hf_p-xii_apc_19501101_munificentissimus-deus.html
uses 20 Biblical passages to make its case. You may not agree with the case, but it’s no different than what the self-appointed Sanhedrin that composed your Confessions has done.
I know what Rome says. The problem is with what Rome does with the Scriptures. Original context and meaning, typically, are irrelevant to dogma.
And FTR, sola scriptura’s not in the Bible either so you’re already one down.
Except, of course, where Jesus appeals to it to settle disputes in His own day.
Your hermeneutic is circular,
No more circular than the Magisterium telling me that the tradition and Scripture point to the church but that the church alone defines tradition and Scripture.
and of course what’s ironic is that most of Protestantism disagrees with Calvin’s double predestination theology, which presumably claims to be “sola scriptura.” So if anyone is, it’s actually you who are the gnostics.
Sorry, we don’t appeal to a Magisterium that alone possesses the knowledge to understand the Bible rightly, that alone knows what the tradition is. Anyone can follow the Reformed argument.
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Mermaid,
Actually, no one said that there were passages in Genesis and Revelation that give support to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. There are passages in both books that refer to Mary. There are other OT prophesies about her as well.
I was talking about what Tom said. I think he thought you and I were discussing the Assumption because he refers to it in his last reply to me.
This started out as a discussion of Marian doctrine, and then became a discussion of Luke 1:28.
Besides, I never said that IC is based soley on Scripture alone. It is based on Scripture plus tradition. I have provided quotes even from St. Augustine that spoke of Mary’s sinlessness. There are scores of such quotes from throughout Church history going way back to the earliest Church fathers that speak of Mary’s sinlessness. It is not a new doctrine invented in the 19th Century.
Okay, and that is my point and Jeff’s point. Neither one of us has disagreed that it is based on tradition. The argument here is only that you can’t use Luke 1:28 for it. But the absence of one text does not falsify a doctrine if it has legitimate grounding. My only point is that you can’t appeal to Luke 1:28 to prove the dogma because it is irrelevant.
Now, IC is not the only explanation for how Mary could have been sinless. It is the one that the Catholic Church specifically endorses. The CCC also allows for the EO understanding to be legitimate, even though theirs is not the official dogma of Catholicism. It is not said to be false, either, and is included in the CCC.
493 The Fathers of the Eastern tradition call the Mother of God “the All-Holy” (Panagia), and celebrate her as “free from any stain of sin, as though fashioned by the Holy Spirit and formed as a new creature”.138 By the grace of God Mary remained free of every personal sin her whole life long.
“Let it be done to me according to your word. . .”
And this is where Rome is somewhat inconsistent. The quote given above doesn’t say you are allowed to deny the IC. Maybe there is another one. But in any case, the main reason the East rejects the IC is because the East rejects Rome’s doctrine of original sin. But curiously, the East is still golden. I’m assuming the doctrine of original sin is one of those infallible things, but one can never be too sure.
Again we’re back to Rome saying the East is a true church even though it rejects much Roman dogma but Protestants aren’t even though they do the same. Inconsistent.
So, this is a case of Scripture plus tradition. The Church also allows for other traditions that maintain the sinlessness of the Mother of God.
But the scriptural case hasn’t been made
When you guys say that Luke 1:28 cannot be used to support IC, you really have no authority to do so.
You are handwaving away the fact that your own scholars don’t think it is appropriate to use Luke 1:28 and that the translation has made its way into approved Bible translations. This is the problem. You can’t say “well, it doesn’t matter because tradition” but then say “it does matter, and you have no authority.”
You can express it as a personal opinion and nothing more.
Just like you can express IC as a personal opinion and nothing more. You just told me that Rome allows for other views, and Tom, Rome’s erstwhile defender, has said that the Marian dogmas are adiaphora. You can also express your view that Rome is the true church as your personal opinion and nothing more.
Or, you RCs could stop with this radical subjectivism.
It is an opinion formed by your theology in this case, and you cannot claim authoritatively that yours is the one and only way of interpreting this verse. Your theology tells you that, not Scripture itself.
Certainly my theology is involved, but words have meaning. And I’ve already adduced several examples of Mary actually sinning, which would disprove the IC or at least show that even if Mary was conceived without sin, she later became a sinner.
It could be that you are right and the whole Church from the early days of Christianity has been wrong, but you do need to admit that yours is the minority opinion. Not for my sake, but for your own peace of mind and credibility.
That Mary did not sin would certainly seem to the majority position for the first 1500 years of church history or so. I do not know enough about the specific history in tradition except that several church fathers affirm she doesn’t sin and that Aquinas denied the IC but affirmed that Mary did not sin. But that does not disturb me because the truth of a matter is not dependent on how many people teach it.
And again, this is another point where Rome is inconsistent. The majority view of church history has been that the papacy does not have any jurisdictional primacy. At best, it’s a primacy of honor. And yet Rome does not go with the majority view. If Rome really was all about the witness of tradition, it would actually go with the witness of tradition. The point is that Rome doesn’t really care much about tradition. It only cares about the Magisterium.
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Robert,
I realize that everyone is still arguing about who has authority to dogmatize whether events in the past happened and are true or didn’t happen and are not true, but keep in mind that even scripture isn’t self authenticating enough( as in a prior ) that it didn’t need a person or body of persons to hopefully know what was inspired and true and what was not. That reminder being said, now consider the history that does exist outside the scope of the written record of God’s dealing with His people( i.e. their actually daily lives). Many disciples who knew Mary would have known when she died and where she is buried, AND considering ancient Christianity’s borrowed tradition from Judaism of generating relics and making prilgrimages to tombs, there is no way that the early church would have overlooked this charity towards the mother of our Lord. So without a burial place in the church’s early memory and that memory being passed on the only other alternative barring a coordiated cover up is that people either witnessed her assumption or her body was there one day on gone the next, but either way people would have been very attentive to her precious remains. Only a radical sceptic could doubt her assumption done by her son. One thing you might want to think about is what would cause us modern Christians to on one hand believe the oral testimony that Elijah was translated out on a golden chariot but that the ark of the new covenant saw corruption.
Remember to that Jesus took his humanity from his mother’s DNA and that to preserve a Christocentric theology the church has to find a way to keep original sin from being passed from to the second Adam. If Eve was created without original sin how much greater is the New Eve.
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Dont forget that Jesus did a lot more than what is written down. He did so much that the world couldn’t have a library large enough to contain them ! ( see the last verse of St. John’s Gospel). Beautiful isn’t it, my friend?
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Susan, at some point you need to answer why they wrote down what they did. Was it so that all the unwritten stuff could give you an excuse to believe whatever you want?
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I realize that everyone is still arguing about who has authority to dogmatize whether events in the past happened and are true or didn’t happen and are not true, but keep in mind that even scripture isn’t self authenticating enough( as in a prior ) that it didn’t need a person or body of persons to hopefully know what was inspired and true and what was not.
I’m not following you here; I don’t understand what you are saying.
That reminder being said, now consider the history that does exist outside the scope of the written record of God’s dealing with His people( i.e. their actually daily lives).
We don’t have a whole lot to go on for the first century besides the written record (including works from the early post-Apostolic period). But even if we did, how do we know that the practices revealed in that evidence were good ones or not?
Many disciples who knew Mary would have known when she died and where she is buried,
Maybe. Certainly John did. Maybe Luke as well. Other than that, it doesn’t seem clear that anyone cared that much, at least from the writings we do have. Paul and Peter pass right over this. In fact, they don’t talk about Mary at all save “born of a woman” in Galatians. Perhaps all their letters were written before she died, which is fine, but one still must explain why, if Mary was so important, these key leaders of the early church don’t say anything about her.
AND considering ancient Christianity’s borrowed tradition from Judaism of generating relics and making prilgrimages to tombs, there is no way that the early church would have overlooked this charity towards the mother of our Lord.
Possibly. Or it could be that Mary’s death was so irrelevant to the thinking of the earliest Christians that no one thought it was worth mentioning. In fact, the evidence for devotion to Mary in prayer and such things doesn’t go back to the beginning. The earliest certain reference I’ve been able to find is dated 200–250 BC. There might be others I am unaware of, however.
So without a burial place in the church’s early memory and that memory being passed on the only other alternative barring a coordiated cover up is thwhosat people either witnessed her assumption or her body was there one day on gone the next, but either way people would have been very attentive to her precious remains.
Not necessarily. There’s reference to people venerating the remains of Polycarp from about 150 AD or so. That’s decades later than Mary would have died. By then, if Mary’s death wasn’t all that significant, it is easy to conceive of no one remembering where she was buried and a story of the Assumption growing up based on that. Given that we don’t hear of the Assumption prior to Nicea, the question should be if this was such an important thing, why no explicit reference to or discussion of it. There was discussion over other issues such as Christology. Why not this if it is so critical to Jesus’ own sinlessness.
Only a radical sceptic could doubt her assumption done by her son.
But there are a lot of faithful disciples whose death we do not know of. Am I a skeptic to doubt the assumption of these others?
The main problem I have with the Assumption is less the doctrine itself (though I find it very problematic). The more important issue is that Rome has defined it as something one must believe for salvation, at least if one is a Roman Catholic. But there’s no biblical or evidence in the early tradition for it. If people want to hold it as a private opinion, that’s one thing. To make it determinative of one’s eternal destiny is another.
One thing you might want to think about is what would cause us modern Christians to on one hand believe the oral testimony that Elijah was translated out on a golden chariot but that the ark of the new covenant saw corruption.
Well, the former is recorded in Scripture. The second isn’t really even recorded in tradition. Where did it happen? Did Mary die before it happened? Who saw it? Are any of these things recorded?
I also don’t agree that Mary is the ark of the new covenant.
Remember to that Jesus took his humanity from his mother’s DNA and that to preserve a Christocentric theology the church has to find a way to keep original sin from being passed from to the second Adam. If Eve was created without original sin how much greater is the New Eve.
Why could the Holy Spirit not have intervened at the point of Jesus’ conception to prevent original sin from being passed from Mary to Jesus? This is one argument I have never understood. Isn’t that what God would have had to do to keep Mary from inheriting sin from her parents? Why not Immaculately conceive them as well. And then back to the beginning? It’s a strained argument that seems invented more to justify Marian devotion than to explain the sinlessness of Christ.
I also think that if people are going to go the New Eve route, then that means I must have been conceived without original sin as well. The bride of the new Adam in Scripture is the church, which certainly includes Mary, but is not limited to her. If the first Eve being made without sin necessitates the second Eve being Immaculately conceived, then every Christian needs that. We’re all part of the second Eve.
Dont forget that Jesus did a lot more than what is written down. He did so much that the world couldn’t have a library large enough to contain them ! ( see the last verse of St. John’s Gospel). Beautiful isn’t it, my friend?
Sure, but the other stuff He did was clearly either not seen as that important, as necessary for salvation, and/or it was a lot of miracles and teaching that were already recorded in one way or another. Even Rome won’t define one word that Jesus spoke outside the written Gospels. It’s hard to see why, then, it should be so important to know such things.
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“I know what Rome says. The problem is with what Rome does with the Scriptures. Original context and meaning, typically, are irrelevant to dogma. ”
Arguing just like the Jews during NT times and now against Christ and the Apostles authority and their interpretations.
“Except, of course, where Jesus appeals to it to settle disputes in His own day. ”
Rome appeals to Scripture. That doesnt get you SS. And Jesus and the apostles couldnt be practicing SS by definition which means no verses can support it. So all this bleating about unscriptural teaching based on some modern scholars is more than a bit ironic.
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Cletus,
Arguing just like the Jews during NT times and now against Christ and the Apostles authority and their interpretations.
No, because Christ and the Apostles didn’t invoke authority to argue against the original meaning of the texts.
Rome appeals to Scripture. That doesnt get you SS. And Jesus and the apostles couldnt be practicing SS by definition which means no verses can support it. So all this bleating about unscriptural teaching based on some modern scholars is more than a bit ironic.
Jesus and the Apostles appealed to Scripture over Jewish (church) tradition. That most definitely gets you to Sola Scriptura, or at least lays the foundation for it. When tradition contradicts Scripture, you reject tradition. Unless of course you fideistically assume that no matter how outlandish (Closed gates of Temple proves Mary’s perpetual virginity) or blatantly plagiaristic (Donation of Constantine) tradition proves to be, you can still hold onto the doctrines it supports.
Now show me where the Apostles teach a view of tradition that includes things that they taught but never got written down.
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Robert,
My point about mysterious and supernatural events in the OT was to point you to tradition that existed within the realm of church but must have been oral before it was written down. Iow’s we believe the record on the testimony of other people who we hope didn’t make up the stories. I mean, Moses didn’t witness creation or the events in the garden. I only believe the scriptures because the church exists and therein lies the tradition. I hope I’mmaking myself clear. I went through doubt because I was out there no longer tethered to the tradition of the church. I dont want to revisit all of this again because I’ve already explained it many times, but for me, if it wasn’t for the Catholic Church I would walk away an agnostic about Christianity. Go ahead and mock but I was in a serious epistemic crisis that funny enough (it would seem to you), leaving behind sola scripture and fideism cured. Hello holy mother church.
Take a peek at this article if you have time. I wish you a wonderful remainder of your day!
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2012/08/relics-saints-and-the-assumption-of-mary/
Kind Regards,
Susan
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James Young, “Rome appeals to Scripture.”
When have you ever appealed to Scripture?
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Robert,
I’m gonna bow out of any further coversation. I dont think I can lay out this subject any clearer than I have. For a long time I think I felt a need to aquit myself of charges of being dumb or deceived to any of my old community that might be reading. I dont feel this way anymore. Now I just want to present what the church teaches as best I can or give sources and material that does it better. Nice thing about being Catholic is that I don’t have to figure it out on my own. I can sit back and learn.
I wish you peace on your journey. Keep being a good bloodhound my friend!
Susan
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Susan,
Go ahead and mock but I was in a serious epistemic crisis that funny enough (it would seem to you), leaving behind sola scripture and fideism cured. Hello holy mother church.
I don’t mean to mock; I’m sure you are sincere. What I’m trying to figure out how you think you are more sure of your ability to identify the church than your ability to figure out other tenets of the faith. That’s kind of the perennial question I have of RCs. “Sola Scriptura is unworkable because the Bible isn’t clear. Sola Scriptura is unworkable because there’s disagreement. Sola Scriptura leaves every man to himself to be his own pope.”
Rome doesn’t solve any of those issues. You are left to be your own pope when it comes to THE most important decision and that is to pick the right church. And the best you have to go on for that are motives of credibility that turn out to be rather circular and fideistic. “Look to tradition (as long as it conforms to what Rome says today; that stuff Cyprian said about the Roman bishop’s jurisdiction isn’t tradition but the stuff he said about no salvation outside the church is).” “Look to the holiness of the church (as long as it the holiness of the faithful; ignore the unholiness of the majority of RCs and claim they aren’t RC until you want to play a numbers game and say 1.2 billion members means Rome is truly catholic (one of Bryan Cross’ favorite arguments.)).
I don’t think you are dumb. I think you are out for a Cartesian kind of absolute philosophical certainty that Rome promises but can’t provide.
But I wish you peace as well.
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Each one must make a decision about what he or she will accept as authority in spiritual matters.
We all accept Scripture as infallible and authoritative. This discussion has helped me clarify why I accept the authority of the Church. Do I reject all that is in the WCF or in Protestantism? No, of course not. Most of the good teaching in Protestantism is really borrowed from the traditions of the Church – including the doctrine of the Trinity, the Nicene Creed, what the Christian life should looke like – even though we all fall short of the ideals – and so forth. We accept the same NT as God’s very Word. We all accept most of the OT as God’s Word – Protestants rejecting the deuterocanonical works.
So, anyway, I do want to clarify this. When I said I don’t trust you, Robert it wasn’t about your personal integrity or trustworthiness. Not at all. From what I can tell through this medium, you are very trustworthy in your personal life. We just disagree. I don’t trust Reformed theology on many points. It has corrupted too many traditional teachings of the Church – teachings that go way back to the 1st Century in many cases.
I will say this, though. 🙂 Can’t pass by without disagreeing with Robert. It’s habit-forming. Again, I certainly respect both Robert and Jeff as brothers in Christ.
—————————————————————-
Robert:
I also think that if people are going to go the New Eve route, then that means I must have been conceived without original sin as well. The bride of the new Adam in Scripture is the church, which certainly includes Mary, but is not limited to her. If the first Eve being made without sin necessitates the second Eve being Immaculately conceived, then every Christian needs that. We’re all part of the second Eve.>>>>>>
Our new nature because of being born from above by the Spirit is born pure and sinless. Remember this. It is not said that Mary was only protected from the effects of original sin inherited from Adam. She also lived a grace-filled, sinless life – enabled by the Holy Spirit to resist temptation in every way. Now, you don’t accept that, but the idea is that she started out sinless like Eve, but did not fall into sin along the way like Eve did.
We have not been given that same grace. We are in the process of progressive justification, also called progressive sanctification. 🙂 We have the initial justification when we believe in Christ. We then grow in righteousness. You must know why I asked if you believe in growth in righteousness.
Right? In English, the fact that what is translated into English as “justification” and “righteousness” are, in the Greek, cognates. So, when the Catholic talks about progressive justification, he or she really mean the same thing as when you guys talk about progressive sanctification. You guys accuse us of misunderstanding the difference.
In saying that, you are recognizing that we do know what progressive sanctification is. We just call it something different – and just as Biblical, BTW. Anyway…
Robert:
Just like you can express IC as a personal opinion and nothing more. You just told me that Rome allows for other views, and Tom, Rome’s erstwhile defender, has said that the Marian dogmas are adiaphora. You can also express your view that Rome is the true church as your personal opinion and nothing more.>>>>>
Well, it is not my personal opinion, It is not something I made up. Rome allows the EO view since they are the same religion. EO recognizes the sinlessness of Mary even though they have a little different way of looking at it.
Protestants have rejected this Christian teaching – that Mary lived a sinless life and that she is a special creation of God. Read the CCC to see that it accepts the EO understanding of this.
The idea that Luke 1:28 cannot be used to support the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, and that somehow the Church agrees with you is certainly a personal opinion. That was the context of my statement I believe.
Anyway, this is one of those threads that will not die. Now I probably will let you have the last word – or not. I will try to do that, anyway. Thanks, Robert, and have a wonderful afternoon.
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Robert,
“No, because Christ and the Apostles didn’t invoke authority to argue against the original meaning of the texts.”
Rome isn’t invoking authority to argue against the original meaning. Since we’re all lovey-dovey with 20th century scholarship now (I guess the previous 19 centuries didn’t count for anything or they just weren’t plugging Scripture properly into the GHM black box 2000 that spits out true doctrine based on linguistic and philological lookups), here’s Brown on sensus plenoir: “That additional, deeper meaning, intended by God but not clearly intended by the human author, which is seen to exist in the words of a biblical text (or group of texts, or even a whole book) when they are studied in the light of further revelation or development in the understanding of revelation”. An “additional, deeper meaning” does not entail that meaning is “against” or opposed to the original meaning. And that is how Christ and the Apostles interpreted the OT and indeed how Christians interpret considering they use a canonical hermeneutic to interpret all of Scripture. So, yes, you’re arguing like a Jew would to counter Christ and the Apostles’ interpretations.
“Jesus and the Apostles appealed to Scripture over Jewish (church) tradition.”
Really – so Jesus and the Apostles didn’t follow any Jewish unwritten tradition or consider it authoritative?
“That most definitely gets you to Sola Scriptura, or at least lays the foundation for it.”
If Jesus and the Apostles practiced SS, then the NT is superfluous. That was the “by definition” part. So no verse can be appealed to in order to support SS, since the authors couldn’t have intended it when they wrote it by definition (so much for Protestants not arguing against the original meaning of texts).
“When tradition contradicts Scripture, you reject tradition.”
Agreed.
“Unless of course you fideistically assume that no matter how outlandish (Closed gates of Temple proves Mary’s perpetual virginity)”
Arguing like a Jew again against Paul and the Apostles use of the OT to support Christ’s claims and prophecies.
“or blatantly plagiaristic (Donation of Constantine) tradition proves to be”
The document disproven by … a Catholic priest. Who woulda thunk it. Good thing the papacy doesn’t rest on the Donation – there are volumes of apologetic works written in support of the papacy over the past 4 centuries – no Donation to be found in them.
“Now show me where the Apostles teach a view of tradition that includes things that they taught but never got written down.”
There are many statements in Scripture showing their appeals to unwritten tradition and exhorting others to follow unwritten tradition. There is no Scripture showing that such unwritten tradition was to be written down at some point in the future, and if it wasn’t could be ignored or would be redundant. And this dovetails with what we see in Tradition – the growth and practice of the church before and after 100AD, the liturgy, the development of the canon, the witness of the fathers, etc. Parallel authorities, not hierarchical.
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James,
Rome isn’t invoking authority to argue against the original meaning. Since we’re all lovey-dovey with 20th century scholarship now (I guess the previous 19 centuries didn’t count for anything or they just weren’t plugging Scripture properly into the GHM black box 2000 that spits out true doctrine based on linguistic and philological lookups), here’s Brown on sensus plenoir: “That additional, deeper meaning, intended by God but not clearly intended by the human author, which is seen to exist in the words of a biblical text (or group of texts, or even a whole book) when they are studied in the light of further revelation or development in the understanding of revelation”. An “additional, deeper meaning” does not entail that meaning is “against” or opposed to the original meaning. And that is how Christ and the Apostles interpreted the OT and indeed how Christians interpret considering they use a canonical hermeneutic to interpret all of Scripture. So, yes, you’re arguing like a Jew would to counter Christ and the Apostles’ interpretations.
No, James. Sensus plenoir as Rome practices it produces all sorts of stuff that is at odds with the original text. Like the gates on Ezekiel’s temple being closed proving perpetual virginity. There’s no line to be drawn from that text in its original context to Mary, let alone her perpetual virginity.
There’s all sorts of fanciful cr*p like that in Rome’s interpretative methods. Mary as the ark of the covenant. Mary as the woman in revelation (no longer endorsed by the US Bishops, ironically enough), and on and on.
“Jesus and the Apostles appealed to Scripture over Jewish (church) tradition.”
Really – so Jesus and the Apostles didn’t follow any Jewish unwritten tradition or consider it authoritative?
They appealed to Scripture when it conflicted with Jewish tradition. Tradition in itself may be adiaphora. Now show me where they appealed to mysterious unwritten tradition as something that must be believed for salvation.
“That most definitely gets you to Sola Scriptura, or at least lays the foundation for it.”
If Jesus and the Apostles practiced SS, then the NT is superfluous. That was the “by definition” part. So no verse can be appealed to in order to support SS, since the authors couldn’t have intended it when they wrote it by definition (so much for Protestants not arguing against the original meaning of texts).
Wrong again. Jesus and the Apostles give us Scripture. Their words are equivalent to Scripture. To submit to Scripture is to submit to them. The only thing that would invalidate SS based on their example would be for you to show something that they said that never got written down. We’re still waiting for Rome to define at least one statement of Jesus that is not found in the NT.
Arguing like a Jew again against Paul and the Apostles use of the OT to support Christ’s claims and prophecies.
Except, of course, I can draw a line between the original context of those prophecies and Christ. There is no such line from closed temple gates to Mary never consummating her marriage.
The document disproven by … a Catholic priest. Who woulda thunk it. Good thing the papacy doesn’t rest on the Donation – there are volumes of apologetic works written in support of the papacy over the past 4 centuries – no Donation to be found in them.
The claim of the papacy was propped up by the Donation. Donation falls away, you have to go looking elsewhere. Traditionally the papacy is taught as being handed on as is from Jesus. We discover that’s impossible, so we invent doctrinal development. Traditional Roman approach—when the evidence you have adduced for your dogma doesn’t work anymore, pretend that such is irrelevant and then go grasping for something, anything to support it.
There are many statements in Scripture showing their appeals to unwritten tradition and exhorting others to follow unwritten tradition.
Name one place where believers are exhorted to follow an unwritten tradition for salvation that is not also found in the written canon.
There is no Scripture showing that such unwritten tradition was to be written down at some point in the future, and if it wasn’t could be ignored or would be redundant.
Since the old covenant practice was to write down the tradition every time you get revelation and Jesus’ practice was to follow Scripture over tradition, the burden of the argument is actually on you.
And this dovetails with what we see in Tradition – the growth and practice of the church before and after 100AD, the liturgy, the development of the canon, the witness of the fathers, etc. Parallel authorities, not hierarchical.
Give me some verifiable Apostolic teachings that never got written down. Just one.
As for the rest of it, none of those things are irrelevant. The question is what do you do with them when they oppose Scripture. Rome’s answer is “Well, the teaching that Mary was perpetually virgin and sinless doesn’t contradict Scripture or tradition because we say so by claiming the sole province to interpret Scripture and to define x as tradition but not y.”
Sola ecclesia.
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sdb
Posted October 19, 2015 at 11:12 am | Permalink
@tvd
“Only by assigning the benefit of the doubt to your side and not the other can you pretend to claim victory.”
So you’re saying that we schlubs won’t definitively settle 500yrs of theological debate by the best minds in the west in comments to a blog post? I mean its almost like that isn’t the point or something…
No, I’m saying that “Only by assigning the benefit of the doubt to your side and not the other can you pretend to claim victory.”
The irony of course is Protestantism created its own magisterium and demands the same orthodoxy. It ended up right back where it started, meet the new boss same as the old boss. And now you’re the ones faulting the Catholic Church for not discipling its members. It’s hilarious.
[Except of course the liberals, who after they conquer a denomination, say the PCUSA, make orthodoxy an ecclesiastical crime. “Where orthodoxy is optional, orthodoxy will sooner or later be proscribed.”]
Robert
“Your hermeneutic is circular”
No more circular than the Magisterium telling me that the tradition and Scripture point to the church but that the church alone defines tradition and Scripture.
You don’t seem to appreciate the irony.
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Robert,
“Where do Protestant confessions say “we do not believe divine authority exists”?”
I said they don’t claim divine authority. Which they don’t.
“What is denied is that a statement of the church has divine authority automatically simply because the church says it is.”
Good thing Rome doesn’t just only claim it then, though they do at least claim it, which is the salient point.
“We don’t claim automatic divine authority for our statements, but that hardly means we reject it.”
It’s not a matter of “automatic” – you don’t claim it – ever. Hence the disclaimers built-in to the confessions.
“We have “thus saith the Lord.””
Right, which you refuse to irreformably identify as Scripture or inspired. It’s at best just “highly likely” opinion it is.
“Where does Jesus say such declarations are required in order to believe the church has divine authority?”
Jesus and the Apostles claimed divine authority, not “highly likely” provisional teachings. Presumably, they had a purpose behind doing so.
“Protestants do not ask believers to put their faith in the church.”
No, just to put faith in self-admitted provisional opinions. Semper reformanda.
“What’s the alternative?”
Rome or the East of course. No need for throwing your hands up – you (and Protestantism) are in a pickle of your own making.
“It’s a claim that Jesus evidently endorsed”
And once again, where did you learn Jesus endorsed this? You continue to beg the question.
“The Holy Spirit self-authenticating His Word is not an extrascriptural means, for He works in and through it.”
This makes no sense. The HS is literally contained within the pages of Scripture? If you want to posit the witness of the Spirit authenticates it, fine, but that’s still extra-scriptural. And of course you do not assert that you are infallible in this so the point remains: The question as to the truth of these statements is all answered by extra-Scriptural means. Yet all extra-scriptural means are fallible, tentative, and provisional by your own admission, so the answering of these questions can yield nothing more than opinion. And no one rationally should be convinced by your assertion of personal spiritual witness – based on your own disclaimers you freely offer – any more than they should be convinced by a Mormon’s bosom burning.
“The extrascriptural source being infallible won’t help ME. I’m still fallible.”
Oy vey. I thought we had gotten over this. You are fallible, yes, so am I. So were those who submitted to Christ and/or the Apostles when they were on earth. As we already went over “Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
“So, the extrascriptural means just gives more stuff to potentially misinterpret and misunderstand”
No, it’s not just giving “more stuff”. You have no basis for even differentiating between “non-stuff”, “stuff”, and “more stuff” in the first place in your system, which is the point.
“You aren’t better off in your system. Only the system, IE, the Magisterium is divinely protected from error”
Oy vey. Only Christ and the Apostles are divinely protected from error, therefore those who submitted to them in NT times were no better off than those who submitted to random Jewish teacher on the street corner. That’s your argument. But as you already admitted, “I do believe that submitting to Jesus and the Apostles puts me in a better position than the Jew who didn’t”
“Further, the vast majority of RCs are not the Magisterium. This creates the problem that only the church/system can have certainty, not its members. So you, by trusting the church as an infallible source, only have provisional opinion of what the church teaches. The fact that the church offers it as infallible or irreformable to you doesn’t make your opinion of what the dogma is or means any more irreformable or infallible than mine. It doesn’t provide the extra help that you think it does. ”
The red herring feast continues. Further, the vast majority of NT believers were not Christ or the Apostles. This creates the problem that only the Apostles can have certainty, not their followers. So they, by trusting the Apostles as an infallible source, only have provisional opinion of what the Apostles teach. The fact that the Apostles offer it as infallible or irreformable to their followers doesn’t make the followers’ opinion of what the dogma is or means any more irreformable or infallbile than those who did not follow them and followed random Jewish teacher who claimed only fallible and provisional teachings and interpretations. The Apostles don’t provide the extra help their followers think it does.
“I’ve given you the word from Jeremiah.”
Which itself is only authentic, inspired, inerrant, authoritative as a matter of opinion, by your own standards and disclaimers. So we’re back to begging the question again. And even if we let the question begging slide, it doesn’t get you where you want to be. Are you now claiming to be sola Jeremiah or sola Matt. 24:35?
“He has told us what is infallible very directly”
And yet Protestantism refuses to identify anything He apparently says as infallible or irreformable despite being told “very directly” – why the hesitation. That’s why you can never get articles of faith offered by Protestantism – such are divine revelation, infallible by definition. You don’t get semper reformanda/”highly likely” and articles of faith in the same system, one or the other has to go.
“Pick a truncated canon if you like”
Blows up your rule of faith. How is SS supposed to function with a truncated canon? How is SS supposed to function properly with a tentative and provisional identification of the extent and scope of the canon, let alone its inerrancy, authority, sufficiency, inspiration? Nothing can ever rise above mere opinion.
“you just said Rome only had to offer one article infallibly in order to be better off.”
Yes.
“I’ve produced several now, and I’m not offering them on my authority or on the authority of the church.”
Right, you’re offering them merely as opinion – that’s the best you can do in your system.
“All you do is increase the articles of faith that must be believed for salvation.”
No, if you think that, then you’ve missed the argument. There is no way to differentiate opinion from articles of faith in the first place in Protestantism – that’s the issue. That is all upstream from the extent of articles of faith defined.
“When you can give me a system that makes me infallibly certain, then we can talk about advantages.”
Oy vey. So those submitting to Christ/Apostles had no advantage because they couldn’t be infallibly certain. That’s your argument. But you already said those who did would have an advantage.
“My argument is that I submit to words that claim divine authority for themselves”
So every verse claims divine authority right? Even those asterisked ones?
“You are the one that says trusting in Rome puts YOU in a better place epistemologically than the Protestant. It doesn’t unless it can overcome your infallibility. ”
Oy vey. Red herring again. So NT believers following Christ/Apostles were in no better place epistemologically than someone following random Jewish teacher offering admitted provisional opinions and teaching on the OT or divine revelation. This is your argument. But again, you already said they had an advantage.
“For you, the identification of the church is nothing more than a matter of opinion because YOU don’t have divine infallible authority. Presenting a church that claims such a thing doesn’t take its truth out of being nothing more than an opinion for YOU. At best, it makes it more than a matter of opinion only for the Magisterium.”
And the identification of the Apostles and Christs as divinely authorized is nothing more than a matter of opinion for NT believers because they didn’t have divine infallible authority. So they were no better off than followers of random Jewish teacher.
“The Red Herring strikes again. NT believers made a choice to submit to Christ or the Apostles and had to interpret their teachings. Therefore Christ and the Apostles could only teach provisional opinions. This is your argument.
-No, that’s not my argument. My argument at this particular juncture is that you don’t have a greater warrant for faith than Protestants do simply because Rome claims to be infallible….The question is whether He has and whether the claim of infallibility somehow automatically gives you a more certain grounding.”
And we just made Christ and the Apostles claims to authority useless and superfluous, yet again. People were in no better position or surer grounding after submitting to them than beforehand and in no better postion than those who submitted to teachers rejecting such claims to authority and only offering provisional opinion. That’s your argument.
“You’ve admitted that it’s possible for you to misunderstand church teaching, even church teaching deemed infallible. So that means you don’t have absolute certainty of what the church teaches.”
Just as it was with NT believers with Christ and Apostles teaching them.
“What changes after assent to Christ is your eternal destiny.”
I see. So my eternal destiny changes, but not my knowledge about or faith concerning divine revelation, Christ, or eternal matters. It’s all just provisional and tentative opinion. So I’m essentially Pelagian in and following my assent. Semper reformanda.
“And where do we have evidence of what the church was declaring is infallible in the first century apart from perhaps Acts 15?”
I’ll let that sentence stand on its own.
“No. But the church is better off and more effective when it has all of Scripture.”
Which you can’t even authoritatively determine. The identification of “all” of Scripture remains provisional and tentative by your own disclaimers. And what helped in identifying Scripture in the first place was the function and operation of the church – the very thing you claim was ineffective until all of Scripture was identified and disseminated.
“Meanwhile, plenty of people pick up a Bible, read it, and are converted to Christ.”
Right – and the Bible has to be identified and put together first – you just conveniently bypass that ladder you climbed and then kicked to get to the end product – and that was done via tradition and the church.
“You don’t think Scripture can stand on its own. You think it requires something outside of itself to authenticate it.”
Scripture is meant to function authoritatively as God intended – which was in the milieu of Tradition and the Church. This is like saying “You don’t think John 1:1 can stand on its own. You think it requires other verses in John and other books in the canon”.
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James Young, “I said they don’t claim divine authority. Which they don’t.”
So whenever someone claims divine authority you go knock-kneed? Hammurabi work for you? Cool.
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Cletus,
Cletus,
I said: “We have “thus saith the Lord.””
Right, which you refuse to irreformably identify as Scripture or inspired. It’s at best just “highly likely” opinion it is.
I don’t have to irreformably identify it as Scripture or inspired. The words themselves do that. Its like demanding Rome to irreformably identify “It is irreformable and infallible that Rome is the true church” when the very words themselves do it.
Jesus and the Apostles claimed divine authority, not “highly likely” provisional teachings. Presumably, they had a purpose behind doing so.
Good. The Magisterium isn’t Jesus. You want to say on the one hand that it is (we have infallibility) but on the other hand that it isn’t (we don’t have inspiration). Pick one.
No, just to put faith in self-admitted provisional opinions. Semper reformanda.
No more than you have to put faith in your self-admitted provisional opinion that Rome is the true church, unless you want to tell me you are infallible in identifying the true church?
And once again, where did you learn Jesus endorsed this? You continue to beg the question.
How did you come to the conclusion Rome was the church? Motives of credibility plus the claim. I have the same thing for the words of Jesus.
I said: “The Holy Spirit self-authenticating His Word is not an extrascriptural means, for He works in and through it.”
This makes no sense.
Only for those who believe Scripture is dead.
The HS is literally contained within the pages of Scripture? If you want to posit the witness of the Spirit authenticates it, fine, but that’s still extra-scriptural.
Depends on what you mean by extrascriptural.
And of course you do not assert that you are infallible in this so the point remains: The question as to the truth of these statements is all answered by extra-Scriptural means. Yet all extra-scriptural means are fallible, tentative, and provisional by your own admission, so the answering of these questions can yield nothing more than opinion. And no one rationally should be convinced by your assertion of personal spiritual witness – based on your own disclaimers you freely offer – any more than they should be convinced by a Mormon’s bosom burning.
I notice you ignored my question about the motives of credibility and their infalliblilty. Your extra-ecclesiastical means of identifying the church are fallible, tentative, and provisional, so the answering of the question—the most important question—as to the identity of the church can yield nothing more than your opinion.
Oy vey. I thought we had gotten over this. You are fallible, yes, so am I. So were those who submitted to Christ and/or the Apostles when they were on earth. As we already went over “Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
So at the end of the day, you are still relying on your own opinion that Rome is the true church and that you have rightly understood her. Good. Same boat again.
No, it’s not just giving “more stuff”. You have no basis for even differentiating between “non-stuff”, “stuff”, and “more stuff” in the first place in your system, which is the point.
Sorry, no dice. You don’t have it either if you apply the same principles. Rome hasn’t told you what the stuff is, except for a handful of statements. I can point to a handful of statements that claim infalliblity for themselves.
Oy vey. Only Christ and the Apostles are divinely protected from error, therefore those who submitted to them in NT times were no better off than those who submitted to random Jewish teacher on the street corner. That’s your argument. But as you already admitted, “I do believe that submitting to Jesus and the Apostles puts me in a better position than the Jew who didn’t”
The claim itself is insufficient to make one better off, and that is the problem. If Protestantism is true and Romanism is false, I’m not better off simply because Romanism claims to be divinely protected from error. You want to dispense with anyone that doesn’t make the claim for itself institutionally without ever actually asking whether what you demand is A. necessary or B. what God has actually given us.
The red herring feast continues. Further, the vast majority of NT believers were not Christ or the Apostles. This creates the problem that only the Apostles can have certainty, not their followers. So they, by trusting the Apostles as an infallible source, only have provisional opinion of what the Apostles teach. The fact that the Apostles offer it as infallible or irreformable to their followers doesn’t make the followers’ opinion of what the dogma is or means any more irreformable or infallbile than those who did not follow them and followed random Jewish teacher who claimed only fallible and provisional teachings and interpretations. The Apostles don’t provide the extra help their followers think it does.
I’m not the one hung up on irreformability as necessary for the certainty of faith. That’s you. You’re creating a problem where none exists. And again, I’m not interested in theory. The parallel with Christ and the Apostles and Rome would work if A. Rome made the exact same claims of inspiration and authority and B. if Rome could fulfill those claims. It doesn’t even formally make A.
Which itself is only authentic, inspired, inerrant, authoritative as a matter of opinion, by your own standards and disclaimers. So we’re back to begging the question again. And even if we let the question begging slide, it doesn’t get you where you want to be. Are you now claiming to be sola Jeremiah or sola Matt. 24:35?
No, I’m pointing out that you are all over the place:
James: “Protestantism can’t give us an infallible canon.”
Robert: “Rome hasn’t given us an infallible canon of dogma.”
James: “Doesn’t matter. All Rome has to offer is one infallible, irreformable statement.”
Robert: “That’s all. Okay. Jeremiah says x.”
James: “I’m going to ignore what I just said and go back to demanding an infallible canon before you quote anything that claims for itself infalliblity.”
Robert: “Rome hasn’t given us an infallible canon of dogma
James: “Doesn’t matter. All Rome has to offer is one infallible, irreformable statement.”
Robert: “Are you a robot or human?”
You whine that Protestantism doesn’t offer up the text as irreformable and infallible. My contention is that Protestantism doesn’t really have to. The text does that. So there’s your one statement. “but how do you know Jeremiah…?” Motives of credibility. Easy.
And yet Protestantism refuses to identify anything He apparently says as infallible or irreformable despite being told “very directly” – why the hesitation. That’s why you can never get articles of faith offered by Protestantism – such are divine revelation, infallible by definition. You don’t get semper reformanda/”highly likely” and articles of faith in the same system, one or the other has to go.
Scripture offers infallible articles. We don’t need to help it out. We don’t ever demand that you accept the Word of God based on ecclesiastical authority. So it’s really not a problem for us. It’s only a problem if you think Scripture is dead.
Blows up your rule of faith. How is SS supposed to function with a truncated canon? How is SS supposed to function properly with a tentative and provisional identification of the extent and scope of the canon, let alone its inerrancy, authority, sufficiency, inspiration? Nothing can ever rise above mere opinion.
Nothing ever rises above mere opinion for YOU on the same standard. That’s the point you don’t get.
But in any case, you demand an infallible canon. I demand an infallible canon of tradition and dogma. You say that’s unnecessary, all you need to proffer is one statement that offers itself as infallible. I say, okay, this statement by Jeremiah claims infalliblity. So you aren’t better off if your standard is one infallible statement.
“you just said Rome only had to offer one article infallibly in order to be better off.”
Yes.
I said: “I’ve produced several now, and I’m not offering them on my authority or on the authority of the church.”
Right, you’re offering them merely as opinion – that’s the best you can do in your system.
No. I’m pointing to Jeremiah and telling you that Jeremiah is offering them based on His prophetic authority. So I’m not offering it as mere opinion. The real question for me should be how I know Jeremiah is from God. My answer: motives of credibility.
It’s a good thing I have an extra life vest in our boat. That way I can share it with you.
No, if you think that, then you’ve missed the argument. There is no way to differentiate opinion from articles of faith in the first place in Protestantism – that’s the issue. That is all upstream from the extent of articles of faith defined.
How do you differentiate your opinion from actual articles of faith in Roman Catholicism? Because the church said it? But many Roman Catholics disagree with you and would read the same statements from Rome in an opposite way.
Oy vey. So those submitting to Christ/Apostles had no advantage because they couldn’t be infallibly certain. That’s your argument. But you already said those who did would have an advantage.
Again, the mere claim isn’t enough. You act as if it is. I’m not the one demanding infallible certainty before I can give the warrant of faith. That’s you. If God has said that an infallible institution is necessary for the warrant of faith and if he has actually provided that, then sure, the person trusting that institution would be better off. But you’re making lots of leaps from that to: Protestantism can’t even be considered.
1. You haven’t proven that an infallible institution is necessary for the warrant of faith.
2. You haven’t proven that God has given us that.
3. You haven’t proven that Rome is that institution.
And there’s more.
So every verse claims divine authority right? Even those asterisked ones?
If I only need to produce one verse, like you need only produce one dogma, then I don’t need every verse to claim divine authority. I have at least one.
Oy vey. Red herring again. So NT believers following Christ/Apostles were in no better place epistemologically than someone following random Jewish teacher offering admitted provisional opinions and teaching on the OT or divine revelation. This is your argument. But again, you already said they had an advantage.
Not my argument. If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically. The simple claim is insufficient. Christ/Apostles actually were infallible, so whoever trusted in them would be better off whether the claim was directly made or not. But it does not follow that I am automatically better off today to trust Rome. I’m only better off if Rome actually is infallible.
So Protestantism doesn’t automatically get thrown out because it doesn’t make a claim of infallibilty. In fact, if God has never promised such an institution, then Rome gets automatically thrown out. How do we know what God has promised. Scripture. How do we know what is Scripture, motives of credibility. It’s no different than how you know what the church is.
And the identification of the Apostles and Christs as divinely authorized is nothing more than a matter of opinion for NT believers because they didn’t have divine infallible authority. So they were no better off than followers of random Jewish teacher.
Again, they’re better off only if the claim is correct. The fact that Rome makes the claim does not mean we automatically throw out Protestantism if, in fact, the claim for the institution is not correct and not something God has ever said was necessary.
And we just made Christ and the Apostles claims to authority useless and superfluous, yet again. People were in no better position or surer grounding after submitting to them than beforehand and in no better postion than those who submitted to teachers rejecting such claims to authority and only offering provisional opinion. That’s your argument.
Not useless. The point is that the claim in itself is insufficient to make one better off. If the claim isn’t true, it’s worthless. If God hasn’t said it is necessary for the church to be infallible, it’s worthless.
People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.
Your claim above entails believing that I’m better off becoming Mormon than remaining Protestant, which I’m pretty sure even Rome would deny.
I see. So my eternal destiny changes, but not my knowledge about or faith concerning divine revelation, Christ, or eternal matters. It’s all just provisional and tentative opinion. So I’m essentially Pelagian in and following my assent. Semper reformanda.
You get assurance. And unless you tell me that there is absolutely nothing that would ever make you leave Rome, even if tomorrow the church were to deny the Trinity, then you are only claiming provisional opinion for yourself.
Which you can’t even authoritatively determine. The identification of “all” of Scripture remains provisional and tentative by your own disclaimers. And what helped in identifying Scripture in the first place was the function and operation of the church – the very thing you claim was ineffective until all of Scripture was identified and disseminated.
I didn’t say ineffective. I said less effective. If the church is not better off with a canon, what’s the point of even talking about canon. But again, your determination of Rome’s fallible teaching is provisional and tentative. Oh you can offer one statement. So can I.
Right – and the Bible has to be identified and put together first – you just conveniently bypass that ladder you climbed and then kicked to get to the end product – and that was done via tradition and the church.
No. Just putting the church in its proper place. The church recognizes and receives the canon. It does not determine it. Rome, or at least the vast majority of Roman apologists get this backward.
Scripture is meant to function authoritatively as God intended – which was in the milieu of Tradition and the Church. This is like saying “You don’t think John 1:1 can stand on its own. You think it requires other verses in John and other books in the canon”.
No it’s not like saying that. Because the other verses are also Scripture. Tradition and the church aren’t Scripture by Rome’s own definition. Remember, the Magisterium isn’t inspired like divine revelation is by your own confession.
Now of course, I agree that Scripture is meant to function within the church. But that’s a far cry from saying that Scripture has no authority apart from the church’s say so. Which is false. If that were so, Abraham should never have left Ur.
And of course you have to let Acts 15 stand on its own. It had Apostles. Once the Apostles leave the scene, the game changes. You have to admit this implicitly, at least until you claim that the Magisterium gets inspiration of the same exact kind as Scripture.
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@tvd
“The irony of course is Protestantism created its own magisterium and demands the same orthodoxy. ”
Only ironic to those who buy the strawman view that the *magisterial* reformers rejected the magisterium. Like I told mwf, it is the equivalent of those who claim papal infallibility means the pope is never wrong about the weather.
“It ended up right back where it started, meet the new boss same as the old boss. And now you’re the ones faulting the Catholic Church for not discipling its members. It’s hilarious.”
Of course from the very beginning of the Reformation, a major emphasis was remembering that church discipline was a mark of the church.
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sdb
Posted October 20, 2015 at 10:06 pm | Permalink
@tvd
“The irony of course is Protestantism created its own magisterium and demands the same orthodoxy. ”
Only ironic to those who buy the strawman view that the *magisterial* reformers rejected the magisterium. Like I told mwf, it is the equivalent of those who claim papal infallibility means the pope is never wrong about the weather.>>>>>
Well, that is not quite true, sdb. You didn’t really accept the magisterium. You fallibly accepted some parts of its infallible teachings, but rejected other parts.
For example you accept the Trinity, the Nicene Creed, the Apostle’s Creed – changing “Church” to “church” – the Virgin Birth, and many other dogmas.
You accepted part of the Church’s bibliology. You rejected other parts, like the deuterocanonical books as being the infallible Word of God.
Your Bible commenters borrowed heavily from the Church’s wealth. That is true.
You dumped a lot of other stuff. You changed the meaning of the Eucharist, but still talk about a Real Presence. It is not the same as what the magisterium teaches. Evidence for that. You call what Catholics do “idolatry.” That is a major disagreement, and big – no huge – hurdle to a renewal of communion with the Catholic Church.
Besides, you do not accept your standards as infallible, so it is not really accurate to say you did not reject the magisterium. Part of the definition of the magisterium is that it is infallible. You rejected the part that makes it the magisterium – its infallibility.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 20, 2015 at 8:22 pm | Permalink
James Young, “I said they don’t claim divine authority. Which they don’t.”
So whenever someone claims divine authority you go knock-kneed? Hammurabi work for you? Cool.
As Cletus has shown, by the authority of Christ founding a Church, by the authority of Pentecost and the Holy Spirit descending upon the apostles.
By what authority did J. Gresham Machen do theology? By what authority did he break off from one version of the one holy catholic and apostolic Church and start another? By the authority of the Holy Spirit descending upon the apostles at Pentecost?
If so, simply say so, Darryl. That’s all anyone’s asking of your theological claim to be an heir of the Church Christ left behind. Just say so.
Otherwise, you’re just a synagogue, a Bible debate society. Show where Jesus left behind a synagogue instead of a Church.
The Reformation began as reform but soon embodied everything it hated in spades. Heresies and heretics multiplied rather than were corrected.
Christ left behind a Church but the Reformation left nothing but wreckage behind it–where there had been handful of divisions there came dozens or hundred of cargo cults, each finding the Bible and then building different and competing versions of Christianity around it.
There is still a Catholic Church that even includes the Eastern Orthodox, claiming to be apostolic heirs of the apostles, by the authority of Christ and the Paraclete at Pentecost.
There is no “Protestant” Church [there isn’t even a “Presbyterian” Church since the Lesbyterians took over almost half of it]. What the Reformation has to show for its ‘reform’ is dozens if not hundreds of “cargo cults” that take the Bible and design incompatible theologies to try to explain it.
D. G. Hart
Posted October 20, 2015 at 8:22 pm | Permalink
James Young, “I said they don’t claim divine authority. Which they don’t.”
So whenever someone claims divine authority you go knock-kneed? Hammurabi work for you? Cool.
Christianity claims to be a divinely revealed religion, Dr. Hart. To use the pagan Hammurabi in rebuttal to any other Christian ultimately sneers at your own beliefs. Dude.
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sdb
Posted October 20, 2015 at 10:06 pm | Permalink
@tvd
“The irony of course is Protestantism created its own magisterium and demands the same orthodoxy.”
Only ironic to those who buy the strawman view that the *magisterial* reformers rejected the magisterium.
Instead of arguing with you, permit me to encourage you run with this, bro. It’s “ecumenical” or something. Me likes.
“It ended up right back where it started, meet the new boss same as the old boss. And now you’re the ones faulting the Catholic Church for not disciplining its members. It’s hilarious.”
Of course from the very beginning of the Reformation, a major emphasis was remembering that church discipline was a mark of the church.
I don’t know what this means, SDB. Back when everybody was Catholic [pre-Reformation], “discipline” was the rule, I guess. Even Aquinas was punked. Or are you talking about non-theological discipline? Jim is banging Joan and has 3 kids with his wife Marian, who’s rubbing uglies with Hillary who’s married to Bill who’s collecting Lewinskys from someone named Lewinsky who really loves Bill more than he loves Hillary who loves Marian more than Joan but thinks Jim is kid of cute?
Not following you here. ;-O
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“I don’t know what this means, SDB. Back when everybody was Catholic [pre-Reformation], “discipline” was the rule, I guess. ”
The reformers included church discipline as a mark of the true church. This observation makes no claim about Rome. The implication of what you wrote is that protestants foreswore church discipline:
You are mistaken here. That being said, many of the reforms arising from the counter-reformation occurred largely in response to the criticism of the protestors. The Roman church had become incredibly corrupt and needed reform. No one disputes this.
Unfortunately at Trent the church doubled down on certain things that many of us simply cannot in good conscience say we believe. Fortunately, the other thing that arose out of the reformation was political freedom and freedom of conscience. First magistrates could go their own way and regional churches developed and finally the enlightenment brought us America where we doubled down on religious freedom. In the US where everyone can reinvent themselves and entrepreneurship is celebrated religion was democratized (and not just the Christian religion). This is where the CtC critique of protestantism falls flat. They want to make the case that the biblio-centric nature of protestantism (captured in the slogan sola scriptura) is the cause of the proliferation of denominations. But that is of course false as witnessed by the proliferation of non-protestant sects as well.
The *magisterial* reformation was not a rejection of the Church’s magisterial authority, value of tradition, &c… Rather it was the recognition that authorities can err and are not absolute (such as establishing the doctrine of the historicity of Adam!). One’s submission to authority is thus contingent (as we see in all sorts of instances in the NT). Of course, this understanding of contingent submission had a big influence on political developments as well and created the fertile soil from which sprung (what I maintain is misleadingly named) the so-called “Calvinist resistance theory”.
cvd argues that the provisional nature of reformed thought makes certainty and authority impossible. That is of course untrue. Conclusions drawn from inductive reasoning are always provisional by nature, but one wouldn’t say the in principle provisional nature of Newton’s laws makes us uncertain about the predictions of satellite launches. While the source of data between say science and theology is different (and frankly among the sciences), there is no reason that I’ve seen that requires our epistemological framework to be different.
Thus I find the most forceful CtC criticisms of protestants wanting:
1) there is a difference between sola and solo scriptura – contingent authority is still an authority
2) sola scriptura is not a formal cause of the proliferation of christian sects
3) one does not need an infallible authority over the data to arrive at religious certainty.
Of course none of these responses to the CtC attack necessarily entail that protestantism true or that roman catholicism false. But then that has never been my design here (or as I read Darryl his design either). You keep attacking a straw man and insisting that he do something else. As several of us have noted, we don’t have a problem with the RCC per se, but we do have a very big problem with the triumphalism and trophy posturing of CtC.
Further when I see the pride of new converts flare up, I worry. Maybe I shouldn’t – Susan and MWF are grownups and I don’t have any connection to them. But I’ve seen enough cases of people who’s faith has been destroyed by the pride that comes with over-intellectualizing their faith and embracing the triumphalism expressed by both Susan and MWF (e.g., every good thing in protestantism comes from the catholic church). I have no desire to rain on their parade or try convince them that the RCC is a false church, but I do hope that they find humility before their new found church runs roughshod over them. As Dreher points out:
I’m glad they find satisfaction in their current church, but if they experience a shift in the diocese with a liberal Bishop and priests who actively work against their Catholic faith (as they understand it), I hope it doesn’t destroy them spiritually. I’ve seen it happen before and it is very, very traumatic. Feel free to continue characterizing such warnings (and Darryl’s examples of challenges the RCC faces) as “attacks” on the RCC and nice catholic ladies, but in doing so realize that you are completely missing the point.
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SDB,
I couldn’t let your last remark get by with free pass.
“Further when I see the pride of new converts flare up, I worry. Maybe I shouldn’t – Susan and MWF are grownups and I don’t have any connection to them. But I’ve seen enough cases of people who’s faith has been destroyed by the pride that comes with over-intellectualizing their faith and embracing the triumphalism expressed by both Susan and MWF (e.g., every good thing in protestantism comes from the catholic church). I have no desire to rain on their parade or try convince them that the RCC is a false church, but I do hope that they find humility before their new found church runs roughshod over them.”
Please tell me how you know for certain that the Catholic Church is a false church? Also, can you define for me when I have over done my intellectualizing? Your approach doesn’t have humility, it has subjectivism. Please don’t confuse them.
.
“I’m glad they find satisfaction in their current church, but if they experience a shift in the diocese with a liberal Bishop and priests who actively work against their Catholic faith (as they understand it), I hope it doesn’t destroy them spiritually. I’ve seen it happen before and it is very, very traumatic. Feel free to continue characterizing such warnings (and Darryl’s examples of challenges the RCC faces) as “attacks” on the RCC and nice catholic ladies, but in doing so realize that you are completely missing the point.”
I have had about four false starts trying hard to type less triumphantly but when anything counts as truth its kind of hard not to appear proud. Let’s address the part where you acknowledge that there is spirit of liberalism working against “something else”. That “something else” you call mine and Mrs Webfoot’s Catholicism. Would that “something else” also be the same conservativism that liberals( who promote liberal ideas) want the Vatican to overturn? Dogmas and doctrines that exist contrary to their ideologies?
Also, how do you have certainty that the Reformers in their zeal for reform didn’t go too far? If reformers blow-up the palace, cut off the head of the king, and burn the constitution, is it still only reform? When does it stop being reform and turn into revolution and anarchy? How do you know? I know how I can tell the difference, do yo know how to know the difference?
You have to have certainty that the Reformers were only taking it as far as they had to, right? And when you enter this state of trust, you derive much certainty, otherwise you wouldn’t be a Protestant Christian.So don’t knock certainty, it’s what you are standing on.
But you’re a relativist. On the one hand, I’m allowed to be in a false church( too bad for me), but my believing that it is the true church puts me in the position of being triumphalistic. Is it triumphalistic to believe in truth? If the Catholicism that is taught from the Vatican is completely true, how is my certainty dangerous and my awareness of its being the true church triumphalism, as long as I’m not mean to you?
You sound like a man with a bull horn on a rooftop shouting that there is no such thing as truth. What you mean is that your truth is truth, but Catholicism isn’t. The only that I am affected by your declaration is if your notion of truth is correct. You begrudge me for believeing that The Catholic Church is true because it destroys other claims? But isn’t that what different denominations do to each other and what Protestantism as a whole does( if true) to Catholicism?
This sounds exactly like the idea that I encountered in a philosophy class full of 20 something’s. I was told that since we live in a pluralistic society no one had a sole claim to truth. If I said that my religion( Christianity) was the truth, that that caused their personal, and meaningful to them, truth to be subjugated to my truth. To them that was tyranny and further, not tolerable in a pluralistic society. I was allowed to call my religion, my own personal truth, as long as I didn’t say that their personal truth wasn’t likewise the truth. But when I tried to point out that their pluralistic notion of personal truths silences the voice of my religious preference, that is also meaningful to me( hands over my heart) in so many special ways, because a huge component of it is that it declares itself to be the only truth, and if I can’t believe this component then well, I can’t have my religion in a religiously pluralistic society. IOW’s their pluralism doesn’t allow for my religion that self-identifies as exclusive. They were fine with my religion as long as it wasn’t triumphalist.
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Susan, we’re either papist or relativists? That’s neither a credible nor a respectable apologetic. Look, you had a crisis, you found comfort in your idea of Roman Catholicism, and that’s about it. You seem nice enough – stop drying to dress up your experience in philosophic garb. I know it’s getting close to Halloween but that costume gets no candy.
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Susan, the reformation as the French revolution, though a nice try, doesn’t work at all. The reformation as beleaugered and exiled group is the case.
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Muddy,
Papacy is just the recogniztion that there was is and always has been a visible church entailing that it was also entrusted with teaching authority and power to demand adherence. You must either find it too laxed or too rigourness since you criticise it so. Go ahead and criticise it for being too extreme( and stand on it…..no wishy washiness allowed),but don’t criticise it for existing, that is historically invalid.
I’m trying to he fair, but either Christianity is heterodox as represented by Protestantism( this is not a personal attack) or orthodoxy exists in it’s visible fullness and Catholic universalness. You see middle ground? Tell me which institutions have what degrees of othodoxy and tell me what authority decides? I will take a pie chart.
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@susan
Nothing I wrote disputes the existence of truth, nor am I relativist. One needn’t be a relativist to recognize that our knowledge is limited. Tolerance and principled pluralism are not inconsistent with the existence of truth. But you are eager to go on and on about “absolute this” and “certainty about that” even when you are clearly clueless about what you are writing.
Furthermore, apart from your basic philosophical errors, you are making claims for your church that they don’t make for themselves. The church does not claim that “the Catholicism that is taught from the Vatican is completely true”. Your church is not certain about all sorts of theological questions, nor do they pretend to have infallible exegesis of all of scripture. The “ordinary” magisterium is fallible while being authoritative for example. Yes it commands your religious submission, but it is open to revision and correction. Sometimes that correction even comes from protestants as JPII and Benedict noted and contrary to your claim that everything good in protestantism came from the catholic church (see this is triumphalism). Believing your church is true is not the problem here – your sophomoric attempts at intellectual sophistication are not serving you well.
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Susan,
1) What I said before.
2) “either Christianity is heterodox as represented by Protestantism( this is not a personal attack) or orthodoxy exists in it’s visible fullness and Catholic universalness.” This is your personal psychology, not an argument.
3) If your churches begin to allow divorced members to take the Eucharist, is your trust in their pope just as strong?
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Sean,
If the cullotes fit, where them. No, I am not likening the reformation to the reign of terror. I am saying that wherever the church is( and you know what I believe), it does have divine rights.It goes with the territory or there is no such thing as an institutional church anywhere. Laying on of hands is absurd……so on and so forth. You know that the extent of doctrine and institutional changes were correct and needed, because who thought so and authorized them? If your in excile and the thing that led to the beginning of the Reformation split is now straightend out, you can come back. But demanding a while litany of things that must be fixed before hand it just revealing that everyone is his own pope.What would have brought Luther home wasnt the same list that would have brought Calvin and Zwingli an Menno Simons, home.
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Susan, you can’t pin me with demands of perfection, I’m treading water in the PCA. I’m enduring. And how in the world do you reconcile Vat II with what you now believe? We all make commitments of faith but you selling papal audacity and Vat II Rahnerian realities is more faith than I can muster. I’ll have to stick with the original apostolic tradition and a faith that believes in what it can’t see. We are supposed to be different from Thomas, right?
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Susan,
Also, how do you have certainty that the Reformers in their zeal for reform didn’t go too far? If reformers blow-up the palace, cut off the head of the king, and burn the constitution, is it still only reform? When does it stop being reform and turn into revolution and anarchy? How do you know? I know how I can tell the difference, do yo know how to know the difference?
You have to have certainty that the Reformers were only taking it as far as they had to, right? And when you enter this state of trust, you derive much certainty, otherwise you wouldn’t be a Protestant Christian.So don’t knock certainty, it’s what you are standing on.
Nobody is knocking certainty. What we’re knocking is this idea that Roman Catholicism offers certainty but Protestantism does not.
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Robert:
Nobody is knocking certainty. What we’re knocking is this idea that Roman Catholicism offers certainty but Protestantism does not.>>>>
Okay, what Protestantism can legitimately claim as certainty was claimed by both Catholic and Orthodox Churches over 1,000-1,500 years before the Reformation. That is basically the contents of the great ecumenical creeds – which large parts of Protestantism now disagree with – and the infallibility of Scripture.
So, you must believe that the Catholic Church offers certainty.
Now before you go into the “I don’t accept the Roman Catholic Church, but I am also catholic” routine, you have to remember that you don’t accept the Orthodox Church, either – which has the same teachings with slight modifications. You reject the teachings that both the Catholic and the Orthodox Churches accept. Now, if the Orthodox do not claim the Catholic brand name, then why do Protestants? The OC is also catholic.
Now, if you wish to start calling your local church the Presbyterian Catholic Church, then maybe you can pretend that you are also catholic. If you won’t claim the brand in public, then don’t pretend it belongs to you. Truth in advertising.
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Robert,
“I don’t have to irreformably identify it as Scripture or inspired. The words themselves do that.”
So the words themselves identify the extent and scope of Scripture? They obviously do not, as logic and history show.
“Good. The Magisterium isn’t Jesus. You want to say on the one hand that it is (we have infallibility) but on the other hand that it isn’t (we don’t have inspiration). Pick one.”
Evasion again. You keep going on about “we’re all fallible, Rome doesn’t offer you advantage, we’re in same boat, claims don’t matter”. I’ve repeatedly shown how such an argument undermines Christ/Apostles claims to divine authority. You then sidestep by saying one cannot have divine authority without inspiration. But that is beside the very simple point I’m making which you continue to refuse to see with your constant red herrings, this one included.
“No more than you have to put faith in your self-admitted provisional opinion that Rome is the true church, unless you want to tell me you are infallible in identifying the true church?”
You just did it again.
“How did you come to the conclusion Rome was the church? Motives of credibility plus the claim. I have the same thing for the words of Jesus.”
The “words of Jesus” do and can remain only a matter of provisional and tentative opinion, by your own claims.
“Your extra-ecclesiastical means of identifying the church are fallible, tentative, and provisional”
Yes, just as the NT believers were when they examined the motives of credibility Christ and the Apostles offered. Motives they offered to support their claims to divine authority. That’s why I ignored your question – because it’s another red herring. You and your confessions reject the types of claims Rome makes. Now what are the implications of that? That’s the focus of discussion, not these red herrings.
“So at the end of the day, you are still relying on your own opinion that Rome is the true church and that you have rightly understood her. Good. Same boat again.”
Yep. Same boat in that we’re all human (so pointing this out continues to be a red herring). Not same boat in what is being assented to – one can yield nothing but opinion by its own admission. Nothing changes in that regard after assent in Protestantism, because nothing can change due to the disclaimers it offers upfront.
“The claim itself is insufficient to make one better off, and that is the problem.”
The claim itself is *necessary*, but not sufficient, as has already been stated. So Protestantism fails getting off the ground. And if the claim is not necessary as you apparently hold, then nothing can rise above provisional opinion.
“I’m not the one hung up on irreformability as necessary for the certainty of faith. That’s you. ”
So articles of faith are just opinions. So Christ and the Apostles had no need to to teach irreformably then. After all it’s unnecessary according to you.
“You whine that Protestantism doesn’t offer up the text as irreformable and infallible. My contention is that Protestantism doesn’t really have to. The text does that.”
The “self-evident” text that apparently is not self-evident as logic, history, and textual criticism show. And hence Protestantism’s hesitation to offer it as such – no confession ever has or ever will.
“Scripture offers infallible articles. We don’t need to help it out.”
Why do the confessions bother (provisionally) identifying the extent, scope, closure, inspiration, sufficiency, authority, inerrancy of it then with their paper tiger authority? Stop helping it out.
“Nothing ever rises above mere opinion for YOU on the same standard. That’s the point you don’t get.”
No. That would only be the case if Protestantism and its confessions/bodies made the same types of claims Rome or the East does to divine authority, or if Rome/East adhered to SS as a rule of faith. But they don’t. That’s the point.
“But in any case, you demand an infallible canon.”
I fail to see how how SS is supposed to function coherently as an infallible rule of faith without an infallible canon. But that is all beside the point anyhow considering the doctrine of SS itself as the rule of faith can never be offered as anything more than provisional tentative opinion in your system.
“How do you differentiate your opinion from actual articles of faith in Roman Catholicism?”
STM-triad. Dissent from articles of faith no more muddies their existence than those who dissented from Christ and the Apostles in the NT muddied the articles they taught. And as to the “but RCs have differences too” objection, read sections 5 and 7 of http://www.newmanreader.org/works/anglicans/volume1/lecture10.html
“Again, the mere claim isn’t enough. You act as if it is.”
No, I’ve never argued it’s enough, just that it’s *necessary*. Which is why Christ and the Apostles made necessary claims you undermine in your arguments.
“I’m not the one demanding infallible certainty before I can give the warrant of faith. That’s you.”
You’re giving the assent of faith to admitted mere opinions – otherwise they’d be offered as irreformable and infallible as divine revelation. But they never are.
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically. ”
Yup. So we can retire the red herrings.
“The simple claim is insufficient.”
Yep. It’s necessary though. Who makes it? Not Protestantism.
“I’m only better off if Rome actually is infallible.”
Yup. So we can retire the red herrings.
“So Protestantism doesn’t automatically get thrown out because it doesn’t make a claim of infallibilty.”
If it doesn’t claim infallibility, there’s no reason for me to assent to it as a system of infallibility, in which case there’s no reason for me to take it seriously as offering articles of faith instead of opinion. So yes, it should get thrown out by its own disclaimers.
“Again, they’re better off only if the claim is correct … The point is that the claim in itself is insufficient to make one better off.”
Yup, so we can retire the red herrings – they are better off regardless of their personal fallibility in assenting or interpreting. And the claim had to be made in the first place, which Protestantism rejects.
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible. ”
Yup, so we can retire the red herrings.
“The church recognizes and receives the canon.”
Which it can never infallibly or irreformably do by your disclaimers.
“Tradition and the church aren’t Scripture by Rome’s own definition. Remember, the Magisterium isn’t inspired like divine revelation is by your own confession.”
Nope, but they do have divine authority.
“Once the Apostles leave the scene, the game changes.”
Right, which is why we see in Scripture them planning for that by ordaining authorized teachers who help build the church. Not frantically running around ordering everything must be written down and reminding everyone to only follow that when John dies.
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Robert,
Let me say this and then I will be outta here( just too busy to comment; what so you guys do for a living anyways:) )?
Protestantism as a thing doesn’t tell me that I can be certain that whatever denomination I choose is the correct one.The best it can do is offer competing theologies.It never claims “this church here is the true church” Now if I was to leave Calvinism for Lutheranism, would I be taking the true view of the Lord’s Supper with me or is the truth about it within the Luther church or is it somewhere else? Protestantism even though having the bible doesn’t give the seeker to this dilemma, an answer. I dont want it to depend on me. Do you understand?
Whose demands for reform should the Catholic Church listen to. Does it have to listen to the list supplied by Lutherans or should it expand some more and change for the same of Calvinists or should it go out of it’s way even more and reform itself to the wishes of Zwingli? Say it did everything to the satisfaction of everyone, would the earlier reformers be perturbed about the amount of change the Mennonites got and vice versa? How do protestants know when it is time to return? Ask these questions to yourself and when you have an answer show me how it would work.
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This guy isn’t reading Roman Catholics who chime in at Old Life:
Have Susan, James, Mermaid, Kevin, or Michael ever had the least shred of fear about where they will be after death?
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Susan, so is this the way you view church and state:
Crusades, anyone?
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Mermaid, “Okay, what Protestantism can legitimately claim as certainty was claimed by both Catholic and Orthodox Churches over 1,000-1,500 years before the Reformation.”
You mean Rome claimed then its two infallible dogmas — papal infallibility (1870) and bodily assumption of Mary (1950) — over 1000 years ago? Is that the math you’re using?
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James Young, “Right, which is why we see in Scripture them planning for that by ordaining authorized teachers who help build the church. Not frantically running around ordering everything must be written down and reminding everyone to only follow that when John dies.”
Which is why we see in written pages why written pages are unimportant compared to what the bishops who are only infallible sometimes and didn’t know it with certainty until 1870 do.
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Susan, “Protestantism as a thing doesn’t tell me that I can be certain that whatever denomination I choose is the correct one.”
Roman Catholicism doesn’t tell you the correct one either. Remember, we’re separated brothers. We have the truth.
Regroup, rinse, repeat.
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Robert,
“Sensus plenoir as Rome practices it produces all sorts of stuff that is at odds with the original text. Like the gates on Ezekiel’s temple being closed proving perpetual virginity.”
Allegorical and typological interpretation is a perfectly valid method of exegesis, as the Apostles showed, as well as the early church fathers in battling heresies.
“There’s all sorts of fanciful cr*p like that in Rome’s interpretative methods.”
Just as Jews characterize Paul’s and the gospel writer’s interpretative methods.
“They appealed to Scripture when it conflicted with Jewish tradition.”
And Rome does not claim Tradition conflicts with Scripture. The point is Jesus was a Jew – he followed Oral Torah – Judaism was not a sola Tanakh religion. He also condemned false traditions based on his authority, but that does not entail he condemned unwritten tradition entirely, just corrupted and man-made parts to it.
“Now show me where they appealed to mysterious unwritten tradition as something that must be believed for salvation.”
There are many texts where the Apostles exhort believers to hold to both written and unwritten tradition. There is no indication that the unwritten is or would become unnecessary or redundant at some point.
“Jesus and the Apostles give us Scripture. Their words are equivalent to Scripture.”
But I thought they practiced SS. How could they practice SS if Scripture of the NT was still being created? Further, how could they practice SS if they were also following Oral Torah at the time?
“The claim of the papacy was propped up by the Donation. Donation falls away, you have to go looking elsewhere”
There were claims made by the papacy before the Donation you reject as just as arrogant as the ones the Donation supposedly propped up.
“We discover that’s impossible, so we invent doctrinal development.”
Doctrinal development was not invented by Newman.
“Name one place where believers are exhorted to follow an unwritten tradition for salvation that is not also found in the written canon.”
Anywhere that they exhort believers to submit to unwritten tradition such as practice and preaching. You think those commands were just useless and superfluous? You’re just assuming that said unwritten tradition was written down at some point, which is never stated as being done in Scripture and hence is inconsistent with your position.
“Since the old covenant practice was to write down the tradition every time you get revelation and Jesus’ practice was to follow Scripture over tradition, the burden of the argument is actually on you.”
Completely ignores the concept of Oral Torah before and during Jesus’ time. Judaism is not an SS religion.
“Give me some verifiable Apostolic teachings that never got written down. Just one. ”
Here’s a few teachings you take for granted that aren’t written down: The extent and scope of the canon, said canon is closed, said canon is inspired and inerrant and authoritative, said canon is formally sufficient and the sole infallible rule of faith, revelation ended with the death of the last apostle.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 21, 2015 at 5:09 pm | Permalink
This guy isn’t reading Roman Catholics who chime in at Old Life:
Typical Old Life. From the comments:
“Pastor Davis, as a Catholic I found this article greatly troubling. Not because I was shocked by the differences between our teachings but because the Catholic position in this article is not Catholic at all. Pastor Davis you are essentially arguing against a straw man. You misrepresent what the church teaches on almost every line of the article.
If the church taught what you say it did I would join you in opposing it. However it does not teach at all what you write it does.”
D. G. Hart
Crusades, anyone?
You know he’s getting desperate when he tries the Crusades. Calvin’s Geneva:
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/06/how-john-calvin-made-me-a-catholic/
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Darryl,
“Which is why we see in written pages why written pages are unimportant compared to what the bishops who are only infallible sometimes and didn’t know it with certainty until 1870 do.”
Right, Scripture attests to the other 2 legs. And the other 2 legs attest to Scripture. See how that works.
As for assurance, I can’t have the “certainty of faith” as Trent puts it because my salvation is not a part of public revelation. I can however have a moral certainty – if I didn’t, the teachings on when to go to confession and when to receive the Eucharist wouldn’t make sense. And I fail to see what advantage your alternative gives. Here’s what Calvinism offers me: You’re assured of salvation, unless you sin severely or for long enough that indicates you weren’t really saved in the first place (gotta stay on that sanctification treadmill).
Calvin: “…experience shows that the reprobate are sometimes affected in a way so similar to the elect, that even in their own judgment there is no difference between them. Hence it is not strange, that by the Apostle a taste of heavenly gifts, and by Christ himself a temporary faith, is ascribed to them. Not that they truly perceive the power of spiritual grace and the sure light of faith; but the Lord, the better to convict them, and leave them without excuse, instills into their minds such a sense of his goodness as can be felt without the Spirit of adoption. Should it be objected, that believers have no stronger testimony to assure them of their adoption, I answer, that though there is a great resemblance and affinity between the elect of God and those who are impressed for a time with a fading faith, yet the elect alone have that full assurance which is extolled by Paul, and by which they are enabled to cry, Abba, Father. Therefore, as God regenerates the elect only for ever by incorruptible seed, as the seed of life once sown in their hearts never perishes, so he effectually seals in them the grace of his adoption, that it may be sure and steadfast. But in this there is nothing to prevent an inferior operation of the Spirit from taking its course in the reprobate … When he shows himself propitious to them, it is not as if he had truly rescued them from death, and taken them under his protection. He only gives them a manifestation of his present mercy. In the elect alone he implants the living root of faith, so that they persevere even to the end. Thus we dispose of the objection, that if God truly displays his grace, it must endure for ever. There is nothing inconsistent in this with the fact of his enlightening some with a present sense of grace, which afterwards proves evanescent.”
“Besides this there is a special call which, for the most part, God bestows on believers only, when by the internal illumination of the Spirit he causes the word preached to take deep root in their hearts. Sometimes, however, he communicates it also to those whom he enlightens only for a time, and whom afterwards, in just punishment for their ingratitude, he abandons and smites with greater blindness.”
Well, that’s much better.
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DG link: “If you listen carefully to contemporary Roman Catholic theologians, you will hear of assurance only in relation to those who have been canonized as saints. For example, when pope John Paul II and John XXIII were declared saints in April of 2014, one Catholic official said that the declaration affirms that these men are in heaven. For Roman Catholicism, saints are individuals who have been canonized by Rome’s official declaration. They are said to have possessed heroic virtue, performed two miracles (one after their death, which is said to confirm their place in heaven), and are nominated by the church. The saints, then, are usually the only individuals who are said to be in heaven. “The title of saint tells us that the person lived a holy life, is in heaven, and is to be honored by the universal Church.”
“I will make myself like the Most High.” The Bible is very clear this pride
and from Matthew 20 John MacArthur sermon excerpt:
…“He (Jesus) says – Well, you will, you will suffer. And so they (disciples) will be glorified. We don’t know where or how because He says in verse 23, “But to sit on My right hand and on My left is not Mine to give. That is to be given to them for whom it is prepared by My Father.” He says I’m in submission now, I’m coming to suffer. I am emphasizing My submissiveness to the Father. He’ll give that out. He is the one passing out the rewards. He is the one who gives the ultimate glory and it’s His decision to whomever He has prepared that.”
“I’ve often asked myself who it is that will be the greatest in heaven. Who would be the most glorified? The only answer is the one who suffered the most, the one who is the most abandoned to self-denial, the one who is the most utterly selfless, humble, self-effacing believer who gave up everything to proclaim the name of Jesus Christ. That’s who it will be.”
seems like this alone should be enough to make one run…fast
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CVD or James Young
I very much enjoy reading your back and forth with Robert. You explain the provisional nature of Protestantism very well.
I’m going to try to stop writing here at OL and just listen in on the conversations. I think Robert is trying to think all of this through; he also asks thoughtful questions over at CtC.
Are you also a convert? Is your background written anywhere? Do you have a blog?
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DGH: Have Susan, James, Mermaid, Kevin, or Michael ever had the least shred of fear about where they will be after death?
Bingo.
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Darryl –
They are said to have possessed heroic virtue, performed two miracles (one after their death, which is said to confirm their place in heaven), and are nominated by the church. The saints, then, are usually the only individuals who are said to be in heaven. “The title of saint tells us that the person lived a holy life, is in heaven, and is to be honored by the universal Church.”
Any of the usual suspects want to try and defend this?
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Publius
Posted October 21, 2015 at 7:14 pm | Permalink
Darryl –
They are said to have possessed heroic virtue, performed two miracles (one after their death, which is said to confirm their place in heaven), and are nominated by the church. The saints, then, are usually the only individuals who are said to be in heaven. “The title of saint tells us that the person lived a holy life, is in heaven, and is to be honored by the universal Church.”
Any of the usual suspects want to try and defend this?
The usual attempt to disrupt the real discussion with trivia. Look a squirrel!
Susan
Posted October 21, 2015 at 4:53 pm | Permalink
Protestantism as a thing doesn’t tell me that I can be certain that whatever denomination I choose is the correct one.The best it can do is offer competing theologies.It never claims “this church here is the true church” Now if I was to leave Calvinism for Lutheranism, would I be taking the true view of the Lord’s Supper with me or is the truth about it within the Luther church or is it somewhere else? Protestantism even though having the bible doesn’t give the seeker to this dilemma, an answer. I dont want it to depend on me. Do you understand?
Whose demands for reform should the Catholic Church listen to. Does it have to listen to the list supplied by Lutherans or should it expand some more and change for the same of Calvinists or should it go out of its way even more and reform itself to the wishes of Zwingli?
Quite true. Luther re-invented the Christian religion to his own druthers, but there are dozens if not hundreds of others who did the same. The issue isn’t Catholicism, it’s “Protestantism,” which because of its own ecclesiastical warfare, is a fairly meaningless term.
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Darryl,
Of course I think about hell; it’s real.
http://catholiceducation.org/en/religion-and-philosophy/apologetics/a-happy-little-reflection-on-hell.html
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Read your link Susan. “Chesterton says that another name for free will is moral responsibility, and “Upon this sublime and perilous liberty hang heaven and hell, and all the mysterious drama of the soul.”
Not sure what Chesterson mean by ‘moral responsiblility’ but I hope He meant ‘FAITH IN JESUS’
Heb 2:3 how will we escape if we neglect so great a salvation? After it was at the first spoken through the Lord, it was confirmed to us by those who heard,
FAITH IN JESUS, = not neglecting salvation (a warning to Jews at that time tempted to return to Judaism)
Heb 2 13 And again, “I WILL PUT MY TRUST IN HIM.” And again, “BEHOLD, I AND THE CHILDREN WHOM GOD HAS GIVEN ME.”
FAITH IN JESUS, His children (given to Him by the Father) trusting Him
Heb 2:14 Therefore, since the children share in flesh and blood, He Himself likewise also partook of the same, that through death He might render powerless him who had the power of death, that is, the devil, 15 and might free those who through fear of death were subject to slavery all their lives.
FAITH IN JESUS, that He is the only One who delivers
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@CVD
“And Rome does not claim Tradition conflicts with Scripture. The point is Jesus was a Jew – he followed Oral Torah – Judaism was not a sola Tanakh religion. He also condemned false traditions based on his authority, but that does not entail he condemned unwritten tradition entirely, just corrupted and man-made parts to it.”
That is not consistent with the gospel accounts. Jesus always seems to be saying “it is written”. Are there examples of His appeals to oral tradition to correct errors? If the tradition can include false elements doesn’t that make the tradition fallible?
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@cvd in you response to Robert you offer two alternatives certain grounded in an infallible authority versus mere tentative opinion. This is a false dichotomy. Obviously the jewish leaders were fallible and disageed about the scope of the canon. That would imply all a Jew could have was mere tentative opinion by your reckoning. However, Paul says they had much more in Romans. That undermines your claim that without a central infallible authority, one is left rudderless.
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James Young, but neither Scripture nor reason point to papal infallibility. That’s your blankie.
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Susan, why no compliments for mmmeeeeEEEE? I explain Roman Catholicism’s provisional nature very well.
No peace, no justice.
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Susan, thinking is not worrying. Have you confessed all your sins? Do you know? Jesus said that if you hate you’ve committed murder. Maybe your mind is a factory of sinful thoughts. Be afraid, be very afraid.
At least, Luther gets credit for taking Rome’s teaching about sin seriously.
But today? Protestants are going to heaven too. It’s one big salvation bus.
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<i.D. G. Hart
Posted October 21, 2015 at 9:36 pm | Permalink
James Young, but neither Scripture nor reason point to papal infallibility. That’s your blankie.
Perhaps, but rejecting papal infallibility lends no truth to your own version of Christianity, which even your surrogates are obliged to admit is no more than the theological guesswork of men–most of whom disagree even with each other, hence hundreds of various Protestantisms.
Neither does it explain why your religion is such a truncated version of the Eastern Orthodox, which is sacramentally the same religion as the pope’s. Your attacks on Rome still leave you nowhere.
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So the words themselves identify the extent and scope of Scripture? They obviously do not, as logic and history show.
The Magisterium does not identify the extent and scope of tradition nor the extent and scope of everything that must be believed in order to be saved. IE, there is not an infallible list of infallible dogma. So I don’t know why I need it if you don’t’.
Evasion again. You keep going on about “we’re all fallible, Rome doesn’t offer you advantage, we’re in same boat, claims don’t matter”. I’ve repeatedly shown how such an argument undermines Christ/Apostles claims to divine authority. You then sidestep by saying one cannot have divine authority without inspiration. But that is beside the very simple point I’m making which you continue to refuse to see with your constant red herrings, this one included.
But you can’t have divine authority without inspiration. You can’t both claim to have the same kind of authority as the Apostles and then deny their inspiration. Your claim proves too little. It is insufficient if we actually measure it against other claims. So if you want to make the claim necessary because Christ and the Apostles claimed it for themselves, then Rome fails. Go to Salt Lake City.
Further, my point doesn’t undermine the claim. The point is that the claim is insufficient and it presupposes that such a claim is necessary to have the warrant of faith. It’s the presupposition that a claim is necessary that I deny. Was the Jew who only heard one of Jesus’ parables and believed it even though he never ever heard Jesus claim divine authority for himself a fideist or lacking the warrant of faith? Was the first-century Jew who believed Esther was Scripture a fideist or lacking in warrant for faith because I can’t find in the book of Esther “here ye, here ye, this is infallible”?
You just did it again.
No. The mere claim doesn’t give anyone an advantage. The question is what God has promised to provide and whether or not the claim is correct. If Rome’s claim is false, you have no advantage. If God has not promised to provide what you claim, you have no advantage.
The “words of Jesus” do and can remain only a matter of provisional and tentative opinion, by your own claims.
Excuse me, but how do YOU move from Rome as the true church being YOUR provisional and tentative opinion to Rome as the true church being a certainty if YOU are not infallible? We’re ALL still waiting for you to answer that question.
Yes, just as the NT believers were when they examined the motives of credibility Christ and the Apostles offered. Motives they offered to support their claims to divine authority. That’s why I ignored your question – because it’s another red herring. You and your confessions reject the types of claims Rome makes. Now what are the implications of that? That’s the focus of discussion, not these red herrings.
The implication is that such claims on Rome’s part are unnecessary and not substantiated biblically, not to mention historically. We aren’t asking you to trust the church. We’re asking you to trust Jesus. If you need the church to infallibly identify those words of Jesus, that just betrays your belief that the Holy Spirit can only communicate to people if He speaks through the Vatican. Which given Rome’s universalism these days doesn’t exactly fit well with post-V2 theology anyway.
But you’re ignoring the question about the motives of credibility. If the motives of credibility that Rome offers are fallible, they don’t enable me to move from uncertainty to the certainty you demand and if I am fallible, the same thing. This is the problem with your whole approach and why we all think its ridiculous and basically a bunch of philosophical huey. The mere claim and motives do not in themselves move you to certainty. Jesus’ claims do not in themselves move one to certainty. Lots of people heard Jesus and didn’t believe Him. Lots of upright people who were smarter than the disciples and even knew Scripture better than they did weren’t convinced. Why? It’s not because the disciples were inherently better (remember grace?). It’s because the message of Jesus self-authenticates itself in the elect.
Rome finally must acknowledge that the only way anyone becomes Roman Catholic is because the Roman message self-authenticates itself to the elect. Otherwise, salvation isn’t by grace but by knowledge, greater spiritual openness, or some other such thing. What we’re dealing with is two competing claims of self-authentication. The Protestant claim is stronger, not the least of which is because there wasn’t a church in Jesus’ day going before Jesus and saying “Make sure you listen to this infallible guy here.”
Yep. Same boat in that we’re all human (so pointing this out continues to be a red herring). Not same boat in what is being assented to – one can yield nothing but opinion by its own admission. Nothing changes in that regard after assent in Protestantism, because nothing can change due to the disclaimers it offers upfront.
Unless Rome can make you infallible, nothing changes for you. Unless you want to tell me there is absolutely nothing that would ever make you stop being RC, not even a Roman rejection of the Trinity, then nothing changes for you. As long as you retain a measure of independent thought and you don’t see God face to face, there is provisionality to your opinion. You have no sure way of telling me, for example, that you are reading Rome rightly and Pelosi isn’t when it comes to abortion. The best you can give me is that it is highly likely that Rome is against abortion. You at least can’t be any more certain of that than I am that the Bible is against abortion.
The claim itself is *necessary*, but not sufficient, as has already been stated.
But the assumption is that it is necessary for the church to make that claim to begin with. So again, unless you want to tell me that the first century Jew would have had warrant to reject Christ’s teaching if he never heard Jesus directly claim infallibility or that Abraham would have been warranted to reject God’s call to leave Ur because God at that point didn’t say “I’m infallible,” then God doesn’t believe the claim is necessary for any institution or even Himself to make.
So Protestantism fails getting off the ground. And if the claim is not necessary as you apparently hold, then nothing can rise above provisional opinion.
Unless there is absolutely nothing that could make you give up Rome, including a denial of the Trinity, no matter how unlikely, then all you have for Rome is YOUR provisional opinion.
So articles of faith are just opinions. So Christ and the Apostles had no need to to teach irreformably then. After all it’s unnecessary according to you.
How is an article of faith NOT an opinion FOR YOU if you aren’t infallible. That’s the million dollar question.
As far as necessity—all I’m arguing for is that it is unnecessary for the institution to make the claim in order to have warrant of faith..
The “self-evident” text that apparently is not self-evident as logic, history, and textual criticism show. And hence Protestantism’s hesitation to offer it as such – no confession ever has or ever will.
It’s at least as self-evident as the identity of the church and what the church of Rome has defined as infallible. Because the identity of the church and what has been infallibly defined is up for debate. Are Protestants included? Who really knows`
What all this is showing, interestingly enough, that for all the claim to define articles of faith, there is only one article of faith that matters for you, and that is that Rome is infallible. Nothing about Jesus in that article. Who cares if you can ever list all of Rome’s infallible dogma because it’s not about the dogma, it’s all about fealty to Rome.
Why do the confessions bother (provisionally) identifying the extent, scope, closure, inspiration, sufficiency, authority, inerrancy of it then with their paper tiger authority? Stop helping it out.
The confessions restate the teaching of Scripture in response to new concerns. But they are unnecessary in order to give one the warrant to believe Scripture. You are telling me that I have no warrant to believe Scripture apart from the church. That means anyone who picks up a Bible and believes in Jesus is a fideist who has no warrant and is acting irrationally. Is it EVER irrational to believe in Jesus?
I said: “Nothing ever rises above mere opinion for YOU on the same standard. That’s the point you don’t get.”
You replied: No. That would only be the case if Protestantism and its confessions/bodies made the same types of claims Rome or the East does to divine authority, or if Rome/East adhered to SS as a rule of faith. But they don’t. That’s the point.
So your opinion of what Rome means by what the Trinity becomes infallible once you believe Rome is infallible? I guess that means that there is no such thing as a misunderstanding of the Trinity among faithful RCs. Good luck with that.
I fail to see how how SS is supposed to function coherently as an infallible rule of faith without an infallible canon. But that is all beside the point anyhow considering the doctrine of SS itself as the rule of faith can never be offered as anything more than provisional tentative opinion in your system.
I fail how to see a three-fold stool can be a three-fold stool if you don’t know the identity of one or more of the legs.
I asked: “How do you differentiate your opinion from actual articles of faith in Roman Catholicism?”
Your replied: STM-triad. Dissent from articles of faith no more muddies their existence than those who dissented from Christ and the Apostles in the NT muddied the articles they taught.
Not actually talking about dissent here or even muddying the existence of truth but about YOUR ability to know the truth. You’re the one talking about the claim of infallibility on the part of Rome being necessary in order to take away YOUR provisionality. What you have yet to answer is HOW the claim to infalliblity takes away your provisional apprehension of the truth and what Rome means by what it says because YOU’RE still doing the interpreting.
And as to the “but RCs have differences too” objection, read sections 5 and 7 of http://www.newmanreader.org/works/anglicans/volume1/lecture10.html
If the system claiming infallibility allows both Mother Teresa and Nancy Pelosi to be regarded as good, faithful, honorable RCs, then my opinion that Rome says abortion is wrong is provisional and cannot attain to certainty.
No, I’ve never argued it’s enough, just that it’s *necessary*. Which is why Christ and the Apostles made necessary claims you undermine in your arguments.
Ah, but I don’t necessarily agree that a claim is necessary. If a claim is necessary to give the warrant of faith, then every person who rejected the book of Genesis before Jesus came along was well within his rights to do so because the book of Genesis never makes the specific claim “This book is the infallible Word of God.”
If a claim is necessary, then Abraham could have not left Ur with impunity. In the account, God does not say “Here ye, here ye, I am God and infallible. Therefore go to Ur.”
If a claim is necessary, then Jesus sinned by expecting Jews to receive as Scripture books that never formally—in the way you demand—claim to be infallible. As far as I can tell, Jesus never says “Accept Genesis as Scripture because I have authority and I say so.” He just expects them to do it.
You’re giving the assent of faith to admitted mere opinions – otherwise they’d be offered as irreformable and infallible as divine revelation. But they never are.
And again, I don’t claim I’m giving the assent of faith to mere opinion any more than I would claim that my belief that 2+2=4 is a mere opinion. That 2+2=4 is divine revelation. That God made the world is divine revelation that I don’t need Scripture to know or a declaration from the revelation itself that it’s giving me infallible truth. I’m just expected to know these things by consulting the revelation (Rom. 1). If a claim of infalliblity was necessary, then the atheist who never finds Scripture is well within his right to believe God doesn’t exist because it’s never right to believe something irrational or fideistically, but you keep telling me an explicit claim is necessary to prevent this.
If it doesn’t claim infallibility, there’s no reason for me to assent to it as a system of infallibility, in which case there’s no reason for me to take it seriously as offering articles of faith instead of opinion. So yes, it should get thrown out by its own disclaimers.
So Jews before Christ had no reason to take the book of Genesis seriously as offering articles of faith instead of opinion? If I pick up a random Bible, never having read one before, I have no reason to believe what it says when there’s no preface that says “Church X has declared that this is the infallible Word of God”? Abraham had no reason to take God seriously when He first came to Abraham even though there is no record in Gen. 12 that God said “I am God, go to Canaan”?
And the claim had to be made in the first place, which Protestantism rejects.
So I guess God really screwed up when He first came to Abraham? Or that a Jew who heard some of Christ’s teaching but never heard Him claim infallibility could reject what He did hear with impunity?
Nope, but they do have divine authority.
No automatic divine authority for everything claimed if you don’t also claim inspiration—if you really have a three-legged stool.
Right, which is why we see in Scripture them planning for that by ordaining authorized teachers who help build the church. Not frantically running around ordering everything must be written down and reminding everyone to only follow that when John dies.
1. Protestants don’t say follow only Scripture. Protestants say only Scripture is infallible.
2. God commanded Moses to ordain priests to succeed him. There is no suggestion that these priests were infallible, and in fact we know that they were not. So an authorized teacher need not be infallible or claim infallibility.
3. No suggestion in the OT that the Jews were to expect an infallible institution to come when Messiah comes.
4. No suggestion from historical evidence that Jews were expecting an infallible institution.
5. No suggestion from Jesus that the Jews of His day needed Him to infallibly define the canon in order to recognize the canon.
IOW, your argument doesn’t work. God in many places commands without claiming infallibility for himself, and yet people aren’t justified in objecting, “but you didn’t claim infallibility for yourself.” In fact, in what is arguably the most important command for the history of salvation (the call of Abraham), God doesn’t say “I am God. I am infallible. Therefore go.” We don’t know that the call was audible or attended by any specific miracles or signs. Turns out He just expected Abraham to recognize His voice and to obey. The claim is unnecessary if Scripture is in fact the Word of God. It might be helpful, but it is not, strictly speaking, necessary for the assent of faith.
Unless of course you want to tell me Abraham would have been well within his rights to reject God’s call in Gen. 12 with no consequences.
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Clete,Susan, et al.,
This is a classic case of the tail wagging the dog. Protestantism doesn’t claim the church is infallible therefore everything falls apart in the system. Constantinople is a little better (they claim “Apostolic Succession”) but they do not have a means by which to arbitrate disagreement among bishops, therefore it is false. This leaves you with Rome and a means to arbitrate between opinion and divine revelation. Rome has an epistemic (noumenal) mechanism to help us understand the ontology of Divine revelation (phenomenal).
Abstractly, it can soothe the conscience. In the real world though, these claims become significantly more complicated. The motives of credibility have some problems, and the complications become far more troublesome when pressed by your quest for certitude.
The thing that DGH and others have tried to point out is that your assertions of superiority are not echoed by your greatest intellectuals. Douthat is a popular example of a brilliant Catholic writer that we’ve cited. No one has knocked his Catholicism here, yet Bryan Cross claims his epistemic approach borders on Protestant. Every modern Catholic historian working in Patristics that I’ve read strongly qualifies their claim that the bishop of Rome is a successor of Peter. It’s not rooted in tactile succession or with historical continuity to the historical Jesus or Peter, but rather, to the development of Jesus’s ministry in the Church through the Spirit in the Father’s providence. Your quest for certainty, however, compels you to make very narrow and specific arguments that are loaded with serious ambiguity (and who arbitrates?!).
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Brandon,
“This is a classic case of the tail wagging the dog. Protestantism doesn’t claim the church is infallible therefore everything falls apart in the system. Constantinople is a little better (they claim “Apostolic Succession”) but they do not have a means by which to arbitrate disagreement among bishops, therefore it is false. This leaves you with Rome and a means to arbitrate between opinion and divine revelation. Rome has an epistemic (noumenal) mechanism to help us understand the ontology of Divine revelation (phenomenal).”
I don’t understand why you would see it as a case of the tail wagging the dog if Rome in fact can solve all disputes.Since differences do occur in the realm of ideas within Christianity and since SS cannot arbitrate, it’s a miracle really that scripture itself imbued with fingers directing the reader towards the church.If the scriptures themselves did not have the concept of church, and authority…… the over all a the concept of a mechanism to keep out the false and anything contrary to what we need for life and holiness ,then I would have been short evidence to discern Rome. So it’s not like we are pulling the concept of church as it understood by Rome, out of thin air. Now Protestants can say as they do that Rome is reading their idea of church into the scriptures, and in the realm of possiblities that could be true, but considering the inability for any protestant to authorize the idea that “Rome reads her idea of church into the scriptures”, the truth of that statement hangs in mid-air.Scripture alone can never absolutely confirm or deny.
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I apologize for my typos.
Brandon,
Am I making myself clear? Please give me feedback so that I can be sure I am being understood.
Let me ask you a different and more direct way: Can any Protestant say with certainty and then authorize the notion that Rome’s reading of scripture wherein she sees support for her own existnce as the one true Church and arbiter of all disagreements, is absoutely untrue? If a protestant body did do that would that legislative protestant body have authority from either tradition or scripture to do so? And by stating it so and putting it into it’s own protestant constitution, would they have truly drawn authority away from Rome and procured authority for itself as the new acting body?
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Susan,
If Rome in fact can solve all disputes
But of course that’s the million-dollar question.
Let’s look at one dispute Rome hasn’t solved: Abortion on demand. Mother Teresa and Nancy Pelosi are two women whom the church obviously considers faithful and true servants of the church, fully orthodox. Mother Teresa is known for being against abortion. Pelosi is known for being for it. Apparently both positions are fully orthodox.
And we can multiply from there. Do Anglicans have true Apostolic succession. I can point to church documents that say no. Pope Francis evidently believes otherwise. You can even be an Anglican and embrace Kenneth Copeland and still be a “brother bishop.” Since you’ve already established that a document (the Bible) can’t settle anything, I must therefore go with Francis and believe that Anglicans have true Apostolic succession.
And on and on and on and on.
If Rome could actually solve disputes in a way that Scripture alone can’t, there would be no disputes among RC theologians on anything the church has said, or at least on the parameters of infallible dogma.
Now of course, Rome’s abject failure doesn’t prove Scripture can determine anything. What it does prove is that Rome’s system doesn’t do any better job than Protestantism does. So walking the triumphalism back even just a bit might be wise.
Which is Darryl’s point.
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Robert,
“So I don’t know why I need it if you don’t’.”
Because I don’t follow SS as the rule of faith. I’m examining if your rule of faith is coherent and consistent in the first place since, just like with rejecting certain claims, if it isn’t, it shouldn’t be considered as a viable option.
“But you can’t have divine authority without inspiration.”
Yes this is what you assert. But that is besides the point. Remember what I said earlier, “Grant Rome’s claims are true. If so, I’m in a better position after buying into it – it was a good deal in that regard. Grant Protestantism’s claims, and more importantly, disclaimers are true. If so, I’m no better off after buying into it – nothing changed – it’s a bad deal.” and “If you want to evaluate the merits or consistency of a system, you grant the truth of the claim it makes and then examine it, as I’ve been doing with both systems.” And part of Rome’s claims is that it has divine authority without being inspired.
Now, you’ve written a lot about how I’m not in a better position because I’m fallible, have to interpret, get no epistemological advantage, Rome could be wrong, etc. But what did you say above:
“I’m only better off if Rome actually is infallible.”
“Again, they’re better off only if the claim is correct.”
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“If the claim isn’t true, it’s worthless.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
“If Rome’s claim is false, you have no advantage.”
So that’s it then. You admit *granting Rome’s claims are true*, I’m in a better position than a Protestant. And this, despite all the things you originally asserted torpedoed any chance of me being in a better position (e.g. I’m fallible, I must interpret, I must choose to submit in the first place, etc). It took far too long to get there, but we got there.
I’m going to zero in here since it should clear away the fog of the red herrings:
“Excuse me, but how do YOU move from Rome as the true church being YOUR provisional and tentative opinion to Rome as the true church being a certainty if YOU are not infallible?”
“If the motives of credibility that Rome offers are fallible, they don’t enable me to move from uncertainty to the certainty you demand and if I am fallible, the same thing.”
“Jesus’ claims do not in themselves move one to certainty. ”
“Unless Rome can make you infallible, nothing changes for you.”
“As long as you retain a measure of independent thought and you don’t see God face to face, there is provisionality to your opinion.”
“But the assumption is that it is necessary for the church to make that claim to begin with.”
“What you have yet to answer is HOW the claim to infalliblity takes away your provisional apprehension of the truth and what Rome means by what it says because YOU’RE still doing the interpreting.”
“How is an article of faith NOT an opinion FOR YOU if you aren’t infallible.”
Again, these are all red herrings. You already admit above I have an advantage granting Rome’s claims are true. You also admit above “the condition of having to rely on one’s understanding” applied to NT believers which is exactly what you inconsistently keep bringing up as a supposed “problem” for Rome’s system.
“It’s the presupposition that a claim is necessary that I deny. ”
So Christ and the Apostles made unnecessary and superfluous claims. I’ve lost track how many times I’ve had to mention it – you reply ostensibly denying it, then turn around and keep dropping these lines.
“So again, unless you want to tell me that the first century Jew would have had warrant to reject Christ’s teaching if he never heard Jesus directly claim infallibility or that Abraham would have been warranted to reject God’s call to leave Ur because God at that point didn’t say “I’m infallible,” then God doesn’t believe the claim is necessary for any institution or even Himself to make.”
The experiences of Abraham speaking directly with God, as well as NT audiences interacting directly with Christ as revelation was unfolding are hardly analogous to the post-apostolic age. If you’d like to claim you are speaking to God as Abraham did, that would create parity – go for it.
“If a claim is necessary, then Abraham could have not left Ur with impunity. In the account, God does not say “Here ye, here ye, I am God and infallible. Therefore go to Ur.””
Do you think God did not ever identify Himself as God when speaking with Abraham?
“If a claim is necessary, then Jesus sinned by expecting Jews to receive as Scripture books that never formally—in the way you demand—claim to be infallible. As far as I can tell, Jesus never says “Accept Genesis as Scripture because I have authority and I say so.” He just expects them to do it.”
Yes He expects them to do it, just as He expects them to adhere to His interpretation of the OT which many of them rejected. That did not mean his claims to ground His authoritative interpretations and judgments of the OT were superfluous or unnecessary.
“Rome is infallible. Nothing about Jesus in that article…it’s all about fealty to Rome.”
Rome is infallible only because of Christ’s promises and His founding of the church. Every Roman dogma is “about Jesus”. It’s all about fealty to Christ’s authorized church which safeguards the apostolic deposit enshrined in Scripture and Tradition.
“The confessions restate the teaching of Scripture in response to new concerns. ”
And they have no authority to do so, based on their own disclaimers. Which has always been the point. I have no reason to follow their judgment on any of those teachings.
“That means anyone who picks up a Bible and believes in Jesus is a fideist who has no warrant and is acting irrationally. Is it EVER irrational to believe in Jesus?”
The spirit blows where it will. Someone who picks up a Bible is already relying on the church’s authoritative judgment and sacred tradition, even as they may not recognize it because they currently have no idea of the development of the canon.
“So your opinion of what Rome means by what the Trinity becomes infallible once you believe Rome is infallible?”
I have a basis for holding the doctrine of the Trinity is no longer just a provisional tentative opinion (that happens to be correct), but rather that it is an article of faith – that is infallible divine revelation. I can never make that move in Protestantism – the best I can hope for is opinion that happens to be correct, as I’ve cited Aquinas before: “Now the formal object of faith is the First Truth, as manifested in Holy Writ and the teaching of the Church, which proceeds from the First Truth. Consequently whoever does not adhere, as to an infallible and Divine rule, to the teaching of the Church, which proceeds from the First Truth manifested in Holy Writ, has not the habit of faith, but holds that which is of faith otherwise than by faith. Even so, it is evident that a man whose mind holds a conclusion without knowing how it is proved, has not scientific knowledge, but merely an opinion about it. Now it is manifest that he who adheres to the teaching of the Church, as to an infallible rule, assents to whatever the Church teaches; otherwise, if, of the things taught by the Church, he holds what he chooses to hold, and rejects what he chooses to reject, he no longer adheres to the teaching of the Church as to an infallible rule, but to his own will. Hence it is evident that a heretic who obstinately disbelieves one article of faith, is not prepared to follow the teaching of the Church in all things; but if he is not obstinate, he is no longer in heresy but only in error. Therefore it is clear that such a heretic with regard to one article has no faith in the other articles, but only a kind of opinion in accordance with his own will.” It ends up reducing faith to Pelagianism.
“I fail how to see a three-fold stool can be a three-fold stool if you don’t know the identity of one or more of the legs.”
M attests to ST. T attests to SM. S attests to TM. These aren’t shrouded in mystery.
“I don’t claim I’m giving the assent of faith to mere opinion any more than I would claim that my belief that 2+2=4 is a mere opinion. That 2+2=4 is divine revelation.”
Conflates natural revelation with divine revelation. And we see the Pelagianism and rationalism in play again. Divine and supernatural revelation must be taken on the authority of another, by definition.
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@cvd
“Grant Rome’s claims are true. If so, I’m in a better position after buying into it – it was a good deal in that regard. Grant Protestantism’s claims, and more importantly, disclaimers are true. If so, I’m no better off after buying into it – nothing changed – it’s a bad deal.”
Can you unpack this for me? What do you mean by “in a better position”? It seems to me that if Rome is correct it is better to believe it – isn’t that tautological?
Why wouldn’t that also be true for protestantism? If you previously believed that the RCC was infallible, but now you believe what protestantism says (and for sake of argument that they are right), aren’t you better off believing that? Or to put it into 1st century terms. If you were a Jew who believed about their religious authorities what you believe about Rome, wouldn’t you be worse off (again assuming protestantism is true and tradition is not infallible)? It seems recognizing the fallibility of tradition and religious leaders would put you a much better place. Assuming protestantism is true and you reject the fallibility of tradition, it seems that you are setting yourself up for serious trouble as you wouldn’t be prepared to hear (for example) the message of the epistle to the Hebrews. You would be better off accepting the claims of protestantism rather than accepting the certainty of false religions.
All this to say, I don’t see how your counter-factual clarifies anything.
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Susan,
You’re a very nice lady and I appreciate your desire to follow Jesus, wherever that may lead, but I believe that your thinking is sloppy at multiple points.
For example,
This doesn’t make sense. Sola Scriptura doesn’t arbitrate anything. Sola Scriptura is a term used to describe the position that the Word of God alone arbitrates on what God requires for salvation (2 Timothy 3:14-17).
You then asked me,
With absolute certainty? Nope. With a high degree of probability? I certainly believe so.
Well since I admit it cannot do so infallible (i.e absolute certainty), no. But if you mean if the Church has the authority to teach and preach the Apostolic Deposit as a servant of the Word, then yes, they have this authority.
You’re bound to get different opinions here, but before I answer, your question is framed in an extremely slanted way. In the Protestant scheme authority is not a zero-sum game. Just because Rome doesn’t have universal authority doesn’t mean it has never or does not presently have authority. The Protestant objection is merely that it does not have absolute authority. Protestants will disagree on the degree of authority Rome exerts. Personally, I believe that the Roman bishop has responsibility for his church in Rome and has the authority to minister the Gospel to them. Whether or not he does so clearly, accurately, or effectively is a different question.
Your comment here though is helpful for illustrating my point. The questions you asked are ideologically loaded. They all assume that an infallible authority must exist. Of course when you operate with the assumption that in order to know Divine revelation we must know it absolutely, then you’re going to come to one of two conclusions–we can’t know anything (agnosticism) or we can’t know anything save the Church (absolutism). Protestants reject both and submit ourselves to the Word of God asking that by His Spirit the Word would continue to transform and illumine his people.
Let me ask you a question that you’ve probably seen numerous times but which I’ve yet to hear a compelling answer. If your problem is primarily a philosophical question of epistemology (how do we know anything about theology if we are not certain?) then what mechanism functioned in the OT for the people of God in an analogous way to the Magisterium?
Claiming that the NT is the fulfillment of the OT won’t get you there because you are talking about an innate human problem related to epistemology. So what infallible mechanism for interpreting the OT existed and why did the Jews abandon it?
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Let me add and clarify. I of course don’t believe that their existed some body of people who picked up the Gospels and said, ” whoa, look at that, there is an office that no body holds currently, so let us fill it and then when people object to our holding said office, we can appeal to scripture.”
If the church linearly proceeds the inscripturization of the concept of “church”( and it does as witnessed at Pentecost……the bible tells me so), then all ither claimants are false.
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Brandon,
“This leaves you with Rome and a means to arbitrate between opinion and divine revelation.”
Well, yes. And yet you claim this tail wagging the dog. Why should someone settle for such arbitration to remain impossible and a hopeless endeavor? That is definitely not audacious (that’s for you DG).
“pressed by your quest for certitude .. Your quest for certainty.”
This is a mischaracterization. It is rather the quest for an authorized and commissioned teacher. As Newman says:
“Here at length, it will be said, is a precedent for such acts of private judgment as are most frequently recommended and instanced in religious tales; and indeed these texts commonly are understood to make it certain beyond dispute, that individuals ordinarily may find out the doctrines of the Gospel for themselves from the private study of Scripture. A little consideration, however, will convince us that even these are precedents for something else; that they sanction, not an inquiry about Gospel doctrine, but about the Gospel teacher; not what has God revealed, but whom has He commissioned? And this is a very different thing.
The context of the passage in which our Lord speaks of searching the Scriptures, shows plainly that their office is that of leading, not to a knowledge of the Gospel, but of Himself, its Author and Teacher. “Whom He hath sent,” He says, “Him ye believe not. Search the Scriptures, for in them ye think ye have eternal life, and they are they which testify of Me.” He adds, that they “will not come unto Him, that they may have life,” and that “He is come in His Father’s name, and they receive Him not.” And again, “Had ye believed Moses, ye would have believed Me, for he wrote of Me.” It is plain that in this passage our Lord does not send His hearers to the Old Testament to gain thence the knowledge of the doctrines of the Gospel by means of their private judgment, but to gain tests or notes by which to find out and receive Him who was the teacher of those doctrines; and, though the treasurer of Candace appears in the narrative to be contemplating our Lord in prophecy, not as the teacher but the object of the Christian faith, yet still in confessing that he could not “understand” what he was reading, “unless some man should guide him,” he lays down the principle broadly, which we desire here to maintain, that the private study of Scripture is not intended ordinarily as the means of gaining a knowledge of the Gospel. In like manner St. Peter, on the day of Pentecost, refers to the book of Joel, by way of proving thence, not the Christian doctrine, but the divine promise that new teachers were to be sent in due season, and the fact that it was fulfilled in himself and his brethren. “This is that,” he says, “which was spoken by the prophet Joel, I will pour out My Spirit upon all flesh, and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy.”
While, then, the conversions recorded in Scripture are brought about in a very marked way through a teacher, and not by means of private judgment, so again, if an appeal is made to private judgment, this is done in order to settle who the teacher is, and what are his notes or tokens, rather than to substantiate this or that religious opinion or practice. And if such instances bear upon our conduct at this day, as it is natural to think they do, then of course the practical question before us is, who is the teacher now, from whose mouth we are to seek the law, and what are his notes?
Now, in remarkable coincidence with this view, we find in both Testaments that teachers are promised under the dispensation of the Gospel, so that they, who like the noble Bereans, search the Scriptures daily, will be at little loss whither their private judgment should lead them in order to gain the knowledge of the truth…. In the New Testament we have the same promises stated far more concisely indeed, but, what is much more apposite than a longer description, with the addition of the name of our promised teacher: “The Church of the living God,” says St. Paul, “the pillar and ground of the truth.” The simple question then for Private Judgment to exercise itself upon is, what and where is the Church?
In corroboration, it may be observed, that Scripture seems always to imply the presence of teachers as the appointed ordinance by which men learn the truth; and is principally engaged in giving cautions against false teachers, and tests for ascertaining the true. Thus our Lord bids us “beware of false prophets,” not of false books; and look to their fruits. And He says elsewhere that “the sheep know His voice,” and that “they know not the voice of strangers.” And He predicts false Christs and false prophets, who are to be nearly successful against even the elect. He does not give us tests of false doctrines, but of certain visible peculiarities or notes applicable to persons or parties. “If they shall say, Behold, he is in the desert, go not forth; behold, he is in the secret chamber, believe it not.” St. Paul insists on tokens of a similar kind: “Mark them which cause divisions, and avoid them;” “is Christ divided?” “beware of dogs, beware of evil-workers;” “be followers together of me, and mark them which walk so, as ye have us for an ensample.” Thus the New Testament equally with the Old, as far as it speaks of private examination into teaching professedly from heaven, makes the teacher the subject of that inquiry, and not the thing taught; it bids us ask for his credentials, and avoid him if he is unholy, or idolatrous, or schismatical, or if he comes in his own name, or if he claims no authority (CVD: sounds familiar), or is the growth of a particular spot or of particular circumstances.
….We conceive then that on the whole the notion of gaining religious truth for ourselves by our private examination, whether by reading or thinking, whether by studying Scripture or other books, has no broad sanction in Scripture, is neither impressed upon us by its general tone, nor enjoined in any of its commands. The great question which it puts before us for the exercise of private judgment is,—Who is God’s prophet, and where? Who is to be considered the voice of the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church?”
and elsewhere:
“This is what faith was in the time of the Apostles…. Men were told to submit their reason to a living authority. Moreover, whatever an Apostle said, his converts were bound to believe; when they entered the Church, they entered it in order to learn. The Church was their teacher; they did not come to argue, to examine, to pick and choose, but to accept whatever was put before them. No one doubts, no one can doubt this, of those primitive times. A Christian was bound to take without doubting all that the Apostles declared to be revealed; if the Apostles spoke, he had to yield an internal assent of his mind; it would not be enough to keep silence, it would not be enough not to oppose: it was not allowable to credit in a measure; it was not allowable to doubt. No; if a convert had his own private thoughts of what was said, and only kept them to himself, if he made some secret opposition to the teaching, if he waited for further proof before he believed it, this would be a proof that he did not think the Apostles were sent from God to reveal His will; it would be a proof that he did not in any true sense believe at all. Immediate, implicit submission of the mind was, in the lifetime of the Apostles, the only, the necessary token of faith; then there was no room whatever for what is now called private judgment. No one could say: “I will choose my religion for myself, I will believe this, I will not believe that; I will pledge myself to nothing; I will believe just as long as I please, and no longer; what I believe today I will reject tomorrow, if I choose. I will believe what the Apostles have as yet said, but I will not believe what they shall say in time to come.” No; either the Apostles were from God, or they were not; if they were, everything that they preached was to be believed by their hearers; if they were not, there was nothing for their hearers to believe. To believe a little, to believe more or less, was impossible; it contradicted the very notion of believing: if one part was to be believed, every part was to be believed; it was an absurdity to believe one thing and not another; for the word of the Apostles, which made the one true, made the other true too; they were nothing in themselves, they were all things, they were an infallible authority, as coming from God. The world had either to become Christian, or to let it alone; there was no room for private tastes and fancies, no room for private judgment.
Now surely this is quite clear from the nature of the case; but is also clear from the words of Scripture. “We give thanks to God,” says St. Paul, “without ceasing, because when ye had received from us the word of hearing, which is of God, ye received it, not as the word of men, but (as it is indeed) the Word of God.” Here you see St. Paul expresses what I have said above; that the Word comes from God, that it is spoken by men, that it must be received, not as man’s word, but as God’s word. So in another place he says: “He who despiseth these things, despiseth not man, but God, who hath also given in us His Holy Spirit”. Our Saviour had made a like declaration already: “He that heareth you, heareth Me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth Me; and he that despiseth Me, despiseth Him that sent Me”. Accordingly, St. Peter on the day of Pentecost said: “Men of Israel, hear these words, God hath raised up this Jesus, whereof we are witnesses. Let all the house of Israel know most certainly (CVD: apparently this is bad or illegitimate) that God hath made this Jesus, whom you have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” At another time he said: “We ought to obey God, rather than man; we are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Ghost, whom God has given to all who obey Him”. And again: “He commanded us to preach to the people, and to testify that it is He (Jesus) who hath been appointed by God to be the Judge of the living and of the dead”. And you know that the persistent declaration of the first preachers was: “Believe and thou shalt be saved”: they do not say, “prove our doctrine by your own reason,” nor “wait till you see before you believe”; but, “believe without seeing and without proving, because our word is not our own, but God’s word”. Men might indeed use their reason in inquiring into the pretensions of the Apostles; they might inquire whether or not they did miracles; they might inquire whether they were predicted in the Old Testament as coming from God; but when they had ascertained this fairly in whatever way, they were to take all the Apostles said for granted without proof; they were to exercise their faith, they were to be saved by hearing….
I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim (CVD: sounds familiar) that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge for themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying, and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt nor change. No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God. This is what St. Paul especially insists on, telling us that Apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers, are given us that “we may all attain to unity of faith,” and, on the contrary, in order “that we be not as children tossed to and fro, and carried about by every gale of doctrine”. Now, in matter of fact, do not men in this day change about in their religious opinions without any limit? Is not this, then, a proof that they have not that faith which the Apostles demanded of their converts? If they had faith, they would not change. Once believe that God has spoken, and you are sure He cannot unsay what He has already said; He cannot deceive; He cannot change; you have received it once for all; you will believe it ever. (CVD: not semper reformanda)
Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it (CVD: sounds familiar). They laugh at the notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts;—this is a reasonable question;—no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that this is slavish (CVD: sounds familiar). They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles … The simple account of their remaining as they are, is, that they lack one thing,—they have not faith; it is a state of mind, it is a virtue, which they do not recognise to be praiseworthy, which they do not aim at possessing …. In the Apostles’ days the peculiarity of faith was submission to a living authority; this is what made it so distinctive; this is what made it an act of submission at all; this is what destroyed private judgment in matters of religion. If you will not look out for a living authority, and will bargain for private judgment, then say at once that you have not Apostolic faith.”
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sdb,
My “better off” statement is regarding differentiating opinions from articles of faith. That’s why I am not better off in Protestantism after assent, granting its claims are true, nothing changed before or after – it is an impossible task given its disclaimers at the outset – hence we get “highly likely” and provisional tentative opinions and semper reformanda and WCF’s deflating its own authority. With Rome, I would be better off afterwards than I was beforehand, granting its claims are true – it makes the necessary (not sufficient) claims at the outset for differentiating opinions from articles of faith. Which Robert apparently recognized – he just contends Rome’s claims aren’t actually true which is a completely separate issue than the one I’m concerned with at this point.
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Cletus,
They shouldn’t and Protestants don’t. Thankfully, the Word of God is the means by which our fallible interpretations are continually measured.
Also, you need to retire the semper reformanda mantra. You believe it all the same. The only difference is you believe that you must be reformed to the teaching that Mary was bodily assumed into Heaven, etc. Just because you claim authority to define the Deposit doesn’t mean you’re still not constrained by the Deposit. I’ll just cull one example of how misguided this approach is:
Actually, that is *exactly* semper reformanda. Those *not* being continually conformed to the Word of God are not following the principle of semper reformanda.
One final note, Newman says,
There are so many things wrong with this statement it’s very difficult to be concise. But the claim that the peculiarity of the Apostolic faith was submission to a living authority is quite a whopper. The pecularity of the Apostolic faith was the “foolishness of the Gospel,” that God would become incarnate and die on a tree. *that* was the peculiarity of the Apostolic faith. The fact that the Apostles asked people to verify their teaching from Scripture (not their authority) in Berea makes this argument untenable. There are so many other directions to go with this statement, but the fact that Newman’s assumptions are distorting the distinctiveness of the Christian message so badly only reinforces my claim that such arguments are being driven by underlying philosophical precommitments.
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James Young, sure would be nice if Newman were infallible. Yup.
But it’s like his opinion.
Really, you use a fallible author to argue for infallibility? See what happens to Scripture? Cool.
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Susan, “I don’t understand why you would see it as a case of the tail wagging the dog if Rome in fact can solve all disputes.”
You assume Rome settles disputes. It doesn’t today. It didn’t in the past. Think Western Schism when it was a council that had to bail out the vaunted papacy.
Arguing with you is like nailing the proverbial jello. You assume as fact things that are contested. That’s what it took to become Roman Catholic?
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What Robert said.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 22, 2015 at 4:05 pm | Permalink
James Young, sure would be nice if Newman were infallible. Yup.
But it’s like his opinion.
Really, you use a fallible author to argue for infallibility? See what happens to Scripture? Cool.
Yeah, look what happens to scripture: Luther wouldn’t join your church and you wouldn’t join his. Who shall we believe? One of your religions is wrong. Maybe both.
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Brandon Addison
Posted October 22, 2015 at 2:31 pm | Permalink
Susan,
You’re a very nice lady and I appreciate your desire to follow Jesus, wherever that may lead, but I believe that your thinking is sloppy at multiple points.
That’s very condescending but it only seems sloppy to you because it’s you who clearly doesn’t understand the Catholic argument.
If your problem is primarily a philosophical question of epistemology (how do we know anything about theology if we are not certain?)?
No, that’s how you view the problem, and your answer is a billion popes and a billion theologies. You cut the Holy Spirit out of the process and substitute the theological guesswork of men.
then what mechanism functioned in the OT for the people of God in an analogous way to the Magisterium?
You don’t seem to know anything about Judaism either. They are not sola scripturists.
http://judaism.stackexchange.com/questions/7308/is-there-torah-inerrancy
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D.G. Hart:
You [Susan] assume as fact things that are contested. >>>>>
This is an interesting observation, Brother Hart. Here are things that you assume as fact, even though they are contested even within your own Presbyterian bodies.
1. Your version of 2K theology is the only true, Biblically sound way to understand how Christians are supposed to relate to this world’s system.
2. The WCF is a reliable, though fallible, rule of faith and practice. In fact, it is among the best in its genre – or the best.
3. There is only one infallible rule of faith and practice – the Word of God; the Bible as you understand it.
4. You are in a position to sit in judgment on every other Christian group based on your 2K theology.
5. There is no such animal as apostolic succession. There is a succession of apostolic teaching that was passed on through faithful men. Your teachers and preachers have received that apostolic teaching and pass it on in their ministries, but that doesn’t make them apostles. That gift was only for the time of the early church and only eye witnesses of Jesus’ resurrection were given that gifting,- plus other qualifications – and there were only 12. etc.
6. Sure, God does things in our day that can be called miracles or answers to prayer, but they do not serve the same function as in NT times. They are not sign gifts, etc.
Brother Hart, all of that and more is very controversial and none of it settles anything. Yet you make such absolutist statements all the time.
It’s not all that convincing a system, actually. In fact, it doesn’t even seem to satisfy your fellow Presbyterians let alone the rest of Christianity.
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Mermaid: all of that and more is very controversial and none of it settles anything.
mermaid, each person must be fully convinced in his own mind and by the testimony of his conscience in these things, because we much each stand before, and we stand or fall, by our master, God.
And God has given us in the church apostles, prophets evangelists, pastors and teachers to help in our instruction and to grow and we rely upon and trust in Him. Hope you agree on the goal of a believer’s instruction, while we remain on this earth, while we each know in part : the goal :
life – and this is eternal life – that we may know the only true God and Jesus, in whom are hidden all the treasures of wisdom and knowledge. And instruction is for to love from a pure heart and a good conscience and a sincere faith
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Mermaid, the only one the I ONLY assume is true is the word of God. Funny. Your church also says it is inerrant and infallible. At least Pius X thought so.
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@ Cletus:
I will say again, that you really need to explain several things before your arguments have any chance.
(1) Why is a Roman Catholic’s provisional knowledge somehow privileged, while a Protestant’s provisional knowledge “kinda sorta” knowledge? You keep saying there is a difference, but you never produce that difference.
That’s why your arguments look less like actual arguments and more like special pleading.
For Protestants, you say (CVD:) The “words of Jesus” do and can remain only a matter of provisional and tentative opinion, by your own claims.
For yourself, you say (CVD quoting Robert:) “So at the end of the day, you are still relying on your own opinion that Rome is the true church and that you have rightly understood her. Good. Same boat again.”
Yep. Same boat in that we’re all human (so pointing this out continues to be a red herring). Not same boat in what is being assented to – one can yield nothing but opinion by its own admission.
You just “yielded nothing but opinion by your own admission”, yet it doesn’t bother you. Very, very sloppy. If your ground for belief is uncertain, you have an uncertain belief.
I’ll say it again: Assenting to claims of infallibility upon fallible grounds yields nothing but fallible knowledge.
You don’t get to bypass your own fallibility just by the act of believing.
(2) Why do you heap such contempt on provisional knowledge? Do you go around doubting gravity, or wondering whether your car will turn into a unicorn? Yet you only have provisional knowledge about either one.
You persist in a serious error, which is to assume that all provisional knowledge is inherently uncertain. Not so. We don’t have infallible knowledge that the world will keep turning or that the air in this room will continue to be oxygen instead of ozone. But you would be a fool to bet against either one.
There is such a thing as uncertainty so small as to be negligible. You seem not to grasp that fact.
Until you learn to be conversant with the language of inductive inference, you will continue to make the error of speaking of all provisional knowledge as equally tentative.
I have no serious doubts about gravity. I have no serious doubts about the canon of Scripture.
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Jeff Cagle
I have no serious doubts about gravity. I have no serious doubts about the canon of Scripture.
You just refuted your entire attack.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 22, 2015 at 9:11 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, the only one the I ONLY assume is true is the word of God. Funny. Your church also says it is inerrant and infallible. At least Pius X thought so.
It also freely admits it has erred and has indeed been fallible. As long as you continue to tell only half the truth, you dishonor your profession and your church, Mr. Hart.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 22, 2015 at 9:11 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, the only one the I ONLY assume is true is the word of God. >>>>>
Do you assume that what you say is true? You want to convince people that your 2K theology is true and that other theologies are flawed. Correct?
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TVD
Posted October 22, 2015 at 10:51 pm | Permalink
D. G. Hart
Posted October 22, 2015 at 9:11 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, the only one the I ONLY assume is true is the word of God. Funny. Your church also says it is inerrant and infallible. At least Pius X thought so.
TVD:
It also freely admits it has erred and has indeed been fallible. As long as you continue to tell only half the truth, you dishonor your profession and your church, Mr. Hart.>>>>>
TVD, I can’t figure that part out. That is why I asked Brother Hart if he assumes the truth of what he says.
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@cvd You are making a category mistake. The alternative to certainty about an article of faith is not opinion (with whatever qualifiers you want to add). Additionally one can arrive at certainty via induction even if one’s conclusions remain in principle falsifiable.
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“I have no serious doubts about gravity. I have no serious doubts about the canon of Scripture.
You just refuted your entire attack.”
How so?
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“Do you assume that what you say is true?” How about conclude or infer?
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Jeff:
I have no serious doubts about gravity. I have no serious doubts about the canon of Scripture.>>>>>
Do you have serious doubts about the Holy Spirit leading you and your church into all truth, and that in an infallible way?
Did the Holy Spirit come?
Who did He come to?
Who will He lead into all truth?
Will He do it in a fallible way or an infallible way?
Does He lead authoritatively or provisionally?
If provisionally, then what?
I mean, how can something man made like the scientific method lead us to infallible truth about gravitational theory, but the Holy Spirit cannot lead the Church infallibly into all truth?
John 16:3
When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.
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Mermaid, please. What you write here you think is false? This is junior high psychology. I thought you were better than that.
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Mermaid, I can’t figure it out either. If your church has admitted being errant and fallible, would you have signed up?
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Mermaid, brilliant. You just made a case for Protestantism.
See mom? No bishops, Peter, or Rome.
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Tom,
I’m sorry, but you’re lost as to what the argument is. Again.
Slow down and pay attention.
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MWF: I mean, how can something man made like the scientific method lead us to infallible truth about gravitational theory,
It can’t. If you think I’ve been talking about scientific truth as infallible, I encourage you to go back and re-read.
MWF: …but the Holy Spirit cannot lead the Church infallibly into all truth?
He can. The Spirit knows all truth and changes men’s hearts to believe that truth.
But in what manner? The Catholic wants to insist that the Holy Spirit MUST work through the sacraments of the RC Church, and that He resides in the leadership of the RC church.
But Jesus said the Spirit blows where He will (John 3).
And over what time frame? The Catholic insists the teaching of the Church *right now* is all true. What if it isn’t? What if the Spirit has not yet corrected some Catholic teaching that really, really needs correcting … such as the teaching that the Pope is the visible head of the Church? Or that those who are called can be separated from God by mortal sin?
Even if we were to grant that the RC church is the true church, it does not follow that all of its teaching is true teaching. Nor does it follow that it might not believe really errant ideas, just as Peter did at times.
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@mwf
“I mean, how can something man made like the scientific method lead us to infallible truth about gravitational theory, but the Holy Spirit cannot lead the Church infallibly into all truth?”
1) gravitational theory is *not* infallible. The fact that it may be true does not entail that it could not possibly be wrong. That doesn’t mean it is mere tentative opinion.
2) the holy spirit is central to ss. He is the interpreter of scripture and leads infallibly. Unfortunately we are fallen and sinful and thus don’t follow so well.
3) there are mysteries that he hasn’t resolved for us.
Your own church recognizes it can err and does not have complete knowledge. That isn’t in dispute here.
The question is whether one must have a human authority infallibly define a doctrine in order for it to rise above “mere tentative opinion”.
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sdb and Jeff, why do disputes with Roman Catholics always boil down to logic and epistemology? Do they all channel Bryan Cross? Or is it that a certain stripe of personality is attracted to religiously inspired philosophical certainty?
Another reason to think that neo-Calvinism and all that epistemology is the gateway drug to Rome.
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@ DGH: Two hypotheses, one local and one global. These are not comprehensively researched or thought through, so caveat lector!
(1) Locally, I imagine there’s a large amount of cross-fertilization, whether through intense bloggery or through personal connections. After all, everyone in the Reformed world was talking about Federal Vision 5 years ago.
(2) Globally, I think Christians feel a great deal more defensive about their truth claims than they did two hundred years ago. If you have any contact with serious atheism, you know that it’s not just a matter of saying “Here’s what the Bible says” (or “Church says”) and you get an audience.
Hence the triumphalism as a kind of reaction.
(3) The concern among Christians about epistemology reflects the intellectual trends of academia in some ways. Over in the liberal arts, we have modern => postmodern => whatever-it-is-we’re doing now, which is some kind of evidence-driven yet not fully anti-postmodern thing.
In math, we had the Hilbert project right around the time of van Til. Hilbert wanted math to be self-proving, so that all results were theorems. Goedel’s Theorem showed that this was impossible, but the quest for iron-clad epistemology lived on. We had the Emmy Noether project, reorganizing algebra on strictly axiomatic lines and creating a desire for well-ordered, systematized knowledge well beyond what the Westminster Standards provide.
And in science, we had an investigation of the scientific method as practiced, which led to the notion of paradigms and Kuhn’s Structure of Scientific Revolution. Recall that Cross’s graduate work is in paradigms.
So I would tentatively say that the obsession with epistemology reflects a felt need to be right, coupled with a cultural habit of meta-cognition.
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Isn’t epistemology quite passe except among conservative Prots and RC’s who used to be conservative Prots? And aren’t the RC’s we get extremely atypical? They can’t get away from their Prot roots, bless their hearts.
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When I was younger and on through college and into my thirties, I was willing to hold more things in tension and spend the time to ferret out underlying assumptions and even delay commitments if I couldn’t reconcile enough of the various competing positions. But not anymore. Call it common sense realism or experience or trading on learned knowledge but anymore it’s more intuitive and listing toward risk. The commitments are more effected by time left, competition, understanding of ability and advantage. There’s also a greater reliance on group driven by increased specialization. Maybe Calvin would deem it ‘staying within the bounds of your vocation/station/calling’. And now there’s enough ‘wisdom’ and information stored to make pretty good calls on which ‘specialists’ can be relied upon and which are full of it. So, history, Darryl good, Tom bad. And there’s no need to spend a lot of time working through the contrary interactions. You have enough knowledge and experience to make that call without laboring through the minutiae of interaction. To some degree, at the level you can’t do this, points to a lack of maturity.
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sdb:
2) the holy spirit is central to ss. He is the interpreter of scripture and leads infallibly. Unfortunately we are fallen and sinful and thus don’t follow so well.>>>>
I KNEW someone would appeal to total depravity as a way to explain why in your system, you can’t be sure about anything. Well, except that your Bible is infallible.
You know, Jesus didn’t say that the Holy Spirit would guide them into all truth, but it will be kind of an epic fail because we are such sinners. Our sinfulness, then keeps the Holy Spirit from doing His job.
sdb:
3) there are mysteries that he hasn’t resolved for us.>>>>
Well, of course. That is why He is leading His people into all truth. We are not there yet, but that is where He is infallibly leading – into all truth.
sdb:
Your own church recognizes it can err and does not have complete knowledge.>>>>
Yes, but the foundation is not shifting sands as in Protestantism. In fact, what you guys accept as absolute knowledge about the Bible has been around in the Church for a long, long time, now.
sdb:
That isn’t in dispute here.>>>>
I contend that what is in dispute here is John 16. You don’t really believe that the Holy Spirit’s leading is infallible. You believe that He failed for almost 1,500 years until the Reformers came along to set everything right. Except that you do not believe He is doing that even now.
There is nothing infallible about anything you believe and teach, except that you have the right Bible. It doesn’t matter that the Bible you use is not the one Jesus used.
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D.G. Hart:
See mom? No bishops, Peter, or Rome.>>>>
See, Brother Hart. Jesus was talking to the 12.
D. G. Hart
Posted October 23, 2015 at 6:12 am | Permalink
Mermaid, please. What you write here you think is false? This is junior high psychology. I thought you were better than that.>>>>>
Aw, Brother Hart. There you go praising me again.
It’s just that it hadn’t really dawned on me how unsure you are about everything. I mean the WCF and all the other confessions and catechisms and Greek lexicons kind of threw me off, there.
It doesn’t matter really what I think is false. It’s that you think none of it is infallible – except the Bible, which belief we hold in common.
Don’t mind me. You can be as sure about something infallible as you wish to be. No problem.
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@dgh I think you are on to something. I think some evangelicals see reformed thought as a pathway to intellectual respectability (I’m not like that Falwell guy, I read Keller and Schaeffer and C.S. freakin’ Lewis). Then they discover that RC is even more intellectually respectable (Maritain is my homeboy). And then they discover their hero Neuhaus was an apologist for child rapists and their faith evaporates. The other path I’ve seen is the RP->mainline (even more respectable) ->whateverism.
I think in both cases they were asking their faith to answer the wrong question, and they are far less clever than they think they are.
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Jeff, I hear you.
But I’d add this. Both neo-Cals and RC’s are spooked by the French Revolution in ways that other Americans were not. A manichean outlook seems to follow from all those who viewed the French as the decisive strike against Christendom or Christian culture.
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Muddy, once logocentric, always logocentric?
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Mermaid, there are only two things you believe that infallible. 2000 years of papal rule and that’s it?
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Mermaid, “See, Brother Hart. Jesus was talking to the 12.”
Exactly, when he talked about the keys of the kingdom as well.
Doh!
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b, sd, the odd thing is is that 35 years ago when I was coming out of college it was the Reformed that had all the intellectual mojo. Roman Catholics were nowhere.
Then came a philosopher pope and Christians with intellectual aspirations swooned the way women did when Whitefield pronounced Mesopotamia.
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Robert,
Allegorical and typological interpretation is a perfectly valid method of exegesis, as the Apostles showed, as well as the early church fathers in battling heresies.
Actually, there’s no true allegory evident in anything the Apostles teach that I can see. The closest thing is Galatians 4, and even that is not a true allegory.
Typology and allegory, in any case, are never valid when they deny the original meaning of the text. There’s no typological connection between the gates of Ezekiel’s temple and Mary’s virginity. Its fanciful stuff made up to support a doctrine that does not arise from Apostolic tradition. Jesus is the fulfillment of Ezekiel’s temple, not Mary. You could also say that the entire church is a fulfillment of the temple, but if that’s the case, then all Christians would have to be perpetual virgins if the lame reading of Ezekiel is correct.
Just as Jews characterize Paul’s and the gospel writer’s interpretative methods.
Sure they could claim that. But I can ground Paul and the gospel writer’s interpretation in the original meaning of the text. You can’t ground something like Ezekiel’s locked gates=perpetual virginity. We know who the temple is, and it isn’t Mary, or at least it isn’t exclusively Mary.
And Rome does not claim Tradition conflicts with Scripture. The point is Jesus was a Jew – he followed Oral Torah – Judaism was not a sola Tanakh religion. He also condemned false traditions based on his authority, but that does not entail he condemned unwritten tradition entirely, just corrupted and man-made parts to it.
Where does Jesus claim that any oral tradition is divine revelation? And if oral tradition hadn’t been proffered as infallible by an infallible body before Jesus, what warrant did the Jews in 100 BC have for following it? Where does Jesus command us to follow undefined but accepted unwritten tradition as necessary for salvation?
I don’t condemn unwritten tradition. It can be quite good. What I condemn is the notion that something is Apostolic tradition simply because the church says it is. When the Apostles speak of Apostolic tradition, they are referring to a fixed body of content that they taught. It can’t accommodate any RC view of tradition that says Council of Nicea is Apostolic tradition because the Apostles didn’t actually say homoousios or hypostasis. Such might actually reflect what the Apostles taught, be a good summary of what they taught, be the logical consequence of what they taught. But formally speaking, it can’t be Apostolic tradition unless they actually taught it in those terms.
Apostolic tradition=fixed body of content. Hold on to the traditions taught by mouth OR by letter. Not AND, OR. So that means partim-partim is dead in the water. Material sufficiency is more believable, but insufficient to reflect what the Apostles mean by tradition. They mean what they actually said. Both are wrong, and the fact that Rome won’t say which one is right means you have no hope of knowing what tradition actually is.
There are many texts where the Apostles exhort believers to hold to both written and unwritten tradition. There is no indication that the unwritten is or would become unnecessary or redundant at some point.
This will work only if I can find stuff in unwritten tradition that is not found in Scripture. Further, when the earliest Christians speak of unwritten tradition, it refers to the kerygma, all of which, incidentally, is in Scripture.
Paul commands the Thessalonians to hold to His teaching whether He taught it in writing OR not. He doesn’t say that part of his teaching is in writing and part isn’t. (writing AND by preaching). There is an identity between what is in writing and what isn’t. If I can’t find it in writing, I have no reason to believe it was taught orally.
But I thought they practiced SS. How could they practice SS if Scripture of the NT was still being created? Further, how could they practice SS if they were also following Oral Torah at the time?
Because Jesus and the Apostles were living, breathing agents of divine revelation and what they taught was equivalent to Scripture. Among other things, sola Scriptura tells us that the only place where divine revelation is to be found is the teaching of Jesus and the Apostles. It means the only infallible source is the Apostolic tradition. Today Scripture is the only place to find Apostolic tradition unless you want to redefine what the Apostles meant by it. While the Apostles were alive, you could find Apostolic tradition in their words and in the Old Testament. By their teaching they practiced sola Scriptura because whatever they taught would become Scriptura.
Rome can’t take on the same role to claim we need something more than Scripture unless Rome claims to be an agent of ongoing divine revelation, which formally speaking you don’t although in reality that’s the way the Magisterium is treated.
There were claims made by the papacy before the Donation you reject as just as arrogant as the ones the Donation supposedly propped up.
Sure. The Donation is just the most evident example of how the claims for the papacy have no support other than the claim itself. (there goes the Triad) Not in Scripture, and certainly not in “the consensus of the fathers” (re: whatever Rome defines as consensus; ignore all the stuff in the fathers that deny papal claims).
Doctrinal development was not invented by Newman.
Perhaps not, but he certainly gave voice to what it meant and he embraced it only after seeing that the early church was not the same church as Rome, which was the claim Rome was making. Only when he could figure out a way to justify the difference could he accept Rome’s claim. It’s clear post-hoc justification. It’s not as if he went from the beginning and traced his way to Rome. He started with Rome and worked backward to justify His decision. That is the way that Roman scholars do church history if they also believe in the Magisterium. RC church history scholars who don’t buy into the superiority complex we see among RC apologists don’t do church history that way.
Anywhere that they exhort believers to submit to unwritten tradition such as practice and preaching. You think those commands were just useless and superfluous?
Not useless. Paul is simply saying “whether you remember my gospel I preached in person or what I say in letter, both are the same thing so hold to it.” Presumably, some Thessalonians had the benefit of hearing him in person. Some only had the letter to go by. But both groups had the same thing, the same gospel because it’s a fixed body of content. IOW, Paul didn’t give them half the gospel when He preached and the other half when He wrote.
I don’t live in the Apostolic era. I live today. Only if the tradition includes things that never got written down would there be a point to looking for the practice and preaching you mention. But Rome doesn’t agree that such a thing exists. You can be a material sufficiency guy. You can also be a partim-partim guy. If the partim-partim guys are right, then they better provide what the Apostles taught but never got written down (nobody does this). If the material sufficiency guys are right, then I have all of the tradition in Scripture and there is no need to posit an ongoing infallible interpretative method because that is not what the Apostles meant by tradition. They mean their actual teaching, the fixed content of the gospel.
You’re just assuming that said unwritten tradition was written down at some point, which is never stated as being done in Scripture and hence is inconsistent with your position.
Not assuming. Paul says that the same thing he taught in person he also taught in letter. So I don’t need what was taught in person unless it includes content not found in Scripture. Still waiting for somebody to tell me what that is, and yet no one will. Of course, that’s because it’s far more common to embrace material sufficiency, and once you go down that road, Roman Catholic scholarship becomes a lot more humble as a rule. Thus, we don’t see actual RC biblical scholars and historians making the same claims for Rome and her superiority that you do. They are far more circumspect.
Completely ignores the concept of Oral Torah before and during Jesus’ time. Judaism is not an SS religion.
Where does Jesus claim that the oral Torah is infallible and of equal authority to Scripture?
Here’s a few teachings you take for granted that aren’t written down:
Just because I take it for granted doesn’t mean I believe that such is formally taught by the Apostles. I’m talking about a fixed body of content, as that is what the Apostles mean when they use the word “tradition.”
The extent and scope of the canon,
The Apostles never formally define the canon as a list of books, so I would not call it an Apostolic teaching per se. More of a good and necessary consequence. Same thing with homoousios and hypostasis, two natures in one person, etc.
said canon is closed,
Good and necessary consequence. If tradition is divine revelation and is understood by the Apostles to be a fixed body of content, that necessitates a closed canon of Scripture—and a closed canon of tradition content—once the Apostles died. An open canon of tradition, such as Rome has, means your claim that revelation has ended is false.
said canon is inspired and inerrant and authoritative,
I never said the canon was inspired. The books in the canon are inspired.
Is the canon inerrant? Sure. But you don’t need an infallible process to produce an inerrant statement. “My name is Robert” is an inerrant statement, but I’m not infallible.
Authoritative? The words of the Apostles are authoritative. Formally speaking, the canon is not the words of the Apostles. Better to say the books in the canon are authoritative.
said canon is formally sufficient and the sole infallible rule of faith,
Formal and material sufficiency in regards to Scripture are RC terms, not ours. And Roman Catholics can’t even agree as to whether the Bible is material sufficient or what material sufficiency even means in practice.
And I don’t think it is quite right to say the canon is the sole infallible rule. Scripture is the sole infallible rule. And it’s sufficient to equip people for every good work says Paul. That includes the good work of establishing and having confidence in doctrine. That includes the good work of figuring out what the canon is. Hello self-authentication.
revelation ended with the death of the last apostle.
From the Apostles themselves we know that there are certain qualifications one has to meet to be an Apostle. So if Apostles are appointed to speak infallibly for Christ (they are, that’s what an Apostle means), and there is no one left who can fulfill the requirements to be an Apostle (there aren’t), then there is no one left to speak infallibly for Christ. I don’t need a formal, infallible statement. The early church fathers didn’t either. Where is the formal declaration that there are no Apostles left and that revelation has ceased for Irenaeus, Athanasius, etc. People just knew. That’s why in the early fathers you see a sharp distinction between their words and the words of the Apostles.
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@dgh
I wonder how this perception would have evolved had Plantinga, Marsden, Hatch, et al. established their careers at Yale or Princeton instead of ND?
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b, sd, so you mean, Protestantism would have been sexier with an Ivy League imprimatur?
Or that aligning with a Roman Catholic university showed a weakness?
Or both?
Or none of the above?
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Darryl,
I wonder how much of it is also due to the propensity of Rome to deny the Creator-creature distinction. If you can become a saint and gain effective omniscience such that you can hear millions of prayers simultaneously, I can see where people could unconsciously infer that perhaps infallible certainty (or whatever it is CVD, Susan, et al think they have with Rome) is possible for creatures. It’s kind of a subtle “you shall be like God” temptation. Come to Rome where you can give up the provisionality of knowledge that is inherent to creatureliness. Transcend your creatureliness through that infusion of grace that gives your reason perfect control over your passions.
There are some who never really bought into the idea of what it means to be a finite creature. It is the perennial temptation of human philosophy and human philosophers, so for those who are by nature attracted to such things, you go Roman Catholic because Rome does not consistently embrace Paul’s teaching on the wisdom of this world.
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My guess is that for those who went through Notre Dame, it was about familiarity and introduction to aspects of the catholic subculture they wouldn’t have interacted with before. For the broader community, my guess is that both of the items you mentioned played a role. It would be interesting to see what the distribution of advanced humanities degrees among CP->RC converts looks like. Now that I think about it a bit more though, I wonder if the FirstThings bit was far more important?
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Jeff,
“If your ground for belief is uncertain, you have an uncertain belief. I’ll say it again: Assenting to claims of infallibility upon fallible grounds yields nothing but fallible knowledge.”
By this logic, God’s authority, let alone Scripture’s authority and teachings, can never be greater or more certain than my fallible decision and assent. That’s a confusion of order of being with order of knowing. So you can keep saying it again, but you advocating it just shows how I’m no better off in Protestantism before or after assent – nothing changes.
“You don’t get to bypass your own fallibility just by the act of believing. ”
You’re still hung up on the whole “you’re fallible so tu quoque” thing. It’s a red herring as I’ve already explained in my response to Robert. Moreover, he recognized that I would be better off with Rome than Protestantism granting Rome’s claims are true. You are positing that even if Rome’s claims are true, I’m no better off than if I would be granting Protestantism’s claims are true.
“Why do you heap such contempt on provisional knowledge?”
Because it’s not compatible with divine revelation and articles of faith, which are infallible by definition given their source. Christ and the Apostles didn’t offer admitted opinions or “highly likely” provisional teachings. That you keep trying to defend that stance just illustrates the root of the problem and gives up the game – you’re admitting you can do never do any better than provisional highly likely opinion in your system, and not only that you seem to think such a position is virtuous and to be actively embraced.
“There is such a thing as uncertainty so small as to be negligible. You seem not to grasp that fact.”
Again, “99.9999%” likely as you said earlier is not compatible with divine revelation and articles of faith. You have never seemed to grasp that, hence your misguided tu quoques and red herrings.
“I have no serious doubts about gravity. I have no serious doubts about the canon of Scripture.’
Divine revelation is not natural revelation as I already said to Robert. Articles of faith are not just opinions, even if those opinions happen to be correct – faith reduces to a kind of Pelagianism and rationalism in that case.
Further, what good reason do I have to take the judgment of the WCF as authoritative, binding, and normative on its identification of the extent and scope of the canon given its disclaimers?
Perhaps you can reply to the previous post addressing you that you might have missed since I didn’t see a reply:
Again, “Protestants claim that the Word of God is absolutely true, but that it is highly likely beyond any reasonable doubt that the Protestant canon is the correct identification of the Word of God.
The first claim is absolute truth; the second is provisional….The word of God is true because God cannot lie.”
You’ve made 4 claims Protestantism makes. The Word of God is absolutely true. The Word of God exists. God cannot lie. The Protestant canon is the correct identification of it. You assert the 4th claim is provisional while the 3 others are not. I’d like to know why the other 3 are not subject to the same disclaimers you give the 4th.
“But you balk and claim instead that the Catholic is in a better position than before.”
Yes, because of the claims of the system adhered to. One system claims divine authority to identify and define articles of faith (infallible and irreformable by definition), i.e. it claims infallibility. One system does not only not make that claim, it actively rejects it. Hence one system asserts any teaching it offers is provisional, highly probable, likely, tentative, and so on – it never will, nor can it, assert any teaching as divine revelation over and instead of mere human opinion. One system asserts semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. One system rejects semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. That is why I said a person buying into one system is better off than before, while another buying into the other is no better than before, despite the fact that both persons must choose and judge beforehand, as well as interpret afterwards.
Notice in all of this, that the fallibility of the submitting agent or the fact he must interpret said teachings has *nothing* to do with the argument, any more than the fallibility of the submitting agent or the fact he must interpret teachings had *anything* to do with the divine authority of prophets, Christ, the apostles, and those that were sent in their promulgating of infallible and irreformable teaching and articles of faith, as opposed to merely provisional or “highly likely” teachings and opinions.
sdb,
“The alternative to certainty about an article of faith is not opinion (with whatever qualifiers you want to add).”
Okay what is it then? Here’s what you’ve said “Science also relies on trust….Science is provisional but makes absolute statements I can trust” – so apparently “faith” in Christianity is analogous to “faith” in science. And you’re still wondering why I’m saying Protestantism is a bad deal to buy and can’t even get out of the gate for consideration due to its disclaimers.
You’ve also said, “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” – again, there’s the red flag. Articles of faith and divine revelation are not in principle provisional, by definition. I have no good reason to follow WCF or any Protestant confessions’ judgments on any matter or teaching, by its own disclaimers.
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Robert,
“I can see where people could unconsciously infer that perhaps infallible certainty (or whatever it is CVD, Susan, et al think they have with Rome) is possible for creatures. It’s kind of a subtle “you shall be like God” temptation.”
What? Where has this been argued. Read the Newman quotes again. Read Aquinas again. Read my posts again. Nowhere has anyone argued we become omniscient or blur the creator-creature distinction just because we make the craaazy claim that divine revelation and articles of faith are infallible.
“think they have with Rome”
You’re doing it again, just as expected. You already admitted above Rome gives an advantage, granting its claims are true over Protestantism, granting those claims are true. Now you’re back to the “double standards”, “no advantage” rabble rabble.
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Muddy Gravel
Posted October 23, 2015 at 8:36 am | Permalink
Isn’t epistemology quite passe except among conservative Prots and RC’s who used to be conservative Prots? And aren’t the RC’s we get extremely atypical? They can’t get away from their Prot roots, bless their hearts.>>>>>
You can’t get away from your Catholic roots. The WCF, other standards, and even the lexicon are attempts on your part to set up a teaching magisterium. You know you need one, but you have to admit that yours are fallible rules.
What you consider to be infallible you got from the Church, not from the WCF. I mean things like the contents of the Nicene Creed and the Bible itself, though you have changed it. You stuck some infallibility in there, otherwise you don’t have much of anything.
You claim a kind of succession of apostolic teaching passed on from faithful men to faithful men. The local pastors and elders are supposed to base their sermons and all their teachings on. Of course, you kind of skip from St. Augustine to John Calvin, but hey! Maybe no one will notice all that much.
Some of your men break with Protestant tradition and go full on Catholic mode, and that freaks you guys out. Some get there using your hermeneutics, even.
Not all of them become Catholic. Some of them stay, and you can’t get rid of them because they have broken no standards. The standards are fallible anyway, so what are you going to do?
You don’t have to use the “e” word to see that something like an infallible teaching magisterium is necessary. sola scriptura can get you there. Start with something like John 16 and see where it leads. Then there’s John 17, and on to the book of Acts where Peter takes the keys of the kingdom and opens it up to the world, and so forth.
Really start with Scripture as the Catholic Church has and does.
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Cletus,
By this logic, God’s authority, let alone Scripture’s authority and teachings, can never be greater or more certain than my fallible decision and assent.
Wrong. God is inherently certain and non-provisional because He is omniscient. No one is denying that. What we are denying is that your fallible assent makes you infallibly certain. You are as fallible after you choose to become RC as you were beforehand. You’re acting as if you’re not. Further, even when a statement such as “This here is the infallible canon” is proclaimed, your knowledge of that very statement remains provisional. Perhaps you have misread it. Perhaps you don’t really understand what infallibility means. You don’t know everything Rome has infallibly defined, so there is no hope for you to understand how that statement fits into everything else. You don’t know whether Rome might one day add a book to the canon. They can always come back and say “We said the canon was closed, but we meant it was closed at that point in history.”
I mean, I’m looking at Rome’s teaching on abortion (which presumably is infallible, although one can never know), and it’s pretty clear my knowledge of it is provisional and so is yours. Because you can have any position on abortion that you want and still get the Eucharist.
Or maybe a better example is the about-face on the Athanasian Creed. “Without believing this you cannot be saved” didn’t really mean you would go to hell for not believing the Trinity. It meant hell is only for the non-invincibly ignorant who don’t believe the Trinity.” I mean all of that killing of non-Trinitarians, evidence of the the Magisterial belief that the Ath Creed didn’t mean for them now what it means for us today, should be disregarded. The church really knew it didn’t mean that, somehow, somewhere. So somehow it’s not a contradiction when the discipline changes because, well, because Rome says.
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Robert,
“God is inherently certain and non-provisional because He is omniscient.”
Now you’re getting it. Divine revelation is inherently certain and non-provisional because of its origin and nature. One system claims to actually have the ability and authority to identify and define it. One does not and rejects such a claim.
“No one is denying that. What we are denying is that your fallible assent makes you infallibly certain.”
You’re also denying (well Jeff is, anyways) that it’s even *possible* for Rome’s claims to actually be true and, more importantly, matter or make any difference if they were. Which is why we keep getting the “but you’re fallible!” red herrings and smokescreen. Nothing changes in Protestantism after my fallible assent, based on its own claims. Something does change in Rome after my fallible assent, based on its own claims, just as something did change for NT believers after their fallible assent to Christ or the Apostles, based on their own claims.
“You are as fallible after you choose to become RC as you were beforehand.”
Yup. I’m still a human. None of that absurd blurring of creator-creature distinction you threw around trying to psychoanalyze RCs.
“You’re acting as if you’re not.”
Nope. If you think that, you’re still missing the point. But you already got the point earlier when you admitted Rome, granting its claims are true, gives an advantage over Protestantism, granting its claims are true, and this despite the fact that in both systems we are fallible, must make choices and judgments in submitting, must interpret, etc.
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Cletus,
Nope. If you think that, you’re still missing the point. But you already got the point earlier when you admitted Rome, granting its claims are true, gives an advantage over Protestantism, granting its claims are true, and this despite the fact that in both systems we are fallible, must make choices and judgments in submitting, must interpret, etc.
Actually, I’ve been trying to get back to this. Rome would be superior if the claim were true AND it could provide infallible certainty. The fact that it merely makes the claim, even if it were true, doesn’t change anything for me as an individual.
The Reformed system is actually better because we claim that Christ by His Spirit gives us infallible assurance of HIs truth though not infallible certainty, which I’m not sure will ever be possible for human beings. We’d have to know how everything relates to everything else, i.e., we’d have to be omniscient. I suppose it depends on what one means by the term “certainty.”
Nothing changes in Protestantism after my fallible assent, based on its own claims. Something does change in Rome after my fallible assent, based on its own claims, just as something did change for NT believers after their fallible assent to Christ or the Apostles, based on their own claims.
What changes? This is what is not clear to me. You agree that you continue to be fallible and that your own knowledge continues to be provisional.You haven’t been made infallible, so what changes? Honest question.
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Robert
Posted October 23, 2015 at 3:25 pm | Permalink
I suppose it depends on what one means by the term “certainty.”
Or “faith.”
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Yes. That’s it exactly. I believe that truth is truth whatever its source. Faith in Christianity is analogous to faith in science or in history or in any other area of knowing (though not identical!). The “world” is infallible (God hasn’t made the illusions of stars – they really exist), but our understanding of the “world” is fallible. It might be because our sensory apparatus is bad, our theory is bad, or some combination of both. Similarly, God’s special revelation is infallible (just like his general revelation). That doesn’t mean my apprehension of his revelation is infallible. Just because the distance from the Earth to the Sun is in principle falsifiable (and thus fallible) doesn’t mean that I have any uncertainty that the distance from the Earth to the sun is 1.5E13cm. You say that nature and divine revelation are different. I agree, but it remains unclear what difference that makes.
But that kind of radical skepticism is unworkable in practice. Knowledge you rely on and use every day relies on the same disclaimers.
You keep saying that you are better off somehow by hitching your wagon to body that claims the ability to infallibly define articles of faith even if:
1) you have fallibly identified that body
2) you fallibly understand their definitions
However, protestantism states upfront that the only infallible source of divine revelation about matters of faith is the Bible even though:
1) we have fallibly identified that book
2) we fallibly understand that book
Am I properly construing your stance? This is what I honestly understand you to be saying, so perhaps I am simply not getting your point.
If I understand you correctly, I don’t get why one approach is inherently better than the other. This is usually where the discussion turns empirical. For example the RC will say, if CP are correct then they shouldn’t have 30,000 denominations. The response from CPs is that,
1) Sin is real, so given the lack of political constraints it is not surprising that denominations bifurcate. Lots of RCs leave their church too. The difference is one of size which the example of the OT makes clear is not a very good indicator of being on the “right side”.
2) The relationships among most CP denominations is more similar to the relationship among various groups in the RCC than say the relationship between EOs and RCs (or Copts, Nestorians, etc…). We are in communion, share seminaries, ministries, etc…
3) CPs and RCs agree on a great many things even though there are crucial items that divide us. CPs show less variation among their members than there is within the RCC.
Then the CPs might retort, your infallible articles of faith have “changed”. For example, the church used to believe that
Now the Church teaches that it isn’t “whosoever”, it is those who are “culpable” and it is not “without doubt” it is “we can never know for sure”. In light of V2, the authors of the Athanasian Creed produced a doctrinal statement that was fallible. The truth of the matter is infallible, our knowledge of that truth is something else.
Additionally, your members are less likely to believe basic truths about the Christian faith and moral practice than CPs suggesting that the purported infallible definitions haven’t done much good. To which the RC will typically respond,
1) That change is really a development. The example of the Athanasian creed given by the CP doesn’t apply. The Christology is doctrinal the prologue is not. VII doesn’t contradict the AC, it provides a fuller picture of the status of non-Catholics. (Alternatively, some would say that VII isn’t infallible which I find very strange).
2) The moral shortcomings of RCs and confusion arising from the clergy is regrettable, but does not falsify the articles of faith the church proclaims. People misapprehend the teachings of the church because they are sinful, ignorant, and/or fallible.
I find these answers unsatisfying. The justifications for changes as “development” and the post-hoc qualifiers on what counts as infallible teaching and what doesn’t undermines the purported advantage. It is akin to claiming I cannot miss with my bow and arrow because I draw a target around wherever it hits. To paraphrase Gandalf, “A wizard is always on time.” I find the moral disparity particularly problematic. The object of true beliefs is not just having the right stuff written down somewhere. At some point you have to ask about why it is that CPs have more (o)rthodox Christological beliefs and why it is that nations with a higher percentage of RC citizens are more likely to support abortion, ssm, and divorce (for example).
From an epistemological point of view, I’m not sure either stance is superior over the other – both fallibly believe in infallible divine revelation fallibly identified and interpreted. You add an infallible middle-man. I still don’t see any evidence (empirical or logically) why this is a benefit.
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@Robert
Didn’t see your post referencing the Athanasian Creed before I put mine up. Great minds and all that…
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Robert,
“Rome would be superior if the claim were true AND it could provide infallible certainty. The fact that it merely makes the claim, even if it were true, doesn’t change anything for me as an individual.”
Rome has never claimed to make its adherents infallible or omniscient. Nor has any apologist or theologian past or present argued that. It’s absurd. Christ and the Apostles didn’t make NT adherents magically infallible and omniscient before or after assent. And yet you and Jeff think this is a compelling or relevant counter. I’ll remind you of what you said:
“I’m only better off if Rome actually is infallible.”
“Again, they’re better off only if the claim is correct.”
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“If the claim isn’t true, it’s worthless.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
“If Rome’s claim is false, you have no advantage.”
Now you’re saying if I’m not magically made infallible and omniscient, none of the above applies.
“We’d have to know how everything relates to everything else, i.e., we’d have to be omniscient. I suppose it depends on what one means by the term “certainty.””
This is why I already referenced the term “certitude of faith”. It does not entail making the adherent infallible or omniscient. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03539b.htm
“What changes? This is what is not clear to me. You agree that you continue to be fallible and that your own knowledge continues to be provisional.You haven’t been made infallible, so what changes? Honest question.”
Again, as I said before. One system claims divine authority to identify and define articles of faith (infallible and irreformable by definition), i.e. it claims infallibility. One system does not only not make that claim, it actively rejects it. Hence one system asserts any teaching it offers is provisional, highly probable, likely, tentative, and so on – it never will, nor can it, assert any teaching as divine revelation over and instead of mere human opinion. One system asserts semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. One system rejects semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. That is why I said a person buying into one system is better off than before, while another buying into the other is no better than before, despite the fact that both persons must choose and judge beforehand, as well as interpret afterwards.
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Sorry if this posts twice. I got disappeared the first time
—
Cletus,
Thanks for persisting. I don’t know that we can break the impasse, but we can at least try. To do so, you and I will need to find a different way to express the argument. I will try below.
JRC: “You don’t get to bypass your own fallibility just by the act of believing. ”
CVD: You’re still hung up on the whole “you’re fallible so tu quoque” thing. It’s a red herring as I’ve already explained in my response to Robert.
It’s not. From my vantage point, this is precisely where you are confused, and where you could benefit from an understanding of inductive inference.
Let’s make a distinction here. A measuring instrument is called precise (in the sciences) if it repeatedly gives the same measurement of the same object. More specifically, its precision is expressed in terms of the “standard error of the mean measurement.” If that standard error is small, the instrument is precise.
Meanwhile, a measuring instrument is called accurate if it repeatedly gives answers close to the reference value. Note that this requires an external standard of measurement, a way to calibrate the machine.
[Most properly, you have to specify both instrument and method]
So we have a distinction between accuracy and precision. You can probably easily imagine some kind of instrument that is accurate but not precise, such an alcohol thermometer, OR an instrument that is precise but not accurate, such as a mis-calibrated laser sight on a sniper rifle.
OK. So your defense of Catholicism is that if one accepts the Catholic claims, one is in a better position than a Protestant because the Church provides teachings that are consistent.
Alright, is that accuracy or precision? It is clearly precision, because you are comparing teachings to one another and finding relative consistency.
And by relative, I mean in comparison to sola scriptura Protestantism (and here, I’m excluding broader Protestantism that does not use sola scriptura as a method, whether evangelical or liberal).
I’ll grant that point. Catholicism has a tighter range of beliefs in its confessions that historic Protestantism does. Not in the pew, which is clearly a problem but in the confessions and catechisms, the Catholic has more consistency than the Protestant.
But are we interested in precision? No. We are interested in accuracy. We want truth, preferably consistent truth, but truth over consistency for sure. It is of no value to have consistent, but consistently wrong, teaching. In fact, it is probably counterproductive to have consistent error, just like it would be counterproductive to rely on a single wrong instrument for measurement.
So now we ask the question, does the Catholic get a better guarantee of accuracy than the Protestant? Do Catholic teachings give answers that are more consistent with a reference standard … say, the Bible … than Protestant teachings.
The Catholic has no way of knowing. His thought structure is
(1) The MOC tell me that the RC Church is the authority.
(2) Whatever the Church teaches magisterially is thus true.
(3) The Church teaches X, Y, Z
(4) Therefore X, Y, Z are true.
This thought structure is only as accurate as (1) is correct and (2) is a valid inference (which it’s not, but that’s another story), combined with the possibility that X, Y, or Z could be incidentally true.
In terms of accuracy, the Catholic is in no better shape than the Protestant. He has provisional knowledge. And if that’s a problem for you in the Protestant, then it needs to be a problem for you in the Catholic. Hence — no red herring.
I think all this time you’ve been confusing greater precision (which is true) for greater claim to accuracy (which is not).
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sdb,
“Yes. That’s it exactly.”
That you eagerly confirm your statement just shows the problem even more. You should not be doubling down on making scientific/natural provisional statements you “trust” for now equivalent to divine revelation and supernatural faith. Putting faith and trusting in Christ and the Apostles claims is not like putting faith and trust into science claims – you might see why I would bring up Pelagianism and rationalism as a consequence of such an approach. I linked to cath ency on certitude:
“It should be noted, too, that in the common opinion of theologians there is a greater certitude in divine faith than in any human science.”
“The term natural certitude is sometimes used in another sense, in contradistinction from the certitude of Divine faith, which is supernatural certitude, and which, according to theologians generally, is greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err.”
“Certitude is contrasted with other states of mind in reference to a proposition: the state of ignorance, the state of doubt, and the state of opinion. The last-named signifies, in the strict use of the term, the holding of a proposition as probable … Certitude differs from opinion in kind, not in degree only; for opinion, that is assent to the probability of a proposition, regards the opposite proposition as not more than improbable; and therefore opinion is always accompanied by the consciousness that further evidence may cause a change of mind in favour of the opposite opinion. Opinion, therefore, does not exclude doubt; certitude does.”
“The certitude of faith is supernatural, being due to Divine grace, and is superior not merely to moral certitude, but to the certitude of physical science, and to that of the demonstrative sciences.”
“there are two orders of knowledge, distinct both in their source and their object; distinct in their source, for the truths of one order are known by natural reason, and those of the other by faith in divine revelation; and distinct in their object, because, over and above the truths naturally attainable, there are proposed to our belief mysteries hidden in God, which can be known through divine revelation alone.”
Apparently this isn’t true for you and Jeff who keep trying to analogize faith to science. And it’s interesting that no one doubts gravity, but plenty doubt string theory and climate models, and lots of people doubt the teachings of Christianity and its various denominations. So there must have been a disconnect in the analogy. Apparently you’re 99.9% sure Calvinism is correct but an Arminian is 99.9% sure it isn’t. And so we have to couch things within semper reformanda at all times. And you’re well within your rights to do so, given the disclaimers you subscribed to in your confessions. Which is why conservative protestantism is just liberal protestantism waiting to happen.
“That doesn’t mean my apprehension of his revelation is infallible. ”
Of course not. No one is arguing this (again). Not Aquinas, not Newman, not Catholic Encyclopedia.
“However, protestantism states upfront that the only infallible source of divine revelation about matters of faith is the Bible even though:”
It states with one hand what it takes away with the other is problem. That statement and doctrine itself “Our identified Bible is the only infallible source of divine revelation” itself remains nothing more than provisional, highly likely opinion, because of the disclaimers all Protestant confessions make in the first place – which you already admitted, “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. They reject divine authority or ability to identify or define infallible divine revelation. That’s why I already pointed out repeatedly that even though adherents remain fallible before and after assent in both systems, one system offers an advantage and grounding while the other does not.
“if CP are correct then they shouldn’t have 30,000 denominations.”
This is irrelevant to the point again. I don’t know why you keep bringing it up. I’ve never brought it up in this discussion. Even if CP’s were reduced to just you, the point would remain.
“The justifications for changes as “development” and the post-hoc qualifiers on what counts as infallible teaching and what doesn’t undermines the purported advantage.”
It’s quite easy to offer examples of infallible dogma in RCism – the Assumption, the Resurrection, Christ is divine, the Trinity, justification by infusion, baptismal regeneration, eucharist, original sin, venial/mortal sin distinction, divine revelation is not a matter of provisional opinion, etc. I can never do that in Protestantism.
“From an epistemological point of view, I’m not sure either stance is superior over the other – both fallibly believe in infallible divine revelation fallibly identified and interpreted. You add an infallible middle-man. I still don’t see any evidence (empirical or logically) why this is a benefit.”
If Rome’s claims are granted as true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority, do they give an advantage over Protestantism, granting its claims are true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority?
Secondly, if Christ and the Apostles claims regarding infallibility and divine authority were granted as true in NT times, did they give an advantage to an NT believer after assent over someone assenting to a random Jewish rabbi during NT times, granting his claims regarding falliblity and no divine authority and his ability to only offer admitted provisional highly likely opinion?
When answering, keep in mind what you said above “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”
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James Young, “Divine revelation is not natural revelation.” Same goes for magisterium’s teaching.
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Cletus van Damme
Posted October 23, 2015 at 5:16 pm | Permalink
sdb,
“Yes. That’s it exactly.”
That you eagerly confirm your statement just shows the problem even more. You should not be doubling down on making scientific/natural provisional statements you “trust” for now equivalent to divine revelation and supernatural faith. Putting faith and trusting in Christ and the Apostles claims is not like putting faith and trust into science claims – you might see why I would bring up Pelagianism and rationalism as a consequence of such an approach. I linked to cath ency on certitude:
“It should be noted, too, that in the common opinion of theologians there is a greater certitude in divine faith than in any human science.”
Cutting out divine guidance and reducing Christianity to the admittedly fallible theological guesswork of men.
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James Young, “One system claims to actually have the ability and authority to identify and define it. One does not and rejects such a claim.”
The self-attestation of the magisterium.
Problem is, it came about 1000 years after Jesus died. Paul and Peter and Jesus were attesting to Scripture long before any pope claimed supremacy or infallibility.
But history doesn’t matter for the church that prides itself in history.
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James Young, “One system claims divine authority to identify and define articles of faith (infallible and irreformable by definition), i.e. it claims infallibility. One system does not only not make that claim, it actively rejects it. Hence one system asserts any teaching it offers is provisional, highly probable, likely, tentative, and so on – it never will, nor can it, assert any teaching as divine revelation over and instead of mere human opinion.”
We got it.
But no one else on your side cares.
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James Young, “Apparently you’re 99.9% sure Calvinism is correct but an Arminian is 99.9% sure it isn’t. And so we have to couch things within semper reformanda at all times.”
Apparently only .0002 percent of Roman Catholics know what you’re talking about.
You’d have made a good Communist. Don’t let the facts get in the way of theory.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 23, 2015 at 5:34 pm | Permalink
James Young, “One system claims to actually have the ability and authority to identify and define it. One does not and rejects such a claim.”
The self-attestation of the magisterium.
Problem is, it came about 1000 years after Jesus died. Paul and Peter and Jesus were attesting to Scripture long before any pope claimed supremacy or infallibility.
But history doesn’t matter for the church that prides itself in history.
The New Testament wasn’t written yet, Dr. History. Ooops.
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vd, t, “thy word is a light to my feet, a lamp to my path.”
Doh!
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Simple question based on Scripture. Is the Holy Spirit succeeding in leading the Church into all truth? Is that leading fallible or infallible?
How much time do Presbyterians spend asking the Holy Spirit to guide you into all truth?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 23, 2015 at 9:37 pm | Permalink
vd, t, “thy word is a light to my feet, a lamp to my path.”
Doh!
you keep serving ’em up we keep hitting ’em out
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vd, t, you mean the Old Testament that came before the Bishop of Rome? The Word that our Lord quoted? That’s the one I served up?
If you’re that dependent on authority to tell even what God’s word is, how much can you really trust a novos ordo seclorum?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 23, 2015 at 10:01 pm | Permalink
vd, t, you mean the Old Testament that came before the Bishop of Rome? The Word that our Lord quoted? That’s the one I served up?
If you’re that dependent on authority to tell even what God’s word is, how much can you really trust a novos ordo seclorum?
Luther and Calvin can look at the same passage and disagree what it means. One of them is wrong. Maybe both. Your religion is at best a guess, a coin flip.
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Mermaid, a lot.
So you’re going to presume that Roman Catholics are more devout than Protestants? Do you remember the numbers or do you simply live in denial?
Don’t be so insulting. Or if you do insult, base it in reality. (You’re objection would make a lot more sense if you were a cradle and were ignorant about Protestantism. Instead, you’re ignorant on purpose.)
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vd, t, at least they look at the Bible. Christianity is a revealed religion, no? What do you look at? The alarm clock and then back to sleep instead of the Mass?
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Tom,
Nancy Pelosi and Mother Teresa can both read the Magisterium and come to different, apparently conflicting conclusions. One or both are wrong. At best Rome gives us a coin flip. Or you can use the full weight of your political office to promote murder with impunity and you can do all you can to stop it.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 23, 2015 at 10:15 pm | Permalink
vd, t, at least they look at the Bible.
If they’re going to come up with different religions, so what? You’re illustrating the problem.
Robert
Posted October 23, 2015 at 10:17 pm | Permalink
Tom,
Nancy Pelosi and Mother Teresa can both read the Magisterium and come to different, apparently conflicting conclusions
Not so. Pelosi was reprimanded by her bishop. You have to stop getting your information on Catholicism from Old Life.
#ecclesiology
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D.G. Hart:
Don’t be so insulting. Or if you do insult, base it in reality. (You’re objection would make a lot more sense if you were a cradle and were ignorant about Protestantism. Instead, you’re ignorant on purpose.)>>>>>
Hmmm. I didn’t know you were hyper sensitive. I am not making an objection. I am asking a question about the infallible leading into all truth by the Holy Spirit. You have to believe such a thing exists.
You spend a lot of time bathing the annual business meetings in prayer. Good.
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TVD: you keep serving ’em up we keep hitting ’em out
Huh. And you said you were a neutral referee.
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CVD: One system claims divine authority to identify and define articles of faith (infallible and irreformable by definition), i.e. it claims infallibility. One system does not only not make that claim, it actively rejects it. Hence one system asserts any teaching it offers is provisional, highly probable, likely, tentative, and so on – it never will, nor can it, assert any teaching as divine revelation over and instead of mere human opinion. One system asserts semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. One system rejects semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. That is why I said a person buying into one system is better off than before, while another buying into the other is no better than before, despite the fact that both persons must choose and judge beforehand, as well as interpret afterwards.
Just observing, but you’ve gotten to the point of repeating yourself. I’m not saying that’s your fault, given that we clearly are responding in way that you think is off-point (“red herring”).
However, I think you’ll need to find a different way to say this. I’m not swayed by “better off than before” because it is an ill-defined term. Better off in what sense?
In the sense of having certitude (a feeling of being right)? I don’t value that.
In the sense of actually being closer to the truth? Only if Rome’s claims are actually true.
In the sense of being better equipped to read the Bible and understand what it means? If Rome’s claims are true, then Yes. If not, then No — they’re actually worse off, because buying into the system entails motivated exegesis.
So please rephrase and clarify.
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Robert, don’t forget that Fourth Lateran can say “absolutely” no salvation outside the church and Vatican II can say not so much.
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Mermaid, or maybe you don’t know how smug you sound.
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Jeff, maybe it’s in the sense that allows James Young to spend more energy showing Protestantism’s defect so all he can do about the priests’ sex scandal and the bishops’ cover up is shrug.
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Maybe. My sense is that he genuinely believes that truth must be known absolutely or not at all, and that he’s found the absolute truth.
It might help if we knew people in real life, y’know?
For all I know, Mermaid might be a twenty-something male who’s working on a performance piece for a literature degree.
But unlikely. 🙂
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Jeff, but how do you get so jazzed about absolute truth and the transmitters of it when the contemporary transmitters are not so jazzed? Disconnect anyone?
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JRC: “If your ground for belief is uncertain, you have an uncertain belief. I’ll say it again: Assenting to claims of infallibility upon fallible grounds yields nothing but fallible knowledge.”
CVD: By this logic, God’s authority, let alone Scripture’s authority and teachings, can never be greater or more certain than my fallible decision and assent.
You’re playing fast-and-loose with terms. God’s authority is one thing. The Scripture’s authority is another. Our understanding of Scripture’s meaning is a third thing.
God’s authority is not derived from our understanding. It is based upon His ability and right to rule over us. It is absolute.
My understanding of God’s word to us is another matter. If a prophet comes to us and says “Thus saith the Lord”, we are not to accept that blindly, but test it. So says the Scripture (I John 4.1, Acts 17.11).
And this implies that our certainty in our knowledge of God’s word is no better than our ability to test.
CVD: You’re also denying (well Jeff is, anyways) that it’s even *possible* for Rome’s claims to actually be true and, more importantly, matter or make any difference if they were.
I actually deny that CtC’s claims are true. Specifically:
* It is NOT true that our only options are either to submit to a higher sacramental authority OR to be our own authority. That argument, as has been shown here repeatedly, is bad philosophy and is objectionable on that ground alone, irrespective of its religious implications. It is impossible to be true.
* It is NOT true that a Protestant only has uncertainty, but a Roman Catholic has certainty, even “within the paradigm.” This is likewise impossible to be true.
Rome’s claim, that the Pope is the visible head of Christ’s church, descended sacramentally in right line from Peter, is merely highly improbable, but not absolutely impossible. For this claim to be true, several Scriptures would have to be overturned, and the organizing principle of the church would have to be derived from propositions that the apostles never wrote down for us, contrary to the understanding of the Church Fathers.
Just to be clear.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 24, 2015 at 8:18 am | Permalink
Mermaid, or maybe you don’t know how smug you sound.>>>>
Does the Holy Spirit lead the Church – or church or groups of Christians or individual Christians – into all truth, and can He be expected to do that in an infallible way?
Sure, we don’t get it all right, but isn’t it a fact that Jesus promised that the Holy Spirit would lead us into all truth? That seems to be the assumption that Christians should go on. I don’t see that Jesus promised we could only get to provisional knowledge.
I mean, Jeff can have his principle of inductive inference that can get him only to provisional knowledge, but where’s that in the Bible?
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Mermaid, don’t you read the news? Where is the Spirit at the Synod?
You act like we’re not supposed to notice. Or maybe you live in a bubble.
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Tom,
Not so. Pelosi was reprimanded by her bishop. You have to stop getting your information on Catholicism from Old Life.
Can Pelosi still get the Eucharist from her bishop? As far as I know, yes. Can Pelosi find another bishop who will give her the Eucharist? Yes.
Both Biden and Pelosi received the Eucharist at the papal inauguration mass.
I can only conclude one of two things from this:
1. Pelosi and Biden’s position on abortion on demand is fully orthodox.
2. Their position is not orthodox and Rome doesn’t care that two of its communicant members are eating and drinking unto their damnation.
Since Rome is all dogs go to heaven now, #1 seems more probable.
Or, you could admit that we can go to the documents, interpret them correctly in their original context, and then solve it that way.
Kind of like what we advocate for the Bible.
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sdb: Divine revelation always seemed to accompanied by signs and wonders. Christianity is fundamentally empirical- prophecies come true, jesus rises from the dead and appears toba bunch of people, and apostles point to this event as evidence. We have to trust their testimony.
Science also relies on trust. You have to take experts at their word. You aren’t measuring the charge of a quark.
Science is provisional but makes absolute statements I can trust.
I would like to highlight a few differences, though. My guess is that these are agreeable to you.
(1) Reading any text is fundamentally different from science in that a text is designed to convey meaning, provoke a response, evoke emotion, create a mental picture (or some combination of those). It has a telos.
Objects don’t have a clearly discernible purpose. If I give you a round rod, flattened at one end, with a handle at the other, you might say “screwdriver.” I might say “paint can opener”. Your four-year-old might say “laser gun.” The rod is suitable for any of these purposes, so long as the four-year-old has pretend play in mind.
The scientific quest is a search for regularity and cause. The exegetical question is a search for meaning.
Here’s where this matters: objects cannot have arbitrary behavior. They are bounded (apparently) by conservation laws. By contrast, texts can have arbitrary meaning. In addition to straightforward discourse, there can be satire. There can be farce. There can be coded meaning. Many texts intentionally subvert expected or typical literary conventions.
For that reason, I can never bound the meaning of texts in the same way that I can bound the behavior of objects.
(2) On a related note, texts cannot be subjected to experiments with controls. Hence the futility of trying to mine Pauline texts for “did Paul really write this?” Paul can write whatever he pleases.
(3) Finally, faith in the Scriptural sense is indeed trust, but it is qualitatively different from scientific trust.
We have evidence for our belief: The resurrection, the writings of the apostles, the testimony of the early church.
We have evidence for our articles of faith: The Scripture itself.
However, we will not ultimately be able to dispositively show that the evidence is undoubtable, for the simple reason that there is no such thing as a well-calibrated God-o-meter. For any evidence I can provide, the unbeliever can simply say that “any naturalistic explanation is preferable to a supernatural one.” That’s an axiom of the naturalistic world-view, and it takes a work of the Spirit to undermine it.
Likewise, intellect unaided by the Spirit cannot come to faith in the same way that intellect unaided by the Spirit can come to scientific belief.
So there is something about Biblical faith that looks to evidence, yes, but also sees that evidence in a certain way.
By contrast, scientific evidence can also be ambiguous, but we don’t expect a work of the Spirit to clarify the ambiguity for us.
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Watched EWTN mass this morning with the folks. Enjoyed the readings, enjoyed the solemnity, and then the homily completely inverts the passage of the fig tree and directs our REPENTANCE toward Mary, with the conditioner that she didn’t require repentance and then directed ALL the prayers toward the saints and because of their merit, the plea that their prayers would be heard. In a capsule, everything that’s wrong with Rome. Jesus is completely eclipsed by all the add-ons and super-piety.
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MWF: Does the Holy Spirit lead the Church – or church or groups of Christians or individual Christians – into all truth, and can He be expected to do that in an infallible way?
Asked and answered.
Yes, and yes. What’s not known is the manner or time.
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sean, hello!!
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MWF: Jeff can have his principle of inductive inference that can get him only to provisional knowledge, but where’s that in the Bible?
All over the place. Do you have instances of people seeing signs or hearing words, then drawing conclusions from those signs or words?
That’s inductive inference.
The occasions of deductive inference in Scripture are actually relatively few, and are limited to the rules for deductive inference.
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Cletus,
Rome has never claimed to make its adherents infallible or omniscient. Nor has any apologist or theologian past or present argued that. It’s absurd.
I agree, which is why your continued focus on “certainty of faith vs. provisional opinion” is perplexing.
Christ and the Apostles didn’t make NT adherents magically infallible and omniscient before or after assent. And yet you and Jeff think this is a compelling or relevant counter. I’ll remind you of what you said:
“I’m only better off if Rome actually is infallible.”
“Again, they’re better off only if the claim is correct.”
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“If the claim isn’t true, it’s worthless.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
“If Rome’s claim is false, you have no advantage.”
Now you’re saying if I’m not magically made infallible and omniscient, none of the above applies.
If the goal is to make one infallibly certain and eliminate all provisionality of faith knowledge, then yes, none of that applies because you’ve just admitted that Christ and the Apostles don’t give that.
This is why I already referenced the term “certitude of faith”. It does not entail making the adherent infallible or omniscient. http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/03539b.htm
I still don’t understand what is meant by certainty of faith and how that differs from assurance that what one believes is correct.
Again, as I said before. One system claims divine authority to identify and define articles of faith (infallible and irreformable by definition), i.e. it claims infallibility. One system does not only not make that claim, it actively rejects it.
Why does the system have to make that claim for itself? Why can the Word not propose something and self-authenticate it via subjective and objective means?
Hence one system asserts any teaching it offers is provisional, highly probable, likely, tentative, and so on – it never will, nor can it, assert any teaching as divine revelation over and instead of mere human opinion.
Again, why does the system have to offer anything it claims for itself? We aren’t asking people to put their faith in the church. If we were, perhaps your critique would have some merit, but that’s not what we’re asking anyone to do. We don’t believe that is the church’s role. We don’t believe that the church grants us supernatural faith. And we don’t believe such is necessary to recognize the Word of God.
The example of the Jews operating under a fallible teaching authority continues to be one that none of you RCs have adequately dealt with. The book of Genesis never explicitly claims to be infallible and irreformable. No Jewish authority was infallible, so even if it was offered as such, that would not be enough for you. And yet Jesus appeals to the words of Moses as a common authority that was already recognized as Scripture apart from His or the Apostles’ authoritative say-so. How was it possible for Him to do this rightly?
It’s a question I don’t think you can answer. Jonathan P. finally had to admit that there was some kind of infallibility on the part of the Jewish people with respect to the reception of Scripture. I suppose that is more consistent with the paradigm you suggest, but it introduces a host of other problems, such as why does Rome then reject the Jewish canon.
One system asserts semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. One system rejects semper reformanda, being consistent with its principles and claims. That is why I said a person buying into one system is better off than before, while another buying into the other is no better than before, despite the fact that both persons must choose and judge beforehand, as well as interpret afterwards.
Again, this doesn’t make any sense, particularly in light of how things work on the ground. It seems to me that you are saying that you are better off because, for example, Rome gives you a way to be sure that the doctrine of the Trinity will never be overturned. But I don’t see how that works on the ground in light of how doctrine has developed. Once Rome said you had to believe in the Trinity to be saved, now you don’t. Nobody knows whether the ontological Trinity is the economic Trinity. Social Trinitarianism is very popular for theologians such as Elizabeth Johnson. And I could go on. None of these things on paper overturn “one ousia, three hypostases” but in reality they strike at the very heart of what the actual Nicene Creed means by this. The formula hasn’t been reformed, but the actual meaning of the doctrine has. It turns out things were quite provisional after all.
This is one of the reason that we all keep harping on the lack of discipline. You can be orthodox on paper (PCUSA), but when in practice nearly anything goes belief wise (PCUSA), you’ve changed the doctrine. The paper just hasn’t caught up yet. This is what we are seeing with the current synod. Life in the family on the ground has been accepted in ways contrary to the tradition for so long that so many of your bishops are throwing up their hands and saying, “Let’s figure out a way to be orthodox on paper and yet ignore that in pastoral practice.” Semper
reformandadeformanda is happening in RCism worldwide as we speak. Maybe there is kind of a blind faith that says the Magisterium will eventually settle things (I’ve seen many RCs say don’t worry, it’ll all be okay), but that does not seem to be the way things have happened historically. It’s certainly not the way the early church Fathers operated. They fought tooth and nail (Athanasius). I don’t see how that is possible in the Roman system when you get a bad pope.LikeLike
Jeff Cagle
Posted October 24, 2015 at 9:49 am | Permalink
MWF: Does the Holy Spirit lead the Church – or church or groups of Christians or individual Christians – into all truth, and can He be expected to do that in an infallible way?
Asked and answered.
Yes, and yes. What’s not known is the manner or time.>>>>>
Finally a straight answer. That should not have been a hard question to answer, or even controversial.
Jeff:
What’s not known is the manner or time.>>>>>
So, if you an put the timing off until the final judgment, you can live by your deductive inference leading you to provisional knowledge. Right?
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Not “finally.” For the second time.
Can I put off the Holy Spirit’s guidance until the eschaton? No.
Can Rome make the Spirit hurry up by claims of charism? No.
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Jeff:
What’s not known is the manner or time.>>>>>
So, if you an put the timing off until the final judgment, you can live by your deductive inference leading you to provisional knowledge. Right?
Jeff Cagle
Posted October 24, 2015 at 10:35 am | Permalink
Not “finally.” For the second time.>>>>
Hmmm. So you can be sure of things even now, and that based on the Holy Spirit’s leading. Can you be infallibly sure that you have the infallible interpretation of Scripture?
Jeff:
Can I put off the Holy Spirit’s guidance until the eschaton? No.>>>>
Okay.
Jeff:
Can Rome make the Spirit hurry up by claims of charism? No.>>>>
Rome can’t but you can? I mean, you just made an absolute statement about Rome’s inability to be led by the Spirit.
I know it makes sense to you. I know you are smart and a high school teacher. I know you trust your guidance system.
Can you ever make a statement that does not come across as “Rome can’t be true, so I believe something else.” Yours seems to be an anti theology, really.
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Jeff, “Do you have instances of people seeing signs or hearing words, then drawing conclusions from those signs or words?”
Anyone seen an apparition of Mary lately?
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Mermaid, so the Spirit leads you to whatever the magisterium does? Did He lead to covering up the sex scandal? How would you be able to tell differently? Pay, pray, obey.
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MWF: Rome can’t but you can? I mean, you just made an absolute statement about Rome’s inability to be led by the Spirit.
No, just the opposite. I just made an absolute claim about Rome’s inability to lead the Spirit.
MWF: I know it makes sense to you. I know you are smart and a high school teacher. I know you trust your guidance system.
How do you know these things?
MWF: Can you ever make a statement that does not come across as “Rome can’t be true, so I believe something else.” Yours seems to be an anti theology, really.
I can control what I say, but I cannot fully control how it comes across to you. As seen above, you frequently take my words to mean the opposite of what they say. I cannot really help that, except to ask you to pay closer attention and to make fewer assumptions.
I tried to help by inviting you twice to carefully lay out the various pieces of evidence for your views, and you passed.
This is a common pattern in our communication. Is your confusion real or feigned? I can’t decide.
So I can only appeal: please pay closer attention, and please make fewer assumptions. As DGH alluded to, it is more offensive than you realize.
For the record, my official position is that Scripture was given to us so that we might read and be guided thereby; Rome’s position is that Scripture can only be read through the filter of Rome’s teaching. Hence Rome subverts the purpose of Scripture and must be wrong.
Reading is just not that hard.
Peace.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 24, 2015 at 11:42 am | Permalink
MWF: Rome can’t but you can? I mean, you just made an absolute statement about Rome’s inability to be led by the Spirit.
Jeff:
No, just the opposite. I just made an absolute claim about Rome’s inability to lead the Spirit.>>>>
She does not claim to lead the Spirit, so your claim applies to nothing. My mistake was in assuming that you were talking about what the Catholic Church actually teaches. Her claim is that the Spirit leads the Church by sending her into the world to preach the Gospel and minister the sacraments. Don’t you believe something like that about your church?
————————————————————————————-
The Holy Spirit and the Church
737 The mission of Christ and the Holy Spirit is brought to completion in the Church, which is the Body of Christ and the Temple of the Holy Spirit. This joint mission henceforth brings Christ’s faithful to share in his communion with the Father in the Holy Spirit. the Spirit prepares men and goes out to them with his grace, in order to draw them to Christ. the Spirit manifests the risen Lord to them, recalls his word to them and opens their minds to the understanding of his Death and Resurrection. He makes present the mystery of Christ, supremely in the Eucharist, in order to reconcile them, to bring them into communion with God, that they may “bear much fruit.”132
738 Thus the Church’s mission is not an addition to that of Christ and the Holy Spirit, but is its sacrament: in her whole being and in all her members, the Church is sent to announce, bear witness, make present, and spread the mystery of the communion of the Holy Trinity (the topic of the next article):
All of us who have received one and the same Spirit, that is, the Holy Spirit, are in a sense blended together with one another and with God. For if Christ, together with the Father’s and his own Spirit, comes to dwell in each of us, though we are many, still the Spirit is one and undivided. He binds together the spirits of each and every one of us, . . . and makes all appear as one in him. For just as the power of Christ’s sacred flesh unites those in whom it dwells into one body, I think that in the same way the one and undivided Spirit of God, who dwells in all, leads all into spiritual unity.133
739 Because the Holy Spirit is the anointing of Christ, it is Christ who, as the head of the Body, pours out the Spirit among his members to nourish, heal, and organize them in their mutual functions, to give them life, send them to bear witness, and associate them to his self-offering to the Father and to his intercession for the whole world. Through the Church’s sacraments, Christ communicates his Holy and sanctifying Spirit to the members of his Body. (This will be the topic of Part Two of the Catechism.)
740 These “mighty works of God,” offered to believers in the sacraments of the Church, bear their fruit in the new life in Christ, according to the Spirit. (This will be the topic of Part Three.)
741 “The Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes with sighs too deep for words.”134 The Holy Spirit, the artisan of God’s works, is the master of prayer. (This will be the topic of Part Four.)
http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P24.HTM
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Jeff:
For the record, my official position is that Scripture was given to us so that we might read and be guided thereby; Rome’s position is that Scripture can only be read through the filter of Rome’s teaching. Hence Rome subverts the purpose of Scripture and must be wrong.>>>>>
So, your view is highly individualistic.
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Darryl,
Thanks for the reference to the 4th Lateran. There’s a whole bunch of stuff in there about “exterminating” heretics. Apparently that wasn’t infallible at the time, though I’m sure the leaders in question thought it was.
Rome never changes, as long as it can say “well, that wasn’t REALLY infallible.” It boggles the mind.
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Mermaid,
How is Jeff’s position any more individualistic than yours?
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Mermaid, then please explain the disagreement among the members of your Synod who have all that charism, papal supremacy, infallibility of scripture and magisterium.
We notice.
You don’t.
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MWF: So, your view is highly individualistic.
Darn it. I have drink another root beer.
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MWF: My mistake was in assuming that you were talking about what the Catholic Church actually teaches. Her claim is that the Spirit leads the Church by sending her into the world to preach the Gospel and minister the sacraments.
That wasn’t the claim under discussion. Your claim was that the Church has a charism of infallibility, and when it exercises that gift, the Holy Spirit leads the Church infallibly into a better understanding of truth.
That would be the Church leading the Spirit.
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Mermaid, like I say, have you followed the Synod? Which spirit?
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Mermaid, why aren’t you worried?
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Mermaid, are you ready?
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Thank you for the link, Brother Hart.
————————————————————————
“The fact is, there is nothing I can do to change the Synod but pray. More importantly, however, there is nothing the Synod can do to change the faith…
Firstly, a Synod does not have doctrinal authority, unless the Pope should elevate its status to that of a local Council and promulgate it as part of the ordinary magisterium. Even if Pope Francis were to do this, there is nothing he can do to eviscerate the tradition on marriage, namely what the Church has always and everywhere believed. This is documented in the Fathers, the Medievals, the Schoolmen, the Manuals, and ecumenical Councils (preeminently Trent). The Pope is not able to change these teachings, or abridge them.”
http://athanasiuscm.org/2015/10/07/why-no-synod-coverage/
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Mermaid,
You did notice what that blog you linked to said, right?
In all reality, I am just a guy with opinions,
D’oh
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Robert, Mermaid sees and hears no evil. Speaks is another matter.
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Robert
Posted October 24, 2015 at 1:59 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
You did notice what that blog you linked to said, right?
In all reality, I am just a guy with opinions,
D’oh
You do realize it’s the same blog that Dr. Hart linked to, right?
No, I didn’t think so. You people are amazing.
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Tom,
Sure. Which is why all of its assurances are hollow. But it is evidence that some RCs don’t have their heads in the sand when it comes to what is going on now even if their heads are in the sand with what it will mean regarding change. It’s the difference between wishful thinking (things are bad but the church will prevail-which is the Reformed position ironically) and pure credulity (things are dandy not like you Protestants and in the long run the church will prevail-the position of Susan, Webfoot, Bryan Cross, etc.)
IOW, rad trads who think V2 changed the church fundamentally know what’s up even though we think they’re wrong that the pope of V1 is the answer.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 24, 2015 at 12:38 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, then please explain the disagreement among the members of your Synod who have all that charism, papal supremacy, infallibility of scripture and magisterium.
We notice.
Of course you do. You’re desperately hoping Catholicism becomes as big a theological and ecclesiastical mess as your own religion [as though that would make your religion true].
http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Lesbian-Couple-Ordained-Jointly-in-Presbyterian-Church-Delaware-297184461.html
Calvinism has achieved more chaos in 500 years than the Catholic Church has in 2000. It must be disappointing to see your religion’s claims to any sort of ‘catholicism’ be so self-refuting.
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TVD
Posted October 24, 2015 at 4:22 pm | Permalink
D. G. Hart
Posted October 24, 2015 at 12:38 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, then please explain the disagreement among the members of your Synod who have all that charism, papal supremacy, infallibility of scripture and magisterium.
We notice.
TVD:
Of course you do. You’re desperately hoping Catholicism becomes as big a theological and ecclesiastical mess as your own religion [as though that would make your religion true].
http://www.nbcphiladelphia.com/news/local/Lesbian-Couple-Ordained-Jointly-in-Presbyterian-Church-Delaware-297184461.html
Calvinism has achieved more chaos in 500 years than the Catholic Church has in 2000. It must be disappointing to see your religion’s claims to any sort of ‘catholicism’ be so self-refuting.>>>>>
That makes the most sense.
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Tom and Mermaid,
Calvinism has achieved more chaos in 500 years than the Catholic Church has in 2000.
You do realize that Western “Catholicism” is to blame for Calvinism, right? No papacy, no failures of the papacy, no Reformation.
Oh, and citing the PCUSA as if they are actually Calvinists is counterproductive. We rejected our heretics long ago. V2 has allowed them to flourish in Romanism, if Romanism can even talk about heresy anymore.
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Robert
Posted October 24, 2015 at 5:28 pm | Permalink
Tom and Mermaid,
Calvinism has achieved more chaos in 500 years than the Catholic Church has in 2000.
You do realize that Western “Catholicism” is to blame for Calvinism, right? No papacy, no failures of the papacy, no Reformation.
No, the problem is the Reformation of the Reformation of the Reformation of the Reformation of the
Oh, and citing the PCUSA as if they are actually Calvinists is counterproductive. We rejected our heretics long ago.
Actually, they rejected you, and your refusal to “reform.”
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Tom,
“The change comes four years after the Presbyterians authorized gay ordination.”
This is from the news article you linked. While I don’t know how many, I do know that there are a few different Presbyterian denominations. What I’d like to know more is what were all the different causes for their splintering from each other since their founding. I wonder if it has ever been the case that a more liberal group broke away from its conservative predecessor because it didn’t like its conservative ideology.
The article speaks as if there is a Federal Presbyterianism, but I know that isn’t the case. Which one or ones(pl), of the Confederacy of Presbyterians authorized it?
How far of a chain of command( ecclesial hierarchy) does that particular denomination have I wonder, and does the very top( Parliament?) have a right to speak authoritatively for the rest of the confederacy, and the rest of Protestantism……… Christianity in general?
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Actually, I should have directed my questions to Dr. Hart.
I just hope he doesn’t tell me to buy his book. I always hate those shameless plugs.
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Susan Vader
Posted October 24, 2015 at 5:54 pm | Permalink
Tom,
“The change comes four years after the Presbyterians authorized gay ordination.”
This is from the news article you linked. While I don’t know how many, I do know that there are a few different Presbyterian denominations. What I’d like to know more is what were all the different causes for their splintering from each other since their founding. I wonder if it has ever been the case that a more liberal group broke away from its conservative predecessor because it didn’t like its conservative ideology.
The article speaks as if there is a Federal Presbyterianism, but I know that isn’t the case. Which one or ones(pl), of the Confederacy of Presbyterians authorized it?
How far of a chain of command( ecclesial hierarchy) does that particular denomination have I wonder, and does the very top( Parliament?) have a right to speak authoritatively for the rest of the confederacy, and the rest of Protestantism……… Christianity in general?
You got the thread. You’re not going to get a straight answer because there isn’t one. “Semper reformanda” guarantees perpetual chaos and perpetual schism.
Which is why “discipline” is Sisyphean. The inmates invariably take over the asylum. There are more of them.
FTR, in Protestantism [Reformationism?] historically it’s been the conservatives who leave after the “reformers” seize control of the denomination. For instance, the unitarians seized control of many of the Congregationalist churches in New England, provoking more schism. The saying still goes, “The Trinitarians kept the faith, the unitarians kept the furniture.”
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Thanks Tom,
And since the Reformation began in Germany and Geneva, does that mean that that is where the hierarchy resides? Who do the Federal Presbyterians in North America answer to? What about Presbyterianism around the globe…..Is there like a United Nations Presbyterian Parliament for handling doctrinal disputes?
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Mermaid, any day now. We’re still waiting for your account of how the Holy Spirit is leading your bishops. The sources I cite are Roman Catholic.
Any thoughts? Or just denial all the time.
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Susan, you know Calvinism’s problems don’t prove Roman Catholicism’s superiority. It only proves you should have chosen the Eastern Orthodox Church.
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Susan, please do give vd, t credit for praising Calvinism as the chief religious ingredient in the American founding and for not going to your church.
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Susan Vader
Posted October 24, 2015 at 6:23 pm | Permalink
Thanks Tom,
And since the Reformation began in Germany and Geneva, does that mean that that is where the hierarchy resides? Who do the Federal Presbyterians in North America answer to? What about Presbyterianism around the globe…..Is there like a United Nations Presbyterian Parliament for handling doctrinal disputes?
The whole point of inventing the theology of “sola scriptura” was to delegitimize Rome’s claim to magisterial [theological] authority. This eventually became the end of any central ecclesiastical authority as well [not that that’s what John Calvin had in mind] and why schism is the rule in Reformationism, not the exception, as it is in Catholicism.
As Gordon Wood wrote of Founding-era Calvinism [the Baptists began as Calvinists]
Some got along, some didn’t.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 24, 2015 at 6:36 pm | Permalink
Susan, you know Calvinism’s problems don’t prove Roman Catholicism’s superiority. It only proves you should have chosen the Eastern Orthodox Church.
More that you should’ve. At least they have true apostolic succession and thus licit sacraments.
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/07/ecclesial-consumerism/#comment-197302
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Darryl,
I give Tom praise for being logical and telling the truth about the historical situation. I’m just asking for the facts, I can figure out the implications myself( though it’s not a problem that he and I agree based on those facts).
“…….. Calvinism as the chief religious ingredient in the American founding and for not going to your church.”
I don’t doubt Calvinism’s part in the American founding, but the Church isn’t supposed to be democracy.
Interesting, is that where there is no authentic theocracy there is always a battle for power. I’m thinking of how it was English Parliament that was America’s problem will England, not King George II. But it was King George who was demonized. For right after our liberation from England the states had to figure out how much authority they were going to invest at the federal level to tax and so forth. How do you know when your jumping out of the fire and into the frying pan, when taking down a system that may not be perfect, but not horrible either?
What do you do when the government that is supposed to be all about individual rights no longer knows how to differentiate between godly and ungodly behavior and constructs laws that hurts the minority of the society? I’m thinking about Jim Crow, Abortion. Yeah, I guess I’m more of a monarchist. I just no there are no perfect systems. But when it comes to the Church there has to be only one or we will continually think we have “the right” to start our own on our own piece of land, until somebody comes along who challenges our right to exercise ecclesial authority and so on ad infinitum.
I’m not going to ask Tom why he doesn’t go to church, I know that God works on all of us individually and loves us all. Here’s a beautiful understanding of how God deal with each one of us.
“Father Brown got to his feet, putting his hands behind him. “Odd, isn’t it,” he said, “that a thief and a vagabond should repent, when so many who are rich and secure remain hard and frivolous, and without fruit for God or man? But there, if you will excuse me, you trespass a little upon my province. If you doubt the penitence as a practical fact, there are your knives and forks. You are The Twelve True Fishers, and there are all your silver fish. But He has made me a fisher of men.” “Did you catch this man?” asked the colonel, frowning. Father Brown looked him full in his frowning face. “Yes,” he said, “I caught him, with an unseen hook and an invisible line which is long enough to let him wander to the ends of the world, and still to bring him back with a twitch upon the thread.”
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Thx, Susan. I don’t discuss my personal religious life in fora such as this, as it is routinely weaponized.
GKC is the main patron saint of one of my groupblogs. 😉
https://twitter.com/NewReformClub
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GK definitely helped me into The Church. Thanks Tom:)
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Susan,
There is no international body to settle disputes. The highest authority in the PCA is its general assembly. Same with the OPC. They have fraternal relations with each other, which makes it easy for them to work together in missions, for clergy to move from one denomination to the other, etc. Both churches, which go back to Pentecost, were particularized under different circumstances, going back to division at the Civil War. It’s kind of like Rome, though Rome was particularized round about Trent even the Western tradition goes back to Pentecost.
It would be nice to have an international Presbyterian body/assembly, but we know from history that said bodies are only as good as their discipline. On our side, the PCUSA was formally orthodox for decades but did not discipline heretics; that’s why it is where it is now. With Ronan Catholicism, we’re seeing the slow burn towards the PCUSA’s end: inconsistent discipline (when it happens), liberal ascendancy that gets a leader in place who is more or less acceptable to all but then starts showing liberalism (Francis), the number of liberal bishops increasing and gaining more clout. Rome is on the same road as the PCUSA was on 100 years ago. You all will end up the same way if things don’t change.
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Hello Robert,
Inside the Catholic Church there are people who would very like to see what is known as a “progressive liberal ideology” become the accepted doctrines of the Roman Catholic Church, not because they want to be contrary and liberal but because they honestly believe that truth is fluid and belongs to the owner’s of the age, I guess, AND because it is more loving. So much for “truth” though if it can be changed, eh?
So far, I don’t see any of that particular ideology officially on the books, nor can I say that that is the mindset of our current Pope( I have no evidence for it). Since the Catholic Church has been moving parallel through time with the rest of Christendom one would expect that with all the clamor inside her walls to, “progress already!” she would have officially succumbed to the modern agenda by now, but somehow or another the ship rights herself up. Another 100 years isn’t going to make a difference is nothing so far is breaking up.
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Susan, who are you talking to? Not succumbed to the modern agenda? That is exactly what Vat II was/is, and Francis is taking names, at this very moment, of those who are not onboard the ‘progressive’ train. I appreciate that you’re devout and conservative and trying to sharpen your theological and philosophical chops, but if you can’t own that Vat II was about catching the church up to modernity and if you can’t reconcile to Francis as an mature product of that change, you either aren’t as bright as you seem or you are lying to yourself. You can hash out Thomism ’till your dead and people have and do, but don’t pull the ‘officially on the books’ routine with this group. The ship RCC dramatically altered course in ’65 and Ratzinger and even JPII tried to a degree to put the genie back in the bottle. It was too late. It was too late when Pope Paul was distressed in ’68/69 over the results. The modernity ship has sailed.
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Darryl and Robert,
I am not trying to rub things in. I went to the site linked looking for something else I wanted to give to Robert,and stumbled upon this and thought I should present it to your attention. I didn’t know that this was happening too. I’m sorry that you guys are battling this insanity.
http://principiumunitatis.blogspot.com/2008/07/presbyterians-pcusa-vote-to-eliminate.html
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Yes, there’s the Roman Catholic faithful. A woman who goes to a Lutheran church and a guy who doesn’t go.
And people wonder why the Reformation happened?
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Susan, shocking.
Did you ever wonder why people wanted a different Presbyterian communion?
So why are you content with the German bishops, not to mention Richard McBrien?
In other words, we actually see problems and try to address them. You see and hear no evil and do a pretty good impersonation of gullible.
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Sean, I think you might need to explain to Susan what modernity is. vd, t sure won’t even though he’s a living breathing modern RC (who doesn’t go to church).
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Susan, look what I found:
I know about the PCUSA. Do you have a clue about the Roman Catholic Church? Or is it the church that you have in your heart?
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Hi there Sean,
Watch up to the minute reporting Synod on the Family on EWTN. :;) Nah, I’m just kidding. Wait until it’s ended to see if there has been a substantial change and then bring it to my attention.
I’m curious though what has officially changed since Vatican II? Can you explain what it is that you mean?
Regarding the Synod on the family there is this document from last year:http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/synod/documents/rc_synod_doc_20141018_relatio-synodi-familia_en.html
The second part of the synod meeting finishes tomorrow( I think) and then:
“After an Ordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, it is common for the Holy Father to issue a substantive document, called a post-synodal apostolic exhortation, which takes up the themes of the Synod and deepens them further. It is also expected that after the Extraordinary General Assembly of the Synod of Bishops, one or more documents will be issued in preparation for the Ordinary General Assembly.”
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Susan, how do I explain this to you, briefly? From a theological/scriptural perspective Vat II adopted German prot liberalism as it’s primary hermenuetical tool to open up the scriptures-higher criticism. They tied that move to what came to be known as Rahnerianism which enabled a pastoral application centered on the human experience or anthropological categories. Basically, you don’t have a dogma based religious expression in Rome. That’s why Francis can say, of course I’m a son of the church, and then make pastoral statements and remarks that have more in common with the PCUSA than ANYTHING pre vat II outside of Maryology. That’s as succinct as I can say it.
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And btw, Susan, that was all purposeful. That was the intention and that’s what they got. Vat II, not belabor the obvious, was a council called by the Holy See. It wasn’t an accident. They, magisterium, meant to do it.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 24, 2015 at 10:56 pm | Permalink
Susan, look what I found:
Dr. Hart trolls the internet for yet another dissident who does not speak for the Catholic Church. Dr. History’s own sub-sub-sub-denomination is mere decades old so he presumes to put his ecclesial stopwatch on the calendar, thinking he’s perceiving a change.
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Meanwhile this fellow making a joke of Protestant Reformation
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/from-comedy-to-national-cathedral/2013/08/01/683906e2-f884-11e2-8e84-c56731a202fb_story.html
is greeted with a yawn. Very telling that the Great Whore of Babylon and its antichrist leader get all the cyberink around here. ;.)
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sean, isn’t this what we all do. We check the terms of agreement after never having read the terms of agreement.
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vd, t if you’re going to live with 1.2 billion you’re going to get cyberink with 1.2 billion.
Anyway, why are your sources on Protestantism telling but mine aren’t? I know. Roman Catholicism breeds arbitrariness. It’s what popes do.
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Darryl, certainly to some degree, but the level at which the denial is engaged for polemical/apologetic purposes becomes disingenuous. We regularly horsewhip our own brand and rightly so, but at least we openly engage our deformations. When the trad RC crew starts quoting catechism and favorable conservative RC theologians to the exclusion of what is going on in the RC communion, most notably their pope, it’s not a conversation or polemic that is compelling. And I and many others happen to be Vat II children, Francis and Kasper aren’t the ones who are out of step with their church and obviously not on the margins. Burke and his ilk, are. Francis is the product of Vat II. He’s darn near textbook. So, as you note, to the non-observant Tom, if you’re going to claim 1.2 billion folks including your pope and most of the monied magisterium, you get to own all of it. And you can’t act like Vat II isn’t the most defining characteristic of your contemporary church, when it is and was intended to be.
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sean:We regularly horsewhip our own brand and rightly so, but at least we openly engage our deformations. >>>>>
You are in denial, since you are ignoring the biggest deformation of all in your “brand.”
You put no value on unity. In fact, you value disunity, criticism, and splitting your churches when and if it suits your agenda, whatever that is. Keeping your group pure? Did you forget that you are totally depraved and unable to judge anything infallibly? You don’t know what purification is any more than a turnip would know.
From things I have read, your own group is kind of internally split 3 ways, and your R2K group is one of those factions. Some people don’t like your power plays.
Yet you sit in judgment on everyone. You are in denial, and this level of denial is, well, undeniable to anyone looking on.
Deny this.:
Ephesians 4:4-6English Standard Version (ESV)
4 There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
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Mermaid, you put no value in reality. How does it feel that 37 of your bishops — the ones who are successors of the apostles — opposed a resolution to reject gay marriage?
So far you’ve not addressed one of the questions I asked you about the contemporary church. No pastor in the OPC would support gay marriage. You have bishops who think otherwise.
Until you address the mess in your own household, no one will take you seriously. And if you want to shoot back, we’ll “you’re divided.” Well, duh. Ever think that division is what happens when pastors and bishops grievously err?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 25, 2015 at 1:55 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, you put no value in reality. How does it feel that 37 of your bishops — the ones who are successors of the apostles — opposed a resolution to reject gay marriage?
Gays and lesbians
Section 76. The section on homosexual unions was approved by a vote of 221-37.
The bishops strongly rejected the notion of same-sex marriages, declaring that they are not “even remotely analogous” to straight unions. But they also reiterated Church teaching that every person, regardless of sexual orientation, must be treated with dignity and respect and not subjected to “unjust discrimination.”
They said local churches shouldn’t be pressured on the question of same-sex marriage, nor should international aid organizations make the acceptance of gay unions a condition of their financial help to poor nations.
So far you’ve not addressed one of the questions I asked you about the contemporary church. No pastor in the OPC would support gay marriage. You have bishops who think otherwise.
Until you address the mess in your own household, no one will take you seriously. And if you want to shoot back, we’ll “you’re divided.” Well, duh. Ever think that division is what happens when pastors and bishops grievously err?
With a tine denomination only 80 years old and only 30,000 members you don’t even have a “household,” you have a little shack in the back of the Presbyterian plantation. meanwhile, the real Presbyterianism not only marries gay couples, it ordains them.
As for dissent among the Catholic bishops, it is to be expected. Peter and Paul disagreed. You laugh when they act like Catholic-bots and revel when they don’t. Nice racket.
And when this synod changes no doctrine, you’ll ignore it and go trolling around for some other issue to pretend that the Catholic Church is as big a mess as your own church, ’cause that’s how schismatics roll.
Dr. History gets taken to school by a little mermaid.
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vd, t, size doesn’t matter in the Bible. Why should it now? #remembergideonsband
Really, vd, t. I get taken to school by someone who entrusts the souls of Christ’s flock to shepherds (bishops) who vote against opposing gay marriage.
Why on earth would it be so bad that the PCUSA ordains lesbians by your standards? Sure Peter and Paul are going to disagree with women priests. Shrug.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 25, 2015 at 4:01 pm | Permalink
vd, t, size doesn’t matter in the Bible. Why should it now? #remembergideonsband
Really, vd, t. I get taken to school by someone who entrusts the souls of Christ’s flock to shepherds (bishops) who vote against opposing gay marriage.
Typical Darryl Hart math. He sees only the 37 and ignores the 221.
Why on earth would it be so bad that the PCUSA ordains lesbians by your standards? Sure Peter and Paul are going to disagree with women priests. Shrug.
It’s all a shrug except when it comes to the Catholic Church. But the point is that lesbian priests is a necessary product of semper reformanda. Where is constant schism in the Bible? Mrs. Mermaid sure has your number.
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Fish lady, Paul the apostle never said he liked the division, but nevertheless thought it necessary and inevitable that the true teachers and confessors would be known. Remember the whole depravity bit? Depravity guarantees division and necessarily so. So, yea, again, when your piety and Kumbaya exceeds the apostolic tradition, the problem is with you. And what about Jesus’ promise to set son against father and daughter against mother. Careful with your cherry-picking, after all, Jesus’ is gonna thin it out some more at the judgement, ‘I never knew you’.
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See, this one doesn’t really work with Catholics.
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Sean, depravity? What about human flourishing?
But it would explain the Crusades.
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Human flourishing, Presbyterian Word-Faith.
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Tom,
That’s because Rome doesn’t believe in heresy anymore, and essentially doesn’t think anyone is going to hell. And if the pope says, “Who am I to judge?” regarding lesbians, why do you care?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 25, 2015 at 5:22 pm | Permalink
Sean, depravity? What about human flourishing?
But it would explain the Crusades.
sean
Posted October 25, 2015 at 6:10 pm | Permalink
Human flourishing, Presbyterian Word-Faith.
The theology–the teleology–of human flourishing is very beautiful.
http://ndias.nd.edu/publications/ndias-quarterly/aquinas-on-human-flourishing/#.Vi2W79KrQsY
“You have made us for yourself; our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in thee.” But until that day of our “final flourishing,” in this life we are commanded to love one another, “faith working through love.”
There is no “human flourishing” other than to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.
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Robert,
The Catholic Church still believes there are heresies and heretics, and the she still teaches that hell is real and it won’t be empty.
You have heard wrongly about what Pope Francis meant when he said, “who am I to judge?” He considers himself a sinner saved by Jesus Christ, and so he doesn’t sit in judgment( condemnation) of a fellow human. Of course the church still considers adultery( or whatever sin) a sin, we just aren’t supposed to throw stones at people is all. Pope Francis is a priest and priests are always supposed to offer the mercy of God to a repentant sinner.
You can’t put that marble back in your bag now that you can’t use it anymore! 🙂
Wish you well and peace:)
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Robert
Posted October 25, 2015 at 7:05 pm | Permalink
Tom,
That’s because Rome doesn’t believe in heresy anymore, and essentially doesn’t think anyone is going to hell. And if the pope says, “Who am I to judge?” regarding lesbians, why do you care?
If Francis says, “Who am I to judge?” per Mt 7 re people with homosexual attractions, has he said anything more than he prays for them, just as he has asked all the Church to pray for him?
I’ll never understand how any Christian would ever want to see any other human soul in hell. Are we not commanded to love our neighbor as ourselves, and wouldn’t that mean to pray for God’s mercy for our neighbor as much as for ourselves?
I don’t know what Francis is up to, but “mercy” is the signature of his papacy, a word he uses over and over.
Mt 9:13, Jesus citing Hosea 6:6. At this point at least I don’t think Dr. Hart’s insinuations of theological [or anti-Biblical] laxity–let alone heresy and therefore illegitimacy–on the part of the Catholic Church are supportable.
Dr. Hart demands of the Catholic Church
and is sorely disappointed when the Catholic Church does not join him in his own hobgoblinism. Francis is not prepared to sacrifice anyone on the altar of foolish consistency.
[Even if Abraham was, eh?]
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Susan
Posted October 25, 2015 at 11:56 pm | Permalink
Robert,
The Catholic Church still believes there are heresies and heretics, and the she still teaches that hell is real and it won’t be empty.
FTR, Susan, Revelation teaches that the hell will be populated, but not necessarily by humans.
[Pardon My Wiki]
Hans Urs von Balthasar wrote a small book addressing the virtuous hope for universalism, as well as its origin in Origen, entitled Dare We Hope “That All Men Be Saved”?. He also addressed the relationship between love and universalism in Love Alone is Credible.
See also the CCC
See also JPII
There are certain Christians who seem to delight in the idea that they’ll be in heaven and the rest of us poor non-Elect bastards will be in hell.
But they’ll miss me. Heaven will be a little less fun 😉
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vd, t, why would sinners, outside Christ, not go to hell?
Looks like doctrine changed. Put no hope in ecclesiastical princes.
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Hold on there, Sparky. First things first. You lead your flock into mocking “human flourishing.” That’s very wrong, Get right.
D. G. Hart
Posted October 25, 2015 at 5:22 pm | Permalink
Sean, depravity? What about human flourishing?
But it would explain the Crusades.
sean
Posted October 25, 2015 at 6:10 pm | Permalink
Human flourishing, Presbyterian Word-Faith.
The theology–the teleology–of human flourishing is very beautiful.
http://ndias.nd.edu/publications/ndias-quarterly/aquinas-on-human-flourishing/#.Vi2W79KrQsY
“You have made us for yourself; our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in thee.” But until that day of our “final flourishing,” in this life we are commanded to love one another, “faith working through love.”
There is no “human flourishing” other than to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.
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Susan: Pope Francis is a priest and priests are always supposed to offer the mercy of God to a repentant sinner.
Hi Susan, also we’re all priests, under our great high priest, Jesus
1 Pet 2:9 But you are A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR God’s OWN POSSESSION, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light;
Rev 1: 6 and He has made us to be a kingdom, priests to His God and Father—to Him be the glory and the dominion forever and ever. Amen.
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TVD: There is no “human flourishing” other than to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.
and this flourishing too, TVD: content in whatever circumstances; as having nothing, yet possessing all things. Phil 4:11; 2 Cor 6:10
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@ Ali: and this flourishing too, TVD: content in whatever circumstances; as having nothing, yet possessing all things. Phil 4:11; 2 Cor 6:10
Just wanted to repeat that. +1
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@JC Lot’s of activity this weekend. Thanks for your response.
I mostly agree here. The point of the analogy between science/history and theology is not that they are identical, but that inductive inference can lead to certainty about an explanation (theory) even if that theory is in principle falsifiable. To be sure, true belief about matters of faith takes a work of the Holy Spirit to enlighten us and change our hearts lest we have eyes but don’t see, etc…
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D.G. Hart:
So far you’ve not addressed one of the questions I asked you about the contemporary church. No pastor in the OPC would support gay marriage. You have bishops who think otherwise.
Until you address the mess in your own household, no one will take you seriously. And if you want to shoot back, we’ll “you’re divided.” Well, duh. Ever think that division is what happens when pastors and bishops grievously err?>>>>>>
Until you address your unbiblical stance – that division is a virtue, not a sign of the operation of the flesh – how many people take you seriously? Not very many, and a whole lot fewer than you think even within your own denomination. You are one of the leaders of one of the factions within the OPC and allegedly like minded Reformed groups who hold to the same standards.
You are a reactionary group – reacting to theonomy and Rushdoony, Christian Reconstructionism, and the religious right
Then there is the Federal Vision crowd who in many ways have adopted lotsa’ Catholic theology. You don’t like it, but they are not heretics even when your standards are applied to them.
So, why not spend some time trying to bring unity, peace, love, and mercy within your own group?
There. I addressed problems in your contemporary church. Oh, and don’t forget the Reformed women who are pushing for a greater voice within your conservative groups. Maybe even ordination? How are you going to keep those women in line?
How do I explain sin in the Catholic Church, even in the leadership? Wheat and tares growing together in the same field. It’s biblical. Sheep and goats grazing together. You think that Catholics do not know that it is possible for the devil to infiltrate God’s Church?
We also know that the Holy Spirit is the One leading God’s people. You do know that the synod closed tight the door to same sex marriage, don’t you? Shut tight. The bishops who disagree will have to deal with it.
You need to take a close look at your own group and your own leadership before you start claiming some kind of purity that doesn’t exist in reality. You are in denial.
You divide from all who you consider to be sinners, and then you criticize everyone else for not doing the same.
Divisions are what happen over all kinds of things. Your methodology is to try to reform everyone else, and hope that no one notices the flaws in your own group. We believe that true reform comes from within, and there have been many great reformers throughout Church history. Today is the feast day of one of them. Check him out.
If the Church did not believe that reformation is necessary, then why does she honor so many of reformers, including St. Alfred the Great.
Sadly, Calvin decided that he was going to reform Catholicism, but from the outside not the inside. The rest is history. You have followed the pattern set down by your father, John Calvin. From the outside, yell at and judge all Christians. Then you claim that you are small because you are the faithful remnant.
Maybe you are small because, well, people don’t like being yelled at by fellow sinners.
Like Jeff said, it’s not all that hard to read the Bible. Somehow, though, you have trouble with John 17, Ephesians 4, and the whole book of 1 Corinthians. God does not put a high value on division. Not at all.
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Mermaid, You are delusional if you think that Rome is not divided. Did you follow the Synod at all?
Also, division is what happens when you think someone is in error. Think 1054.
You’re problem is you’re in a church where no one worries about error. No reason to divide.
Have another tall glass of kool aid.
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I’m still not tracking with human flourishing. This life is difficult and if you’re poor it’s even worse. Hope in Heaven, I get. Brief respites, I get. Human flourishing? If there were no hope of Heaven, Paul says it’s better to go hedonist, particularly if the God of the bible is true. How about human toleration or maintaining.
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Sean, human flourishing is prosperity gospel for the culturalist class, Worldviewers and Paradigmers Together. But if it were true, shouldn’t two-thousand years be enough to have bagged a better game? World’s still as broken as it ever was, flourishers, you’re not trying hard enough.
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Mermaid,
Until you address your unbiblical stance – that division is a virtue, not a sign of the operation of the flesh – how many people take you seriously?
Division is never, ever warranted? This is what I don’t understand. Every time you anathematize someone, you’re establishing division. Why is it not division when Rome kicks the Protestants to the curb without giving them a true hearing but it is division if Reformers yell at the top of their lungs and finally leave because there’s no hope of solving the problem?
You are a reactionary group – reacting to theonomy and Rushdoony, Christian Reconstructionism, and the religious right.
Actually, the OPC wasn’t founded to counter any of those things.
There. I addressed problems in your contemporary church. Oh, and don’t forget the Reformed women who are pushing for a greater voice within your conservative groups. Maybe even ordination? How are you going to keep those women in line?
Which women in the OPC are pushing for ordination.
How do I explain sin in the Catholic Church, even in the leadership? Wheat and tares growing together in the same field. It’s biblical. Sheep and goats grazing together. You think that Catholics do not know that it is possible for the devil to infiltrate God’s Church?
At what point has the Devil taken over enough that it is better to leave than to stay? Or is that completely impossible.
We also know that the Holy Spirit is the One leading God’s people. You do know that the synod closed tight the door to same sex marriage, don’t you? Shut tight. The bishops who disagree will have to deal with it.
There’s no shutting it tight when more than one-tenth of the bishops present can’t figure out that the statement against homosexuality is in line with Scripture and tradition. More than half of the laity in this country at least agree with those dissident bishops. And worldwide, the more RCs present in a country, the greater the percentage of the population that is in favor of gay marriage. The dissident bishops will just bide their time and wait for their numbers to increase. It’s exactly what happened with the PCUSA. They did not discipline dissident elders, and eventually, the dissident elders took over. If Rome can’t kick the aforementioned bishops to the curb, then it does not have the chops to maintain the party line. It’s well known that homosexuality is a big problem among the clergy already. And eventually, the bishops will cave to the laity. The whole reason the synod was called in the first place was because bishops in Germany and elsewhere are already caving. This is why consistent discipline is required.
You need to take a close look at your own group and your own leadership before you start claiming some kind of purity that doesn’t exist in reality. You are in denial.
Where has Darryl claimed purity for the OPC?
You divide from all who you consider to be sinners, and then you criticize everyone else for not doing the same.
If this were true, Darryl would be a church of one. He isn’t.
Divisions are what happen over all kinds of things. Your methodology is to try to reform everyone else, and hope that no one notices the flaws in your own group. We believe that true reform comes from within, and there have been many great reformers throughout Church history. Today is the feast day of one of them. Check him out.
Reform from within was tried during the Reformation. Luther was kicked to the curb. He was made all sorts of promises of having an actual theological debate, safe travels, etc. None of them were fulfilled. The only reason why Trent happened was to stop the bleeding caused by the Protestants. Earlier attempts at reform failed.
If the Church did not believe that reformation is necessary, then why does she honor so many of reformers, including St. Alfred the Great.
From Wikipedia: Alfred undertook no systematic reform of ecclesiastical institutions or religious practices in Wessex. For him the key to the kingdom’s spiritual revival was to appoint pious, learned, and trustworthy bishops and abbots.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_the_Great#Religion_and_culture
No systematic reform. Check. And why is it the king’s job to appoint bishops anyway. Could a king even try and get away with that now? So the reform was for the actual bishops to take their job back from the princes? And that’s not a change in dogma?
Sadly, Calvin decided that he was going to reform Catholicism, but from the outside not the inside.
Calvin saw what happened to others who tried to reform from the inside in his day. It wasn’t pretty. That’s back when your dogma said kill heretics. But luckily for us, your dogma has changed.
The rest is history. You have followed the pattern set down by your father, John Calvin. From the outside, yell at and judge all Christians. Then you claim that you are small because you are the faithful remnant.
I don’t recall where Darryl has claimed to be the faithful remnant.
Maybe you are small because, well, people don’t like being yelled at by fellow sinners.
Well, consistent church discipline is not the way to go if you want a church of 1.2 professing adherents, 900 million or so of which are nominal at best.
Like Jeff said, it’s not all that hard to read the Bible. Somehow, though, you have trouble with John 17, Ephesians 4, and the whole book of 1 Corinthians. God does not put a high value on division. Not at all.
God puts a high value on truth. Unity is no good if you are unified around a lie. Cults have a lot of unity.
I’m also looking for somebody to argue that visible unity is what is being talked about in those passages. Maybe it is, but all I’ve seen from you is “Don’t you believe in Ephesians 4?” That’s not an argument that visible unity is the goal. It might be what the passages are teaching, but we need an argument for it.
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Sean, hunger-and-thirst quenched is just human toleration or maintaining?
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Jeff,
“I’ll grant that point. Catholicism has a tighter range of beliefs in its confessions that historic Protestantism does. Not in the pew, which is clearly a problem but in the confessions and catechisms, the Catholic has more consistency than the Protestant.”
That consistency and tighter range relative to Protestantism is a corollary and consequence of the claims, but still not getting at the root difference, as I already explained to sdb. Even if Protestantism was limited to a single confession or a single human being, the point would remain – one system can distinguish articles of faith and divine revelation from opinion, consistent with its claims, and one cannot, consistent with its disclaimers. In both systems, people are still fallible before and afterwards which is why the continued tu quoque focusing on that is a red herring.
“It is of no value to have consistent, but consistently wrong, teaching.”
Of course.
“So now we ask the question, does the Catholic get a better guarantee of accuracy than the Protestant?”
The question is whether the Protestant can even in principle get a better guarantee of accuracy. It rejects the claim that it is has the ability or authority to define or identify teachings that are divinely protected from error – that is infallible and irreformable. Divine revelation and articles of faith are “accurate”, but they are more than that.
“Do Catholic teachings give answers that are more consistent with a reference standard … say, the Bible … than Protestant teachings.”
And that teaching – the nature of the Bible, its contents, and that it is the sole ultimate reference standard – remain provisional and probable according to you and your confessions – it can never rise above opinion nor is it offered as irreformable or an article of faith divinely protected from error. So you’re already jumping the gun.
“In terms of accuracy, the Catholic is in no better shape than the Protestant. He has provisional knowledge. And if that’s a problem for you in the Protestant, then it needs to be a problem for you in the Catholic. Hence — no red herring.”
Only, that’s not the problem for me in the Protestant, again – I’ve said it repeatedly (apparently I have to since there’s a disconnect) – adherents are fallible in both systems – that has nothing to do with the argument. I’ll ask the same questions I asked sdb:
If Rome’s claims are granted as true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority, do they give an advantage over Protestantism, granting Protestantism’s claims are true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority?
Secondly, if Christ and the Apostles claims regarding infallibility and divine authority were granted as true in NT times, did they give an advantage to an NT believer after assent over someone assenting to a random Jewish rabbi during NT times, granting his claims as true regarding falliblity and no divine authority and his ability to only offer admitted provisional highly likely opinion?
Keep in mind in all cases the adherent still has provisional knowledge and was fallible and had to choose and judge beforehand, as well as interpret afterwards.
“In the sense of actually being closer to the truth? Only if Rome’s claims are actually true.”
In the sense of actually being able to differentiate opinion (provisional, probable, highly likely) from divine revelation (infallible and irreformable). That’s why I asked you to grant Rome’s claims are true, then grant Protestantism’s claims are true. Robert recognized the advantage, then backtracked to the “well, if you’re not also made infallible yourself, then you have no advantage” with no supporting argument.
“My sense is that he genuinely believes that truth must be known absolutely or not at all, and that he’s found the absolute truth.”
Here’s my crazy belief – divine revelation and articles of faith are infallible and irreformable by definition. They are not probable, likely, provisional, tentative opinion.
“God’s authority is not derived from our understanding.”
Bingo. Which is why the “but you’re always fallible in your understanding!” to then undermine or make useless and irrelevant Rome’s claims is a misfire.
“I actually deny that CtC’s claims are true”
CtC was not the first to advance the argument, as was pointed out with Aquinas and Newman and Cath Ency (none of which argued adherents must be made infallible). Secondly, you ignored the “more importantly” part of my statement – you have argued thus far that, simply because humans are fallible, Rome’s claims do not matter or make any difference even if they were true.
Robert,
“If the goal is to make one infallibly certain and eliminate all provisionality of faith knowledge, then yes, none of that applies because you’ve just admitted that Christ and the Apostles don’t give that.”
Yep, we agree Christ and the Apostles didn’t make adherents omniscient and infallible. And yet what did you say:
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
So how could Christ/Apostles offer an advantage granting their claims were true if they also didn’t make their adherents personally infallible and omniscient as you’re now arguing? You already conceded the point (finally) and now you backtrack to the same old “but you’re fallible!” red herring.
“I still don’t understand what is meant by certainty of faith and how that differs from assurance that what one believes is correct. ”
Read how it defines “opinion”. Compare with what has been said by you, Jeff, and sdb in this thread. Then read how it contrasts that with the certitude of faith. I already pulled out some relevant quotes in my reply to sdb.
“We aren’t asking people to put their faith in the church.”
You’re asking people to put faith into what it proposes and teaches as doctrines as reflective of Scripture’s teaching. But those are never offered as more than provisional highly likely opinion, at best, including that very rule of faith (e.g. SS and associated rejection of ecclesial infallibility). So there is no good reason for me to submit to any church’s confessions, given its own disclaimers.
“And yet Jesus appeals to the words of Moses as a common authority that was already recognized as Scripture apart from His or the Apostles’ authoritative say-so. How was it possible for Him to do this rightly?”
Jesus also appealed to his interpretation of the OT as authoritative and expected the Jews to recognize it and submit to it – did that mean He didn’t actually ground His claims and teachings in His divine authority? The Jews had authorities instituted by God (cf. Exodus 18:13-26, Matt 23:2-3) and were the chosen people, but revelation was still unfolding and would not reach fulfillment and completion until Christ. There is nothing untoward with Him holding Jews accountable to the teaching they had received and honored, nor nothing untoward to the teachings they *should* have received and honored – namely his claims to authority and his authoritative and normative interpretations of the OT. Further, it was not difficult to identify Israel during that time. Given the nature of the NC, one does not identify the “church” based on ethnic or national lines – so if we claim the church is God’s community, we have to answer how to identify (and submit to) it. Protestantism gives no solution to this, nor can it.
“Rome gives you a way to be sure that the doctrine of the Trinity will never be overturned. But I don’t see how that works on the ground in light of how doctrine has developed.”
Here’s what you need to do – has Rome added a fourth member to the Trinity? Has Rome taught the Trinity does not consist of 3 persons? Has Rome declared the Father, Son, or Holy Spirit are not divine?
“None of these things on paper overturn “one ousia, three hypostases””
Right. And we can never get that guarantee with Protestantism – if it was overturned, semper reformanda on one hand or “no true scotsman” kicks in on the other.
“but in reality they strike at the very heart of what the actual Nicene Creed means by this.”
And who has had scholars trying to revise the Nicene Creed? They’re not even trying to be subtle about it as you claim Rome is. Semper reformanda.
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Cletus,
The question is whether the Protestant can even in principle get a better guarantee of accuracy.
But the whole principally thing is just dumb. In principle, Mormonism could give a better guarantee of accuracy than Rome can. So I’m going to ignore Roman Catholicism and choose Mormonism. Better yet, if I’m inspired then that can give me the best claim of all. So therefore I’ll just run around claiming inspiration and authority for myself.
I could think of half a dozen ways to make a better claim than Rome that, in principle, Rome can’t offer.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 26, 2015 at 11:53 am | Permalink
Mermaid, You are delusional if you think that Rome is not divided. Did you follow the Synod at all?
Also, division is what happens when you think someone is in error. Think 1054.
You’re problem is you’re in a church where no one worries about error. No reason to divide.
Have another tall glass of kool aid.>>>>>
I understand, Brother Hart. All you can do is lash out at others, since you know all is not well in the OPC. You can run from problems, but you can’t hide. They follow you and stick to you. You can’t avoid them.
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Robert,
Yep, we agree Christ and the Apostles didn’t make adherents omniscient and infallible. And yet what did you say:
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
So how could Christ/Apostles offer an advantage granting their claims were true if they also didn’t make their adherents personally infallible and omniscient as you’re now arguing? You already conceded the point (finally) and now you backtrack to the same old “but you’re fallible!” red herring.
They offer the advantage of granting infallible assurance, which Rome does not offer. The claim of authority/infallibility doesn’t really do much good unless the individual can know/be assured that the claim is true. “My sheep hear my voice,” says Christ. They just know/have assurance. It isn’t the claim or even the claim being true that gives one an advantage if you can’t be certain/have assurance that the claim is true.
How does Rome offer such assurance? The Reformed tradition says that the Spirit gives it to His elect. I don’t think Rome ever even offers it as a possibility.
Read how it defines “opinion”. Compare with what has been said by you, Jeff, and sdb in this thread. Then read how it contrasts that with the certitude of faith. I already pulled out some relevant quotes in my reply to sdb.
The article isn’t really helpful in that regard, which is why I’m asking. And from reading what you say to the others, basically what I get is “to treat knowledge of divine revelation in any way analogous to knowledge of the natural world is rationalism and Pelagianism,” which frankly makes no sense. Revelation, whether it comes through nature or the Written Word is supernatural in character. And I would say that every time mankind comes to knowledge of the truth in any sense, God has provided the illumination (John 1:9). So there has been a bestowal of grace every time a person learns that 2+2=4.
You’re asking people to put faith into what it proposes and teaches as doctrines as reflective of Scripture’s teaching. But those are never offered as more than provisional highly likely opinion, at best, including that very rule of faith (e.g. SS and associated rejection of ecclesial infallibility). So there is no good reason for me to submit to any church’s confessions, given its own disclaimers.
The good reason is that it is true. The proposal that Jesus is the Messiah is no more or less provisional than the proposal that 2+2=4. You are treating religious knowledge in an entirely different category of knowledge, which isn’t helpful or demonstrable.
Jesus also appealed to his interpretation of the OT as authoritative and expected the Jews to recognize it and submit to it – did that mean He didn’t actually ground His claims and teachings in His divine authority?
Irrelevant to the point I am making. You’re sidestepping the issue. He expected the Jews to know Genesis was Scripture apart from an infallible declaration from an infallible authority before His coming and apart from His infallible declaration. Either he sinned by such an expectation or he didn’t. If he didn’t, there is no need for an infallible church today. In fact, there is even LESS of a need today given the outpouring of the Spirit.
When I read you, I get the sense that you believe that the benefit of the new covenant is that now we have an infallible church. Where in the world do the prophets anticipate that, and where does the NT say that such is what God gave?
The Jews had authorities instituted by God (cf. Exodus 18:13-26, Matt 23:2-3) and were the chosen people, but revelation was still unfolding and would not reach fulfillment and completion until Christ.
Yes, and note well that those divinely instituted authorities weren’t infallible. Jesus was condemning them all the time. Not helping your argument.
There is nothing untoward with Him holding Jews accountable to the teaching they had received and honored, nor nothing untoward to the teachings they *should* have received and honored – namely his claims to authority and his authoritative and normative interpretations of the OT.
Of course there was nothing untoward about it. But you aren’t dealing with the issue, and frankly I don’t think you can. Because if the Jews were right to receive Genesis apart from the book or Jesus explicitly saying they should, then I don’t need an infallible declaration for the certainty of faith, whatever that means.
Further, it was not difficult to identify Israel during that time.
Really? Was it the Pharisees, Sadducees, Zealots, or Essenes? What about all the Messianic claimants? What about the thoroughly Hellenized Jews. And on and on and on.
Given the nature of the NC, one does not identify the “church” based on ethnic or national lines – so if we claim the church is God’s community, we have to answer how to identify (and submit to) it. Protestantism gives no solution to this, nor can it.
The solution is to identify the community that follows the Word of God. The solution isn’t Apostolic Succession. Where do the Apostles say, “In the event you need to find the church, look for the unbroken succession to Peter?” They say look to the Apostolic teaching. We already know the NT is Apostolic teaching. This is why I keep asking for you to actually give me something else they’ve said if there is something else.
Here’s what you need to do – has Rome added a fourth member to the Trinity? Has Rome taught the Trinity does not consist of 3 persons? Has Rome declared the Father, Son, or Holy Spirit are not divine?
The fact that Rome has not done any of this yet (well, you guys come pretty close to making Mary a de facto goddess), doesn’t prove anything except that Rome hasn’t done it yet.
Right. And we can never get that guarantee with Protestantism – if it was overturned, semper reformanda on one hand or “no true scotsman” kicks in on the other.
Oh how I wish I had a nickel for every time I appeal to a RC theologian who openly disagrees with the Magisterium but who hasn’t been condemned only to hear conservatives like you or Susan or Mermaid or TVD say “that person isn’t really RC.” Semper reformanda doesn’t mean “make up crap as you go along.” The text has a meaning that doesn’t require an infallible Magisterium to define. Remember, Jesus expected the Jews to know Genesis was Scripture and that God created the world apart from His infallible say-so.
And who has had scholars trying to revise the Nicene Creed? They’re not even trying to be subtle about it as you claim Rome is. Semper reformanda.
Has Elizabeth Johnson been excommunicated yet?
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CVD: If Rome’s claims are granted as true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority, do they give an advantage over Protestantism, granting Protestantism’s claims are true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority?
This is a silly question. If Rome’s claims are true, then we all stop arguing and become Roman Catholic. If Protestant claims are true, we all stop arguing and become Protestant.
If Rome’s claims were to be (or “hypothetically are”) true, then the Roman Catholic has an easier time identifying articles of faith than the Protestant. Hence, greater precision.
To get actual accuracy, you have to first establish that Rome’s claims are actually true. The hypothetical won’t get you there.
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CVD: In both systems, people are still fallible before and afterwards which is why the continued tu quoque focusing on that is a red herring.
Enough already. The shared fallibility is relevant to my argument, hence not a red herring.
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James Young, “has Rome added a fourth member to the Trinity? Has Rome taught the Trinity does not consist of 3 persons? Has Rome declared the Father, Son, or Holy Spirit are not divine?”
What you haven’t done is demonstrate that Rome cares about the Trinity. It used to. Now? Maybe the lack of knowledge among RC’s comes from catching on that the bishops don’t care. Maybe you learned how to shrug from the bishops.
Also, when you stand before God on that great day, will your defense be that Rome had a system that could infallibly identify the right doctrine? Is that what makes you “better off”?
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Mermaid, right. No answer. So feel superior by picking on a little Presbyterian communion.
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CVD: The question is whether the Protestant can even in principle get a better guarantee of accuracy.
Actually, the Protestant can and does get better accuracy, as seen in the exegetical work. Ultimately, the Catholic has to appeal to tradition in order to get the major articles of faith. So he ends up with doctrines or practices that flout Scripture (Jesus: “call no-one Father”), skirt the edges of Scripture (forbidding marriage to priests), are in tension with Scripture (grace through sacraments rather than by faith alone), or are simply unheard of in Scripture (perpetual virginity). All of these are justified by tradition.
If the Catholic method clearly and objectively produced superior exegesis of Scripture, there would not be such a fear of sola scriptura.
CVD: It [Protestantism?] rejects the claim that it is has the ability or authority to define or identify teachings that are divinely protected from error – that is infallible and irreformable. Divine revelation and articles of faith are “accurate”, but they are more than that.
No, that’s not really right. Again, your unfamiliarity with inductive reasoning is showing.
The Protestant does indeed believe that the the church has authority. The Protestant does indeed believe that the church has the ability to identify teachings that are divinely protected from error (namely, the Scripture).
The Protestant denies that either the authority of the church or its ability is infallible, and further claims that both authority and ability are subordinate to the Scripture.
The Roman Catholic claims that both authority and ability are infallible, and that in fact the church has the authority to define the canon of Scripture.
Does this offer the Roman Catholic a superior system within his own system, if accuracy is the goal? No.
The reason is that the very structure that gives the Catholic consistency also precludes checking accuracy against a reference standard such as Scripture. In the Catholic system, the content and meaning of the canon of Scripture is grounded in the authority of the church. So if the Catholic reads the Scripture and sees that it contradicts church teaching … he figures that he himself is simply wrong somewhere. Loyola: “We should always be prepared so as never to err to believe that what I see as white is black, if the hierarchic Church defines it thus.”
For that reason, the Catholic is always reasoning in a circle. A very consistent circle, but a circle nonetheless.
The Protestant, meanwhile, accepts the authority of the early Church as fallible but highly probable, so he uses the criterion of universal acceptance as the rule. If the entire church everywhere accepted a book, it is vanishingly improbable that the work is not Scripture.
Note that the circle disappears. Why is Scripture held to be the word of God? Because saints everywhere have recognized God speaking in it, and they aren’t going to all be wrong all at the same time.
—
From way back…
JRC: “Why do you heap such contempt on provisional knowledge?”
CVD: Because it’s not compatible with divine revelation and articles of faith, which are infallible by definition given their source. Christ and the Apostles didn’t offer admitted opinions or “highly likely” provisional teachings.
You’re confusing the object of faith (Christ and the Apostles) with the subject of faith (the believer). It is entirely compatible to say that the object is infallible, but the subject is not.
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Jeff,
“This is a silly question.”
Yes, it’s silly to not beg the question when analyzing competing systems. Got it.
“If Rome’s claims are true, then we all stop arguing and become Roman Catholic. If Protestant claims are true, we all stop arguing and become Protestant.”
I’m asking grant each system’s claims are true. Then see what the implications are of each. This is not an impossible task.
“If Rome’s claims were to be (or “hypothetically are”) true, then the Roman Catholic has an easier time identifying articles of faith than the Protestant. Hence, greater precision.”
Still missing the point – it’s not a matter of “easier”. It’s a matter of whether it’s even possible to identify articles of faith in your system – the difference is not in degree, but in kind. Note this question has nothing to do with personal fallibility of agents in either system.
“The shared fallibility is relevant to my argument, hence not a red herring.”
The shared fallibility is relevant to showing we’re both humans, not relevant in arguing Rome’s claims to divine authority and associated ability to define and identify articles of faith divinely protected from error as opposed to probable opinion are useless as you are attempting. You still have yet to show how your argument is relevant to my argument, nor did you do so in this reply. The point of my question was to spell that out.
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Jeff, “For that reason, the Catholic is always reasoning in a circle. A very consistent circle, but a circle nonetheless.”
That would explain the Syllabus of Error’s outright rejection of modernity. It would not explain Vatican 2’s sloppy wet kiss of modernity.
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James Young, “It’s a matter of whether it’s even possible to identify articles of faith in your system – the difference is not in degree, but in kind. Note this question has nothing to do with personal fallibility of agents in either system.”
Why not shrug it off the way you have the sex scandal? What’s the biggie?
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I hope I’m addressing the question you were asking. The formatting is hard to follow. May I recommend HTML tags?
CVD: Perhaps you can reply to the previous post addressing you that you might have missed since I didn’t see a reply:
So I think the question is, “Why is the Protestant canon not infallibly identified (in Protestant theology)?”
And the question at the back of that would then be, “And why then do we trust it, if it is fallibly identified?”
Not being snarky a bit, but let me put the question back to you: You believe that the RC church has infallible authority, yes? And you also believe that you have fallibly (through the MOC) identified that the RC church has infallible authority, yes? I think we’ve agreed to those two points.
So then the parallel question would be, “Why do you trust in the Roman Catholic church, if you have only fallible knowledge of its infallibility?”
And I think you would give some kind of reply that distinguishes between the object (infallible church) and the knowing subject (you). It is perfectly consistent in your mind to say that the RC church is infallible, but you have fallibly IDed it as the infallible church. And there is no problem for you placing your faith in the authority of the church.
The Protestant now pairs his goose with your gander. It is perfectly consistent to say that the church universal has fallibly identified the infallible word of God.
Why “fallibly”? Because the church has dithered at points over the edges of the canon. Because there are demonstrable but small differences between the texts of the original and the texts that were accepted by the early church. All of this nibbles at the fringe of our knowledge, but not at the core, or even the margins.
Why place our trust in it? Because the object (Scripture) really does have the quality of being infallible. When Nathaniel recognized the Lord (John 3), he did so fallibly. Yet he was justified in placing his faith in Jesus.
So a central issue here is the subject/object distinction. The knowing subject (you, the church) cannot escape his fallibility in knowledge. But he may fallibly know an infallible object.
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Jeff,
“The Protestant does indeed believe that the the church has authority. The Protestant does indeed believe that the church has the ability to identify teachings that are divinely protected from error (namely, the Scripture).”
Where does the Protestant “church” do this? You already admitted earlier your and the confessional identification of Scripture remains provisional. If the church had this ability, it would nullify WCF’s disclaimers.
“The Protestant denies that either the authority of the church or its ability is infallible, and further claims that both authority and ability are subordinate to the Scripture.”
Right – so you just refuted your claim above that the Protestant church had the ability. And concordantly, this claim itself remains provisional and a matter of opinion, by your own disclaimers. Now, if the authority of the church or its ability were actually infallible, would you have an advantage over Protestantism, despite the fact you remain fallible?
“The Roman Catholic claims that both authority and ability are infallible, and that in fact the church has the authority to define the canon of Scripture.”
Better to say to recognize it, but that not provisionally, but in an authoritative, normative, and binding manner, consistent with it claims.
“The reason is that the very structure that gives the Catholic consistency also precludes checking accuracy against a reference standard such as Scripture.”
STM-triad is not M-leg. You already posited Rome clearly and obviously subverts Scriptural meaning, so if what you say here is true, then Rome should’ve just defined the canon at Trent to exclude all these “problematic” books and passages that clearly contradict it, or teach that non-Scriptural works supporting its teaching were inspired – it would’ve been well within its rights to do so according to your argument. But of course it did not do that, because of the STM-triad. Apparently this was only a ruse meant to keep up appearances.
“Loyola: “We should always be prepared so as never to err to believe that what I see as white is black, if the hierarchic Church defines it thus.””
If this undermines the authority of Scripture, then Christ and the Apostles must have undermined Scripture by their authoritative and binding judgments that adherents were to submit to. It is not difficult to see why supposed confessional authority and sola scriptura devolve into solo scriptura by this line of argument.
“The Protestant, meanwhile, accepts the authority of the early Church as fallible but highly probable, so he uses the criterion of universal acceptance as the rule. If the entire church everywhere accepted a book, it is vanishingly improbable that the work is not Scripture.”
Have to define the “church” first. Which you do by discerning the church from the canon. So you’ve already begged the question. And the “entire church” did not everywhere accept your canon, and we see textual criticism continues to slice and dice authenticity of passages which were also accepted by the “church”. So we’re already mired in problems at the start, and even if we handwave those away you are still left with nothing more than provisional probable opinion on the canon, as you freely admit, being consistent with your system’s disclaimers.
“Why is Scripture held to be the word of God? Because saints everywhere have recognized God speaking in it, and they aren’t going to all be wrong all at the same time.”
Except for the saints who rejected certain books you accept, accepted certain ones you reject, and others who accepted verses and passages you reject, and which continue to grow and be subject of debate in the field of textual criticism and associated disciplines. Semper reformanda.
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CVD: Still missing the point – it’s not a matter of “easier”. It’s a matter of whether it’s even possible to identify articles of faith in your system – the difference is not in degree, but in kind.
If that’s your question, then the answer is Yes. The Protestant can indeed identify articles of faith.
CVD: Note this question has nothing to do with personal fallibility of agents in either system.
Then you need to clarify. You seem to be arguing that because the Protestant agents are fallible, therefore they cannot identify articles of faith. Then you say that fallibility is irrelevant.
Your argument is not nearly as clear as you think.
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JRC: The Protestant does indeed believe that the church has the ability to identify teachings that are divinely protected from error (namely, the Scripture).”
CVD: Where does the Protestant “church” do this? You already admitted earlier your and the confessional identification of Scripture remains provisional. If the church had this ability, it would nullify WCF’s disclaimers.
Seriously? WCF 1 identifies which teachings are divinely protected from error (and which are not).
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JRC: “The Protestant denies that either the authority of the church or its ability is infallible, and further claims that both authority and ability are subordinate to the Scripture.”
CVD: Right – so you just refuted your claim above that the Protestant church had the ability. And concordantly, this claim itself remains provisional and a matter of opinion, by your own disclaimers.
No. You seem to think that I claimed that the Protestant church has an infallible ability. I made no such claim.
CVD: Now, if the authority of the church or its ability were actually infallible, would you have an advantage over Protestantism, despite the fact you remain fallible?
I don’t see how to answer this question without begging the question entirely. You seem to be asking, “If Rome is right, wouldn’t it have an advantage over Geneva?”
Trivially, yes. And if wrong, then it has a disadvantage.
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And at that, I need dinner and to get back to work. Peace.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 26, 2015 at 5:04 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, right. No answer. So feel superior by picking on a little Presbyterian communion.>>>>
I answer you, and you say I don’t answer. I think your arguments are weak at best. You don’t like my answers, but don’t say I haven’t given answers.
No, I don’t feel superior. What do I feel? I feel like we have common enemies. I feel like we are all in this battle together. I feel like we are not one another’s enemies. You seem to disagree.
I feel like Jesus really meant it when He said:
John 17:23 I in them and you in me, that they may become perfectly one, so that the world may know that you sent me and loved them even as you loved me
I feel like Paul meant it when he said:
Ephesians 4
4 I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
I feel like that message is lost here at OL. I’ll keep reminding you, Brother Hart.
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Ali, so were the saints who passed on, satisfied while they waited on a better city, a heavenly city? How about the hope of heaven makes this life tolerable? Best I get from scrpture is to be satisfied with work, fruit and wife of your youth. But then I get promised distress and persecution as I follow Jesus. I don’t see anywhere in the NT a promise of a rose garden this side of glory. And the older I get, and watch my folks health go and watch mine start to get rough around the edges and the economy constricts and the church shrinks, I’m less and less compelled by a gospel that would lie to me about bringing human flourishing. Just tell me it’s gonna be difficult and enjoy what’s legitimate when you can, if you can. But the whole ground being cursed and death comes and gets everyone, is a real suckfest. And someone who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something.
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Jeff et al,
Actually, the Protestant can and does get better accuracy, as seen in the exegetical work.
And this is empirically verifiable. As far as I know, you don’t typically see the best modern RC exegetes coming to conclusions all that different from traditional Protestant ones. Aside from some disagreements about human authorship at places, the best RC exegetes pick up Romans and walk away with conclusions that are more or less identical to what Protestants have said, or at least that are contrary to what Trent has said. Fitzmeyer’s work is a good example.
Surprise surprise, let people do the work of GH exegesis, and those that are intent on figuring out the original meaning of the text actually come to a good consensus on it.
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Robert
Posted October 26, 2015 at 6:42 pm | Permalink
Jeff et al,
Actually, the Protestant can and does get better accuracy, as seen in the exegetical work.
And this is empirically verifiable. As far as I know, you don’t typically see the best modern RC exegetes coming to conclusions all that different from traditional Protestant ones. Aside from some disagreements about human authorship at places, the best RC exegetes pick up Romans and walk away with conclusions that are more or less identical to what Protestants have said, or at least that are contrary to what Trent has said. Fitzmeyer’s work is a good example.
Surprise surprise, let people do the work of GH exegesis, and those that are intent on figuring out the original meaning of the text actually come to a good consensus on it.>>>>>
Actually, go back and read something like St. Thomas Aquinas’ commentary on the Gospel of John – and other of his commentaries – and see that the exegesis has been there for a long, long time.
It surprised me because I had been taught that it was Protestants who are the ones who really know how to do exegesis. Remember Jeff’s eisegesis where he said Mary called Jesus insane? Not in the text at all.
How do you exegete Ephesians 4:1-6?
Ephesians 4
4 I therefore, a prisoner for the Lord, urge you to walk in a manner worthy of the calling to which you have been called, 2 with all humility and gentleness, with patience, bearing with one another in love, 3 eager to maintain the unity of the Spirit in the bond of peace. 4 There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to the one hope that belongs to your call— 5 one Lord, one faith, one baptism, 6 one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all.
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MWF: Actually, go back and read something like St. Thomas Aquinas’ commentary on the Gospel of John – and other of his commentaries – and see that the exegesis has been there for a long, long time.
You’re correct. Not only Thomas, but Chrysostom and Augustine as well.
What else is remarkable about them is that they don’t spend a lot of time appealing to “the church teaches.” They look to the Bible and aren’t afraid to read it. They don’t act as if they need an infallible interpreter to keep them from messing up the text.
MWF: Remember Jeff’s eisegesis where he said Mary called Jesus insane? Not in the text at all.
I remember where you badly mischaracterized what I wrote and never retracted, even after you were called on it. Are you talking about that time?
Love is honest, dear Webfoot.
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Mermaid, funny how Paul doesn’t mention anything about Peter, Rome, or the papacy as the vehicle of such unity.
So what you’re saying is no matter what the bishops do, it can’t affect your unalloyed and unthinking trust in the church — which is sort of odd since the bishops are the successors of the apostles. Shrug.
So why couldn’t you not let Protestantism’s disunity roll over you the way the sex scandals and bishops support for gay marriage does?
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sean: I know what you are saying sean. The Lord is certainly making sure we really ‘get’ the destructiveness of our sin. consequences of fallen-ness, this corrupt world, etc. I think you probably get what I’m saying too – His desire is for such satisfaction in Him that it eclipse circumstance even while we have to walk this earth .. all in preparation
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 26, 2015 at 7:27 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, funny how Paul doesn’t mention anything about Peter, Rome, or the papacy as the vehicle of such unity.
So what you’re saying is no matter what the bishops do, it can’t affect your unalloyed and unthinking trust in the church — which is sort of odd since the bishops are the successors of the apostles. Shrug.
So why couldn’t you not let Protestantism’s disunity roll over you the way the sex scandals and bishops support for gay marriage does?
Because they’re not the same thing. You keep pumping the same category error. Dissent is not synonymous with schism. Your argument rests on a lie.
#ecclesiology
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Ali
Posted October 26, 2015 at 9:45 am | Permalink
TVD: There is no “human flourishing” other than to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.
and this flourishing too, TVD: content in whatever circumstances; as having nothing, yet possessing all things. Phil 4:11; 2 Cor 6:10
Jeff Cagle
Posted October 26, 2015 at 10:00 am | Permalink
@ Ali: and this flourishing too, TVD: content in whatever circumstances; as having nothing, yet possessing all things. Phil 4:11; 2 Cor 6:10
Just wanted to repeat that. +1
It would be helpful if y’all actually printed out the verses. These particular verses are pretty generic and if remotely applicable seem to be rather Buddhist about being happy with your lot.
which completely misses the point about the telos of “human flourishing,” as if neither of you read a word of what was posted, or if you did, are incapable of comprehending it.
Perhaps why Dr. Hart gets approving Beavis & Butthead-type snickering when he trashes “human flourishing.” But whoever snickers at Thomas Aquinas makes a fool only of himself. I can only think Dr. Hart believes “human flourishing” is some sort of New Age newspeak, but as we see, nothing could be further from the facts.
Nearer My God to thee
The theology–the teleology–of human flourishing is very beautiful.
http://ndias.nd.edu/publications/ndias-quarterly/aquinas-on-human-flourishing/#.Vi2W79KrQsY
“You have made us for yourself; our hearts are restless, until they can find rest in thee.” But until that day of our “final flourishing,” in this life we are commanded to love one another, “faith working through love.”
There is no “human flourishing” other than to love God and to love your neighbor as yourself.
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MWF: Remember Jeff’s eisegesis where he said Mary called Jesus insane? Not in the text at all.
I remember where you badly mischaracterized what I wrote and never retracted, even after you were called on it. Are you talking about that time?
Love is honest, dear Webfoot.>>>>
Love is honest, Brother Jeff, and you did mischaracterize what Mary thought about her Son, and you called her clueless for having to learn things she didn’t know. You said that a fully sanctified person would not be so clueless.
Are you denying that?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 26, 2015 at 7:27 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, funny how Paul doesn’t mention anything about Peter, Rome, or the papacy as the vehicle of such unity.
So what you’re saying is no matter what the bishops do, it can’t affect your unalloyed and unthinking trust in the church — which is sort of odd since the bishops are the successors of the apostles. Shrug.
So why couldn’t you not let Protestantism’s disunity roll over you the way the sex scandals and bishops support for gay marriage does?>>>>>
Brother Hart, what in the world? You ask me questions, I give you answers. What you are really doing is baiting me.
Is you name Lucy by any chance?
I know that your beloved OPC is having some internal strife, but why are you taking it out on Catholics? Shouldn’t you be more concerned about what is going on in your own denomination?
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 26, 2015 at 7:15 pm | Permalink
MWF: Actually, go back and read something like St. Thomas Aquinas’ commentary on the Gospel of John – and other of his commentaries – and see that the exegesis has been there for a long, long time.
You’re correct. Not only Thomas, but Chrysostom and Augustine as well.
What else is remarkable about them is that they don’t spend a lot of time appealing to “the church teaches.” They look to the Bible and aren’t afraid to read it. They don’t act as if they need an infallible interpreter to keep them from messing up the text.>>>>
Yes, and all three believed that Mary was sinless. Remember Augustine’s comments on Mary and Jesus’ words about “who is my mother?”
Remember, too, that Chrysostom understood the word “kecharitomene” to be a title for Mary.
They all accepted the deuterocanonical books as the infallible Word of God as well.
They all agreed as well on the meaning of the Eucharist and the meaning of the Communion of Saints. They all venerated the saints. Were they idolators?
None of them were cessationists.
So, if they did not resort to saying “the Church teaches” in order to defend their beliefs, what did they base them on?
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Mermaid, back at you. Why are you concerned more about Old Life than your Synod of bishops? I know lots of serious Roman Catholics who don’t give a fig about the OPC but are alarmed about their church’s teaching on marriage and sex.
Maybe the answer is you’re not that serious. Maybe you’re more interested in justifying your “conversion”.
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@mwf
“Love is honest, Brother Jeff,”
But you are not. You consistently lie about what we write here. Take for example your charge that I’ve implied that papal infallibility implies that the pope can’t be wrong. You even asserted that I was crazy on the basis of your lie. I pointed out that you misread what I wrote and that I implied no such thing…no retraction of your calumny. There is no point engaging with you further.
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Mermaid, please pay attention:
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@cvd
I’ve fallen way behind here, but I think I’m caught up. Going back a few items, I think I’ve got a better handle on where we are fundamentally at odds:
Articles of faith are not “by definition” not in principle provisional. The articles of faith for the National Baptist denomination are fallible, the articles of faith for the Mormon church are fallible, etc… Divine revelation is infallible, articles of faith are the synthesis or summary of that revelation. That does not reduce them to mere opinions (tentative or otherwise).
Now you might want to say that my definition of “article of faith” *should* be infallible beliefs or that my definition of “opinion” should align with the Catholic Encyclopedia, but you’d have to convince me first. Otherwise, I don’t see how we move forward. Perhaps I can at least clarify where we stand. Thus the thrust of my previous thread to you. I wrote,
My question remains. Have I misconstrued your stance here?
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Mermaid, maybe this is your excuse, you’re confused by your holy father:
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I guess I was unclear then. I was pointing out that if I properly described your stance, then it is not at all clear why you are better off epistemologically. In previous conversations, this is where the discussion usually turns to empirical questions. So you will ofter hear from RC apologists about the multitude of protestant sects and the CP will then respond with the answers I gave and then suggest that Rome did indeed change and the evidence of the holiness of the church is lacking. I then sketched out the line of response one often hears and why I find these responses unsatisfying. So in summary,
In other words I favor protestantism for among other things its parsimony. But again, if I’ve misconstrued your case, please show me where I’m getting it wrong. I’d really like to understand where you are coming from even if I ultimately disagree. If the problem is that we just cannot accept one another’s priors (to be an article of faith, it must be infallible; fallible teachings by the church are mere tentative, provisional opinions) that is enlightening as well.
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@dgh Ol’ Pat better be careful. He might be the target of a nasty letter by his theological betters. Who says liberals don’t do discipline…
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b, sd, saw it. It is truly significant and should put the apologists on notice. Will it? Nothing changes, pope is infallible, Protestants are divided blah blah blah.
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Hello Darryl,
I think the important thing to remember is that no doctrine regarding divorce and remarriage, the reception of the Eucharist, and homesexual marriage has changed. What stands out is that the Church is, through her teaching and sacraments, saving the family and the world. Protestants who have remained in their first and only marriage are also witnesses of Christ’s love in the same way. There is a lot out.there that is up against the survival of the traditional family unit( domestic church) and if you look around the world you can see that it is really only the Catholic Church( institutionally wise) that is constantly working to keep the family intact as well as defined so it can remain intact. Add to this job description, the fact that she promotes life and love by condemning abortion, contraception, and euthanasia, and you have pretty good evidence that she is led by the Holy Spirit.
Please watch this starting at about 17 min until about 28 min. I think it will help to clear up some of the confusion.
http://www.ewtn.com/tv/live/worldover.asp
One other thing; I’ve been reading some of the official documents from Vatican II and I dont know what modern and pernicious elements have infiltrated the Catholic Church.
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Jeff, maybe even the word “infallible” is ambiguous:
Great to see James Young tripling down on papal infallibility while his bishops, the ones above his pay grade are so beyond papal infallibility.
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Susan, I’m glad you’re reading but how about your pope and Kasper? Do you think they represent Vat II? Can you offer an critical opinion(not asking for skepticism)?
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Dear Sean,
I was honestly hoping you’d catch my comment this morning. I think that the priest in the video and the other man do gjve good critical assement of what the liberalogues want and to what degree their wishes can happen without jeapodizing truth; that is, the read tradion of upholding the family even from internal attack.
I have to do some errands so I can’t comment anymore. Not that it matters to you,but you and your family are on my heart because of the things you have talked about concerning the wear and fear of life, and I pray for you. I can relate to what you speak of. Anyways I hope you have good day.
God bless you guys 🙂
Susan
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DGH: Second, the words “at some time” point to the fact that while a text is promulgated at a specific moment in history, history does not stop. The meanings of words change over time. Our conceptualization of ideas change.
This expresses concisely a front in the argument that I haven’t even opened up yet, but have wanted to for some time.
Thanks.
Even if Nicea were infallible, we have no guarantee of understanding it correctly today. What is the “catholic church”, after all?
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Susan, that’s sweet of you. I wasn’t fishing for sympathy or empathy, I was merely stating an obvious(to me). But thank you. Still, I want your thoughts. I have a perspective formed over a lifetime of interaction, and from a Vat II angle, I’m completely familiar with Kasper and Francis. They are the mainstream. The trads are what’s odd to me. So, I want your take on Francis and Kasper, particularly since you’ve pledged religous fealty to them. Franicis is the trump card of charism in your scheme, audacity and all that, so, when you look at Francis or Kasper and then look at Burke, for example, how does that make you feel about the former and their words and trajectory?
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Sean,
I will need to read more in order to give my own critical opinion, but per your warnings I am on the lookout for anything that I can perceive as a substantial change. Unless I die, you’ll hear back from me.
Susan
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Robert,
“They offer the advantage of granting infallible assurance, which Rome does not offer.”
What? So they infallibly assured NT believers’ apprehension was correct? Then how did NT believers misunderstand their teachings? And is this infallible assurance of knowledge analogous to the infallible assurance you have in salvation? Strange the former is asserted as provisional by you then while the latter is not.
“The claim of authority/infallibility doesn’t really do much good unless the individual can know/be assured that the claim is true.”
And you just backtracked again. I’m only interested in you agreeing that granting Rome’s claims are true, it gives one an advantage over granting Protestantism’s claims are true. You did agree, and now are going back to “but Rome’s claims are false” which is a separate issue at this point.
““My sheep hear my voice,” says Christ. They just know/have assurance.”
You just know? Then why the disclaimers about all your teachings and that everything you “know” of faith is just highly likely and probable? Why does Jeff doubt .0001% despite his infallible assurance?
“It isn’t the claim or even the claim being true that gives one an advantage if you can’t be certain/have assurance that the claim is true.”
So now it’s not that one has to be omniscient or infallible, but that one has to be certain. And I linked to something about “certitude of faith” – hmmm.
“How does Rome offer such assurance?”
By claiming it’s the church founded by Christ and given divine authority to infallibly identify/define/teach articles of faith. Something your bodies refuse to do, thus leaving everything as a matter of opinion – no assurance – semper reformanda.
“The article isn’t really helpful in that regard, which is why I’m asking.”
What I already cited above from it:
“It should be noted, too, that in the common opinion of theologians there is a greater certitude in divine faith than in any human science.”
“The term natural certitude is sometimes used in another sense, in contradistinction from the certitude of Divine faith, which is supernatural certitude, and which, according to theologians generally, is greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err.”
“Certitude is contrasted with other states of mind in reference to a proposition: the state of ignorance, the state of doubt, and the state of opinion. The last-named signifies, in the strict use of the term, the holding of a proposition as probable … Certitude differs from opinion in kind, not in degree only; for opinion, that is assent to the probability of a proposition, regards the opposite proposition as not more than improbable; and therefore opinion is always accompanied by the consciousness that further evidence may cause a change of mind in favour of the opposite opinion. Opinion, therefore, does not exclude doubt; certitude does.”
“The certitude of faith is supernatural, being due to Divine grace, and is superior not merely to moral certitude, but to the certitude of physical science, and to that of the demonstrative sciences.”
“there are two orders of knowledge, distinct both in their source and their object; distinct in their source, for the truths of one order are known by natural reason, and those of the other by faith in divine revelation; and distinct in their object, because, over and above the truths naturally attainable, there are proposed to our belief mysteries hidden in God, which can be known through divine revelation alone.”
Combine that with Aquinas:
“The reason of this is that the species of every habit depends on the formal aspect of the object, without which the species of the habit cannot remain. Now the formal object of faith is the First Truth, as manifested in Holy Writ and the teaching of the Church, which proceeds from the First Truth. Consequently whoever does not adhere, as to an infallible and Divine rule, to the teaching of the Church, which proceeds from the First Truth manifested in Holy Writ, has not the habit of faith, but holds that which is of faith otherwise than by faith. Even so, it is evident that a man whose mind holds a conclusion without knowing how it is proved, has not scientific knowledge, but merely an opinion about it. Now it is manifest that he who adheres to the teaching of the Church, as to an infallible rule, assents to whatever the Church teaches; otherwise, if, of the things taught by the Church, he holds what he chooses to hold, and rejects what he chooses to reject, he no longer adheres to the teaching of the Church as to an infallible rule, but to his own will. Hence it is evident that a heretic who obstinately disbelieves one article of faith, is not prepared to follow the teaching of the Church in all things; but if he is not obstinate, he is no longer in heresy but only in error. Therefore it is clear that such a heretic with regard to one article has no faith in the other articles, but only a kind of opinion in accordance with his own will.”
Note the phrase “holds that which is of faith otherwise than by faith” – that is the best Protestantism can offer when it teaches opinions that happen to be true.
and Newman:
“In corroboration, it may be observed, that Scripture seems always to imply the presence of teachers as the appointed ordinance by which men learn the truth; and is principally engaged in giving cautions against false teachers … Thus the New Testament equally with the Old, as far as it speaks of private examination into teaching professedly from heaven, makes the teacher the subject of that inquiry, and not the thing taught; it bids us ask for his credentials, and avoid him if he is unholy, or idolatrous, or schismatical, or if he comes in his own name, or if he claims no authority (BINGO), or is the growth of a particular spot or of particular circumstances…. The great question which it puts before us for the exercise of private judgment is,—Who is God’s prophet, and where? Who is to be considered the voice of the Holy Catholic and Apostolic Church?”
“This is what faith was in the time of the Apostles … Men were told to submit their reason to a living authority. Moreover, whatever an Apostle said, his converts were bound to believe; when they entered the Church, they entered it in order to learn. The Church was their teacher; they did not come to argue, to examine, to pick and choose, but to accept whatever was put before them. No one doubts, no one can doubt this, of those primitive times. A Christian was bound to take without doubting all that the Apostles declared to be revealed; if the Apostles spoke, he had to yield an internal assent of his mind; it would not be enough to keep silence, it would not be enough not to oppose: it was not allowable to credit in a measure”
“We give thanks to God,” says St. Paul, “without ceasing, because when ye had received from us the word of hearing, which is of God, ye received it, not as the word of men, but (as it is indeed) the Word of God.” Here you see St. Paul expresses what I have said above; that the Word comes from God, that it is spoken by men, that it must be received, not as man’s word, but as God’s word. So in another place he says: “He who despiseth these things, despiseth not man, but God, who hath also given in us His Holy Spirit”. Our Saviour had made a like declaration already: “He that heareth you, heareth Me; and he that despiseth you, despiseth Me; and he that despiseth Me, despiseth Him that sent Me”. Accordingly, St. Peter on the day of Pentecost said: “Men of Israel, hear these words, God hath raised up this Jesus, whereof we are witnesses. Let all the house of Israel know most certainly (BINGO) that God hath made this Jesus, whom you have crucified, both Lord and Christ.”
“I think I may assume that this virtue, which was exercised by the first Christians, is not known at all among Protestants now; or at least if there are instances of it, it is exercised towards those, I mean their own teachers and divines, who expressly disclaim (BINGO) that they are fit objects of it, and who exhort their people to judge for themselves. Protestants, generally speaking, have not faith, in the primitive meaning of that word; this is clear from what I have been saying, and here is a confirmation of it. If men believed now as they did in the times of the Apostles, they could not doubt nor change (BINGO). No one can doubt whether a word spoken by God is to be believed; of course it is; whereas any one, who is modest and humble, may easily be brought to doubt of his own inferences and deductions. Since men now-a-days deduce from Scripture, instead of believing a teacher, you may expect to see them waver about; they will feel the force of their own deductions more strongly at one time than at another, they will change their minds about them, or perhaps deny them altogether; whereas this cannot be, while a man has faith, that is, belief that what a preacher says to him comes from God. This is what St. Paul especially insists on, telling us that Apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, and teachers, are given us that “we may all attain to unity of faith,” and, on the contrary, in order “that we be not as children tossed to and fro, and carried about by every gale of doctrine”. Now, in matter of fact, do not men in this day change about in their religious opinions without any limit? Is not this, then, a proof that they have not that faith which the Apostles demanded of their converts? If they had faith, they would not change.”
“Such is the only rational, consistent account of faith; but so far are Protestants from professing it, that they laugh at the very notion of it (BINGO). They laugh at the notion itself of men pinning their faith (as they express themselves) upon Pope or Council; they think it simply superstitious and narrow-minded, to profess to believe just what the Church believes, and to assent to whatever she will say in time to come on matters of doctrine. That is, they laugh at the bare notion of doing what Christians undeniably did in the time of the Apostles. Observe, they do not merely ask whether the Catholic Church has a claim to teach, has authority, has the gifts;—this is a reasonable question;—no, they think that the very state of mind which such a claim involves in those who admit it, namely, the disposition to accept without reserve or question, that this is slavish (BINGO). They call it priestcraft to insist on this surrender of the reason, and superstition to make it. That is, they quarrel with the very state of mind which all Christians had in the age of the Apostles.”
The above taken together should give you an idea of what is meant by certitude of faith, and why Protestantism can never offer it.
“And I would say that every time mankind comes to knowledge of the truth in any sense, God has provided the illumination (John 1:9). So there has been a bestowal of grace every time a person learns that 2+2=4. ”
And the Pelagianism keeps on rolling. This is about the same as when you said the “grace of creation” makes the covenant of works non-Pelagian, which is … exactly how the Pelagians argued.
“You are treating religious knowledge in an entirely different category of knowledge, which isn’t helpful or demonstrable.”
It’s no wonder you didn’t appreciate the Cath Ency article. But the Pelagianism and rationalism keep on rolling.
“He expected the Jews to know Genesis was Scripture apart from an infallible declaration from an infallible authority before His coming and apart from His infallible declaration.”
And He expected the Jews to assent to his infallible declaration Genesis was Scripture as well as his infallible teaching and interpretation of it. By your logic, those teachings did not need to be grounded in his claims to authority and infallibility – thus making his claims to such useless and unnecessary, as I’ve repeatedly shown you keep arguing even as you ostensibly deny it.
“In fact, there is even LESS of a need today given the outpouring of the Spirit.”
And here we go with solo – not sola – scriptura again. Weird how much the Apostles and Christ spoke of the church and duly authorized teachers then.
“Where in the world do the prophets anticipate that, and where does the NT say that such is what God gave?”
You’re treating the NT as if it is not reflecting the definitive closing of divine revelation or that it is not normative over the OC in which revelation was still gradually unfolding. We are not stuck in the same position as the Jews and their warring sects – new prophets and new Apostles are not are being raised to correct errant understandings – why is that? Because Christ made promises concordant with the fulfillment and completion of divine revelation that were not present in the OC. And He certainly used OT types to do so – 12 apostles/tribes, 70 disciples/elders of sanhedrin, chair of peter/moses, apostolic succession/priestly succession, etc.
“Yes, and note well that those divinely instituted authorities weren’t infallible. Jesus was condemning them all the time.”
Correctumundo. He was infallibly interpreting and defining Tradition and Scripture. Based on the claims He made. Claims which your arguments keep making irrelevant and unnecessary.
“Because if the Jews were right to receive Genesis apart from the book or Jesus explicitly saying they should”
Jews were to be subject to those fallible authorities instituted by God through Moses, as Jesus attests in Matt 23. They were to be held accountable to honoring those authorities. Christ supplants Moses’ teaching on divorce – that does not mean Jews were to have ignored Moses’ teaching on divorce previously.
“Really? Was it the Pharisees, Sadducees, Zealots, or Essenes?”
I see. So one couldn’t distinguish a Gentile from a Jew. The NC is no longer based on physical or ethnic descent or along national lines.
“The solution is to identify the community that follows the Word of God.”
Have to identify the Word of God first. More question begging and cart before the horse – the community/church did that.
“The solution isn’t Apostolic Succession.”
Only that’s exactly the solution we see in the NT and Tradition.
“They say look to the Apostolic teaching.”
Which was *received*. By whom? The church.
“We already know the NT is Apostolic teaching.”
You mean you know what is probably and highly likely Apostolic teaching, given the identification of the canon remains provisional, as do all of the attendant doctrines Protestantism takes as foundational. Semper reformanda.
“The fact that Rome has not done any of this yet (well, you guys come pretty close to making Mary a de facto goddess), doesn’t prove anything except that Rome hasn’t done it yet.”
Um, yeah. The fact that Rome hasn’t revoked irreformable dogma just proves Rome hasn’t revoked irreformable dogma. That’s kind of the point.
“The text has a meaning that doesn’t require an infallible Magisterium to define.”
A meaning that can never be offered as infallible, and hence an article of faith, by your own disclaimers. It can only be offered as provisional opinion.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 27, 2015 at 11:46 am | Permalink
DGH: Second, the words “at some time” point to the fact that while a text is promulgated at a specific moment in history, history does not stop. The meanings of words change over time. Our conceptualization of ideas change.
This expresses concisely a front in the argument that I haven’t even opened up yet, but have wanted to for some time.
Thanks.
Even if Nicea were infallible, we have no guarantee of understanding it correctly today. What is the “catholic church”, after all?>>>>>>
Take a close look at what Brother Hart and Brother Jeff are saying, here, guys. Nothing is nailed down in your communion. This should make you sit up and take notice.
They might also be asking what the phrase “the fundamentals of the faith” means anymore. Times change after all, and history marches on. Why not just come out and say that truth depends on culture and the times, so as times change, so does truth.
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sdb,
“Articles of faith are not “by definition” not in principle provisional.”
Articles of faith are divine revelation and supernatural truths – that’s why they (as opposed to opinions) warrant the assent of faith in the first place. And as you say “Divine revelation is infallible”. This is why even when Protestantism happens to teach a correct opinion, the adherent is holding something that is of faith, otherwise than by faith as Aquinas notes.
“articles of faith are the synthesis or summary of that revelation.”
Which remains provisional, probable, highly likely by your own previous statements and your confessions. Including of course the identification and nature of “that revelation” you appeal to in the first place.
“That does not reduce them to mere opinions (tentative or otherwise).”
Are they provisional or not? Are they probable and highly likely or not? Do they meet Cath Ency definition of opinion or not?
“You keep saying that you are better off somehow by hitching your wagon to body that claims the ability to infallibly define articles of faith even if:
1) you have fallibly identified that body
2) you fallibly understand their definitions”
Yep, just as NT believers were better off even though they had to fallibly identify Christ and the Apostles and fallibly understand their definitions. Now, do you want to propose NT believers were not better off because of their personal fallibility, and that Christ and the Apostles claims to divine authority and ability were irrelevant and useless? That’s why I asked you the question regarding that which you ignored.
“However, protestantism states that the only infallible source of divine revelation about matters of faith is the Bible even though”
I’ll just repeat what I said originally since you didn’t interact. It states with one hand what it takes away with the other is problem. That statement and doctrine itself “the only infallible source of divine revelation about matters of faith is the Bible” itself remains nothing more than provisional, highly likely opinion, because of the disclaimers all Protestant confessions make in the first place – which you already admitted, “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. They reject divine authority or ability to identify or define infallible divine revelation. That’s why I already pointed out repeatedly that even though adherents remain fallible before and after assent in both systems, one system offers an advantage and grounding while the other does not. That’s why you’re not better off afterwards than you were before – any proposed teaching can never rise above opinion.
“From an epistemological point of view, I’m not sure either stance is superior over the other”
I’ll repeat again since you didn’t interact: If Rome’s claims are granted as true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority, do they give an advantage over Protestantism, granting its claims are true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority?
Secondly, if Christ and the Apostles claims regarding infallibility and divine authority were granted as true in NT times, did they give an advantage to an NT believer after assent over someone assenting to a random Jewish rabbi during NT times, granting his claims regarding falliblity and no divine authority and his ability to only offer admitted provisional highly likely opinion?
When answering, keep in mind what you said above “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”
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James,
And the Pelagianism keeps on rolling. This is about the same as when you said the “grace of creation” makes the covenant of works non-Pelagian, which is … exactly how the Pelagians argued.
Kind of like how Rome argues like the ancient Israelite idolaters—venertating statues ain’t idolatry and all that.
It’s no wonder you didn’t appreciate the Cath Ency article. But the Pelagianism and rationalism keep on rolling.
It’s not rationalism to believe any knowledge of the truth, whatever the truth, is God’s gift.
And He expected the Jews to assent to his infallible declaration Genesis was Scripture as well as his infallible teaching and interpretation of it. By your logic, those teachings did not need to be grounded in his claims to authority and infallibility – thus making his claims to such useless and unnecessary, as I’ve repeatedly shown you keep arguing even as you ostensibly deny it.
Translation: I can’t justify my demands because Jesus didn’t expect first century believers to have them, so I’ll continue to obfuscate.
And here we go with solo – not sola – scriptura again. Weird how much the Apostles and Christ spoke of the church and duly authorized teachers then.
Only weird if you think that the purpose of teachers is to go around declaring things infallibly.
You’re treating the NT as if it is not reflecting the definitive closing of divine revelation or that it is not normative over the OC in which revelation was still gradually unfolding. We are not stuck in the same position as the Jews and their warring sects – new prophets and new Apostles are not are being raised to correct errant understandings – why is that? Because Christ made promises concordant with the fulfillment and completion of divine revelation that were not present in the OC. And He certainly used OT types to do so – 12 apostles/tribes, 70 disciples/elders of sanhedrin, chair of peter/moses, apostolic succession/priestly succession, etc.
Translation: I can’t account for why the Jews, who had a much harder time since revelation was unfolding DIDN’T need an infallible canon declaration, so I’ll just have to start making points that aren’t irrelevant.
Answer the question: If the Jesus expected the Jews to recognize Genesis as Scripture apart from His say so and without the book itself saying so, why does that not work today?
Correctumundo. He was infallibly interpreting and defining Tradition and Scripture. Based on the claims He made. Claims which your arguments keep making irrelevant and unnecessary.
When the Roman Church wants to make official its implicit claim to be Jesus, then we can talk. Until then the point stands: divinely instituted authorities are not required to be infallible. Jesus did not recognize them as such. Rome doesn’t recognize the OC authorities as infallible either.
Jews were to be subject to those fallible authorities instituted by God through Moses, as Jesus attests in Matt 23. They were to be held accountable to honoring those authorities. Christ supplants Moses’ teaching on divorce – that does not mean Jews were to have ignored Moses’ teaching on divorce previously.
Jesus supplants nothing with regard to Jesus’ teaching on divorce. And yes, they were to be subject to those fallible authorities, except when those authorities got it wrong. Sounds awfully Protestant.
I see. So one couldn’t distinguish a Gentile from a Jew. The NC is no longer based on physical or ethnic descent or along national lines.
Irrelevant. You said it was easier back then to identify God’s church. Not so.
Have to identify the Word of God first. More question begging and cart before the horse – the community/church did that.
Sure, the community does that. No one is arguing otherwise.
Only that’s exactly the solution we see in the NT and Tradition.
Except, of course, where the NT doesn’t say look with someone with a halfway legitimate ordination claim according to post-Avignon papacy Roman Catholicism and where Athanasius said it is more important to have the doctrine than the bishop.
“They say look to the Apostolic teaching.”
Yes, and inscripturated in Scripture. I look at Scripture and Rome and I see, “You know, something ain’t right.”
You mean you know what is probably and highly likely Apostolic teaching, given the identification of the canon remains provisional, as do all of the attendant doctrines Protestantism takes as foundational. Semper reformanda.
Your identification of the church is provisional.
Um, yeah. The fact that Rome hasn’t revoked irreformable dogma just proves Rome hasn’t revoked irreformable dogma. That’s kind of the point.
The fact that Rome hasn’t revoked it on paper doesn’t prove it won’t do it in the future or that the meaning of your doctrines has changed. Remember, I’m fully orthodox now. Back in Luther’s day, you all would have killed me. Disconnect much?
A meaning that can never be offered as infallible, and hence an article of faith, by your own disclaimers. It can only be offered as provisional opinion.
It’s as provisional as 2+2=4. I don’t have infallible access to that either.
But again, the point you routinely sidestep with both Jeff and me and SDB is that you can’t jump from provisionality to infallibility. The claim doesn’t magically allow you to do that. And unless there is absolutely nothing that would ever make you rethink Romanism, you’re beliefs are as provisional as the rest of ours.
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James,
What? So they infallibly assured NT believers’ apprehension was correct? Then how did NT believers misunderstand their teachings? And is this infallible assurance of knowledge analogous to the infallible assurance you have in salvation? Strange the former is asserted as provisional by you then while the latter is not.
Infallible assurance that they have found the Messiah. And infallible assurance does not mean get things right all the time, never sin, etc. It’s an assurance that grows in strength over time.
And you just backtracked again. I’m only interested in you agreeing that granting Rome’s claims are true, it gives one an advantage over granting Protestantism’s claims are true. You did agree, and now are going back to “but Rome’s claims are false” which is a separate issue at this point.
I agree with Jeff that it’s a rather trivial point. If Rome is true, I have an advantage? Sure. If Protestantism’s claims are true, I have an advantage? Sure. If Mormonism’s claims are true, I have an advantage? Sure.
You just know? Then why the disclaimers about all your teachings and that everything you “know” of faith is just highly likely and probable? Why does Jeff doubt .0001% despite his infallible assurance?
I would say that the fallibility pertains more to the formulation. I.E., is homoousios/hypostasis the best way to express the Trinity. Highly likely, but since those words aren’t divinely revealed, there may be a better way. There is also the possibility of further refinement. Is it theoretically possible that God isn’t a Trinity. I suppose in the same sense that it is theoretically possible that there is no such thing as gravity or that solipsism is true and I’m the only being that exists.
So now it’s not that one has to be omniscient or infallible, but that one has to be certain. And I linked to something about “certitude of faith” – hmmm.
My point is that the claim isn’t true unless you can know it is true infallibly, which is not an advantage that Rome provides. No one has to say “here ye, here ye this is infallible to have infallible certainty that the point offered is true.” Hence the book of Genesis not having to claim to be Scripture.
By claiming it’s the church founded by Christ and given divine authority to infallibly identify/define/teach articles of faith. Something your bodies refuse to do, thus leaving everything as a matter of opinion – no assurance – semper reformanda.
This is like saying that whether gravity exists is a matter of opinion just because science hasn’t said “here ye, by the divine authority given to us, gravity is infallible.” The idea that something cannot be an article of faith unless it is proposed infallibly by some kind of “accrediting body” just won’t work historically, lest you turn believing intertestamental Jews into rank fideists or rationalists.
In case you haven’t noticed, this is one of Darryl’s main critiques. You guys come at this from the starting point of philosophy and ignore the insurmountable historical problems that your philosophical assumptions can’t make go away. Christianity is a revealed religion—in history.
IOW, what if God has not given us what your philosophers demand that we must have for the certitude of faith, and what if the demand is illegitimate to begin with?
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@cvd
Yes, but the analog today is the scriptures. I may fallibly identify and understand them, but they themselves are infallible. Why is a middle man necessary?
Our identification of the bible as the infallible word of God is not one doctrine among many. It is the fundamental identification of God’s special revelation. Its equivalence to the RC system is the identification of Rome as an infallible divine authority. That identification is fallible as you have already allowed above. If the protestant is correct such that the bible is the infallible word of God and only final authority on matters of faith while all other traditions are susceptible to error, then I don’t see how he is worse off than an RC if the RC were correct and STM are the infallible source of divine revelation.
You keep saying that, but if I give the game away by allowing that I could be wrong about properly identifying scripture, why aren’t you giving the game away by allowing that you could be wrong about your assent to Rome? You are putting the protestant’s identification of scripture in the system and taking the catholic’s identification of church out of the system. You haven’t justified this asymmetry. It seems to me the rest of the discussion is a distraction and this is the key point of contention.
If Protestantism’s claims are true, then the Bible is the perspicuous Word of God and I am better off believing that. The fact that I may misidentify the Word is no more a problem for prots than the possibility that you may misidentify the church.
I’m not sure Christ in his preaching to the people ever claimed to be infallible. Not to say that he wasn’t, but it sure wasn’t obvious to his followers. To many people, he was a random Jewish rabbi who happened to perform some amazing signs. Do you think any of his followers ever thought, “I’m following this guy because it is impossible to ever get anything wrong”. Certainly wasn’t reflected in their actions in the passion.
Yes I stand ready to correct my understanding of what scripture teaches. However, some doctrines are so well established that I find it inconceivable that I will see them change. Not because it was impossible for a certain group of people summarizing scripture to make a mistake, but because their teaching has stood the test of time.
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CVD: Articles of faith are divine revelation and supernatural truths – that’s why they (as opposed to opinions) warrant the assent of faith in the first place.
What distinguishes articles of faith from Scripture?
Also, when you go to Mass, the priest and congregation do not repeat the creed infallibly. Yet you assent.
So it is false to suggest that articles of faith command assent only if infallible.
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Yes I stand ready to correct my understanding of what scripture teaches. However, some doctrines are so well established that I find it inconceivable that I will see them change. Not because it was impossible for a certain group of people summarizing scripture to make a mistake, but because their teaching has stood the test of time.
Affirmed by the sensus fidei.* The alternative argument is that the Spirit left the Church in error for 1500 years until a lawyer named John Calvin showed up to fix it.
_______________________
*http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/cti_documents/rc_cti_20140610_sensus-fidei_en.html
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TVD,
Affirmed by the sensus fidei.* The alternative argument is that the Spirit left the Church in error for 1500 years until a lawyer named John Calvin showed up to fix it.
If the sensus fidei means merely something well established, the Reformers didn’t change anything. Transubstantiation, Mariolatry, the papacy, Apostolic succession as Rome defines it, etc. all arise after Scripture and cannot be substantiated by the actual Apostolic witness if anyone cares at all about the original meaning of the text. A practice/belief with a long history doesn’t necessarily mean well established; otherwise, Rome would never reject anything.
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Mermaid, only if you take a close look at what your infallible magisterium is doing. Rome is burning and you tilt and little old NAPARC Presbyterians.
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James Young, ” If Rome’s claims are granted as true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority, do they give an advantage over Protestantism, granting its claims are true regarding ecclesial infallibility and divine authority?”
No. Infallibility is not Jesus died for your sins.
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Robert
Posted October 27, 2015 at 4:54 pm | Permalink
TVD,
Affirmed by the sensus fidei.* The alternative argument is that the Spirit left the Church in error for 1500 years until a lawyer named John Calvin showed up to fix it.
If the sensus fidei means merely something well established, the Reformers didn’t change anything. Transubstantiation, Mariolatry, the papacy, Apostolic succession as Rome defines it, etc. all arise after Scripture and cannot be substantiated by the actual Apostolic witness if anyone cares at all about the original meaning of the text. A practice/belief with a long history doesn’t necessarily mean well established; otherwise, Rome would never reject anything.
NonTrinitarianism has a long history, I suppose, but that’s not what “sensus fidei” means. If you want to argue against the Catholic position, you should read the link, as it’s an official document of the Catholic Church. In short, Tradition does not merely come from the top down, from the pope.
Of course the sensus fidei argument against your own version of the Christian religion is that Reformation innovations such as “sola scriptura” and “justification by faith alone” have little historical claim to normativity in the Christian religion–sensus fidei–and have despite claims they are in the Bible, are not—they are theological extrapolations themselves. They fail by the same “sola scriptura” hermeneutic you use to attack Tradition, and don’t even have sensus fidei going for them.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 27, 2015 at 5:15 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, only if you take a close look at what your infallible magisterium is doing. Rome is burning and you tilt and little old NAPARC Presbyterians.
Look! A squirrel!
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Rome is burning and you tilt and little old NAPARC Presbyterians.
Rome burned a long time ago Darryl. Don’t sweat it. Let’s just keep on preaching the Word, administering the sacraments, and observing the sabbath
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Publius
Posted October 27, 2015 at 6:09 pm | Permalink
Rome is burning and you tilt and little old NAPARC Presbyterians.
Rome burned a long time ago Darryl. Don’t sweat it. Let’s just keep on preaching the Word, administering the sacraments, and observing the sabbath
Rome’s still there. It’s Geneva that’s in a thousand little pieces. Had the Reformation survived intact instead of a jillion splinters, it might have a legitimate claim to catholicity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Reformed_denominations
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Robert,
“Kind of like how Rome argues like the ancient Israelite idolaters—venertating statues ain’t idolatry and all that.”
Another evasion. You’re the one equating natural knowledge with supernatural knowledge and divine revelation. I guess Christ didn’t mean to say flesh and blood didn’t reveal it to Peter, it was just like 2+2=4 and water=h2O.
“It’s not rationalism to believe any knowledge of the truth, whatever the truth, is God’s gift.”
Rationalism: a belief or theory that opinions and actions should be based on reason and knowledge rather than on religious belief or emotional response.
Your argument: “And I would say that every time mankind comes to knowledge of the truth in any sense, God has provided the illumination (John 1:9). So there has been a bestowal of grace every time a person learns that 2+2=4 … You are treating religious knowledge in an entirely different category of knowledge, which isn’t helpful or demonstrable.”
“Translation: I can’t justify my demands because Jesus didn’t expect first century believers to have them, so I’ll continue to obfuscate.”
They’re not my demands – they’re Christ and the Apostles demands (remember, those claims they made you supposedly don’t deny are unnecessary). There’s no obfuscation. Christ held the Jews accountable to fallible authorities instituted by God. The OC had institutions that were authoritative, yet fallible, given revelation was still unfolding.
“Only weird if you think that the purpose of teachers is to go around declaring things infallibly.”
The purpose of prophets in the OC and teachers in the NC is not to just propose opinions that are provisional and probable.
“Translation: I can’t account for why the Jews, who had a much harder time since revelation was unfolding DIDN’T need an infallible canon declaration, so I’ll just have to start making points that aren’t irrelevant.”
Right, Christ’s promises in the NC are irrelevant. And an infallible canon declaration is not needed, unless you propose SS as a rule of faith, which Judaism did not have.
“Answer the question: If the Jesus expected the Jews to recognize Genesis as Scripture apart from His say so and without the book itself saying so, why does that not work today?”
His “say so” is what affirmed Genesis was Scripture, just as his “say so” affirmed His interpretation of Genesis He expected the Jews to also recognize as opposed to their erroneous fallible interpretations. It doesn’t work today because revelation was completed and because of Christ’s claims and promises affirmed in the NC. Your argument would gain traction if Christ and the Apostles claims to authority were useless and unnecessary. They weren’t.
“When the Roman Church wants to make official its implicit claim to be Jesus, then we can talk.”
Or its claim that it has divine authority granted by Him to infallibly protect, teach, identify, and interpret Scripture and Tradition.
“Rome doesn’t recognize the OC authorities as infallible either.”
Nope it doesn’t. Which is why I said in the OC prophets were raised, as well as the apostles during the culmination of revelation. That no longer happens, the pattern ended – why not? Because of Christ’s promises and nature of the NC.
“And yes, they were to be subject to those fallible authorities, except when those authorities got it wrong. Sounds awfully Protestant.”
And which authorities pointed out the fallible authorities got it wrong? Ah yes, Christ and the Apostles. Those authorities claiming divine authority and infallibility. Odd, that.
“Sure, the community does that. No one is arguing otherwise.”
You said “The solution is to identify the community that follows the Word of God.” You posit discerning the community from the canon. So you’re begging the question.
“Your identification of the church is provisional.”
Yep. That doesn’t mean any teaching the church then proposes must be provisional, just as it didn’t mean for an NT believer that any teaching Christ/Apostles then proposes must be provisional. If it was, that means I didn’t actually submit to the claims of authority in the first place. In Protestantism, any teaching the church(es) proposes is provisional, including its teaching on the canon, rule of faith, and attendant doctrines.
“The fact that Rome hasn’t revoked it on paper doesn’t prove it won’t do it in the future or that the meaning of your doctrines has changed.”
I can see this argument in NT times. Hey Joe, just because Christ and the Apostles haven’t revoked their teachings yet, it doesn’t prove they won’t do it in the future. Better to ignore the need for their claims and authority in the first place and just follow our fallible synagogue rabbis then.
“It’s as provisional as 2+2=4. I don’t have infallible access to that either.”
So you put faith in 2+2=4? Do you have a shrine set up to Euclid?
“But again, the point you routinely sidestep with both Jeff and me and SDB is that you can’t jump from provisionality to infallibility. The claim doesn’t magically allow you to do that.”
The point is Protestantism can never offer me anything more than opinion by its own admission. SDB and Jeff admit any of Protestantism’s teachings are and remain provisional. That’s consistent with Protestantism’s claims. Rome’s claims allow for non-provisional and irreformable teaching. And that’s the advantage.
“Infallible assurance that they have found the Messiah. And infallible assurance does not mean get things right all the time, never sin, etc. It’s an assurance that grows in strength over time.”
So you have infallible assurance you don’t get things right, but might get things right later? What if that teaching itself isn’t right? There’s no reason for that particular foundational teaching to be an exception, thus it self-defeats. And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where things are “gotten right” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right.
“I agree with Jeff that it’s a rather trivial point. If Rome is true, I have an advantage? Sure. If Protestantism’s claims are true, I have an advantage? Sure. If Mormonism’s claims are true, I have an advantage? Sure.”
Talk about sidestepping. This is not a difficult mental exercise. Take Rome and Protestantism’s claims. Grant them both as true. Then compare and contrast. As you already did earlier:
“I’m only better off if Rome actually is infallible.”
“Again, they’re better off only if the claim is correct.”
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“If the claim isn’t true, it’s worthless.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
“I would say that the fallibility pertains more to the formulation. I.E., is homoousios/hypostasis the best way to express the Trinity. Highly likely, but since those words aren’t divinely revealed, there may be a better way. There is also the possibility of further refinement. Is it theoretically possible that God isn’t a Trinity. I suppose in the same sense that it is theoretically possible that there is no such thing as gravity or that solipsism is true and I’m the only being that exists.”
So the Trinity remains provisional. This is exactly the opposite of the certitude of faith and the faith of apostolic times, as Newman pointed out. And exactly what I meant by saying nothing changes after assent in Protestantism. And the teaching itself by Protestantism of “those words that are divinely revealed” remains provisional as well. There’s always the possibility of further refinement – taking out books, adding books, more asterisks on passages, it isn’t inerrant, isn’t inspired, etc.
“My point is that the claim isn’t true unless you can know it is true infallibly, which is not an advantage that Rome provides.”
And this notion that submitting agents must be personally infallible or omniscient for Rome’s claims to have any merit or advantage has yet to be demonstrated by you. Christ and the Apostles did not make their adherents personally infallible and omniscient – even with your notion of “infallible assurance” they still have no advantage because they can’t distinguish divine revelation from opinion – there’s no definitive and normative judgment to be had.
Joe in NT times is sitting reading OT scriptures with Christ and the Apostles sitting next to Him teaching its meaning – teachings that are not provisional. Jane in NT times is sitting reading OT scriptures with Rabbi Levi sitting next to Him offering admitted provisional opinion on what it teaches. Who has the advantage?
Protestantism: “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. Rome: “the living teaching office of the Church, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ. This teaching office is not above the word of God, but serves it, teaching only what has been handed on, listening to it devoutly, guarding it scrupulously and explaining it faithfully in accord with a divine commission and with the help of the Holy Spirit, it draws from this one deposit of faith everything which it presents for belief as divinely revealed….For all of what has been said about the way of interpreting Scripture is subject finally to the judgment of the Church, which carries out the divine commission and ministry of guarding and interpreting the word of God.” Grant both claims are true. Who has the advantage? Which one has the ability to differentiate and judge divine revelation from opinion?
“You guys come at this from the starting point of philosophy”
I’m not the one making Christ and the Apostles’ claims useless and unnecessary. I’m not the one making Christ’s promises in the NC immaterial and inconsequential. All that’s in Scripture. The “starting point” is divine revelation is infallible and irreformable, by definition. Not a crazy claim.
“and ignore the insurmountable historical problems”
Insurmountable historical problems like “The fact that Rome has not done any of this yet (well, you guys come pretty close to making Mary a de facto goddess), doesn’t prove anything except that Rome hasn’t done it yet.”?
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sdb,
“Yes, but the analog today is the scriptures. I may fallibly identify and understand them, but they themselves are infallible.”
The infallibility of the Scriptures, as well as the identification of it, are themselves provisional teachings and opinions in your system.
“Our identification of the bible as the infallible word of God is not one doctrine among many.”
The teaching of the extent and scope of the Bible, its inerrancy, its inspiration, its closure, and its authoritative nature are not doctrines? WCF teaches it. And it doesn’t exclude those teachings from its disclaimers that apply to the whole of the confession.
“If the protestant is correct such that the bible is the infallible word of God and only final authority on matters of faith while all other traditions are susceptible to error”
But of course you and your confessions posit these teachings themselves are susceptible to error, as WCF’s disclaimers demonstrate as well as your and Jeff’s statements regarding the provisionality of the canon and all other doctrines.
“You keep saying that, but if I give the game away by allowing that I could be wrong about properly identifying scripture, why aren’t you giving the game away by allowing that you could be wrong about your assent to Rome?”
Once again, believers had to identify Christ and the Apostles. They had an advantage after assent – they didn’t just have provisional teaching. Joe identifies the RC church and its claims. He assents. He has an advantage after assent – he doesn’t just have provisional teaching – if he did, that would nullify the assent given in the first place. Jack identifies a confession and its claims. He assents. He has no advantage after assent – he has just provisional teaching and opinion, consistent with the assent given.
“The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” applies to Protestantism, consistent with its claims. It does not apply in RCism, consistent with its claims. And yet this contrast is somehow inconsequential according to you to determining if one is better off or has an advantage in one system over the other.
“If Protestantism’s claims are true, then the Bible is the perspicuous Word of God and I am better off believing that.”
If Protestantism’s claims are true, then there is no way to differentiate divine revelation from opinion. You get at best highly likely provisional opinion. No judgment, teaching, or interpretation in Protestantism can be offered as binding, normative, or of divine authority.
“I’m not sure Christ in his preaching to the people ever claimed to be infallible.”
What an odd statement.
“When Jesus had finished saying these things, the crowds were amazed at his teaching, because he taught as one who had authority, and not as their teachers of the law.”
“The people were amazed at his teaching, because he taught them as one who had authority, not as the teachers of the law … The people were all so amazed that they asked each other, “What is this? A new teaching–and with authority! He even gives orders to impure spirits and they obey him.”
“and they were amazed at His teaching, for His message was with authority.”
“Then, after three days they found Him in the temple, sitting in the midst of the teachers, both listening to them and asking them questions. And all who heard Him were amazed at His understanding and His answers.”
“When the Sabbath came, He began to teach in the synagogue; and the many listeners were astonished, saying, “Where did this man get these things, and what is this wisdom given to Him, and such miracles as these performed by His hands?”
“The officers answered, “Never has a man spoken the way this man speaks.””
The entire sermon on the mount, His teaching on divorce, His forgiveness of sins, etc.
“I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven; whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
“Truly I tell you, whatever you bind on earth will be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth will be loosed in heaven.”
“Then He called His twelve disciples together and gave them power and authority over all demons, and to cure diseases. ”
“just as My Father has granted Me a kingdom, I grant you that you may eat and drink at My table in My kingdom, and you will sit on thrones judging the twelve tribes of Israel.”
“By myself I can do nothing; I judge only as I hear, and my judgment is just, for I seek not to please myself but him who sent me.”
“Jesus answered, “My teaching is not my own. It comes from the one who sent me.”
“For I did not speak on my own, but the Father who sent me commanded me to say all that I have spoken.”
“Very truly I tell you, whoever accepts anyone I send accepts me; and whoever accepts me accepts the one who sent me.””
“Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me? The words I say to you I do not speak on my own authority. Rather, it is the Father, living in me, who is doing his work.”
“He will glorify me because it is from me that he will receive what he will make known to you. All that belongs to the Father is mine. That is why I said the Spirit will receive from me what he will make known to you.””
“Again Jesus said, “Peace be with you! As the Father has sent me, I am sending you.””
“Then Jesus came to them and said, “All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.”
“I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ.”
“Not to say that he wasn’t, but it sure wasn’t obvious to his followers.”
Seems they were pretty amazed by how He was teaching and the claims to authority grounding that teaching He was making.
“Yes I stand ready to correct my understanding of what scripture teaches.”
Right. So all teaching remains provisional, including that it teaches SS as the rule of faith, including that it teaches provisional opinion is no different than divine revelation, including the teaching of the extent and scope of Scripture, including the teaching that Scripture is inspired and inerrant, including the teaching that public revelation has closed, etc. “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” is incompatible with divine revelation or the assent of faith.
“However, some doctrines are so well established that I find it inconceivable that I will see them change.”
Well established by what? An extra-scriptural source such as a large group of people over time? But any extra-scriptural source is precluded from being infallible or divinely protected from error by your lights. So this appeal doesn’t resolve anything.
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Cletus,
Another evasion. You’re the one equating natural knowledge with supernatural knowledge and divine revelation. I guess Christ didn’t mean to say flesh and blood didn’t reveal it to Peter, it was just like 2+2=4 and water=h2O.
Flesh and blood don’t reveal those things either. God does via natural revelation.
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Cletus,
Rationalism: a belief or theory that opinions and actions should be based on reason and knowledge rather than on religious belief or emotional response.
So belief in the Trinity isn’t based on reason working with divine revelation?
Christ held the Jews accountable to fallible authorities instituted by God. The OC had institutions that were authoritative, yet fallible, given revelation was still unfolding.
Where does Christ say that the finalization of revelation in the new covenant means that the divine institutions were no longer fallible?
The purpose of prophets in the OC and teachers in the NC is not to just propose opinions that are provisional and probable.
Where does Christ say this is the purpose of non-inspired NC teachers.
Right, Christ’s promises in the NC are irrelevant. And an infallible canon declaration is not needed, unless you propose SS as a rule of faith, which Judaism did not have.
So Rome’s declaration of canon is unnecessary and pointless, then? Are you trying to refute yourself?
His “say so” is what affirmed Genesis was Scripture, just as his “say so” affirmed His interpretation of Genesis He expected the Jews to also recognize as opposed to their erroneous fallible interpretations. It doesn’t work today because revelation was completed and because of Christ’s claims and promises affirmed in the NC. Your argument would gain traction if Christ and the Apostles claims to authority were useless and unnecessary. They weren’t.
So Genesis wasn’t Scripture until Jesus said so and the Jews had no reason to accept it as such until 1 A.D.? Are you kidding me? And still waiting for where Christ says that what sets the NC apart is that the divinely instituted authorities no longer are fallible?
Or its claim that it has divine authority granted by Him to infallibly protect, teach, identify, and interpret Scripture and Tradition.
The claim isn’t biblical. Chapter and verse.
Nope it doesn’t. Which is why I said in the OC prophets were raised, as well as the apostles during the culmination of revelation. That no longer happens, the pattern ended – why not? Because of Christ’s promises and nature of the NC.
Where does it say that the blessing of the NC is an infallible church on this side of heaven. Chapter and verse please.
And which authorities pointed out the fallible authorities got it wrong? Ah yes, Christ and the Apostles. Those authorities claiming divine authority and infallibility. Odd, that.
So if Christ had never pointed it out, the Jews would have been justified to follow the leaders in everything he did condemn? Without Jesus, the Jews were a bunch of dumb cult members? I guess all those other non-inspired Jews did the wrong thing when they rejected wrong Pharisaic teachings based on the OT apart from Jesus’ words.
You said “The solution is to identify the community that follows the Word of God.” You posit discerning the community from the canon. So you’re begging the question.
Not when the canon precedes the church. See the Old Testament.
Yep. That doesn’t mean any teaching the church then proposes must be provisional, just as it didn’t mean for an NT believer that any teaching Christ/Apostles then proposes must be provisional. If it was, that means I didn’t actually submit to the claims of authority in the first place. In Protestantism, any teaching the church(es) proposes is provisional, including its teaching on the canon, rule of faith, and attendant doctrines.
This is rather odd since you believe one can be justified truly and then lose it. But one can’t submit truly and then not submit. Very, very odd.
But in any case, what you are telling me is that what the church teaches cannot change but you have no real way of knowing whether the church is what it says it is. Helpful.
I can see this argument in NT times. Hey Joe, just because Christ and the Apostles haven’t revoked their teachings yet, it doesn’t prove they won’t do it in the future. Better to ignore the need for their claims and authority in the first place and just follow our fallible synagogue rabbis then.
When Rome can claim the requisite inspiration that Jesus and the Apostles had, then we can talk. Until then, the claim will fall on deaf ears. If Rome is not inspired in the same way, I have no reason to believe it won’t change, especially when on any honest reading of history Rome has changed.
So you put faith in 2+2=4? Do you have a shrine set up to Euclid?
Translation: James has no answer. And actually, I’m always putting faith in other authorities, not saving faith, but trust that they got it right. Same kind of trust I put in the church. Not the kind of trust that makes the church the Savior. I’m not Roman Catholic.
Again, Protestants don’t place their faith in the church. When you do, you get all sorts of things like covering the rear end of the bishops who happily allowed sex abuse to go on under their watch.
The point is Protestantism can never offer me anything more than opinion by its own admission. SDB and Jeff admit any of Protestantism’s teachings are and remain provisional. That’s consistent with Protestantism’s claims. Rome’s claims allow for non-provisional and irreformable teaching. And that’s the advantage.
It’s not non-provisional and irreformable when no one can figure out if the ontological Trinity is the economic Trinity and when documents are written intentionally to allow pervasive interpretative pluralism.
But again, the claim you are presenting finally is this one: Rome offers dogma that can’t change but you peons in the pew have no clue as to whether you ever get it right because you’re fallible vs. Protestants offer dogma that can change but you peons in the pew have no clue as to whether you ever get it right because you’re fallible. Yep there’s an advantage there. Not for me. Not for you. But for….someone?
So you have infallible assurance you don’t get things right, but might get things right later?
Yes, they’re called the promises of God. They’re found in Scripture.
What if that teaching itself isn’t right? There’s no reason for that particular foundational teaching to be an exception, thus it self-defeats.
What if you’re wrong about Rome? All you get is unchanging error that you can never know is error or not.
And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where things are “gotten right” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right.
It’s called now we see through a glass darkly, then in heaven face to face. You’re giving me more over realized eschatology from the church that knows nothing of the theology of the cross.
Talk about sidestepping. This is not a difficult mental exercise. Take Rome and Protestantism’s claims. Grant them both as true. Then compare and contrast. As you already did earlier:
Knowing that the dogma won’t change even though I can have no assurance that I ever have it correct because of my own fallibility doesn’t seem to be a meaningful advantage at the end of the day. Yeah, I know the Trinity won’t change. I don’t know what it means or whether it is actually essential to my salvation—once Rome said it was, now not so much. But I know it won’t change.
So the Trinity remains provisional.
As provisional as 2+2=4. Are you denying that it is logically possible to come up with a clearer formula that conveys the same meaning as Nicea? I don’t know if it is likely, but impossible?
This is exactly the opposite of the certitude of faith and the faith of apostolic times, as Newman pointed out.
As Brandon (I think, maybe it was Jeff) has pointed out, Newman flubbed the uniqueness of the Apostolic claim so much that I take this as a complement. Newman is your shining light and he can’t get that what set Xty apart was the cross? I pity you.
And exactly what I meant by saying nothing changes after assent in Protestantism.
What’s the alternative, becoming unthinking members of a cult that follow a teacher that claims uninspired infallible authority whenever he says but never actually gives us a list of all that has been taught?
And the teaching itself by Protestantism of “those words that are divinely revealed” remains provisional as well. There’s always the possibility of further refinement – taking out books, adding books, more asterisks on passages, it isn’t inerrant, isn’t inspired, etc.
Based on this, your canon is just as provisional because endorsed RC Bibles have the same asterisked passages. And if there’s not possibility of further refinement, what is the point of the Synod of the Family which has been about as clear as mud?
And this notion that submitting agents must be personally infallible or omniscient for Rome’s claims to have any merit or advantage has yet to be demonstrated by you. Christ and the Apostles did not make their adherents personally infallible and omniscient – even with your notion of “infallible assurance” they still have no advantage because they can’t distinguish divine revelation from opinion – there’s no definitive and normative judgment to be had.
Sure Christ and the Apostles can. And infallible assurance enables Protestants to do so as well. There’s a reason why Protestants agree on more across denominational boundaries than RCs do within the church that supposed offers the advantage.
Joe in NT times is sitting reading OT scriptures with Christ and the Apostles sitting next to Him teaching its meaning – teachings that are not provisional. Jane in NT times is sitting reading OT scriptures with Rabbi Levi sitting next to Him offering admitted provisional opinion on what it teaches. Who has the advantage?
Joe does because Christ and the Apostles have the inspiration. Rome denies that it possesses the inspiration, so if you want Christ and the Apostles to be the model, Rome doesn’t offer an advantage. Particularly since I can see what Christ has defined far better than what Rome has.
Protestantism: “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. Rome: “the living teaching office of the Church, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ. This teaching office is not above the word of God, but serves it, teaching only what has been handed on, listening to it devoutly, guarding it scrupulously and explaining it faithfully in accord with a divine commission and with the help of the Holy Spirit, it draws from this one deposit of faith everything which it presents for belief as divinely revealed….For all of what has been said about the way of interpreting Scripture is subject finally to the judgment of the Church, which carries out the divine commission and ministry of guarding and interpreting the word of God.” Grant both claims are true. Who has the advantage? Which one has the ability to differentiate and judge divine revelation from opinion?
Rome has a trivial advantage unless and until it can provide infallible assurance/certainty that its own claims are true.
I’m not the one making Christ and the Apostles’ claims useless and unnecessary.
Does not follow since even you put Christ and the Apostles in a different category (in theory)
I’m not the one making Christ’s promises in the NC immaterial and inconsequential.
Where does he promise an infallible interpreter in the form of the Magisterium?
All that’s in Scripture.
Where? Yeah the claims of Christ are. Where does Christ say His church will be infallible?
The “starting point” is divine revelation is infallible and irreformable, by definition. Not a crazy claim.
Yes. And Protestants agree that divine revelation is infallible and irreformable.
Insurmountable historical problems like “The fact that Rome has not done any of this yet (well, you guys come pretty close to making Mary a de facto goddess), doesn’t prove anything except that Rome hasn’t done it yet.”?
The main one I have in mind (though there are MANY others) is the idea that the Intertestamental Jews didn’t need an infallible canon declaration but that I do. Even when you posit that it was different because Jews had oral Torah you have the same problem because Rome has an oral Torah AND it has defined the canon infallibly. I guess that means Trent’s definition was unnecessary.
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don’t you mean 1.2 billion squirrels?
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TVD
Posted October 27, 2015 at 6:14 pm | Permalink
Publius
Posted October 27, 2015 at 6:09 pm | Permalink
Rome is burning and you tilt and little old NAPARC Presbyterians.
Publius:
Rome burned a long time ago Darryl. Don’t sweat it. Let’s just keep on preaching the Word, administering the sacraments, and observing the sabbath>>>>
Why do you sweat it, Brother Hart? Publius makes a good point.
TVD:
Rome’s still there. It’s Geneva that’s in a thousand little pieces. Had the Reformation survived intact instead of a jillion splinters, it might have a legitimate claim to catholicity.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Reformed_denominations>>>>>
True. Why did Geneva splinter?
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CVD: This is not a difficult mental exercise. Take Rome and Protestantism’s claims. Grant them both as true. Then compare and contrast.
It is a difficult mental exercise. It is an exercise in “guess what CVD is thinking.” If I literally take all of Rome’s claims and grant them as true, then the Roman Catholic is trivially in a better position than the Protestant.
Conversely, if I literally take Protestant claims to be true, then the Protestant is trivially in a better position than the RC.
You’re not after this trivial point. You’re after something else, but I can’t see what it is.
So what claim, precisely, do you want to be hypothetically held as true, while not assuming the truth of the rest of Rome’s claims? What advantage does that one specific claim confer? And why should that hypothetical advantage be relevant to the truth of Rome’s claims, rather than grist for an Appeal to Consequences?
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CVD: Once again, believers had to identify Christ and the Apostles. They had an advantage after assent – they didn’t just have provisional teaching. Joe identifies the RC church and its claims. He assents. He has an advantage after assent – he doesn’t just have provisional teaching – if he did, that would nullify the assent given in the first place.
I’m very sorry to insist here, but I really believe you to be mistaken on this point. The assent of the subject does not increase the truthfulness of the object.
Jesus’ teachings weren’t provisionally true until Peter believed Him. And they didn’t become untrue when “many” no longer followed Him.
His teachings were true without regard to assent. Peter, meanwhile, had provisional knowledge and understanding of those teachings.
When Joe identifies the RC church and assents to its claims (provisionally, as we agree), he now operates according to the following syllogism:
(1) Whatever the church teaches is correct
(2) The church teaches X
—
(3) Therefore, X is correct.
You seem to be arguing that because Joe has believed (1), he now has non-provisional truth.
However, as is well known, the soundness of the argument rests on the truth of its premises. If (1) is provisional, then (3) will be provisional also. Joe’s act of assent causes him to think and act as if (1) were completely true, but it does not make (1) to be true.
The provisionality of (1) will always make (3) less than certain. It could be, after all, that Joe has been mistaken about the church all along. In fact, I think he is!
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 28, 2015 at 12:45 am | Permalink
CVD: Once again, believers had to identify Christ and the Apostles. They had an advantage after assent – they didn’t just have provisional teaching. Joe identifies the RC church and its claims. He assents. He has an advantage after assent – he doesn’t just have provisional teaching – if he did, that would nullify the assent given in the first place.
I’m very sorry to insist here, but I really believe you to be mistaken on this point. The assent of the subject does not increase the truthfulness of the object.
Jesus’ teachings weren’t provisionally true until Peter believed Him. And they didn’t become untrue when “many” no longer followed Him.
His teachings were true without regard to assent. Peter, meanwhile, had provisional knowledge and understanding of those teachings.
When Joe identifies the RC church and assents to its claims (provisionally, as we agree), he now operates according to the following syllogism:
(1) Whatever the church teaches is correct
(2) The church teaches X
—
(3) Therefore, X is correct.
You seem to be arguing that because Joe has believed (1), he now has non-provisional truth.
However, as is well known, the soundness of the argument rests on the truth of its premises. If (1) is provisional, then (3) will be provisional also. Joe’s act of assent causes him to think and act as if (1) were completely true, but it does not make (1) to be true.
The provisionality of (1) will always make (3) less than certain. It could be, after all, that Joe has been mistaken about the church all along. In fact, I think he is!
Or Carl allows his “reason,” which for the “fallen man” amounts to no more than opinion, a subjective provisionality [on the nonessential matters of papal infallibility and Mariology] to separate himself from the true Church. If he has no reason to swallow them whole, it’s also true he has no scriptural reason to summarily spit them out.
Carl gives a valid demurral from Catholicism, but that doesn’t mean you join a do-it-yourself Christianity that throws the baby out with the bathwater.
http://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/10/newman-for-protestants
He just replaces one uncertainty with another and as CVD notes, ends up no better than when he started. Doubt is a zero-sum game; faith is not. Tell us the Holy Spirit sent John Calvin to straighten out the Christian religion and the discussion is over–unprovisionally.
[But you don’t dare, and good you don’t.]
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Tom,
The Holy Spirit sent Calvin, Luther, et al to straighten out the Christian religion. Thank you.
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The Holy Spirit sent John Calvin to give us the American founding. Come on, vd, t. What are you thinking?
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Just as the identification of the “true church” is provisional in yours.
I didn’t say that the teaching of the extent and scope of the Bible is not doctrine. I said it wasn’t one among many – it is foundational. The identification of the Bible as the infallible word of God in the protestant system is equivalent to the identification of the “true church as infallible” in the catholic system.
Yes. I can misidentify scripture just as you can misidentify the church. What protects you from this error? We protestants say the Holy Spirit. I suspect you say the same.
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b, sd, but you don’t understand. Rome is superior because it claims to be infallible. That settles it. Whenever someone claims infallibility, we not just listen but follow.
And don’t forget, we (RC apologists) are not deluded by falling for such boasts. Most American RC’s couldn’t care less about infallibility or which dogmas are infallible. But that doesn’t change that we (apologists) are superior and Protestants are just plain stupid (or rationalists [or both]).
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@Jeff
I think the point he is making is a comparison of the the epistemological status of the Catholic assuming catholicism is true versus the Protestant assuming protestantism is true. Assuming that everything Rome claims for itself is true, the catholic is better off (epistemologically) than the protestant assuming everything the WCF claims is true (in particularly the fallibility of their assertion that the scriptures alone are infallible). I am inferring that cvd has in mind epistemology when he says “better off”. I’ve never been entirely clear on that.
One might say, it doesn’t matter in which world one is better off. Maybe we are all better off if the Bahai are correct, but that doesn’t make it more or less likely that they are true. I don’t think that is what cvd is after here. He is addressing the relative epistemological merits of SS and Rome’s system. In particular, are the claims of protestantism self-defeating (kind of like the game folks play with relativists: “there are no such thing as absolutes”, “oh yeah? Is that an absolute statement?”. (CVD, correct me if I am misreading you). I gather he believes he has found an internal “defeater” for protestantism.
Now for reasons discussed in this thread, I think he is mistaken. In outline he asserts that we prots believe that all of our articles of faith are reformable. In other words, none of them have been perfectly articulated. We also assert that the only infallible source of divine revelation is the scriptures. However, the scriptures have to be identified and we believe we have done so fallibly. Therefore, we have no infallible source of divine revelation – everything is reduced to mere opinion. We can have no positive knowledge of God’s divine revelation. CVD, is that a fair representation of your argument here?
Our response has several lines, but it seems the following two are most fundamental:
1) while my (our) identification of scripture is fallible, that says nothing about the quality of God’s divine revelation itself. The RC system asserts for itself divine, infallible, authority – similar to what we understand the scriptures to claim for themselves. However, everyone’s identification of the true church is fallible. Thus everyone’s knowledge of everything that follows from that identification is necessarily provisional. The RC is in exactly the same boat as the CP in this regard. (as an aside, this is the fundamental problem with foundational epistemology more generally. Alistair McGrath has a very nice summary of the logical problems with foundationalism more generally in his scientific theology series. It is worth engaging.)
2) More important than pointing out that the CP and RC (and any other foundationalist system) are equally provisional, is showing that we aren’t thus left with “mere, tentative, provisional, opinion” (I think the reason I balk at opinion is that opinion is not falsifiable. My opinion that butter pecan ice cream is better than vanilla ice cream is just that. My inference that the caloric content of butter pecan ice cream is higher than vanilla ice cream is fallible, but it is not an opinion.) Knowledge can be gained inductively, and while such knowledge is in principle falsifiable (we don’t assert at the outset that it must be this way or that), it is robust. It is not sufficient to say that religious knowledge is different from scientific knowledge (or historical knowledge, or literary knowledge). One must provide warrant for believing that fallible interpretation of data can lead to certainty as it regards science but is reduced to mere opinion as it regards theology. CVD hasn’t done that yet (assertions of Pelagianism or whatever don’t do that either). This isn’t to say that scientific knowledge is identical to religious knowledge (obviously they aren’t), but the ability to achieve certainty via science does indicate that inductive inference is a valid approach to discovering truth. Thus the failure of foundationalism does not leave us with mere opinion – it takes us asymptotically closer to a more accurate knowledge of reality. Of course, theology has a moral component and true knowledge of God requires enlightenment by the holy spirit – it isn’t exactly like the hagiographies of scientific progress. CVD has not explained why the requirement of divine enlightenment as it pertains to theologic knowledge entails that one only has infallible certainty or mere opinion.
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@dgh how silly of me.
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sdb,
Yep, the point has been advocated over at CtC as well in detail in the “Tu Quoque” article.
Catholics in principle have a mechanism for producing an infallible doctrinal statement. Protestantism does not have a mechanism for producing an infallible statement. I think this is what CVD is trying to get at, here.
Moreover, I also believe that he is trying to point out that the Magisterium works in an analogous way to Jesus. There is discontinuity in that the Church is infallible under very specific circumstance whereas Jesus is infallible in his person. The point is once the motives of credibility lead you to Jesus (which are, admittedly, provisional), you at least possess a mechanism for saying, “This is Divine revelation–for sure.” Protestantism doesn’t have that. I think this is the point that CVD is getting at and he believes that this gives Rome a distinct epistemological advantage. Even if Rome is false it’s better than Geneva because it has a mechanism for infallibly defining Divine revelation.
Here is an excerpt from CtC explaining things,
The language of that article makes it clear that Protestants are left with interpretations of a text while Catholics interpretations lead them to a *person,* the Divinely guided Magisterium of the Church. Thus, Protestants, based on their own principles, cannot move beyond their mere man-made opinions. The Tu Quoque article concludes,
I think there are scores of problems with this approach–of which I’m particularly focused upon the historical improbability of this course of events–but I believe this is the argument CVD is putting forward.
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SDB,
1) while my (our) identification of scripture is fallible, that says nothing about the quality of God’s divine revelation itself. The RC system asserts for itself divine, infallible, authority – similar to what we understand the scriptures to claim for themselves. However, everyone’s identification of the true church is fallible. Thus everyone’s knowledge of everything that follows from that identification is necessarily provisional. The RC is in exactly the same boat as the CP in this regard. (as an aside, this is the fundamental problem with foundational epistemology more generally. Alistair McGrath has a very nice summary of the logical problems with foundationalism more generally in his scientific theology series. It is worth engaging.)
Yes, but the problem isn’t only the initial decision. CVD has admitted that making the decision of faith to become RC doesn’t make the decider infallible. So we’re also left with the question as to what the RC can actually have certainty about once he becomes RC if provisional knowledge cannot give one certainty. Can CVD himself know with infallible certainty what Rome has defined? I don’t see how given everything else he’s said. At best, he has provisional certainty that Rome has declared the Assumption infallibly; he doesn’t have infallible knowledge that such has been done because he’s not infallible.
So it is unclear to me how the individual RC’s knowledge does not remain provisional even after making an assent of faith. This is part of the problem with the argument and why this tack of radical skepticism that demands infallibility for religious knowledge actually ends up making a person unable to know anything.
How is even the suggestion that Rome claims infallibility for itself not provisional for CVD. Perhaps CVD and everyone else has gotten it wrong and Rome doesn’t actually claim infallibility. After all, he and all other RCs are fallible.
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Brandon,
If I’m not mistaken, doesn’t CTC finally deal with the reality of our own interpretative limitations and possibility of misreading the Magisterium by positing that we can finally ask yes or no questions which are not open to misunderstanding? And then didn’t you write something about that on your blog?
One of the fatal flaws of CTC is the assumption that a yes or no answer is inherently clear. But as anyone knows, that is not necessarily the case. The tone of voice can indicate that a yes answer is really a no answer that is begrudgingly giving in to the other person. People can simply mishear the word, etc.
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TVD:
Or Carl allows his “reason,” which for the “fallen man” amounts to no more than opinion, a subjective provisionality [on the nonessential matters of papal infallibility and Mariology] to separate himself from the true Church. If he has no reason to swallow them whole, it’s also true he has no scriptural reason to summarily spit them out.
Carl gives a valid demurral from Catholicism, but that doesn’t mean you join a do-it-yourself Christianity that throws the baby out with the bathwater.
http://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/10/newman-for-protestants
He just replaces one uncertainty with another and as CVD notes, ends up no better than when he started. Doubt is a zero-sum game; faith is not. Tell us the Holy Spirit sent John Calvin to straighten out the Christian religion and the discussion is over–unprovisionally.
[But you don’t dare, and good you don’t.]>>>>>>>
This whole discussion is very eye opening for me.
Why did the Presbyterian churches and all Protestant churches splinter? They continue to splinter. Is that the leading of the Holy Spirit, or is it the flesh?
The answer “Catholics are internally divided” is a non answer. If you wanted to reform the Church, why is your performance 10s of thousands of times worse than what you left?
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Robert,
I think Brandon did an excellent job describing the epistemical superiority of the Catholic Church. What I dont understand is what is the principled reason by which Protestants deny this apostolicity?
Paul warns in Eph., Gal., Col. as does Jesus at the end of the sermon on the mount, as does St. Jude that people would deceive and this would cause their hearers to depart from the apostles. Does the situation of Protestantism in the world demonstrate a visible apostleship? If It does in Spirit, why does that spiritual unity manifest itself in visible disunity? Something to think about. Nobody is twisting anyone’s arm. If you dont find the arguments compelling then we Catholics need to work harder to present our proofs!
Anyways, I was just peeking in today because I’m in bed 28th a hurt neck. Please pray for me.
Have a wonderful day!
Susan
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Robert,
Right, CtC attempts to say that persons are able to answer clarifying questions and texts cannot. I did write a response on my blog (“Texts, Turns, and the Tiber”). In my response I argue, as you note, person-to-person communication is no less prone to misinterpretation than a written text. A brief perusal of Church history (e.g. Honorius to Pope Francis [!!!!]) underscores this point. Complicating the whole issue is that even if *you* think the Church is speaking infallibly you could be mistaken. So the “Yes” may only be the provisional opinion of a counsel or pontiff, even though you believe it to be an infallible decree.
Perhaps the most important problem, IMO, is that Scripture is the living and active Word of God. In Scripture we do not simply encounter a text. We encounter the Spirit of the Living God. I believe CtC’s argument unintentionally mutes the voice of God. The interplay here is complex, but I think the above CtC quotes move us farther from truth.
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Susan:
Anyways, I was just peeking in today because I’m in bed 28th a hurt neck. Please pray for me.
Have a wonderful day!
Susan>>>>
Will do. Hope you recover quickly.
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Brandon:
Perhaps the most important problem, IMO, is that Scripture is the living and active Word of God. In Scripture we do not simply encounter a text. We encounter the Spirit of the Living God. I believe CtC’s argument unintentionally mutes the voice of God. The interplay here is complex, but I think the above CtC quotes move us farther from truth.>>>>
I am with you on the fact that we encounter the Spirit of the Living God in the written Word of God.
Maybe you would be willing to address the splintering of Protestantism into tens of thousands of different groups – and more are being created all the time. Where do we find the Holy Spirit doing anything like that in the NT? What Scripture do you use to show where the Holy Spirit intended to lead the Body of Christ that way as He leads her into all truth?
How do you justify the divisions even among Presbyterians?
If you mention that the Catholic Church is internally divided, you have evaded the question it seems to me. Besides, Brother Hart and his friends say that Rome burned long ago.
What about you Presbyterians?
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Hi Brandon,
But how do we resolve our differnces using the scripture alone? That is what needs to be answered.
I’m I mistaken to believe that the tradition of Christianity in it’s liturgy is priesthood and a real presence of Christ in the Eucharist and transportation? In what way does tradition work to inform you whether or not this is the way of the true church? Then what do you do with scripture that coincides wirh the historical liturgy of the church?
One of my first few times attending holy mass I heard, MalChi 1:11 and I thought, ” well there you go. There’s her argument( for lack of a better word) for an ongoing sacrifice.”
Then I heard him, after the consecration, ask that the Father would look with favor on the offerings and accept them as He accepted the gifts of Abel, the sacrifice of Abraham our father in the faith and the bread and wine offered by His priest Melchisdech, and I knew that the sacrifice of bread and wine that prefigured Chist was to be offered perpetually in Christ’s church because Christ’s priesthood is ongoing.
I wouldn’t know what to do with these verses if they were not brought to life by the liturgy.
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There goes autocorrect again. Sorry about that.
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Susan,
I think once more it’s very important to be as precise as possible. Subtle distortions radically change arguments. Let’s take a quick look at your comment,
Why do you think Protestants are arguing that our differences are resolved by Scripture alone? Using slogans like Sola Scriptura aren’t all bad, but we need to make sure they are properly defined otherwise we’ll be talking past one another. In this case, let me ask you, as a former Protestant, what do Protestants mean by “Sola Scriptura?” Do we mean it is the only tool used to resolve differences or do we mean something else? I’m interested to see if you can identify the doctrine in a way that I recognize as Protestant. I know you are capable, but I want to see if we’re on the same wavelength 🙂
I also believe that the liturgy of the church is vitally important to understand the teaching of the Church. The dense theological and philosophical argumentation of the early ecumenical councils was in the backdrop of defending the Trinitarian (though clearly not under that name at the time) liturgies the churches had been invoking since the time of Jesus. Yet, one of the questions at hand is whether the liturgy of the church is in fact Apostolic.
We do know a presider blessed the bread and wine from a very early time. We also know that there was a sacramental significance and communion with the risen Jesus that was believed from a very early time. Those familiar with the Medieval discussions on this issue from Ratramnus and Radbertus, however, know that even in the ninth century there were competing understandings of *how* Christ was present in the Supper. Ratramnus’s view is nearly identical to the Reformed understanding. The Reformed likewise have no problem affirming that the Eucharist is a re-presentation of the once for all sacrifice of Christ.
I don’t think Malachi 1:11 is a very strong argument for arguing, however, that the sacrifice of Christ is offered at every Mass. Is the sacrifice of Christ a once-for-all sacrifice (Hebrews 7:26-27; 9:28; 10:12) or is it a perpetual sacrifice? If it is a representation of Christ for sinners, then we have no qualms. If argument is that it needs to be a perpetual sacrifice, however, that contradicts the entire book of Hebrews. The fulfillment of Malachi 1:11 is in the once-for-all sacrifice of Christ.
In other words, the liturgy of the church is important and helpful for instructing us in the doctrine of the Church, but the liturgy is not infallible and is under the Word of God.
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Thank you Mrs. Webfoot!
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Robert,
“So belief in the Trinity isn’t based on reason working with divine revelation?”
Faith works with reason. Reason gets you 2+2=4. It’s not faith working with reason that gets you 2+2=4. Supernatural truths are supernatural (above nature), not natural.
“Where does Christ say this is the purpose of non-inspired NC teachers.”
Timothy and Silas were not inspired, yet classed with Apostolic authority per Paul. The 70 sent out had divine authority in teaching, yet were not inspired. Apostolic succession in the NT (and now) confers apostolic and divine authority, without conferring inspiration.
“So Rome’s declaration of canon is unnecessary and pointless, then?”
Not pointless. Not strictly necessary though since M is only one leg, and ST are others – the church wasn’t waiting in hibernation to operate until hippo/carthage came out with their lists, or Trent. But I still have not seen how SS is supposed to be a coherent rule of faith or function properly without an infallible identified canon.
“So Genesis wasn’t Scripture until Jesus said so”
Genesis was Scripture before Jesus said so. The Trinity was divine revelation before Nicea.
“and the Jews had no reason to accept it as such until 1 A.D.?”
Of course they had reason to accept it. Christ held them accountable to the prophets and to the fallible authorities.
“And still waiting for where Christ says that what sets the NC apart is that the divinely instituted authorities no longer are fallible?”
Christ’s promises regarding the church’s divine authority, protection, guidance into truth are not the only thing that set the NC apart.
“So if Christ had never pointed it out, the Jews would have been justified to follow the leaders in everything he did condemn?”
If Christ had never pointed it out, they’re following or not following of teachings would never rise above opinion. That’s why you get the warring sects within Judaism in NT times concerning interpretations and teachers to follow. But thank you for arguing once again Christ’s claims were useless and unnecessary.
“Not when the canon precedes the church. See the Old Testament.”
So Jews discerned Israel from the canon? What? There are churches that don’t share your OT canon. The NT canon did not precede the church, by definition. You keep begging the question.
“But in any case, what you are telling me is that what the church teaches cannot change but you have no real way of knowing whether the church is what it says it is.”
I have no idea how you concluded I have no real way of knowing whether the church is what it says it is. I said, “Yep. That doesn’t mean any teaching the church then proposes must be provisional, just as it didn’t mean for an NT believer that any teaching Christ/Apostles then proposes must be provisional. If it was, that means I didn’t actually submit to the claims of authority in the first place. In Protestantism, any teaching the church(es) proposes is provisional, including its teaching on the canon, rule of faith, and attendant doctrines.” An NT believer, an RC believer, and a Protestant believer are all fallible. That is irrelevant to the point.
“When Rome can claim the requisite inspiration that Jesus and the Apostles had, then we can talk.”
Another evasion. Your argument was “Rome might have not changed supposed irreformable dogma, but that doens’t mean she won’t in the future”. I showed how such a claim undermines Christ and the Apostles claims. We get it – you don’t think infallibility or teaching that is divinely protected from error can happen without inspiration – you’ve never argued why that’s somehow impossible, but that’s fine – you can hold to that for this conversation. All I’m asking is for you to is grant Rome’s claims to divine authority and infallibility without inspiration as true. Does that give you an advantage, despite your personal fallibility and lack of omniscience? Yes, as you already admitted before.
“Translation: James has no answer. And actually, I’m always putting faith in other authorities, not saving faith, but trust that they got it right. Same kind of trust I put in the church. Not the kind of trust that makes the church the Savior. I’m not Roman Catholic.”
Um, the answer is you’re doubling down on equating supernatural and natural revelation. That’s why you double down on “everything always remains provisional and probable”. Supernatural and divine revelation is taken on the authority of another, by definition – as was already noted above by Cath Ency (the thing that apparently “isn’t really helpful”): “The term natural certitude is sometimes used in another sense, in contradistinction from the certitude of Divine faith, which is supernatural certitude, and which, according to theologians generally, is greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err.”
This is why I charged you with Pelagianism and rationalism. And yet you double-down on it, just like sdb did earlier. This is why Protestantism never offers anything more than opinion and why conservative Protestantism is just liberal Protestantism waiting to happen – it’s baked into the system at the start.
“Again, Protestants don’t place their faith in the church.”
No, they irrationally (that’s the other side of the coin) place their faith in admitted provisional opinions.
“Rome offers dogma that can’t change but you peons in the pew have no clue as to whether you ever get it right because you’re fallible vs. Protestants offer dogma that can change but you peons in the pew have no clue as to whether you ever get it right because you’re fallible. Yep there’s an advantage there. Not for me. Not for you.”
Well at least we finally made some progress in the “advantage” question. So NT believers who followed Christ and the Apostles in their teaching and authority had no epistemological advantage over those who followed a random synagogue rabbi offering admitted provisional teaching because adherents in both systems are fallible right? Therefore, Christ and the Apostles claims to authority and infallibility were useless and unnecessary right?
“Yes, they’re called the promises of God. They’re found in Scripture.”
Scripture whose identification remains only a matter of opinion for your confessions – so we have more cart before the horse. Can you point me where God promises his teaching church to “not get things right, but might get things right later”? What a majestic guarantee and foundation. And why is the canon and SS magically exempt from reflecting something that wasn’t gotten right? It isn’t, which is why it is only offered as provisional opinion by your confessions and bodies. And yet this is somehow proposed as a coherent system calling for the assent of faith.
“What if you’re wrong about Rome? All you get is unchanging error that you can never know is error or not.”
Again, grant Rome’s claims are true. I don’t run into self-defeating positions like you posited that I pointed out (“There’s no reason for that particular foundational teaching [ie. you have infallible assurance you don’t get things right, but might get things right later] to be an exception, thus it self-defeats. And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where things are “gotten right” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right”). Grant Protestantism’s claims are true, we get your position. See the difference yet?
“It’s called now we see through a glass darkly, then in heaven face to face. You’re giving me more over realized eschatology”
Joe during NT times: “Excuse me Christ and the Apostles, don’t you know we see through a glass darkly? Why are you giving all these infallible teachings I’m supposed to accept given my fallibility?” We do see through a glass darkly – that’s why the assent of faith is the assent of … faith. But I have no reason to give that assent to Protestant claims – either I’m just giving it to admitted provisional opinions, or I’m giving it to mathematical proofs which obviously don’t need “faith” – a mathematical proof compels assent due to natural reason, a supernatural truth can be shown to be reasonable, but cannot compel assent, as the Cath Ency also pointed out – that’s what makes an act of faith virtuous.
“Knowing that the dogma won’t change even though I can have no assurance that I ever have it correct because of my own fallibility doesn’t seem to be a meaningful advantage at the end of the day. ”
NT believers were fallible, again. Christ and the Apostles offered infallible, not provisional, teaching, again. No advantage for them apparently.
“As Brandon (I think, maybe it was Jeff) has pointed out, Newman flubbed the uniqueness of the Apostolic claim so much that I take this as a complement.”
That’s lovely. You go on about not understanding “certitude of faith”. I cite Cath Ency, Newman, and Aquinas in response to your “honest question”. You don’t even bother showing evidence you assimilate them or interacted with them, based on your arguments and continued red herrings.
“Newman is your shining light and he can’t get that what set Xty apart was the cross? I pity you.”
Thanks for the pity. Newman’s article was concerning private judgment, hence his focus will be on that regard – Brandon was replying to a couple of sentences and disregarding the larger point made in the citations I provided he ignored. He also wrote on justification if you actually care to get his thought on the matter, but I’m not optimistic.
“What’s the alternative, becoming unthinking members of a cult that follow a teacher that claims uninspired infallible authority whenever he says but never actually gives us a list of all that has been taught?”
Were NT believers unthinking members of a cult? Did Christ and the Apostles and successors walk around with a list of infallible teachings they kept updating and handing out to people? No, and yet they still had authority and infallibility, and their adherents were still fallible. By assenting to their claims, adherents could not think of their current and future teaching as provisional or probable (doing so would nullify the claims to authority they supposely assented to in the first place), but rather had to think of them as irreformable and infallible (doing so is consistent with the claims they assented to in the first place).
“And if there’s not possibility of further refinement”
So SS can apparently function with books being removed, added, and passages being chucked.
“Sure Christ and the Apostles can. And infallible assurance enables Protestants to do so as well.”
Infallible assurance enables Protestants to distinguish divine revelation from opinion and for definitive and normative judgments to be had? Where has this ever happened? WCF didn’t do it with its disclaimers. Your assemblies and pastors don’t do it with their disclaimers. Semper reformanda.
“Joe does because Christ and the Apostles have the inspiration. Rome denies that it possesses the inspiration, so if you want Christ and the Apostles to be the model, Rome doesn’t offer an advantage.”
Game over. Joe is fallible. You claim because we’re all fallible, there’s no advantage that can be had. Now you’re shifting to, well Rome doesn’t have inspiration. Different game.
“Rome has a trivial advantage unless and until it can provide infallible assurance/certainty that its own claims are true.”
Did you read what you responded to? Protestantism: “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”.
Rome: “the living teaching office of the Church, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ. This teaching office is not above the word of God, but serves it, teaching only what has been handed on, listening to it devoutly, guarding it scrupulously and explaining it faithfully in accord with a divine commission and with the help of the Holy Spirit, it draws from this one deposit of faith everything which it presents for belief as divinely revealed …. For all of what has been said about the way of interpreting Scripture is subject finally to the judgment of the Church, which carries out the divine commission and ministry of guarding and interpreting the word of God.”
Grant both claims are true. Who has the advantage? Which one has the ability to differentiate and judge divine revelation from opinion?
“I’m not the one making Christ and the Apostles’ claims useless and unnecessary.
-Does not follow since even you put Christ and the Apostles in a different category (in theory)”
Um, it follows because your entire argument is “everyone’s fallible, therefore Rome’s claims can’t and don’t matter”.
“Yes. And Protestants agree that divine revelation is infallible and irreformable.”
And yet every teaching it offers is couched in “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. That’s the problem.
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Brandon, “Whereas a Protestant confession cannot bind the conscience except per accidens, (i.e. unless one is already bound in conscience by the interpretation contained in that confession), a divinely authorized magisterium binds the conscience per se, that is, by the divine authority it has within itself.”
That’s funny. The divine interpreters don’t say that and won’t do that — bind consciences.
So it’s sort of like arguing for Apples OS over Microsoft — all the while shrugging over what the ones with apostolic authority really do.
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Susan, “What I dont understand is what is the principled reason by which Protestants deny this apostolicity?”
You answered yourself: “”Paul warns in Eph., Gal., Col. as does Jesus at the end of the sermon on the mount, as does St. Jude that people would deceive and this would cause their hearers to depart from the apostles.”
When was the last time a pope warned against not following the apostles? When was the last time James Young argued for apostolic infallibility?
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Mermaid, you are entirely predictable and haven’t at all considered what division means.
You have unity but internal disunity. If someone tries to bring about internal unity, one part of the church goes.
So to have a church that is striving for holiness, a disciplined church, is to have division. You want unity, you get priest scandals.
How’s that working for you.
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Jeff,
“Jesus’ teachings weren’t provisionally true until Peter believed Him. And they didn’t become untrue when “many” no longer followed Him. ”
Correct.
“His teachings were true without regard to assent. Peter, meanwhile, had provisional knowledge and understanding of those teachings.”
True again. And the same applied to their followers, even as those followers were fallible.
“The provisionality of (1) will always make (3) less than certain. It could be, after all, that Joe has been mistaken about the church all along. In fact, I think he is!”
This is what I meant by “if he did, that would nullify the assent given in the first place.” (1) may be false. But if (1) is granted as true and assented to by Joe, then to *be consistent* with that assent, Joe cannot take 3 as provisional – if he did, he would nullify the claims to authority/ability he was supposedly assenting to in 1 in the first place – he never actually assented in faith. Just as an NT believer would not be justified (if we replace “Church” in your example with Christ/Apostles) in holding (3) as provisional after assenting to (1). The nature of the claims in (1) is what warrants the assent and certitude of faith that then apply to (3). I never get that in Protestantism, based on the nature of the claims it makes (or rather lacks/rejects) in its (1) (e.g. Whatever the church teaches may or may not be true, or is highly likely to be true, etc). Provisionality and probable opinions are not compatible with divine revelation, irreformable and infallible by definition.
As sdb helpfully noted, do an internal critique of both systems (i.e. grant both systems’ claims as true). See what happens.
sdb,
“Just as the identification of the “true church” is provisional in yours. ”
I said “The infallibility of the Scriptures, as well as the identification of it, are themselves provisional teachings and opinions in your system.” I said, “in your system”. Everyone is fallible, as has been repeated ad nauseum by both sides here. Just as fallible NT believers identified Christ/Apostles and chose to submit to them. When they submitted, or an RC submits, it is not the case that “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” as it is in yours. Your position is compatible and consistent with your system and its disclaimers. It is not compatible with the faith during apostolic times and the RC system – the citation from Dei Verbum I provided to Robert was to help demonstrate that.
“I didn’t say that the teaching of the extent and scope of the Bible is not doctrine. I said it wasn’t one among many – it is foundational.”
Right, you have many foundational doctrines. Extent and scope of the bible, it is inerrant, it is inspired, it is closed and public revelation ended with death of last apostle, it is sufficient and final ultimate authority and perspicuous (i.e. SS). But there is no reason to take these foundational doctrines as different in kind to any other doctrine proposed by Protestantism. Your confessions teach all of these foundational doctrines, yet still have their disclaimers. There is no reason to exempt these foundational doctrines from those disclaimers or your position that “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” and Jeff’s agreement that the teaching of the extent and scope of the canon in Protestantism is a provisional one. Hence there is no way to authoritatively or normatively judge and differentiate opinion from divine revelation – everything remains a matter of provisional, highly likely, probable, opinion. Semper reformanda.
“Yes. I can misidentify scripture just as you can misidentify the church.”
Sure I could misidentify the church, just as someone during NT times could misidentify Christ/Apostles as divine authorities. But that’s never been relevant to the point of the argument or showing the differences in the two systems and what they can yield.
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Darryl,
When was the last time a pope argued for apostolic authority? That’s the whole “Catholic” thing, until someone tried to make it a small “c”.
But that’s okay that you dont get it yet. I like you just the same:)
Brandon,
I will have to answer you later. I have homework right now.
I appreciate the conversation though.
God Bless!
Susan
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b, sd, James Young writes: “Sure I could misidentify the church, just as someone during NT times could misidentify Christ/Apostles as divine authorities. But that’s never been relevant to the point of the argument or showing the differences in the two systems and what they can yield.”
See. We’ve built a better box, entered it, closed it on ourselves, and we don’t need to worry about real people.
But at least the box keeps Pope Francis out of Bryan and the James’ happy place.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 28, 2015 at 4:22 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, you are entirely predictable and haven’t at all considered what division means.
You have unity but internal disunity. If someone tries to bring about internal unity, one part of the church goes.
So to have a church that is striving for holiness, a disciplined church, is to have division. You want unity, you get priest scandals.
How’s that working for you.>>>>
You can’t do it. You cannot justify the splintering of Calvinism from the Bible as the only infallible rule of faith and practice. Explain to me what unity means. Exegete Ephesians 4:1-6. Did Calvin intend for that to happen?
Remember, the Catholic Church burned down long ago in your understanding. For you, she should be irrelevant.
Why do you put such a low value on unity even within your own allegedly like-minded congregations? Can you justify it biblically, which is your only infallible rule of faith and practice?
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Darryl,
Again, to take your metaphor – it’s not a “better” box. The difference is in kind, not degree. Protestantism can’t provide the box at all.
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James Young, Christ didn’t call us to build a box and live inside it to avoid reality. But if you want to live in there, go ahead. It’s not clear why you should be on the internet.
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Mermaid, because unity means so little to the ones who prate on about it.
I’ve yet to hear you register one idea about the Synod of Bishops and what transpired.
If I had your husband’s address, I’d warn him that you’re holed up in the box with James Young.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 28, 2015 at 4:22 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, you are entirely predictable and haven’t at all considered what division means.
You have unity but internal disunity. If someone tries to bring about internal unity, one part of the church goes.
Wrong. The great dissenters have reformed the Church from within. The do-it-yourselfers just pick up a Bible and wing it. That’s how you get 1000s of versions of Christianity. It’s how you get Mark Driscolls by the sackful.
So to have a church that is striving for holiness, a disciplined church, is to have division. You want unity, you get priest scandals.
That’s not even logical, nor does it explain why you follow a religion so radically different from the Eastern Orthodox, who have nothing to do with the priest scandals.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 28, 2015 at 5:22 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, because unity means so little to the ones who prate on about it.
I’ve yet to hear you register one idea about the Synod of Bishops and what transpired.
Dr. Calvinism: A Calvinism’s actual knowledge of a 2000-year-old institution is confined to what he reads in the morning paper.
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The Little Mermaid
Posted October 28, 2015 at 4:53 pm | Permalink
D. G. Hart
Posted October 28, 2015 at 4:22 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, you are entirely predictable and haven’t at all considered what division means.
You have unity but internal disunity. If someone tries to bring about internal unity, one part of the church goes.
So to have a church that is striving for holiness, a disciplined church, is to have division. You want unity, you get priest scandals.
How’s that working for you.>>>>
You can’t do it. You cannot justify the splintering of Calvinism from the Bible as the only infallible rule of faith and practice. Explain to me what unity means. Exegete Ephesians 4:1-6. Did Calvin intend for that to happen?
Dr. A. Calvinism schooled again by the nice Catholic Lady. “Predictable” indeed.
http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/06/how-john-calvin-made-me-a-catholic/
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CVD,
I don’t take it personally, and I know you’re valiantly taking on multiple people, but I’m curious if you’re not responding because you’re overwhelmed and/or disinterested in taking up issues with me or because I”m not actually understanding what you’re saying. If it’s the latter, perhaps you could point me in the direction of something from Newman or Aquinas that you believe would be good to chew on.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 28, 2015 at 3:55 pm | Permalink
Susan, “What I dont understand is what is the principled reason by which Protestants deny this apostolicity?”
You answered yourself: “”Paul warns in Eph., Gal., Col. as does Jesus at the end of the sermon on the mount, as does St. Jude that people would deceive and this would cause their hearers to depart from the apostles.”
Um. That’s you. You have zero claim to apostolic succession. None. Even if every demurral about Peter/the papacy is true, there’s a 1500-year gap between you and the apostles.
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Brandon Addison
Posted October 28, 2015 at 5:58 pm | Permalink
CVD,
I don’t take it personally, and I know you’re valiantly taking on multiple people, but I’m curious if you’re not responding because you’re overwhelmed and/or disinterested in taking up issues with me or because I”m not actually understanding what you’re saying. If it’s the latter, perhaps you could point me in the direction of something from Newman or Aquinas that you believe would be good to chew on.
Mr. Addison, if I may, I think you’ll enjoy this.
http://www.firstthings.com/article/2015/10/newman-for-protestants
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Mr. Addison, my apologies: The article is behind the First Things paywall [$1.99]. However, you might find it worth it. The article is by the estimibly civilized Carl Trueman, and remains thoroughly Reformed to the end.
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TVD:
Dr. A. Calvinism schooled again by the nice Catholic Lady. “Predictable” indeed.>>>>>
See, I believed in the whole sola scriptura thing, and believed it was something real. Yes, I know they say it is the only infallible rule of faith and practice, but there are other fallible rules they follow.
What good is a fallible rule that teaches people to ignore, twist, or reinterpret key passages of the infallible rule?
No, that doesn’t prove Catholicism correct, but it does show the fatal flaw in sola scriptura. That is actually what splinters Protestantism. Everyone has a different idea about what the infallible rule means.
Jeff has tried to appeal to rules of logic and new perspectives on the Greek lexicon in order to prop up his theology. Where is that in the Bible?
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vd, t, “Dr. Calvinism: A Calvinism’s actual knowledge of a 2000-year-old institution is confined to what he reads in the morning paper.”
You left out Edgardo Mortara.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 28, 2015 at 6:48 pm | Permalink
vd, t, “Dr. Calvinism: A Calvinism’s actual knowledge of a 2000-year-old institution is confined to what he reads in the morning paper.”
You left out Edgardo Mortara.
And the Rosary, now that we’ve corrected your confusion on that. 😉
Edgardo Mortara > therefore…?
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Brandon,
Your last post addressed to me was Oct 22. Is that what you wanted a reply to? In it, you said:
“Me: Why should someone settle for such arbitration to remain impossible and a hopeless endeavor?
– They shouldn’t and Protestants don’t. Thankfully, the Word of God is the means by which our fallible interpretations are continually measured.”
My response was due to you saying:
“This is a classic case of the tail wagging the dog. Protestantism doesn’t claim the church is infallible therefore everything falls apart in the system. Constantinople is a little better (they claim “Apostolic Succession”) but they do not have a means by which to arbitrate disagreement among bishops, therefore it is false. This leaves you with Rome and a means to arbitrate between opinion and divine revelation. Rome has an epistemic (noumenal) mechanism to help us understand the ontology of Divine revelation (phenomenal).”
Since you left it at that, it seemed to me you were indicating Protestantism does not have a means to arbitrate between opinion and divine revelation, since you then went on to try to deflate Rome’s claims (“In the real world though, these claims become significantly more complicated.”) rather than affirming and countering Protestantism can indeed meet Rome on its own grounds and provide the means. But then you replied above saying yes Protestantism does have the means – the Word of God. But as I keep laboriously going over with everyone here, upon closer examination that actually ends up not being the case. But you at least seemed to grasp and appreciate the point in contrast being made given your recent reply to sdb.
“Also, you need to retire the semper reformanda mantra.”
We already went over this. SR in Rcism is not analogous to SR in Protestantism – the quotes I provided from WCF, Horton, and Winters on SR are consistent with Protestantism’s claims, not with RCism.
You then said regarding 2 sentences out of the many I cited of Newman in trying to help give another angle in explaining how the RC system differs in kind from Protestantism this:
“But the claim that the peculiarity of the Apostolic faith was submission to a living authority is quite a whopper. The pecularity of the Apostolic faith was the “foolishness of the Gospel,” that God would become incarnate and die on a tree. *that* was the peculiarity of the Apostolic faith.”
The two are not mutually exclusive. It is undeniable the NT witness endorses submission and assent to the Apostles’ living authority in faith, consistent with the claims to authority they were making. There was no hedging bets, provisional and highly likely teachings, arguing and debating them afterwards, semper reformanda, etc.
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Cletus,
I may respond to the other stuff later, but I’ve been trying to lay out a basic framework to figure out why you think Rome gives you something Protestantism doesn’t because honestly, it makes no sense to me.
Cletus and the Protestants agree:
1. That divine revelation exists
2. That divine revelation is infallible
3. That the individual fallibly identifies the revelation
4. That the individual fallibly interprets the revelation or the dogmatic summary of the revelation
Where we disagree:
1. That without an infallible identifier of divine revelation, you cannot separate truth from opinion and everything remains provisional.
Your conclusions:
A. By Protestants rejecting the need for an infallible institution, they are either making Christ’s claims unnecessary or superfluous.
B. By Protestants stating that our fallibility somehow negates the advantage Rome as an infallible identifier provides, we are somehow suggesting that defined infallible dogma doesn’t exist.
B. certainly does not follow. It is possible to believe that infallible dogma does exist without being able to infallibly identify it. In fact, this is where you are. You believe that Roman defined infallible dogma does exist; however, you do not believe that you can infallibly identify the scope of that dogma. The very best you’ve been able to give is one dogma, but as Tom has well demonstrated, even that is up for debate. He doesn’t believe the Assumption or transubstantiation are part of the infallible dogma that must be affirmed for salvation. So where’s the advantage? If fallibility means bondage to provisionality, you are as provisional in your apprehension of truth after you submit to Rome because you are fallible. In fact, I don’t see how your statement that Rome claims to define things infallibly is anything more than a provisional. You are fallible. Maybe you’ve misunderstood the claims Rome makes. There are certainly many practicing RCs that don’t think Rome claims infallibility for itself.
A. certainly does not seem to follow either. The fact that we do not believe an institution must be selectively infallible does not make the claims of Christ superfluous or unnecessary. The infallibility has its locus in Christ, not the church. Then you raise the question, “But how do you know what Christ said?” And my answer is I don’t know that infallibly/have infallible certainty because I am fallible, though I would claim infallible assurance. But that is not a problem unique to me because due to your fallibility, you cannot know infallibly what the church has declared as infallible, unchanging dogma.
On the one hand, you seem to agree with that, but then you say you don’t agree with that because Rome is infallible. By assenting to her claims you don’t lose your fallibility but you gain the ability to discern unchanging truth from provisional opinion. But what is not at all clear is HOW do YOU gain that ability to discern truth/articles of faith from opinion if you remain fallible after the assent. That’s the hang up I simply cannot get past, so either I’m dense, you aren’t explaining things very well, or the advantage is a chimera. So help me out. HOW do YOU have an advantage if your knowledge of Rome, what it has defined, and even what its precise claims are remain provisional due to your fallibility.
As SDB has asked, what advantage does adding an infallible middleman give you if you remain fallible? Why is it an advantage to trust the church as an infallible definer but not to trust the Scriptures as an infallible source.
1. One of your answers is: “But how can you trust the Scriptures if Protestantism hasn’t infallibly identified the scope of them?” My answer is that even if Protestantism were to do that that, my own fallibility means my knowledge of that canon is provisional, at least in theory. But that is the same predicament you face as a Roman Catholic since you are fallible, so it is unclear to me HOW you have an advantage. You can look at a list that Rome has given, but there is no guarantee that you’ll get the list right, understand it correctly, etc. But you still claim that you have an advantage. HOW, if when Rome speaks you don’t become infallible?
2. I’ve said that there is no advantage because Jesus could rightly expect the Jews to know Genesis was Scripture even though the book never makes the claim for itself and there is no infallible declaration of its status prior to Jesus making it. In other words, Jesus doesn’t talk to the Jews as if they could only know Genesis was Scripture in a non-provisional way until after he said so. Your response has been: That infallible declaration isn’t needed because Judaism wasn’t a sola Scriptura religion. That claim is quite debatable and seems to reflect your misunderstanding of SS. But let’s just accept it at face value. HOW does having an oral Torah mean you don’t need an infallible declaration to know Genesis is Scripture in a non-provisional way?
3. The argument seems to undercut everything you have said about your authority/rule of faith being a three-legged stool. The only one of these legs that has been infallibly defined in Roman Catholicism is the extent of Scripture (but that’s a provisional claim on my part and on your part because we’re both fallible). There is no canon of all infallible dogma. There is no canon of tradition. HOW is it impossible to hold to SS as a rule of faith without an infallible canon declaration but not impossible to hold to the three-legged stool as a rule of faith without a declared infallible canon of tradition (which would include the full scope of tradition and all infallibly declared dogma)? That seems like a double standard and to make the real rule of faith the Magisterium. Want to know what is infallible, ask the Magisterium. Don’t ask Scripture or tradition. Ask the Magisterium to interpret for you. In fact, I don’t see what the value is in knowing tradition or Scripture is in Roman Catholicism. Just get the list of dogma from the Magisterium and go to mass?
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Or Cletus, to put it briefly:
According to Cletus, fallibility = provisional opinion, ergo all Protestants (because their church is fallible) have is provisional opinion.
But why do you have more than provisional opinion if you are fallible? You can’t infallibly identify Rome (because you are fallible). You can’t infallibly know that Rome has declared the Assumption or the Trinity infallibly (because you are fallible and fallibility=provisional opinion).
It seems to me that unless you can yourself become infallible, all you have is the provisional opinion that Rome is infallible and the provisional opinion that doctrines such as the Assumption have been infallibly defined. You can’t get out of your fallibility, can you?
Even if we grant that Rome can infallibly define dogma, I’m not clear as to the personal advantage when you can’t infallibly identify which dogmas have been so defined.
The whole approach seems to be employ a radical skepticism to make the Protestant doubt the validity of his beliefs but then provide a solution that doesn’t really address the fundamental problem that if applied consistently should make everyone doubt their beliefs, even Roman Catholics.
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Robert,
Here’s an example of infallibility at work: Seeker who can believe that Jesus is God, now wants to know which view of the Lord’s Supper is the correct one. Calvinist church’s answer, “ours”; Lutheran church’s answer, “ours”; Community Bible Church’s answer, “ours”. Rome that isnt a denomination has one view.
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Robert,
This scenario plays out the same way for the people who are reached by different missionaries. If a Calvinst shares Christ with them and then stays among them teaching them Calvinism, the person believes that Calvinism is the true church. What is their answer if they say, “hey you all say your bringing the gospel to us but you then convert us into your different churches. Who is telling us the truth?”
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Susan,
I said a prayer for your neck BTW. 🙂
I don’t think your examples answer my question. For CVD, and presumably you, fallibility=provisionality=bad. If I accept that, what advantage does Rome give me if it does not take away my fallibility? My identification of what Rome has said is just as provisional as it was before because I’m fallible.
IOW, it seems that for Rome to offer an advantage, it has to overcome what you all claim is the inherent provisionality of Protestantism. But the problem is, even if we accept Rome’s claims as true, you as an individual never get out of provisionality because you remain fallible and to be fallible is to be provisional.
So Rome might declare something infallibly, but how can you be sure that what you have identified as what Rome has declared is infallible corresponds to what Rome has actually declared? You are fallible. How is your assertion that Rome has infallibly declared the Assumption nothing more than a provisional opinion on your part?
This is what I honestly don’t get. All this electronic ink spilled to prove that Rome eliminates the supposed faults of provisionality but Rome can never take away your provisionality unless and until you can say that becoming Roman Catholic made you infallible. It all seems to be a bunch of theory that never touches the ground. The system can distinguish truth from opinion because it is infallible. The adherents of the system cannot because they are fallible and, in principle, can only trust in their provisional opinion of what Rome has taught because, remember, fallibility=provisionality=bad.
Does that make sense?
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Susan, CVD, et al,
IOW, this is what I am hearing from CVD:
“Poor Protestant, all you have is provisional opinion because your system doesn’t claim infallibility for itself and you are fallible.”
“RCism is better because you as a fallible individual have only a provisional opinion of a system that claims infallibility for itself, but even that claim is the provisional opinion of the individual as to what Rome has actually said and means because the individual is fallible.”
IOW, if fallibility means all you are left with is provisional opinion, how is your belief that Rome has claimed infallibility for itself anything more than your provisional opinion given that you are fallible. How are you not trusting in your provisional opinion that Rome has claimed infallibility for itself any less in my provisional opinion that Jesus has claimed to be God?
The disconnect is the HOW. How are you at an advantage if you remain fallible. That’s the question I want someone to answer. And further, if you remain fallible, how is your suggestion of the advantage anything more than your provisional opinion?
I don’t get why it is better to trust in your own provisional fallible opinion of an infallible interpreter than it is to trust in your own provisional fallible opinion of a fallible interpreter. I don’t see where there is any inherent advantage unless and until my individual fallibility is overcome. This is the where the rubber meets the road aspect of the CTC apologetic doesn’t add up. Hence Darryl’s box comment.
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Robert,
Awww, thank you so very much! I haven’t read anything else you said yet. I was touched and blessed to hear you say that you prayed for me.
Now to read the rest. But whatever our differences I call you friends.
I used to think Sean was a real mean one, but he isn’t at all. I find myself praying for all of you guys so much of my day.
I am very find of you all( date I say “love”?. Yes I do)
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Susan
Posted October 28, 2015 at 8:56 pm | Permalink
Robert,
Here’s an example of infallibility at work: Seeker who can believe that Jesus is God, now wants to know which view of the Lord’s Supper is the correct one. Calvinist church’s answer, “ours”; Lutheran church’s answer, “ours”; Community Bible Church’s answer, “ours”. Rome that isn’t a denomination has one view.
You just revealed the trick–Catholicism isn’t a “denomination.” There is Catholicism, and then there is a motley assortment of Bibleistic not-Catholic denominations.
The trick in these discussions is making an equivalency between Catholicism and Protestant denomination X, and Y, and also Z and Q too, as though “everybody’s entitled to their Biblical-theological opinion. They certainly don’t treat each other that way! Indeed, even within Presbyterianism, the PC-USA and the OPC aren’t even on theological speaking terms.
So Catholics are supposed to meet the OPC on equal terms when Lutherans and Anglicans and Eastern Orthodox also think the OPC and the PC-USA and whatnot Presbyterians are completely bogus on the Eucharist and apostolic succession [no matter how much Presbyterians, even Carl Trueman, protest that they’re essentially the same].
So basically you’re trying to have a definitive and authoritative conversation with a Reformation of the Reformation of the Reformation that has no definition or authority.
Susan
Posted October 28, 2015 at 9:02 pm | Permalink
What is their answer if they say, “hey you all say your bringing the gospel to us but you then convert us into your different churches. Who is telling us the truth?”
All of them. None of them. Who knows? All they agree on is their disagreements with the Catholic Church–and they even disagree on their disagreements!
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Robert
Posted October 28, 2015 at 9:52 pm | Permalink
Susan, CVD, et al,
IOW, this is what I am hearing from CVD:
“Poor Protestant, all you have is provisional opinion because your system doesn’t claim infallibility for itself and you are fallible.”
None of you refute or even deny this premise. Your church has no authority, and each man left on his own with his “unassisted reason” can at best see through the glass darkly.
You have set your version of the Christian religion upon this sand.
The Catholic argument agrees that man’s unassisted reason is fallen [and thus unreliable] and this is precisely why Jesus left behind a Church, not a “faith.” Yes, it’s called the Catholic “faith,” but part of that “faith” is that Jesus left behind a catholic church, not just a theology.
You’re not on your own. You don’t have to learn the original Hebrew and ancient Greek to come up with a new “reformed” theology that will correct all the errors of the past 1000 or 2000 years.
Why would Christ leave his Church in such disarray? Where did he say he would? Why instead did he send the Spirit on Pentecost to descend on his up-’til-then completely useless apostles, just to have those tongues of fire amount to nothing?
The Reformation is more important than Pentecost in your theology, That’s what I don’t get. Only one of them is in the Bible.
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Robert,
The thing is, Rome doesn’t claim to be provisional, it claims to know by having an advantage above all others. This is what I would expect the church to have. What good are provisional statements about things Christianity is having infighting over? Actually, provisionality calls into question, even those doctrines that you thought you could stake your life over, because it works the same way in retro.
I want to know the mind of God on all the different doctrines that the rest of Christendom is always in disagreement about. If I beg for Jesus’ to teach me, does he tell me to choose among churches or does he tell me to trust those whom he appointed? And the appointed of apostles is not something. In question, is it?
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Robert, don’t forget, Protestants still have way more infallible teaching than Roman Catholics. The Bible vs. papal infallibility and the bodily assumption of Mary. Book to two.
We win.
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Susan, here’s another. Roman Catholic who doesn’t think going to mass is important. No one is telling him he’s in trouble.
So much for infallibility.
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Susan, it also hurts you. Why did 33 bishops oppose language at the Synod on the Family that rejected gay marriage. If they are successors to the apostles, if they have charism, if they are part of the magisterium, what happened? And are you at all confident of what those bishops are doing in their dioceses?
So what happens when Cincinnati is different from Lansing?
At least Lutherans and Calvinists believe the gospel.
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“Your church has no authority, and each man left on his own with his “unassisted reason” can at best see through the glass darkly” says the guy who doesn’t go to mass and denies one of the church’s only two infallible dogmas. Yes, Roman Catholics are so much better off.
vd, t, here‘s help. They left out the tenth — not going to mass.
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Susan, and what do you think the pope would say to you or your desire for permanency?
You need to catch up with your bishops.
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Tom,
None of you refute or even deny this premise.
I don’t think that is exactly right. We’ve all admitted a provisionality to human knowledge, but we’ve all denied that such amounts to all we have is our opinion that might or might not be right. At best we’ve said that “in principle” we could be wrong. But the thing is, the RC’s identification of Rome is provisional and every time a RC interprets what Rome has said, it is provisional because the individual RC is fallible. Remember fallible=all you have is provisional opinion. So I don’t see how RC can offer the infallibility of the church as anything more than their provisional opinion of what Rome has actually said. Maybe Rome really claims to be fallible? How can you know for sure if fallibility means provisional opinion? I mean, it is highly likely you are correct that Rome claims to be infallible, but since you are fallible, how do you know for sure?
Your church has no authority
Says who? Rome? We laugh in Rome’s direction.
and each man left on his own with his “unassisted reason” can at best see through the glass darkly.
1. Who says we’re left with our “unassisted reason”? Not us.
2. Paul says that on this side of eternity at best we see through the glass darkly, so this isn’t a knock. Why does Rome think it can claim more for us than what Paul does?
3. And even then, remember fallibility=provisionality. It is your provisional opinion that at best we can see through the glass darkly. And it is your provisional opinion that Rome claims infallibility for yourself. It is highly likely that it does but remember, fallibility-provisionality. So how can you be sure Rome claims infallibility for itself? How can you have the certainty of faith that such is what Rome claims as long as you are fallible and have nothing but provisionality.
You have set your version of the Christian religion upon this sand.
Your own version of the Christian religion is built on the sand of your provisional opinion that Rome claims infallibility for itself.
The Catholic argument agrees that man’s unassisted reason is fallen [and thus unreliable] and this is precisely why Jesus left behind a Church, not a “faith.” Yes, it’s called the Catholic “faith,” but part of that “faith” is that Jesus left behind a catholic church, not just a theology.
Actually this isn’t exactly right. Unassisted reason is good enough in Roman Catholicism to evaluate the motives of credibility and come to a highly likely but provisional opinion that Rome is the true church. So again, HOW does one move from provisional opinion to certainty if fallibility is what prevents us from having certainty?
Further, Protestantism agrees that Jesus left behind a church. The fact that we don’t believe the church has some guaranteed charism of infallibility doesn’t mean Jesus didn’t leave a church behind.
You’re not on your own. You don’t have to learn the original Hebrew and ancient Greek to come up with a new “reformed” theology that will correct all the errors of the past 1000 or 2000 years.
The fact that you think this is what the Reformation was all about shows that you don’t know what the Reformation was all about.
Why would Christ leave his Church in such disarray?
Why would Christ leave his Church with only provisional infallibility? Talk about disarray. The problem is your critiques can’t be answered by Rome. Besides, it’s just your provisional and fallible opinion that the church is in disarray, and it is your provisional opinion that Rome says it has guaranteed infallibility in certain cases. Remember, provisionality=falliblity and uncertainty. Until you become infallible, all you can put your trust in is your provisional opinion of what Rome has said.
You’re proving it. You believe the Assumption is nonessential. Other RCs believe it is essential. Provisional, provisional.
Where did he say he would? Why instead did he send the Spirit on Pentecost to descend on his up-’til-then completely useless apostles, just to have those tongues of fire amount to nothing?
Why does a fallible church mean amount to nothing? Confessional Protestants are doing just fine maintaining orthodoxy, thank you very much. Meanwhile, the majority of rank and file RCs approve of contraception and homosexual marriage.
Further, there was no infallible body before Pentecost. Why did God leave the Jews so clueless. Poor God, didn’t know what he was doing?
Of course, it’s jus
The Reformation is more important than Pentecost in your theology, That’s what I don’t get. Only one of them is in the Bible.
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Tom,
Where did he say he would? Why instead did he send the Spirit on Pentecost to descend on his up-’til-then completely useless apostles, just to have those tongues of fire amount to nothing?
Why does a fallible church mean amount to nothing? Confessional Protestants are doing just fine maintaining orthodoxy, thank you very much. Meanwhile, the majority of rank and file RCs approve of contraception and homosexual marriage.
Further, there was no infallible body before Pentecost. Why did God leave the Jews so clueless. Poor God, didn’t know what he was doing?
Of course, it’s just your provisional opinion that a fallible church means Pentecost didn’t do anything. Just as it is your provisional opinion that Rome claims infallibility for itself. It is highly likely, but not guaranteed because remember, we’re all fallible and fallibility means provisional uncertainty.
The Reformation is more important than Pentecost in your theology, That’s what I don’t get. Only one of them is in the Bible.
What in the world are you talking about? One could just as well say that the Reformation is proof that Pentecost is working and that the Spirit continues with His church to correct it when it falls into error.
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Interesting post here this am http://thecripplegate.com/reformation-reminders-rome-her-desecration-of-christ/
“This Saturday, October 31, commemorates nearly 500 years since one of the greatest movements of God in church history; the Protestant Reformation”
“With one mind, God’s people discerned from Scripture that, tragically, Roman Catholicism was a desecration to the Lord Jesus Christ”
“To my evangelical and Catholic friends, it’s important that we no longer erroneously say that Roman Catholicism differs from Scripture only on minor points of doctrine and history.”
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Susan, so, let’s say we grant that Rome is better because she says she is. How come you don’t sound like Francis or Kasper or the majority of bishops? If Burke and Francis are at odds( and Burke says they are), how do you justify leaning in Burke’s direction? And I don’t mean theoretically or hypothetically but actually.
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Susan,
The thing is, Rome doesn’t claim to be provisional, it claims to know by having an advantage above all others.
But you are fallible, so all you’ve given me is your fallible, provisional opinion that Rome doesn’t claim to be provisional. Even if Rome presents the statement: “Rome is not provisional,” if I am fallible, I still only have provisional opinion that the statement actually means Rome is non-provisional.
This is what I honestly after all this time don’t get about the doubling down on provisionality, opinion, etc. as an inherent problem only for the Protestant. The RC apologetic among you guys here and at CTC is to complain about the provisionality of fallible knowledge being an inadequate grounding for faith but then you give me a system that at the end of the day does not purport to make me infallible. So it is not at all clear how Rome solves the problem for ME. I’m assenting to my provisional, fallible opinion in Romanism no less than in Protestantism. In fact, because I can’t get out of myself, at no point do I ever trust in anything except my own provisional opinion of Christ, the church, etc.
CVD’s typical retort is “Well, then the Jews following the provisional rabbi had no advantage over the people following Christ.” And my basic response is yes that is true for the individual Jew as long as fallibility=provisional opinion=bad. Because the individual Jew who submitted to Christ was no less fallible and no less apt to misunderstanding and no less apt to not having the ability to be corrected as the Jew who submitted to someone else. Where, then, is his advantage?
The problem goes away if you don’t double down on the need for human beings to be infallible, because that is really what you all are saying at the end of the day. I am fallible, therefore I don’t have a “principled way” to discern my opinion from truth. But submitting to Rome doesn’t change that. It’s not a “principled way” if my fallibility means that I can never get better than provisionally believing that Rome is infallible, or a provisional understanding that Rome has in fact infallibly defined the Trinity. I’m fallible. Maybe I’ve misunderstood Rome completely and Rome hasn’t made an infallible definition. I can ask a question for clarification, but I’m no less apt to fallibly and provisionally read the “yes” from the local bishop as I am the Nicene Creed.
What I’m saying is that the doubling down on infalliblity of the Magisterium at the end of the day doesn’t remove the provisionality and fallibility of the individual. So what have I accomplished by putting all my eggs in that basket.
In short, CVD and Bryan Cross and you suggest a problem that I never knew I had before, but then you don’t give me a way to actually solve it and escape everything being a matter of my provisional opinion. If fallibility and provisionality is an inadequate grounding for faith, then the only way you can solve it for ME is to somehow figure out a way to make my apprehension infallible. Otherwise, my assent to Rome is inherently provisional and that, as we know, is a bad thing according to you all.
This is what I would expect the church to have.
But is this expectation correct? See further down.
Also, what I see, particularly from you, is:
“I expect this from God, therefore if God is there he must have given it and if he hasn’t given it, then he must not be there or I have no hope of knowing him”
But there are all sorts of problems with that expectation. What if God says “Your expectation is arrogant and I refuse to comply?”
What good are provisional statements about things Christianity is having infighting over? Actually, provisionality calls into question, even those doctrines that you thought you could stake your life over, because it works the same way in retro.
But again, if you double down on this, my question is, “How is your assertion that the Trinity is not a provisional dogma anything more than your provisional opinion? And since we know provisional opinion is not a ground for faith according to what you all have said, what right do you have trusting in your provisional opinion that the dogma of the Trinity is not provisional, that the church is not provisional, etc.?”
I want to know the mind of God on all the different doctrines that the rest of Christendom is always in disagreement about. If I beg for Jesus’ to teach me, does he tell me to choose among churches or does he tell me to trust those whom he appointed? And the appointed of apostles is not something. In question, is it?
Yes, he tells you to trust those whom He has appointed. But that in no way guarantees that those whom he has appointed are infallible. This is the disconnect I think. You believe that the Apostles appointed successors. So do I. But it’s a big leap from that to, well if the Apostles appointed successors they must have a guaranteed charism of infallibility. I don’t see anywhere that the Apostles call us to submit without question to their successors. I don’t really see even that with the Apostles. Paul holds that it is possible at least in theory for the Apostles to teach a different doctrine (Galatians).
The only unqualified submission I see proposed is unqualified submission to God and Christ and what they have said. You want me to submit in an unqualified way to Rome, but even Rome does not claim that everything she has spoken is spoken with the voice of God.
I just can’t get past the severe disconnect that this philosophical assumption has with reality. It seems that we get “Well, certainly God would not leave us only with a fallible means to determine His will” but in fact we know he did that for the entire period of history leading up to Christ. Rome doesn’t believe the Jewish Magisterium was selectively infallible or that the oral Torah (if in fact it was the accepted Jewish practice to hold to the oral Torah as inspired, which is very debatable) is divine revelation. And even if it did, it doesn’t propose that the Jews infallibly determined the scope of Jewish belief.
Evidently, God was quite comfortable with granting us a fallible means of determining His will. It’s special pleading to say “Surely God wouldn’t do this.”
It all smacks of “This is ideal, therefore God must give it.” I’m sorry, but that comes across as a demand of God.
Why cannot I say “The ideal world would be to make not only His church infallible but to make us able to infallibly know what the church is,” therefore, individual human beings are all infallible in matters of dogma? I see no “principled reason” why this should not be the case.
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Robert, the U.S. says it’s the greatest nation on God’s green earth. That may explain why so many U.S. Roman Catholics agree.
All you need to do is claim it and you have it. The infallibility gospel.
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Good Morning Sean,
I think that Pope Francis’s thing is love and mercy, so I don’t see him opposed to Burke; I guess I need some actual( and very clear) proof that Francis would be a pope that wants to promote a uber liberal ideology.What I think I see is a man who has seen the marginalized and as a result he gets himself down in there with them just like Jesus would do. Burke appears, to our eyes, a middle class conservative, but that is only because we think in terms of social politcs that divides groups according to strict party lines rather than moral imperatives that unify human beings. I dont mean to say that Burke isn’t conservative, he is, but Francis isnt a political socialist in comparison either. I think people who want the church to change thought they saw their man in Pope Francis but there is opposite evidence that he’s interested in recognizing an upside down universe.
I dont think I identify as a follower of Burke or of Francis, I follow them only insofar as they follow Jesus.
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Susan, we could have a lively discussion about just how left leaning Francis is, and this isn’t about how Burke is perceived but what he’s said and how he’s been dealt with politically. Being given the Malta chair is tantamount to being posted in Siberia after crossing your superiors. But, it’s interesting that from an apologetic/polemical stance you and others argue audacity and principled means in the abstract but in practice you exercise a very provisional, flexible, sanctity of religious conscience priority, stance. I bring this up because my major pushback has never been that I can’t make the RC system, really the CtC paradigm, cohere, but that the outworkings of it, make you your own bishop and puts you in largely the same position as the soloists y’all decry. I could argue, even, that I take a lot more on the chin, from a submission to a subjugated authority(elders) than you do from an hypothetical, infallible authority in which that sort of submission only takes place on the chalkboard but when it comes to religious conscience, you engage the same discernment as the sincere or observant prot. Which is Ok, after a fashion, but renders your arguments not so much true, in reality, but just really round.
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Darryl, Sean, Robert,
I know you guys don’t see what I see as the only answer to the problem of disunity and heterodoxy, and so I need to work a little harder to try to explain how it is a corrective, but in the process of making attempts, I want you to know that I am never attacking you personally. I do not want to do that. I want to demolish systems that keep us separated, but if I lose the people that I sought friendship in the process, I will have not improved over the systems that divide us. Just wanted to mention this before I say anymore so that you understand my intention of goodwill.
You’ll hear from me later. I need to get some Ibuprofen now.
Have a great day!
Susan
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Sean,
Okay, I am getting what you mean and I intend to address it. After a bout of existential angst ( Thank you Kant) I even wondered what things within the field were my own bigotries or ideologies and what was the truth. Were times changing and were stances because Christianity was patriarchal in a way that supressed women, was it okay for two people of the same sex to come together? Was it all social construct? I didn’t want to be commited where I didn’t have toI, so what was informing me as a person who identified as Christian and said no way to homosexual union and woman’s ordination, and what was informing another person who also identified as a Christian yet didnt mind adopting an idea opposed to mine? I mean we both have our bibles and we both read them. In fact the woman who gets ordained knows the bible better than I do, she studied it in seminary.
That’s my rough draft. I need to spend longer on it, so I’m thankful that maybe we can talk about it more over time.
Bye Sean. Hope you have a wonderful day.
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Cletus,
You said,
No I concede that Protestants don’t have a mechanism to infallibly interpret Divine revelation, but I do believe we have a mechanism to differentiate opinion from divine revelation–Scripture. Your argument, if I’ve understood correctly, is that this is insufficient because we cannot infallibly know the infallible teaching. You grant the ontology of Scripture as God’s Word, but you deny that our epistemic position allows us to principally identify Divine teaching.
SR has a different *scope* for RCs but the concept is identical. Your point is that Protestants haven’t properly identified the extent of God’s Word. In other words, Protestants are failing on their own principles. If you want to continue arguing that being always and continually reformed to God’s Word is fallacious, that’s fine, but you won’t find many in your communion following you and your argument will fall on deaf ears with Protestants. As a matter of fact, it will reinforce a false impression that some Protestants have of RCism–it doesn’t value God’s Word. You and I both know that’s not true, but your argument isn’t helping the perception.
Finally, regarding Newman you said,
There is no debate about the Apostles possessing specific authority as those men commissioned by Jesus to spread the Gospel. But even they were confined to the Word of God as delivered by Jesus (I John 1:1-4; Gal 1:8-9). That’s why Scripture is identified as being sufficient to equip and enable the Christian for every good work (2 Tim. 3:16-17). So please, stop the “semper reformanda” shtick, it’s distracting.
In addition, we’re talking about the specific office of Apostle. Who else occupies this office today? If you want to argue the Apostolic office continues in some sense you can do that. As I’ve attempted to outline elsewhere (and intend to clarify and expand upon in the future), your biggest and brightest scholars agree with Protestant scholars that those claims cannot be taken seriously as history.
This leaves you in a precarious position given you current argument for Rome. If the Apostolic office has not continued, then you are left with one of two options: God did not intend for there to be an infallible interpreter of Divine revelation (hello Protestantism) *or* God does not exist (hello agnosticism/atheism).
Most of your Catholic colleagues don’t encounter the same tension, however, because they are not philosophically committed to the necessity of infallibility for the Christian religion. They may believe that this is a charism that God gifted the Church with, but they don’t make it the essence of their faith. I think that approach is far more healthy and far more widespread in your communion.
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Robert,
“1. That without an infallible identifier of divine revelation, you cannot separate truth from opinion and everything remains provisional.”
I don’t know why this is a disagreement – your side freely admits as much – “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. Jeff concurred. WCF affirms.
“B. By Protestants stating that our fallibility somehow negates the advantage Rome as an infallible identifier provides, we are somehow suggesting that defined infallible dogma doesn’t exist.”
I don’t conclude this. I am concluding there is no way for Protestantism to identify infallible dogma and be consistent with its disclaimers. And so there’s no warrant for faith – Apostolic, Christian, supernatural faith is not something akin to “faith” in scientific conclusions or historical assertions or America or law enforcement or the like as your side keeps doubling down on.
“The fact that we do not believe an institution must be selectively infallible does not make the claims of Christ superfluous or unnecessary.”
No, it’s the fact that you believe personal fallibility is relevant to making Rome’s claims unnecessary and useless and without any advantage is what does it.
“The infallibility has its locus in Christ, not the church.”
False dichotomy. The church and Christ are not in competition, and the church derives its gifts from Christ who bestowed them in founding it.
“Then you raise the question, “But how do you know what Christ said?” And my answer is I don’t know that infallibly/have infallible certainty because I am fallible”
Yes, you’re fallible. So were NT believers.
“By assenting to her claims you don’t lose your fallibility but you gain the ability to discern unchanging truth from provisional opinion. But what is not at all clear is HOW do YOU gain that ability to discern truth/articles of faith from opinion if you remain fallible after the assent.”
NT believers were fallible. So were they not able to discern unchanging truth from provisional opinion under Christ and the Apostles? No way for Christ and the Apostles to make binding definitive normative judgments by virtue of their authority because all their adherents were fallible?
“HOW do YOU have an advantage if your knowledge of Rome, what it has defined, and even what its precise claims are remain provisional due to your fallibility.”
How did an NT believer had an advantage following Christ/Apostles over random synagogue rabbi if his knowledge of Christ, what He has defined, and even what His precise claims were remained provisional due to his fallibility?
“As SDB has asked, what advantage does adding an infallible middleman give you if you remain fallible?”
What advantage did adding Christ and the Apostles give a Jew if he remains fallible? And it’s not a “middleman” – your teaching of the identified canon and its attendant foundational doctrines in your system themselves remains provisional because of the very lack of that “middleman”, showing he’s not a “middleman” at all but rather essential. And even in a secular perspective we could see an advantage of a living infallible interpreter – if I have Joyce sitting next to me while I read Finnegan’s Wake, I obviously have an advantage over someone reading it bare without his clarifications and feedback and his binding normative judgments of interpretation. And yet I’m still fallible.
“My answer is that even if Protestantism were to do that that, my own fallibility means my knowledge of that canon is provisional, at least in theory. But that is the same predicament you face as a Roman Catholic since you are fallible, so it is unclear to me HOW you have an advantage.”
Because of the nature of the claims being made that I assented to in the first place, as I went over with Jeff’s 1-2-3. And as I already said, don’t confuse order of being with order of knowing – the fallible decision to submit to an infallible authority does not render that authority as fallible or provisional as one’s choice, or entail such authority can never be greater than one’s fallible decision.
“HOW, if when Rome speaks you don’t become infallible?”
Did NT believers become infallible when Christ and the Apostles spoke?
“HOW is it impossible to hold to SS as a rule of faith without an infallible canon declaration but not impossible to hold to the three-legged stool as a rule of faith without a declared infallible canon of tradition (which would include the full scope of tradition and all infallibly declared dogma)?”
Because Rome is not Sola-T. It doesn’t claim Tradition is the sole ultimate infallible authority and perspicuous and formally sufficient. And the demand for a canon of tradition doesn’t even make sense. Can you give me an exhaustive canon of American tradition or Presbyterian tradition or Robert family tradition?
“That seems like a double standard and to make the real rule of faith the Magisterium. Want to know what is infallible, ask the Magisterium. Don’t ask Scripture or tradition.”
If one didn’t ask Scripture or Tradition, there would never be any reform or correction of bishops and popes, nor parameterized development. Can their be reform and correction in the Protestant sense of Semper Reformanda – no – that would indeed be inconsistent with Rome’s claims, but that doesn’t mean there cannot be reform and correction.
“But why do you have more than provisional opinion if you are fallible?”
Because of the nature of claims being made that warrant faith and the certitude of faith. NT believers had more than provisional opinion even as they were fallible – Joe accepting what he likes or doesn’t (and justifiably doing so, because of the claims being made) from random synagogue rabbi offering nothing more than admitted provisional likely opinion can never have more than provisional opinion, by his own admission. Joe’s in a pickle, but its of his own making.
“The whole approach seems to be employ a radical skepticism”
The skepticism is on your side actually. You’re the one arguing because we’re all fallible, then the certitude of faith as explained in Cath Ency, Newman, Aquinas is impossible and is actually illegitimate – we can never do better than highly likely doctrines because we’re all fallible and it’s hopeless and we should throw up our arms. Such skepticism eviscerates even the very notion of faith as described in Scripture and Tradition, then mutates it into a crude form of Pelagianism and rationalism by likening it to things like science and math.
“if applied consistently should make everyone doubt their beliefs, even Roman Catholics.”
The certitude of faith is not compatible with doubt. Doubt is compatible with Protestantism – even if it’s only 0.001% or whatever arbitrary number your side proposes.
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Cletus, two things, one, your side doesn’t entertain doubts? There goes Ignatian sprituality. Two, your faith doesn’t rest on historic realities?
“And so there’s no warrant for faith – Apostolic, Christian, supernatural faith is not something akin to “faith” in scientific conclusions or historical assertions”
The entire Christian faith rests on the historic realities of the resurrection and the incarnation, thus, it’s subject to historical inquiries into past events and ancient texts, Paul in his apostolic office, was more than comfortable in bringing the veracity of the faith before such inquiries. Thus, the appeal to eyewitness testimony and the reconciliation to a hedonistic/fatalistic philosophical conclusion if Christ was not raised from the dead. You may be able to craft a ‘christianity’ with a distinct set of propositions but even Paul ulitmately grounds it in historical events.
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Sean,
Sure it entertains doubts. It doesn’t with articles of faith though – faith seeks understanding, not I must understand before I have faith. Yes, it rests on historical **realities**. Not likely probable conclusions about what might have happened in history. No doubt seen when Peter preached “Men of Israel, hear these words, God hath raised up this Jesus, whereof we are witnesses. Let all the house of Israel know most certainly that God hath made this Jesus, whom you have crucified, both Lord and Christ.” and “We ought to obey God, rather than man; we are witnesses of these things, and so is the Holy Ghost, whom God has given to all who obey Him”.
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Cletus,
I don’t know why this is a disagreement – your side freely admits as much – “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. Jeff concurred. WCF affirms.
The disagreement is that we cannot separate truth from opinion apart from somebody saying “this here is infallible.” It’s like saying it is hopeless for me to be able to separate the truth of 2+2=4 from my opinion that 2+2=4 because there’s no infallible mathematician. 2+2=4 is natural/general revelation but its source is no less supernatural than the source of Scripture.
I don’t conclude this. I am concluding there is no way for Protestantism to identify infallible dogma and be consistent with its disclaimers. And so there’s no warrant for faith – Apostolic, Christian, supernatural faith is not something akin to “faith” in scientific conclusions or historical assertions or America or law enforcement or the like as your side keeps doubling down on.
God grants the gift of faith, but where does Scripture say faith=infallible certainty? Is it not part of the limitations of humanity to be fallible?
No, it’s the fact that you believe personal fallibility is relevant to making Rome’s claims unnecessary and useless and without any advantage is what does it.
Do you know this infallibly?
False dichotomy. The church and Christ are not in competition, and the church derives its gifts from Christ who bestowed them in founding it.
Then part of your apologetic has to demonstrate where Christ bestows the gift of infallbility. It simply isn’t self evident that “Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth” means there comes a point when you as an individual lose provisionality or that the church can never teach error.
NT believers were fallible. So were they not able to discern unchanging truth from provisional opinion under Christ and the Apostles? No way for Christ and the Apostles to make binding definitive normative judgments by virtue of their authority because all their adherents were fallible?
The issue isn’t whether Christ and the Apostles could do that. The issue is what advantage that mere ability provides when the person submitting to them cannot infallibly know what binding normative judgments have been made. Herein is the fundamental problem—if fallibility=provisional=bad then all you, CVD are left with is faith in your provisional opinion of infallible dogma. The Protestant is left with faith in his provisional opinion of fallible dogma. In both cases, faith is in that which is provisional. That’s the issue that I have yet to see has an answer.
At the end of the day all it seems to me that you are saying is that Rome can identify dogma infallibly but that since you yourself are fallible, you can never have more than a provisional opinion of what Rome has actually infallibly declared. Remember, you have said that Rome doesn’t make you infallible. So you remain fallible after the assent, which means your view of what Rome has said remains ever provisional. Your view of what the dogma actually is and what it means is provisional. In fact, because you are fallible, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Rome has said that she possesses the charism of infallibility. Other faithful RCs in good standing with the church believe the opposite. How do you have certainty that they are wrong and you are right. Remember, you are fallible and all you have is provisional opinion if you are fallible.
How did an NT believer had an advantage following Christ/Apostles over random synagogue rabbi if his knowledge of Christ, what He has defined, and even what His precise claims were remained provisional due to his fallibility?
Because what Christ and the Apostles said were true. Who has the advantage in this scenario:
Rome claims infallibility but is wrong about it.
Protestantism does not claim infallibility but in fact teaches truth.
What advantage did adding Christ and the Apostles give a Jew if he remains fallible?
The benefit of final revelation and the fulfillment of God’s promises.
And it’s not a “middleman” – your teaching of the identified canon and its attendant foundational doctrines in your system themselves remains provisional because of the very lack of that “middleman”, showing he’s not a “middleman” at all but rather essential.
All human apprehension is in some sense provisional. Your apprehension of what Rome has said and means remains no less provisional than my apprehension of what Protestantism has said or what Jesus has said. So where is the advantage where the rubber meets the road.
Here’s the syllogism.
1. To be fallible is to have provisional knowledge.
2. Rome does not grant CVD infallibility.
3. Therefore, all CVD has is the provisional, reformable knowledge that Rome has said that there are circumstances in which Rome is infallible.
4. Because provisional knowledge is fallible, it is possible that Rome actually has never claimed infallibility for itself.
Where is the above wrong, in your view?
And even in a secular perspective we could see an advantage of a living infallible interpreter – if I have Joyce sitting next to me while I read Finnegan’s Wake, I obviously have an advantage over someone reading it bare without his clarifications and feedback and his binding normative judgments of interpretation. And yet I’m still fallible.
Wait, was Joyce infallible? And even if he were, what guarantee do you have that you are rightly submitting to Joyce because your knowledge of him remains ever provisional.
Because of the nature of the claims being made that I assented to in the first place, as I went over with Jeff’s 1-2-3. And as I already said, don’t confuse order of being with order of knowing – the fallible decision to submit to an infallible authority does not render that authority as fallible or provisional as one’s choice, or entail such authority can never be greater than one’s fallible decision.
If you are going to put all this weight on infallibility, you need to acknowledge at least one thing, and that is the fact that you will never be infallibly certain that you made the right choice. Remember fallibility=provisionality=bad. You only have provisional certainty. Sounds awfully Protestant.
Did NT believers become infallible when Christ and the Apostles spoke?
No, which is why I don’t put all my eggs in the Christians are better off than Jews because Christ claimed infalliblity basket like you put your RCs are better off than Protestants because the RCC claims infallibility basket.
Because Rome is not Sola-T. It doesn’t claim Tradition is the sole ultimate infallible authority and perspicuous and formally sufficient.
So we’re back to the one-legged stool of the M.
And the demand for a canon of tradition doesn’t even make sense. Can you give me an exhaustive canon of American tradition or Presbyterian tradition or Robert family tradition?
If I were infallible, I could.
If one didn’t ask Scripture or Tradition, there would never be any reform or correction of bishops and popes, nor parameterized development. Can their be reform and correction in the Protestant sense of Semper Reformanda – no – that would indeed be inconsistent with Rome’s claims, but that doesn’t mean there cannot be reform and correction.
Back to the one-legged Magisterial stool.
Because of the nature of claims being made that warrant faith and the certitude of faith. NT believers had more than provisional opinion even as they were fallible – Joe accepting what he likes or doesn’t (and justifiably doing so, because of the claims being made) from random synagogue rabbi offering nothing more than admitted provisional likely opinion can never have more than provisional opinion, by his own admission. Joe’s in a pickle, but its of his own making.
Why? Do you know infallibly that Rome claims to be infallible? Aren’t you fallible? So how do you have more than a provisional opinion that Rome really does claim infalliblity for itself?
The skepticism is on your side actually. You’re the one arguing because we’re all fallible, then the certitude of faith as explained in Cath Ency, Newman, Aquinas is impossible and is actually illegitimate – we can never do better than highly likely doctrines because we’re all fallible and it’s hopeless and we should throw up our arms. Such skepticism eviscerates even the very notion of faith as described in Scripture and Tradition, then mutates it into a crude form of Pelagianism and rationalism by likening it to things like science and math.
No, it’s on your side. We’re not the ones going around saying, “Nyah, Nyah, we have certainty and you don’t.” The whole thing seems like an exercise in justifying to yourself why its better to be RC than Protestant.
I’m also not the one driving such a sharp wedge between general revelation and special revelation so as to make it the case that a supernatural being in some cases doesn’t act supernaturally (natural revelation) but in other cases does (supernatural revelation). What I want to know is what it even means for a supernatural being not to do things supernaturally.
Honestly, I still don’t get what in the H E double hockey sticks is meant by the “certitude of faith.” If it means that faith gives one more certainty than other forms of knowledge, then that’s simply not something that is the province only of the RC. And the whole business of believing something of faith but not based on faith is Aquinas going off half-cocked because he’s been imbibing more Aristotle than Scripture and history. I guess the Jews who lived in the intertestamental period didn’t really have faith, which goes contrary to Scripture (Heb. 11) that points to the faith of Jews from the intertestamental period as exemplary. If you take the author of Hebrews at His Word, Protestants should have greater certitude of faith because like those intertestamental Jews, we don’t have an infallible speaker in whom to trust apart from Scripture.
The certitude of faith is not compatible with doubt. Doubt is compatible with Protestantism – even if it’s only 0.001% or whatever arbitrary number your side proposes.
So are you saying that it is absolutely impossible for Rome to be wrong and that there is absolutely nothing that could prove to you that Christianity is false, not even the presentation and proof of the physical body of Jesus in a grave somewhere?
But the essence of my question still hasn’t been answered: How does fallible CVD escape provisional knowledge if trusting Rome doesn’t make CVD infallible. Remember, fallibility=provisionality. All I see you offering me is a system that offers infallible dogma but which you can never be more than provisionally certain of or that you can know you are using rightly to discern truth from opinion in anything more than a provisional way. Even if Rome’s claim to be infallible were true, it doesn’t make you infallible.
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Sean, and maybe those arguments are a tad, just a tad, self-serving (like papal infallibility).
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Brandon, ultimately both “systems” rely on the Holy Spirit. Who’s going to decide where that wind is blowing? I don’t think it’s the one who insists it has lone, infallible access to the weather charts.
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James Young, And you have no way of determining whether the bodily assumption of Mary is true. All you have is a declaration of a pope. The other legs of the stool are silent.
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DGH,
Right. We are both agreed that the Spirit moves and speaks in Scripture. We just disagree that the Spirit moves in the same way in the Church as he does in Scripture.
CVD seems to be suggesting, however, that if we can’t have certainty in our epistemology that we have no principled reason to believe anything about the ontology of Divine revelation. That’s why in other contexts Bryan is arguing that we don’t know if the swingers “Swignin for Jesus” are violating God’s will without the Magisterium (But who is Francis to judge, anyway?). You couldn’t draw up a more ridiculous caricature if you tried. Yet, that’s what these arguments lead to: radical skepticism.
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Brandon, either radical skepticism of deluded obeisance.
And you wonder why the contemporary RC church is having trouble. From pay, pray, obey to sensum fidelium.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 29, 2015 at 1:39 pm | Permalink
James Young, And you have no way of determining whether the bodily assumption of Mary is true. All you have is a declaration of a pope. The other legs of the stool are silent.
And you have no reason to determine that it’s not, except your own fallen reason. By making everything fallible, there is no method to pick this interpretation over that, one church over another, the Eucharist or your version of it, the “Lord’s Supper.” This is the problem.
You may claim the Spirit leads the individual, but that’s not in the Bible. The Church is what’s in the Bible. But you are unequipped to choose between Church P, Q, or R except your emotions and ego.
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SDB: The RC is in exactly the same boat as the CP in this regard. (as an aside, this is the fundamental problem with foundational epistemology more generally. Alistair McGrath has a very nice summary of the logical problems with foundationalism more generally in his scientific theology series. It is worth engaging.)
Ding, ding, ding!
Notice the huge similarity between CVD’s concern and Greg’s: If you allow even a smidgen of provisionality or fallibility, you get nothing. It’s all down to foundationalism as the only method for truth-collection.
Brandon: Catholics in principle have a mechanism for producing an infallible doctrinal statement. Protestantism does not have a mechanism for producing an infallible statement. I think this is what CVD is trying to get at, here.
I agree that that’s probably the endpoint he wants. The trouble is, it doesn’t compute.
The Protestant has in principle a mechanism for producing an infallible statement. He picks up the Bible and says “Behold! An entire volume of infallible statements!”
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TVD,
And you have no reason to determine that it’s not, except your own fallen reason.
That plus the utter silence of Scripture and early tradition on the matter. It’s as if nobody cares what happened to Mary after she leave the scene in Acts 1. It’s as if what happened to her body is completely irrelevant to Christianity. In that respect, you are correct about the Assumption being a nonessential doctrine. But where you are wrong is in thinking that Rome says the same thing, or at least my provisional opinion of what Rome has said about the Assumption gives that, just like CVD’s provisional opinion says the same thing.
By making everything fallible, there is no method to pick this interpretation over that, one church over another, the Eucharist or your version of it, the “Lord’s Supper.” This is the problem.
CVD has admitted that we’re all fallible, so if you were to consistently apply that, then CVD doesn’t have any method to pick Rome over Mormonism. The best he can say is “not Protestantism.” Of course you’d be hard pressed to find the Vatican agree that given the choice between Mormonism and Protestantism you should go Mormon. But that’s basically where CVD’s doubling down on infallibility should lead him.
You may claim the Spirit leads the individual, but that’s not in the Bible.
Except of course where the psalmist assumes as much “Open my eyes, that I may behold wondrous things out of your law.” (Ps. 119:18). Unless you think he offered a prayer that he knew had no chance of being offered.
The Church is what’s in the Bible.
No one is disputing that the church is in the Bible. What we’re looking for in the Bible is where Jesus says the church is infallible whenever it says it is infallible.
But you are unequipped to choose between Church P, Q, or R except your emotions and ego.
What is equipping you to say that the Assumption is irrelevant in the realm of Roman Catholicism?
And I see a whole lot of emotionalism from the converts here. Read the nice ladies and particular and it’s like “I was depressed and despondent when I realized I couldn’t know anything, but then when I found out I could when I heard a claim, I was like all happy and such.”
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Jeff,
“He picks up the Bible and says “Behold! An entire volume of infallible statements!””
Jumping the gun yet again – “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” – that includes the doctrines of the extent and scope of the canon, it’s inspiration, it’s inerrancy, its closure, its sufficiency and authority, etc.
And this supposed mechanism has never been exercised by your churches or confessions, nor could it without violating their disclaimers – every judgment they offer can never be definitive or normative because of that.
“If you allow even a smidgen of provisionality or fallibility, you get nothing.”
Divine revelation is infallible and irreformable, by definition. That’s why it warrants the type of faith attested to in Scripture and Tradition.
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Robert
Posted October 29, 2015 at 5:23 pm | Permalink
TVD,
“And you have no reason to determine that it’s not, except your own fallen reason.”
That plus the utter silence of Scripture and early tradition on the matter.
As they say, the absence of evidence is not the evidence of absence. Not to be glib, but the Trinity–Jesus’s divinity–is not explicitly in the Bible either. You rely on much Tradition whether you admit it or not.
It’s as if nobody cares what happened to Mary after she leave the scene in Acts 1. It’s as if what happened to her body is completely irrelevant to Christianity. In that respect, you are correct about the Assumption being a nonessential doctrine. But where you are wrong is in thinking that Rome says the same thing, or at least my provisional opinion of what Rome has said about the Assumption gives that, just like CVD’s provisional opinion says the same thing.
Again, you elevate a trivial matter to prime importance. The Eastern Orthodox rather agree with you, but still have apostolic succession and licit sacraments.
“By making everything fallible, there is no method to pick this interpretation over that, one church over another, the Eucharist or your version of it, the “Lord’s Supper.” This is the problem.”
CVD has admitted that we’re all fallible, so if you were to consistently apply that, then CVD doesn’t have any method to pick Rome over Mormonism. The best he can say is “not Protestantism.”
That doesn’t fly. Catholicism is the main branch, quite visibly and historically, regardless of any arguable uncertainties about the first century of Church history. All other Christianities are splinter groups. [Although it may be said that the Eastern Orthodox were never in perfect union with Rome in the first place, so it wasn’t exactly a schism.]
The point is that you have no legitimate method of picking Calvin over Luther.
“But you are unequipped to choose between Church P, Q, or R except your emotions and ego.”
What is equipping you to say that the Assumption is irrelevant in the realm of Roman Catholicism?
Again, a trivial issue, and neither does the Catholic Church say if you don’t buy the Assumption, you’re going to hell. The rest is theological mush. [Before you do hours of work digging up a shaky chain of one quote from 946 and another from 1344, most of these anathema things aren’t about affirmative acceptance, they’re more about public denials. You or I have no reason to publicly deny the Assumption–we weren’t there. Benign indifference to this piece of theological trivia is not going to send us to hell, I think.]
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Clete, I still have to go through some sort of historical inquiry(including ancient texts) in order know anything about it and I’m engaged in it this side of the resurrection, so……… I make use of the tools of textual and historical criticism to do so. So, there is something distinct to my faith this side of Thomas’ encounter, so……there is something ‘akin’ to historical inquiry about historical events about my supernatural faith. The point was Paul didn’t ultimately rest the ‘truth’ on an infallible persuasion or conclusion derived from his apostolic authority, but on the fact of the resurrection-historical reality. Jesus was raised from the dead.-1 cor 15:12- All his apostolic authority is for not, and worse, if he preaches Christ and Christ is not actually raised from the dead.
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Cletus van Damme
Posted October 29, 2015 at 5:34 pm | Permalink
“He picks up the Bible and says “Behold! An entire volume of infallible statements!””
Jumping the gun yet again – “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” – that includes the doctrines of the extent and scope of the canon, it’s inspiration, it’s inerrancy, its closure, its sufficiency and authority, etc.
And this supposed mechanism has never been exercised by your churches or confessions, nor could it without violating their disclaimers – every judgment they offer can never be definitive or normative because of that.
Exactly. If the various Confessions were claimed to be the work of the Holy Spirit, that would be that, a truth claim. But they do not claim truth.
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Sean,
“but on the fact of the resurrection-historical reality.”
There you go. Facts and reality and Peter’s “know most certainly”. Not 25%, 50%, 99.9% whatever arbitrary percentage likely, everything is provisional, infallible “assurance” we get things wrong, but might get things right later, hedging bets, etc.
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So, Clete, you have no doubts? Or who is having this 100% certitude? Is the church having it for you, so, this is some exercise in implicit faith? So, the only faith you REALLY(100% certitude) have is your implicit faith in believing what the church believes?
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And if that’s the case, do you every doubt the church? EVER?! And if you do, do you maybe not have supernatural faith?
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test
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Re read Article 1 of the WCF. Note that they assert that the revelation from God’s Word is infallible. My disclaimer applies to the identification & interpretation of the scriptures. If the RC is true, my disclaimer applies to the identification and interpretation of what comes from the RCC. My certainty of the truth of rome’s claims are only as sure as my certainty of my identification of Rome and my interpretation of their claims. This is exactly the same situation for prots and for all foundational systems.
But your identification of it is always fallible, thus all of the teachings that follow are in principle fallible even if they turn out to be true. Of course, if they turn out to be false, then they weren’t divine revelation to begin with. But that’s the point.
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@Jeff
Yes, but in fairness to CVD, he hasn’t accused me of being a smut-apologist. Good times, good times… heh.
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sdb
Posted October 29, 2015 at 7:14 pm | Permalink
“He picks up the Bible and says “Behold! An entire volume of infallible statements!””
Jumping the gun yet again – “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” – that includes the doctrines of the extent and scope of the canon, it’s inspiration, it’s inerrancy, its closure, its sufficiency and authority, etc.
And this supposed mechanism has never been exercised by your churches or confessions, nor could it without violating their disclaimers – every judgment they offer can never be definitive or normative because of that.
Re read Article 1 of the WCF. Note that they assert that the revelation from God’s Word is infallible. My disclaimer applies to the identification & interpretation of the scriptures. If the RC is true, my disclaimer applies to the identification and interpretation of what comes from the RCC. My certainty of the truth of rome’s claims are only as sure as my certainty of my identification of Rome and my interpretation of their claims. This is exactly the same situation for prots and for all foundational systems.
Not at all. They are two different belief systems: Catholicism is based on the belief Christ left behind a Church, upon which he sent the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. Protestantism is a self-referential belief system in this doctrine or that. These are not the same method, yet Protestants try to argue Catholicism is just one more flavor of Christianity, as their own churches are.
Leo Strauss said something similar about modernity/relativism. If you reject the existence of objective truth
They cannot touch the question, how does one choose between Luther and Calvin? By what method, on what grounds? It’s just a matter of taste. Christ has nothing to do with it.
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Tom,
Not at all. They are two different belief systems: Catholicism is based on the belief Christ left behind a Church, upon which he sent the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
Protestantism denies this where?
Protestantism is a self-referential belief system in this doctrine or that.These are not the same method, yet Protestants try to argue Catholicism is just one more flavor of Christianity, as their own churches are.
Actually, from reading the likes of CVD and the guys at CTC, it seems that RCism is a self-referential belief system grounded in the assumption that without an infallible interpreter you’re just left guessing.
They cannot touch the question, how does one choose between Luther and Calvin? By what method, on what grounds? It’s just a matter of taste. Christ has nothing to do with it.
The method starts with the question, “Which one more accurately preaches Christ?”
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Sean,
Or who is having this 100% certitude? Is the church having it for you, so, this is some exercise in implicit faith? So, the only faith you REALLY(100% certitude) have is your implicit faith in believing what the church believes?
Bingo. Frankly, I’m surprised that CVD hasn’t gone there yet. I’ve had RCs who are just as knowledgable as he is finally tell me that yes the individual never has anything more than provisional certainty but that’s okay because the church has infallible certainty and as long as you commune with the church all is good. It’s the only logical answer if you go down the road CVD is traveling.
Problem is that the answer ends up making the RCC into a cult that demands mindless obeisance. And it destroys the responsibility of the individual to, I don’t know, know Christ personally.
No wonder nominalism seems to be the sine qua non of Roman Catholicism and only .0000000001% of the worldwide RCC actually gives a fig about the dogma.
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Robert
Posted October 29, 2015 at 8:03 pm | Permalink
Tom,
Not at all. They are two different belief systems: Catholicism is based on the belief Christ left behind a Church, upon which he sent the Holy Spirit at Pentecost.
Protestantism denies this where?
Protestantism is a self-referential belief system in this doctrine or that.These are not the same method, yet Protestants try to argue Catholicism is just one more flavor of Christianity, as their own churches are.
Actually, from reading the likes of CVD and the guys at CTC, it seems that RCism is a self-referential belief system grounded in the assumption that without an infallible interpreter you’re just left guessing.
They cannot touch the question, how does one choose between Luther and Calvin? By what method, on what grounds? It’s just a matter of taste. Christ has nothing to do with it.
The method starts with the question, “Which one more accurately preaches Christ?”
You have no method with which to even engage the question, only subjective opinion. No way to prefer Luther over Calvin or vice versa.
Further, you have perverted the question, and made it an academic one, a theological one, one you have no way of reliably answering. This is why the Protestant hermeneutic is a “novum,” as it reduces “church” to nothing more than a theological debating society.
For the Catholic, the proper question is, Which is the true Church Christ left behind? For Augustine, the question [and the answer] are quite obvious:
The Catholic hermeneutic is not the Protestant one: Find the true Church Christ left behind and the theology follows. You do it backwards, theology first, then create a church around it. This is neither historical nor Biblical.
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Tom,
You have no method with which to even engage the question, only subjective opinion. No way to prefer Luther over Calvin or vice versa.
That’s like your fallible provisional opinion man.
Further, you have perverted the question, and made it an academic one, a theological one, one you have no way of reliably answering. This is why the Protestant hermeneutic is a “novum,” as it reduces “church” to nothing more than a theological debating society.
For the Catholic, the proper question is, Which is the true Church Christ left behind? For Augustine, the question [and the answer] are quite obvious:
“I should not believe the Gospel except as moved by the authority of the Catholic Church.”
The Catholic hermeneutic is not the Protestant one: Find the true Church Christ left behind and the theology follows. You do it backwards, theology first, then create a church around it. This is neither historical nor Biblical.
The question as to which church Christ left behind is a theological question, as is how one identifies it. Once you ask the question, “Which is the true Church Christ left behind”? you’ve asked a theological question. The answer “It’s the church with a
unbrokenmostly unbrokenApostolic succession” is a theological answer.And actually, it’s eminently biblical for theology to precede the church. It’s called the Old Testament. Divine revelation gives the church, the church does not give divine revelation. Rome has that backwards.
Now I’d like the way that you infallibly determine which claimant is the right one and why, once claimed, you don’t go to mass if that’s where the grace is.
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Robert
Posted October 29, 2015 at 8:49 pm | Permalink
Tom,
You have no method with which to even engage the question, only subjective opinion. No way to prefer Luther over Calvin or vice versa.
That’s like your fallible provisional opinion man.
Further, you have perverted the question, and made it an academic one, a theological one, one you have no way of reliably answering. This is why the Protestant hermeneutic is a “novum,” as it reduces “church” to nothing more than a theological debating society.
For the Catholic, the proper question is, Which is the true Church Christ left behind? For Augustine, the question [and the answer] are quite obvious:
“I should not believe the Gospel except as moved by the authority of the Catholic Church.”
The Catholic hermeneutic is not the Protestant one: Find the true Church Christ left behind and the theology follows. You do it backwards, theology first, then create a church around it. This is neither historical nor Biblical.
The question as to which church Christ left behind is a theological question, as is how one identifies it. Once you ask the question, “Which is the true Church Christ left behind”? you’ve asked a theological question. The answer “It’s the church with a unbroken mostly unbroken Apostolic succession” is a theological answer.
And actually, it’s eminently biblical for theology to precede the church. It’s called the Old Testament. Divine revelation gives the church, the church does not give divine revelation. Rome has that backwards.
Now I’d like the way that you infallibly determine which claimant is the right one and why, once claimed, you don’t go to mass if that’s where the grace is.
Are you going to play Dr. Hart’s cheesy little game? I don’t discuss my personal religious life with people who stoop to using it as a weapon.
As for the rest, leaving the Catholic Church out of it, first you need to justify how you go about choosing Calvin’s version of Christianity over Luther’s. You’re not engaging the argument.
The question as to which church Christ left behind is a theological question, as is how one identifies it.
The answer is mere subjective opinion once again, reducing the Church to a theological debating society. Again, begging the premise. For Augustine, it was not subjective, it was self-evident.
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CVD: Facts and reality and Peter’s “know most certainly”. Not 25%, 50%, 99.9% whatever arbitrary percentage likely, everything is provisional, infallible “assurance” we get things wrong, but might get things right later, hedging bets, etc.
You are very hung up on provisionality. You hope to purge the provisionality from your belief system by assenting to a claim of infallible identification and infallible declaration of articles of faith.
What I’ve been trying to suggest is that you actually still have provisionality in your system. Even if we were to stipulate that “The RC Church has the ability to infallibly define…”, think about the fallible points in the chain:
* Translation of articles of faith from Latin to (or Greek to Latin to) English
* Transmission of articles of faith by priests to you
* Your own understanding of the articles of faith as taught by the priests.
* Your own identification of the articles of faith that are in fact infallible.
Given that you agree to those points of fallibility, it necessarily follows that you have no guarantee that the articles of faith that you assent to, in English, as translated, as explained by your priest, are in fact infallible. Even given your own system, you don’t get what you want.
So where’s the beef? If 99.9% is not good enough for you, then I have bad news. The odds that there has been an error in one of those four processes above is greater than 0.1%.
As sdb astutely observed, this is really an underlying argument over foundationalism.
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“Are you going to play Dr. Hart’s cheesy little game? I don’t discuss my personal religious life with people who stoop to using it as a weapon.”
So, that’s a ‘no’ on mass attendance for the past weekend. And since it’s time for ‘pick the weekend winners thursday’, I’m gonna go with a ‘no’ for the coming weekend. Back to you, Hal.
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Quite a swinish disruption and evasion, Sean.
____________________________________________
Are you going to play Dr. Hart’s cheesy little game? I don’t discuss my personal religious life with people who stoop to using it as a weapon.
As for the rest, leaving the Catholic Church out of it, first you need to justify how you go about choosing Calvin’s version of Christianity over Luther’s. You’re not engaging the argument.
The question as to which church Christ left behind is a theological question, as is how one identifies it.
The answer is mere subjective opinion once again, reducing the Church to a theological debating society. Again, begging the premise. For Augustine, it was not subjective, it was self-evident.
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Tom, I struggle taking you seriously. I blame you. But as far as veracity of the faith goes, I’m good with the testimony of the apostles. They were there.
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Odd that Paul didn’t mention church, bishop, magisterium, or papacy (and he was like an apostle):
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b, sd, “in fairness to CVD, he hasn’t accused me of being a smut-apologist.”
Yup.
Cool.
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vd, t, Calvin and Luther are in more agreement than your bishops, you know the ones you don’t obey.
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Robert, “a cult that demands mindless obeisance”
ding ding.
Maybe that explains why James Young is making this case and not his bishops.
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vd, t, “Find the true Church Christ left behind and the theology follows.”
So how do you choose the right pope between Urban VI and Clement VII?
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 29, 2015 at 10:27 pm | Permalink
vd, t, Calvin and Luther are in more agreement than your bishops, you know the ones you don’t obey.
Ridiculous, Dr. History. Unlike Luther and Calvin, the bishops agree on the Eucharist, much more essential than your mumblings on Mariology or Edgardo Mortara.
And Luther and Calvin would not agree with what’s become of their churches, that’s for damn sure.
http://www.delawareonline.com/story/life/2015/03/19/wilmington-church-ordain-first-married-lesbian-couple/25027443/
sean
Posted October 29, 2015 at 10:12 pm | Permalink
Tom, I struggle taking you seriously. I blame you. But as far as veracity of the faith goes, I’m good with the testimony of the apostles. They were there.
That’s what they all say, which is why there are dozens or 100s of disagreeing Protestant denominations.
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Tom, but they all agree that you don’t know what you’re talking about and they also agree you should just start by going to mass. And you’re offering a church who claims it and therefore has to be trusted because they’re the only ones with the audacity to do it. Rome has become the Donald Trump of religions or Donald Trump is the rome of politics or whichever way your religious conscience best understands it.
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sean
Posted October 29, 2015 at 10:45 pm | Permalink
Tom, but they all agree that you don’t know what you’re talking about and they also agree you should just start by going to mass. And you’re offering a church who claims it and therefore has to be trusted because they’re the only ones with the audacity to do it. Rome has become the Donald Trump of religions or Donald Trump is the rome of politics or whichever way your religious conscience best understands it.
You’re nowhere near participating in the discussion with this junk.
D. G. Hart
Posted October 29, 2015 at 10:30 pm | Permalink
vd, t, “Find the true Church Christ left behind and the theology follows.”
So how do you choose the right pope between Urban VI and Clement VII?
I don’t, the Holy Spirit does, and did, Dr. History. And eventually the Church reunified, the theology unscathed.
Always arguing the exception against the rule, but once again, the exception proves the rule.
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TVD:
The Catholic hermeneutic is not the Protestant one: Find the true Church Christ left behind and the theology follows. You do it backwards, theology first, then create a church around it. This is neither historical nor Biblical.>>>>>
Exactly!
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Jeff Cagle:
* Translation of articles of faith from Latin to (or Greek to Latin to) English
* Transmission of articles of faith by priests to you
* Your own understanding of the articles of faith as taught by the priests.
* Your own identification of the articles of faith that are in fact infallible.>>>>>>
You are making the work of the Holy Spirit dependent on philology especially textual criticism. I don’t see where the Holy Spirit is involved at all in the system you are developing.
Your foundation is flawed, Jeff. At the same time, you say it is easy to read the Bible. If that is true, please exegete Ephesians 4:1-6.
I’d say you never get it right, because on every doctrinal subject you are only mostly sure. If you add all that up, how much certainty do you really have?
You cannot be 100% certain that Jesus is the Son of God.
You cannot be 100% certain that there even is a God.
You cannot be 100% certain that you have the right Bible.
You cannot be 100% certain that any given word in the Bible has been accurately translated into English.
You cannot be 100% certain that the translation you use is based on the best Greek manuscripts.
You cannot be 100% certain of anything in your system.
See how the uncertainty multiplies and approaches an infinity of uncertainties instead of just the small percentage of uncertainty you allow for?
Worse than that, you are the only one who can decide any of that for yourself.
What about people who are monolingual? What about people who cannot read the original languages or follow you down your linguistic rabbit holes?
How could that be the sure foundation that Jesus Christ built His Church on?
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vd, t, “I don’t, the Holy Spirit does, and did, Dr. History. And eventually the Church reunified, the theology unscathed.”
No wonder you’re a fan of David Barton. One man’s American exceptionalism is another man’s Roman Catholic exceptionalism. Often it’s the same man.
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Mermaid, “You are making the work of the Holy Spirit dependent on philology especially textual criticism.”
Are you kidding? You make the Holy Spirit dependent on the votes of Cardinals. And where was the church before the college of Cardinals?
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Tom,
Are you going to play Dr. Hart’s cheesy little game? I don’t discuss my personal religious life with people who stoop to using it as a weapon.
I’m actually not trying to be rude with the point, but here’s the problem: You’ve claimed to be the impartial judge when it’s darn well clear that you are rooting for Rome. That’s fine, but it does get a bit annoying when you A. claim neutrality and B. have confessed that you don’t go to mass. It’s hard to take you seriously as an impartial authority or as actually thinking that Rome has the answer to these made-up epistemological problems.
As for the rest, leaving the Catholic Church out of it, first you need to justify how you go about choosing Calvin’s version of Christianity over Luther’s. You’re not engaging the argument.
The problem with this is you are acting as if Calvin’s version of Christianity is substantially different than Luther’s. But again, the answer is you determine which one preaches Christ more accurately, and you determine that by reading Scripture.
The answer is mere subjective opinion once again, reducing the Church to a theological debating society. Again, begging the premise. For Augustine, it was not subjective, it was self-evident.
The consent of peoples and nations…so does her authority…the succession of priests…and so, lastly, does the name itself of Catholic, which, not without reason, amid so many heresies, the Church has thus retained; so that, though all heretics wish to be called Catholics, yet when a stranger asks where the Catholic Church meets, no heretic will venture to point to his own chapel or house.
But it’s not “self-evident.” It’s not self-evident that the church is where the succession of priests is. That is a theological answer to a theological question that might be right or it might be wrong. If it were self-evident, Augustine wouldn’t have to say anything about it. And nota bene Calvin has a theology of predestination that is basically the same as Augustine’s, and Augustine certainly didn’t think it was a question that should be up for debate. For Augustine, the true church doesn’t only have Apostolic succession, it also teaches Apostolic doctrine. The question becomes what happens when the church with Apostolic succession no longer teaches Apostolic doctrine? The response of the RCs here is to stick their heads in the sand and pretend that such hasn’t happened and that such can’t happen. The problem is, we have the Bible. We know what the Apostles said. “Go find the bishop” and “Priests can’t get married” and “Mary was assumed bodily into heaven” isn’t there.
That’s why your comment that Rome is obviously the main guy is off. That isn’s self-evident unless you think numbers matter. Every professing Christian group can trace its history back to the Apostles.
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Mermaid,
You are making the work of the Holy Spirit dependent on philology especially textual criticism. I don’t see where the Holy Spirit is involved at all in the system you are developing.
Whoa right there. Human beings communicate in words. God communicated to us in words. The philology matters.
But in any case, I don’t see where the Holy Spirit is involved if your system is supposed to be so certain and one in seven attendees of the synod weren’t happy with condemning homosexual behavior.
I’d say you never get it right, because on every doctrinal subject you are only mostly sure. If you add all that up, how much certainty do you really have?
You cannot be 100% certain that Jesus is the Son of God.
You cannot be 100% certain that there even is a God.
You cannot be 100% certain that you have the right Bible.
You cannot be 100% certain that any given word in the Bible has been accurately translated into English.
You cannot be 100% certain that the translation you use is based on the best Greek manuscripts.
You cannot be 100% certain of anything in your system.
See how the uncertainty multiplies and approaches an infinity of uncertainties instead of just the small percentage of uncertainty you allow for?
This is only a problem if you think that in this life the provisional nature of human knowledge and understanding is bad. But as Jeff has ably demonstrated, our knowledge is always provisional in some sense.
Worse than that, you are the only one who can decide any of that for yourself.
You’re the only one who can decide the most important aspect in your system and figure out the church Christ founded. You have to choose between many different claimants. All you have at the most critical point in your system is your fallible self, some fallible motives of credibility, and provisional knowledge.
What about people who are monolingual? What about people who cannot read the original languages or follow you down your linguistic rabbit holes?
An accurate translation works just fine. The Apostles used the Septuagint and the Septuagint itself wasn’t divinely inspired.
How could that be the sure foundation that Jesus Christ built His Church on?
How can Peter be the sure foundation when at points in history the pope was a rank apostate? How can Peter be a sure foundation when at one point you had three claimants to the throne and the average layperson had no way to figure out which one was the real pope.
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Indeed,
I mean, look at how identifying the TrueChurch helped this RC theologian find certainty about what Thomistic Natural law has to say about homosexuality,
Amazing how the theology has followed…
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SDB,
BTW, I saw this the other day and didn’t thank you yet:
Didn’t see your post referencing the Athanasian Creed before I put mine up. Great minds and all that…
Thanks. I think actually I was inspired by you because I believe you have commented on this matter in previous months. Rome’s about face on the necessity of believing the Trinity really is a striking example of dogmatic change.
Ironically, the first place I ever heard of the Athanasian Creed was as a boy as a member of the Lutheran Church. And we have no “principled means…”
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b, sd, you’re in a small church so you’re wrong. Links don’t work. Quotes are inaccurate. Nothing here to see.
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SDB,
Yup, and it’s awful isn’t it? She isn’t looking for truth she’s looking for the Catholic Church to approve of her bogus research. She doesn’t understand Thomism. The magesterium cannot move on this issue no matter what people try to do
Just like changing out your sex organs doesn’t make one the opposite.
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Darryl,
Mad scientists are always tinkering in their laboratory. Only the fringe are going to give it any crediblity. Imagine any pope in our recent history granting the “sister” a private meeting. Could never happen.
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Susan, have you never considered that you are fringe?
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Darryl,
Sometimes I don’t know what to do with your comebacks, but hey I like you. If we were talking icace to face I doubt you would have responded that way.
Anyways, to answer your question and 28th certainty no less, NO. I try hard to orbit the church very closely. That’s the beauty of the magesterium…..it will not, I repeat, will not approve of the nonsense. It’s an impossibility.
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My phone keeps insering a number with “th” added to it when I type the word “with”. Sorry about that.
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I’m feeling bad about using the phrase “beauty of it” as if I’m describing GPS on my car. The blessed Holy Spirit is guiding the church through the magesterium. It is not a thing, a mechanism of a system, he is a person.
Sometimes I get caught up in the bantering and my words become careless. Sorry, my friends.
Now I need to scoot permanently. Have a great Friday!
God Bless You All,
Susan
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Susan,
The magesterium cannot move on this issue no matter what people try to do.
But the fact is that one in seven members of the Magisterium, based on reports from the recent synod, want to move on the issue. I can guarantee you that said number is higher than it was in the 1950s. And many of those bishops were appointed by JPII and Benedict, who were much more precise in their theology.
What happens when the number gets to be 4 in seven, or is that impossible? Tomorrow’s bishops are today’s priests who, by and large, are trained in seminaries that have capitulated to modernism. In the PCUSA and other denominations, first the liberals take the seminaries, then the pastors go out and preach/discipline what they were taught. There’s no evidence that Rome is somehow immune to this.
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Robert,
Consider this: you talk about a reigning conservancy in the ’50’s and then you note that in the protestant churches things began moving away, but notice that you still speak of Rome as a sole intenty, that also happens to be sitting in the morass yet dogma hasn’t been changed. That’s the Catholic difference.
Let me ask you, what you think it means for the gate’s of hell not to prevail against the church that was begun by Jesus and continues on the same foundation. Can you show me This phenomenon happening anywhere else in the world?
Mormonism doesn’t count it borrowed from linear and earlier Christianity.
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Robert, and all
I’ve decided to quit commenting here permanently. I appreciate the conversation and the virtual friendship but I feel that I waste too much time(I struggle with addiction, I think). I desire to fall into the rhythms of the liturgy as well as spend more time being with my children.
I never did learn the last names of some of you,so I can’t look you up on FB. You know mine( and Tom’s, now that I come to think of it, (and yet you publicly beat him up for not going to church). Anonymity is powerful.
Anyways, look me up on FB, I’d like that!
God Bless!
Susan
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Susan,
Let me ask you, what you think it means for the gate’s of hell not to prevail against the church that was begun by Jesus and continues on the same foundation.
It means that the church will advance against hell and ultimately succeed. It doesn’t mean that there can be no dogmatic errors on the way. As in the real world, military commanders make all sorts of tactical, strategic, and even errors of understanding on their way to final victory. Lots of errors were made between the beginning of WW2 and the end by the Allies, but the Allies still won because they could be corrected.
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testing again – post not going through
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Jeff,
I’m not very hung up on provisionality. I am very hung up on divine revelation which is non-provisional by definition. Relatedly, I am also hung up on what is and what is not compatible with the assent of faith as defined in Scripture and Tradition. You should be too.
“think about the fallible points in the chain: ”
Yup, and think about the fallible points in the chain of NT believers assenting to Christ/Apostles claims. Did that make their claims and authority unnecessary or useless or that NT believers were then to hold all their teachings as provisional? Nope.
“If 99.9% is not good enough for you, then I have bad news.”
99.9% is not good enough for divine revelation, by definition. That’s the whole point behind the certitude of faith. There are certainly radical skeptics in this discussion, just not on the RC side.
sdb,
“Re read Article 1 of the WCF. Note that they assert that the revelation from God’s Word is infallible. My disclaimer applies to the identification & interpretation of the scriptures.”
Yes, they assert it. Then they also assert:
“All synods or councils, since the apostles’ times, whether general or particular, may err; and many have erred. Therefore they are not to be made the rule of faith, or practice; but to be used as a help in both.”
“The purest Churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error; and some have so degenerated, as to become no Churches of Christ, but synagogues of Satan.”
Which of course includes the WCF itself and men behind it and Article 1. So the disclaimer applies not only to you, but to any confessional and Protestant church teaching, including any identification and interpretation of Scripture they offer.
“But your identification of it is always fallible, thus all of the teachings that follow are in principle fallible even if they turn out to be true.”
Confusing order of being and order of knowing again. Christ and the Apostle’s teachings were not in principle fallible (even as an NT believer’s identification of their authority was fallible). That’s the point. Holding all teaching as provisional is not consistent with Rome’s claims as I went over with Jeff’s 1-2-3 example. It is consistent with Protestantism’s claims. That’s the problem and why you can never get above probable opinion. The point is not “we’re all fallible so must hold room to doubt everything”.
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Cletus,
Christ and the Apostle’s teachings were not in principle fallible
But why? Because they made the claim or because they were in fact infallible? Both? What if they never made the claim but the teachings were in fact infallible?
That’s the point. Holding all teaching as provisional is not consistent with Rome’s claims as I went over with Jeff’s 1-2-3 example.
How do I distinguish the truth of this statement from the provisional opinion I have of what you mean by it?
It is consistent with Protestantism’s claims. That’s the problem and why you can never get above probable opinion. The point is not “we’re all fallible so must hold room to doubt everything”.
Again, do you admit that you could possibly be wrong about Rome and her claims or not? Is there absolutely nothing that could ever be produced that could ever cause you to change your mind? If the answer is that in fact you really could one day be convinced by finding the body of Jesus or something, then how is your assent non-provisional?? This is what I don’t get.
I can get a cult member saying he is sure and that nothing could ever possibly cause Him to rethink his position, but if I can remember correctly, you have said that if Rome were to demonstrably change what is supposedly a defined dogma, you would cease to be RC. I know for sure that Bryan Cross has said that. But if you could can say that, how is your assent non-provisional?
I would cease to be a Christian tomorrow if they were to find the body of Jesus and prove that it was his body beyond a shadow of a doubt. Do I think that will ever happen? Not in the least. I imagine you would say the same thing. So I want to know how my assent is provisional and yours is not.
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I just saw this being shared on fb.
This is what I meant when I talked about the Reformation being like the French Revolution. I didn’t know the political situation that resulted.
http://www.socialmatter.net/2015/10/28/reactionary-heretic-how-luther-survived-a-holiness-spiral/
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@cvd When you wrote “better off” I inferred you had in mind epistemology. The question on the table is how we can know – does one system give us an advantage over the other at obtaining certainty.
We don’t disagree that what God says is necessarily infallible and when the apostles spoke the word of God as it was given to them what they said was necessarily infallible. That’s true for prots and rcs both.
You assert that you have to have an infallible interpreter that tells you what God’s word means and that with that you have access to 100% certainty of the TRUTH. This is incorrect. You are cheating in your response to Jeff’s 1,2,3. You say that if you assent to 1, then 2 and 3 necessarily follow. Of course, but the question on the table is whether you can have non-provisional certainty about 1. If we assent to the Bible as God’s infallible word, then of course the same thing applies for the prot. We don’t take step 1 out of the system – we acknowledge upfront that we can err here and thus reform can be necessary (though on most core issues isn’t). However, you don’t acknowledge “1” as part of the system – you want to hide it behind a curtain and claim certitude. Just because you close your eyes, the moon doesn’t disappear!
While could be right about the RCC, but as long as it is possible for you to be wrong, you can’t have 100% certainty of anything that follows from that foundation even if you choose to assent to it. So from the question of knowing, it remains unclear what adding an infallible middle man provides.
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Robert,
“The disagreement is that we cannot separate truth from opinion apart from somebody saying “this here is infallible.””
Divine revelation and supernatural truths is taken on the authority of another, by definition. Otherwise, it’s reduced to rationalism. Nor is it provisional, even in principle, by definition.
“where does Scripture say faith=infallible certainty?”
What do you think Peter meant by “know most certainly”. Did the Apostles preach in this meek and timid manner of “um, we’re pretty sure we’re right, but might be wrong” hedging bets business? Or did they preach with boldness and conviction?
“It simply isn’t self evident that “Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth” means there comes a point when you as an individual lose provisionality or that the church can never teach error.”
And that promise can never cash out in Protestantism – the best we got from you was “infallible assurance we get things wrong, but might get things right later”. And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where teachings are “gotten right” or “guided into truth” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right.
“The issue isn’t whether Christ and the Apostles could do that. The issue is what advantage that mere ability provides when the person submitting to them cannot infallibly know what binding normative judgments have been made.”
So Christ and the Apostles authority and ability gave no advantage. So their claims were useless and unnecessary since NT believers were fallible. Yet you also said, “If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“In both cases, faith is in that which is provisional.”
I went over this with Jeff’s 1-2-3. Such “faith” is not compatible with RCism’s (or Christ/Apostles in NT times) claims. Such “faith” is compatible with Protestantism. And that’s the problem.
“Remember, you have said that Rome doesn’t make you infallible.”
Just like it Christ/Apostles didn’t make NT believer infallible.
“In fact, because you are fallible, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Rome has said that she possesses the charism of infallibility. ”
In fact, NT believer Joe, because you are fallilble, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Christ/Apostles has said they possess the charism of infallibility. So you’re in no better position than me putting faith into synagogue rabbi Levi giving admitted provisional teaching over here.
“Because what Christ and the Apostles said were true.”
It was because they had divine authority that guaranteed and grounded the truth of those claims in the first place. Their claims weren’t like saying something like 2+2=4. But since you take all natural and supernatural “truth” as provisional anyways, this doesn’t even go anywhere.
“Protestantism does not claim infallibility but in fact teaches truth.”
At best it can only teach opinion that happens to be true. Because it rejects infallibility in the first place. Hence “holding things of faith otherwise than by faith”.
“And even if he were, what guarantee do you have that you are rightly submitting to Joyce because your knowledge of him remains ever provisional.”
The skepticism never ends. You’re saying Joyce’s live feedback and clarification gives me no advantage over someone reading FW without him because I’m fallible. Seriously? You’re arguing against Christ and the Apostles again.
“No, which is why I don’t put all my eggs in the Christians are better off than Jews because Christ claimed infalliblity basket”
So Christ/Apostles claims were useless and unnecessary after all. Yet you said, “People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“So we’re back to the one-legged stool of the M.”
What? No, there’s no Sola-S, no Sola-T, no Sola-M. That’s the point.
“If I were infallible, I could.”
If you were infallible, could you make a square circle? Your question is a nonsensical one is the point.
“Back to the one-legged Magisterial stool.”
What? I said If one didn’t ask Scripture or Tradition, there would never be any reform or correction of bishops and popes, nor parameterized development. Can their be reform and correction in the Protestant sense of Semper Reformanda – no – that would indeed be inconsistent with Rome’s claims, but that doesn’t mean there cannot be reform and correction.
So because there’s no Protestant Semper Reformanda in RCism, that means it’s Sola-M? No, there was no Protestant Semper Reformanda for Christ/Apostles teachings even as they offered normative and binding judgments of S and T – that didn’t make them overlords of S and T.
“Do you know infallibly that Rome claims to be infallible? ”
Did NT believers know infallibly Christ/Apostles claims to be infallible?”
“No, it’s on your side. We’re not the ones going around saying, “Nyah, Nyah, we have certainty and you don’t.””
No, you’re the ones going “we must hold room to doubt everything”. Awfully skeptical.
“I’m also not the one driving such a sharp wedge between general revelation and special revelation”
This is the worst part. Not only are you radically skeptical about natural revelation (2+2=4 might be wrong), worse you’re radically skeptical about divine revelation (we must hold any proposed teaching as provisional in principle). That’s the problem.
“But the essence of my question still hasn’t been answered: How does fallible CVD escape provisional knowledge if trusting Rome doesn’t make CVD infallible.”
The same way it worked for NT believers who trusted Christ and the Apostles. They could misunderstand things, they grew in knowledge – same as RCs – faith seeks understanding, but not understanding seeks faith. The point is they had grounds for that faith – based on the claims Christ/Apostles made.
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CVD,
Susan
Posted October 30, 2015 at 12:20 pm | Permalink
Robert,
Consider this: you talk about a reigning conservancy in the ’50’s and then you note that in the protestant churches things began moving away, but notice that you still speak of Rome as a sole intenty, that also happens to be sitting in the morass yet dogma hasn’t been changed. That’s the Catholic difference.
Let me ask you, what you think it means for the gates of hell not to prevail against the church that was begun by Jesus and continues on the same foundation. Can you show me this phenomenon happening anywhere else in the world?
That is the Catholic difference, yes. Dissent, of course. Atomization, no.
Susan
Posted October 30, 2015 at 2:08 pm | Permalink
I just saw this being shared on fb.
This is what I meant when I talked about the Reformation being like the French Revolution. I didn’t know the political situation that resulted.
http://www.socialmatter.net/2015/10/28/reactionary-heretic-how-luther-survived-a-holiness-spiral/
The French Revolution, yes. Revolutions eat their own. It’s built in: Once you feed the bear you must never stop.
Peace, sister.
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Robert:
“where does Scripture say faith=infallible certainty?”
CVD:
What do you think Peter meant by “know most certainly”. Did the Apostles preach in this meek and timid manner of “um, we’re pretty sure we’re right, but might be wrong” hedging bets business? Or did they preach with boldness and conviction?>>>>
The kind of provisional uncertainty seen here is eye opening for me. That kind of thing is not seen in Scripture, especially in the NT. So, when the brothers here make absolutist kinds of statements, they are only covering up their own uncertainties? I don’t know how to interpret anything they say.
1 Corinthians 14:8
And if the bugle gives an indistinct sound, who will get ready for battle?
Acts 4:13
Now when they saw the boldness of Peter and John, and perceived that they were uneducated, common men, they were astonished. And they recognized that they had been with Jesus.
Acts 4:23
[ The Believers Pray for Boldness ] When they were released, they went to their friends and reported what the chief priests and the elders had said to them.
Acts 4:29 And now, Lord, look upon their threats and grant to your servants to continue to speak your word with all boldness,
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“It simply isn’t self evident that “Holy Spirit will guide you into all truth” means there comes a point when you as an individual lose provisionality or that the church can never teach error.”
And that promise can never cash out in Protestantism – the best we got from you was “infallible assurance we get things wrong, but might get things right later”. And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where teachings are “gotten right” or “guided into truth”
Like all revolutions. The snake keeps eating its tail.
Very odd version of Christianity, making theologians and human reason the boss of the church. At least the evangelicals don’t make Pentecost moot.
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James Young, “Christ and the Apostle’s teachings were not in principle fallible (even as an NT believer’s identification of their authority was fallible). That’s the point.”
So the corollary point is that the teachings of the popes and bishops are fallible unless when they say they are. Two dogmas in two thousand years. And vd, t doesn’t accept one of them.
Booyhah!
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James Young, “It was because they had divine authority that guaranteed and grounded the truth of those claims in the first place.”
So it’s divine authority that’s the difference.
So a father is divinely appointed but not fallible.
A divine-right monarch is divinely appointed but not fallible.
But when it comes to the church, we need divine right infallible bishops.
Nope.
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vd, t, odd since the loyalist in this case doesn’t eat the wafer.
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Brandon,
“No one denies that what Jesus taught is infallible. Jesus’s authority is not provisional, but my understanding of Jesus’s teaching is very much provisional.”
Correct.
“Luke 16:19-31 has Jesus explain a parable”
Jumping the gun. The teaching of Luke as inspired, inerrant, and authoritative itself (let alone its interpretation) remains a matter of provisional opinion in your system – it is not and cannot be offered as an infallible article of faith, given the disclaimers of your confessions and teachers.
“Divine revelation is definitive and settled. It is not provisional.”
Correct.
“Again, mixing up ontology and epistemology”
I’ve not been the one arguing that the authority of RCism can never be greater than one’s fallible decision to submit to it, or that my fallibility in doing so renders that authority as fallible as my decision. Others have though.
“Why do you insist that my understanding of Divine revelation must be infallible in order for Divine revelation to be possible?
I’ve not insisted upon that.
“I understand that in principle you possess a mean to infallibly interpret Divine revelation while Protestantism does not. I also grant that I’d love the ability to be able to infallibly define the Apostolic Deposit”
Great. So would you agree that such a system gives an advantage over Protestantism in identifying and defining divine revelation and irreformable dogma (even as you disagree its claims are actually true)? Or will you go the route of everyone else here with “but you’re fallible, so you have no advantage”.
sdb,
“does one system give us an advantage over the other at obtaining certainty.”
One system claims the authority and ability to define and identify irreformable dogma. The other does not. Does one have an advantage?
“We don’t disagree that what God says is necessarily infallible and when the apostles spoke the word of God as it was given to them what they said was necessarily infallible. That’s true for prots and rcs both.”
Jumping the gun. That teaching itself is a matter of provisional opinion, by Protestantism’s own disclaimers, and yours as well – “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”.
“You are cheating in your response to Jeff’s 1,2,3. You say that if you assent to 1, then 2 and 3 necessarily follow. Of course, but the question on the table is whether you can have non-provisional certainty about 1.”
The question on the table is what is consistent afterwards with the assent given in (1) in both systems. I outlined where the difference lies. That’s not cheating, nor is that closing one’s eyes – it’s simply subjecting both systems to an internal critique. What is common in both systems is that adherents were fallible before and afterwards. Which is why pointing that out has always been a red herring.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 30, 2015 at 3:10 pm | Permalink
vd, t, odd since the loyalist in this case doesn’t eat the wafer.
“The wafer?” How infantile, Dr. Hart.
D. G. Hart
Posted October 30, 2015 at 3:09 pm | Permalink
James Young, “It was because they had divine authority that guaranteed and grounded the truth of those claims in the first place.”
So it’s divine authority that’s the difference.
So a father is divinely appointed but not fallible.
A divine-right monarch is divinely appointed but not fallible.
But when it comes to the church, we need divine right infallible bishops.
Nope.
False premise. A radical Two Kingdoms adherent should be among the first to be able to tell the difference between a king and a bishop.
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Divine revelation and supernatural truths is taken on the authority of another, by definition.
By whose definition?
Otherwise, it’s reduced to rationalism.
Was Abraham a rationalist.
Nor is it provisional, even in principle, by definition.
No one is saying divine revelation is provisional. We’re saying our understanding of it is.
What do you think Peter meant by “know most certainly”.
He didn’t mean omniscience, which would seem to be necessary for what you seem to be advocating. Even Paul entertained the possibility of provisional apprehension: “If Christ has not been raised…your faith is in vain.”
Did the Apostles preach in this meek and timid manner of “um, we’re pretty sure we’re right, but might be wrong” hedging bets business? Or did they preach with boldness and conviction?
You don’t need to be infallible to preach with boldness and conviction. The boldest preaching I’ve ever heard has been from sola Scripturists. Most RC homilies I’ve heard are lame, and the recent synod of the bishops isn’t the best example of bold teaching. Bold teachers don’t employ ambiguous language such as we see at V2 either.
And that promise can never cash out in Protestantism – the best we got from you was “infallible assurance we get things wrong, but might get things right later”. And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where teachings are “gotten right” or “guided into truth” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right.
But the mere claim itself can’t get you to correctness, which is why doubling down on the claim is quite frankly dumb.
So Christ and the Apostles authority and ability gave no advantage.
Of course it did, but you still have to make the leap from that to “no authority unless one claims infalliblity and no ability to figure out the truth unless one claims infallibility.” That’s the leap you keep making.
So their claims were useless and unnecessary since NT believers were fallible.
Not useless, but helpful. Unnecessary? Apparently they weren’t necessary to convince Abraham to leave Ur. Was he a fideist or rationalist?
I went over this with Jeff’s 1-2-3. Such “faith” is not compatible with RCism’s (or Christ/Apostles in NT times) claims. Such “faith” is compatible with Protestantism. And that’s the problem.
And as SDB has shown, you missed the 1-2-3 point. Your act of faith includes your knowledge of what is being claimed. But if you aren’t infallible, your faith therefore includes trust in your fallible apprehension of what has been claimed. You want us to ignore that, and I don’t see why other than it punches a hole in your airtight system.
In fact, NT believer Joe, because you are fallilble, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Christ/Apostles has said they possess the charism of infallibility. So you’re in no better position than me putting faith into synagogue rabbi Levi giving admitted provisional teaching over here.
More or less yes, if you want to put all your eggs in the claim of infalliblity basket like you do. The claim of infalliblity gives no advantage if it’s wrong, but how do you as an individual have more than provisional certainty that the claim is right?
It was because they had divine authority that guaranteed and grounded the truth of those claims in the first place. Their claims weren’t like saying something like 2+2=4. But since you take all natural and supernatural “truth” as provisional anyways, this doesn’t even go anywhere.
I don’t see how any knowledge can escape provisionality in every sense unless the one holding the knowledge is omniscient. Each individual truth, be it natural or supernatural (if you can use those terms) doesn’t exist on its own but in a complex network of other truths, and all facts must be interpreted. Since you are finite, you can’t know all those other truths, how they are related to the one truth, and your interpretation is fallible. Therefore there is inherent provisionality for YOU even if the person you trust claims infallibility. That’s Jeff and SDB and my point.
At best it can only teach opinion that happens to be true. Because it rejects infallibility in the first place. Hence “holding things of faith otherwise than by faith”.
I guess, then, the author of Hebrews was off his rocker to commend those who held things of faith otherwise than by faith like those martyred intertestamental Jews who had no infallible canon declaration, infallible oral Torah, or infallible Magisterium to go by.
The skepticism never ends. You’re saying Joyce’s live feedback and clarification gives me no advantage over someone reading FW without him because I’m fallible. Seriously? You’re arguing against Christ and the Apostles again.
I’m just pressing you to the logical conclusion of putting all your eggs in “infallible certainty or nothing basket.” The advantage of Joyce for ME only holds true to the extent that I can interpret Him correctly whether in person or by letter. Same with Christ and the Apostles and the Roman Church. If I cannot interpret any of it infallibly, I don’t see how I ever get more than provisional certainty. In fact, if I interpret it wrongly, the teaching of Christ is disadvantageous to me. Jesus says as much when he points out how parables can make people harder in heart or when he condemns his present generation and says Tyre is better off.
Christ walking around teaching infallibly is a great advantage to ME if I get Him right and believe what He says. If I don’t, I’m actually worse off. This is why despite your best attempts to get us to ignore our own provisionality, you have to address the key issue as to HOW Rome makes you better off if you are not infallibly certain of what Rome has said, what Rome means, and whether you’ve accurately understood it or not.
So Christ/Apostles claims were useless and unnecessary after all. Yet you said, “People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
Claims are helpful, but I don’t know that they are necessary, strictly speaking. Abraham went to Ur before God said “I am infallible.” The intertestamental Jews were lauded for their faith even though apparently they held it not by faith (according to infallible and inerrant Aquinas).
What? No, there’s no Sola-S, no Sola-T, no Sola-M. That’s the point M
No, there’s sola M alright. You’ve admitted that infallibly defining the contours of the other two are unnecessary, and yet somehow infallibly defining what the church is (though not what it has declared) is. What that means is that for all the “infallible truth” you laud, there’s only one necessary truth, and that is that Rome is infallible whenever she says she’s infallible. That’s cultic-type thinking.
If you were infallible, could you make a square circle? Your question is a nonsensical one is the point.
Coming up with a canon of tradition is logically impossible, why? You’re sidestepping the issue.
What? I said If one didn’t ask Scripture or Tradition, there would never be any reform or correction of bishops and popes, nor parameterized development. Can their be reform and correction in the Protestant sense of Semper Reformanda – no – that would indeed be inconsistent with Rome’s claims, but that doesn’t mean there cannot be reform and correction.
Having the S and T is useful, but unnecessary. Further, there really can’t be true reform if the M defines the S and the T. It’s like hiring a non-independent investigator to investigate corruption. It’s like hiring Sidney Blumenthal to investigate Hilary Clinton’s emails.
So because there’s no Protestant Semper Reformanda in RCism, that means it’s Sola-M? No, there was no Protestant Semper Reformanda for Christ/Apostles teachings even as they offered normative and binding judgments of S and T – that didn’t make them overlords of S and T.
Christ and the Apostles are agents of special revelation. You have said that Rome isn’t. For one who is all about ontology, why can’t you get the rather elementary distinction between the foundation and the building?
Did NT believers know infallibly Christ/Apostles claims to be infallible?”
Know, which might account for why their apologetic isn’t “leave your paganism because we can provide a means of infallible certainty that Zeus can’t.”
No, you’re the ones going “we must hold room to doubt everything”. Awfully skeptical.
I’m not saying we must hold room to doubt everything. I’m trying to point out that doubling down on “we have non-provisional knowledge because we fallibly interpret Rome and you have provisional knowledge because you fallibly interpret Scripture” is dumb. I’m still looking for you to explain HOW you have an advantage if your certainty that Rome is what she is is merely provisional.
This is the worst part. Not only are you radically skeptical about natural revelation (2+2=4 might be wrong), worse you’re radically skeptical about divine revelation (we must hold any proposed teaching as provisional in principle).
Are you omniscient? If not, how is your knowledge non-provisional in principle. There are all sorts of realms of study, such as quantum mechanics, where our purely philosophical ideals of what is possible start to break down when we see how reality actually operates. Kind of like what happens when your philosophy meets the real world.
The same way it worked for NT believers who trusted Christ and the Apostles. They could misunderstand things, they grew in knowledge – same as RCs – faith seeks understanding, but not understanding seeks faith. The point is they had grounds for that faith – based on the claims Christ/Apostles made.
That’s not an answer to my question.
1. It’s not at all clear to me why one cannot believe that infallible revelation exists but that my fallible apprehension of that revelation is insufficient for faith. Because no matter how hard you try to ignore it, the fact that you are fallible means that you could in fact be wrong that divine revelation depends by definition on the witness of another, that Rome really claims to be infallible, and a host of other things. You call that skepticism. I call that putting all of your eggs in “we must have an infallible declaration to know anything supernatural” basket and being honest enough to point out where they end up hatching.
2. It’s not at all clear to me how YOU can know when YOU’VE arrived at truth if the proposal of infallibility is so important and necessary. A living person saying, “yes” still has to be interpreted, and a “yes” doesn’t always really mean “yes.” At some point you are resting in a belief even though in theory it’s at least logically possible you could be wrong. You do that when you trust Rome. You do that when you trust that you’ve understood what Rome means by the Trinity. You do that when you trust that Rome really has said the Assumption is infallible dogma.
So HOW are you better off? YOU’RE still fallible. Maybe divine revelation doesn’t NEED, strictly speaking, to be attested by another (in fact, the testimony of Scripture shows that it doesn’t. Nobody attested to Abraham. God spoke Himself).
HOW does fallibly trusting an infallible claimant make YOU more than provisionally certain than the person fallibly trusting a fallible claimant. Even if the grounds are different, where does that leave YOU if YOU are fallible. I get that faith seeks understanding. But when do YOU know that understanding has been reached.
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Tom,
A radical Two Kingdoms adherent should be among the first to be able to tell the difference between a king and a bishop.
Maybe so. But the infallible Bishop of Rome couldn’t figure it out for centuries, and now nobody can agree on what is infallible dogma and what isn’t, particularly when it is pretty clear that the medieval popes were nigh well convinced they were acting infallibly when today’s popes would say not so much.
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Robert
Posted October 30, 2015 at 3:29 pm | Permalink
Tom,
A radical Two Kingdoms adherent should be among the first to be able to tell the difference between a king and a bishop.
Maybe so. But the infallible Bishop of Rome couldn’t figure it out for centuries, and now nobody can agree on what is infallible dogma and what isn’t, particularly when it is pretty clear that the medieval popes were nigh well convinced they were acting infallibly when today’s popes would say not so much.
You keep concentrating solely on the pope, who has pulled this infallibility thing exactly twice, on a soteriologically irrelevant matter.
But the infallibility via the Holy Spirit is a much larger question: The Eucharist, the Trinity–Tradition, not just the province of the pope, but the whole Church, the sensus fidei. In fact Pius cited the sensus fidei in his “infallible” promulgation of the Assumption. He didn’t do it solely on his own authority. [Again, it becomes a red herring, more an argument about infallibility than whatever the actual “infallible” subject is.]
And as much as you fight it, Tradition was the mechanism that the Holy Spirit used to promulgate the Biblical canon, the “sole” basis of your entire version of Christianity. And you still have the problem of the Eastern Orthodox, who have no pope yet have the same canon as the pope does. You can’t justify your religion just by attacking Rome.
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CVD,
I’m willing to grant that if your claims are true you’d have a cool advantage. But I find your claims about as compelling as a delusional man on the street claiming he speaks infallibly for God. If it were true it’d be cool, but it’s not and so the hypothetical isn’t really all that helpful.
I don’t think anyone objects to the fact that it’d be nice if we could infallibly define dogma. The push back you are getting is that you think there is something of apologetic value in getting that concession. I don’t see any substance to it, though.
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Tom,
And as much as you fight it, Tradition was the mechanism that the Holy Spirit used to promulgate the Biblical canon, the “sole” basis of your entire version of Christianity.
The mechanism that the HS uses to recognize the tradition includes the witness of the church, Apostolic provence, and the witness of the Scriptures, as the earliest church fathers all attest to. What is not attested to is the fact that the pope does it or that the church is infallible whenever it says it’s infallible.
I have no problem recognizing the church’s role. The problem is the Roman claim that the church came first and that Rome has a guaranteed gift of infallibility whenever it says it has infallibility.
And you still have the problem of the Eastern Orthodox, who have no pope yet have the same canon as the pope does. You can’t justify your religion just by attacking Rome.
1. I agree we cannot justify our religion just by attacking Rome. Nobody is trying to present a full-on justification for Protestantism by attacking Rome. We’d settle for a less triumphant posture of the RCs based on, you know, the facts of history.
2. You are wrong about the EO. Their canon is not the same as Rome’s. They have an even larger OT canon despite following the same “consensus of Tradition.” Turns out the consensus of Tradition isn’t all that clear, doesn’t it?
Where do the Protestants, RCs and EOs agree—the NT canon. Turns out you don’t need tradition to be infallible after all to get it right.
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Robert, (posting in pieces since it won’t go through)
“Divine revelation and supernatural truths is taken on the authority of another, by definition.
– By whose definition?”
If they weren’t, then there would be no difference between supernatural and natural revelation (supernatural is above nature). As Newman said, “No revelation is given, if there be no authority to decide what it is that is given.” And before your anti-Newman bias goes into overdrive, we see this echoed in Scripture whose definition you should accept.
“Was Abraham a rationalist.”
God spoke to Abraham. Are you communicating with God as Abraham did? Are you also claiming Abraham did not receive divine revelation on the authority of God?
“No one is saying divine revelation is provisional.”
Good. Problem is you can never offer any teaching that isn’t provisional, by your own disclaimers and semper reformanda. So your system can never actually identify divine revelation. Rome can. Thus the advantage.
“He didn’t mean omniscience, which would seem to be necessary for what you seem to be advocating.”
No, omniscience and personal infallibility would not be necessary for what I’m advocating. Peter wasn’t telling his hearers “know this teaching with some arbitrary percentage of likelihood”.
“Even Paul entertained the possibility of provisional apprehension: “If Christ has not been raised…your faith is in vain.””
Paul also said “I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ.” Which is what grounded his claims and thus warranted assent of faith to his teaching.
“You don’t need to be infallible to preach with boldness and conviction.”
So the Apostles did preach “we’re pretty sure we’re right, but might be wrong” hedging bets business?
“But the mere claim itself can’t get you to correctness, which is why doubling down on the claim is quite frankly dumb.”
No, but the claim itself is *necessary*, even as it isn’t sufficient. And this is very telling if this is the extent of your response to: “And that promise can never cash out in Protestantism – the best we got from you was “infallible assurance we get things wrong, but might get things right later”. And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where teachings are “gotten right” or “guided into truth” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right.”
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Robert (cont),
“Of course it did, but you still have to make the leap from that to “no authority unless one claims infalliblity and no ability to figure out the truth unless one claims infallibility.””
So of course it did – that is Christ and the Apostles authority and ability gave an advantage. But you had said “The issue isn’t whether Christ and the Apostles could do that. The issue is what advantage that mere ability provides when the person submitting to them cannot infallibly know what binding normative judgments have been made.” So they gave an advantage, but they also didn’t provide an advantage. You’ll understand my confusion. It still looks like what my original reply applies – So Christ and the Apostles claims to authority were useless and unnecessary.
“Not useless, but helpful. Unnecessary? Apparently they weren’t necessary to convince Abraham to leave Ur. Was he a fideist or rationalist?”
Helpful? How were they helpful? Do you think when God spoke to Abraham He didn’t claim to be God?
“And as SDB has shown, you missed the 1-2-3 point. ”
Only he didn’t show it.
“You want us to ignore that, and I don’t see why other than it punches a hole in your airtight system.”
Where do I want you to ignore adherents in both systems are fallible before and afterwards? I’ve argued that since the beginning to try (unsuccesfully given we’re still going over it) to preempt red herrings of “but you’re fallible!”.
“More or less yes, if you want to put all your eggs in the claim of infalliblity basket like you do. ”
Great. So you gladly affirm this: “In fact, NT believer Joe, because you are fallilble, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Christ/Apostles has said they possess the charism of infallibility. So you’re in no better position than me putting faith into synagogue rabbi Levi giving admitted provisional teaching over here.” This is what Protestantism gets you. And you just refuted your own earlier statements:
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
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Robert,
“Christ walking around teaching infallibly is a great advantage to ME if I get Him right and believe what He says.”
And you should only believe what He says in faith because of the very claims to infallibility and authority He makes in the first place – see the first point at top of this reply. Your argument is that if Christ and the Apostles came back to earth and sat with you in a room with unlimited time for discussion and feedback and clarification, you’d have no advantage over anyone else in understanding Scripture or revelation because you’re fallible. As I said, seriously?
“Coming up with a canon of tradition is logically impossible, why? ”
Tradition is the common life, faith, worship, teaching of the church handed down through the generations. You want a “canon” of that.
“Having the S and T is useful, but unnecessary. ”
What? How is it unnecessary if it’s necessary for correction of errant bishops and popes and parameterized development?
“Christ and the Apostles are agents of special revelation.”
So were they overlords of S and T? If not, how much less so would Rome which doesn’t claim to be an agent of special revelation.
“I’m not saying we must hold room to doubt everything.”
Um, what? Have you read what you and Jeff have written?
“we have non-provisional knowledge because we fallibly interpret Rome and you have provisional knowledge because you fallibly interpret Scripture” is dumb.”
That is dumb. Which is why I haven’t argued it.
“It’s not at all clear to me why one cannot believe that infallible revelation exists but that my fallible apprehension of that revelation is insufficient for faith.”
Jumped the gun – you can’t even get to “infallible revelation exists and this is what it is” in your system given its disclaimers. That’s the point – nothing rises above provisional opinion.
“I call that putting all of your eggs in “we must have an infallible declaration to know anything supernatural” basket and being honest enough to point out where they end up hatching.”
So you can know supernatural revelation through an admitted fallible provisional teaching offered by admitted fallible teachers. Why on earth would you put faith in such a system? It can’t cash anything, by its own admission. That’s why it ends up running into fideism.
“So HOW are you better off? YOU’RE still fallible. ”
The same way NT believers were as you agreed:
“If Christ/Apostles were not infallible, then they would be in no better place epistemologically.”
“People were only in a better position after trusting the Apostles because the Apostles actually were infallible.”
“I’m only better off if Rome actually is infallible.”
“Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
“Nobody attested to Abraham. God spoke Himself”
Yeah God spoke Himself. The divine authority spoke, warranting Abraham’s assent in faith. That’s the point.
“But when do YOU know that understanding has been reached.”
More skepticism. Being consistent with Rome’s claims, we can reach the point of being “guided into truth”. Christ is divine and the Trinity is divinely revealed are teachings “gotten right”. Your system can never offer that, by your own admission, which is why you’re doubling down here. “We can never know if or when we’ve been guided into truth, so Christ’s promise actually never applies” – this is your position. It’s a position and skepticism at total odds with the notion of faith in the NT and Tradition.
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Robert
Posted October 30, 2015 at 4:17 pm | Permalink
“And as much as you fight it, Tradition was the mechanism that the Holy Spirit used to promulgate the Biblical canon, the “sole” basis of your entire version of Christianity.”
The mechanism that the HS uses to recognize the tradition includes the witness of the church, Apostolic provence, and the witness of the Scriptures, as the earliest church fathers all attest to. What is not attested to is the fact that the pope does it or that the church is infallible whenever it says it’s infallible.
I have no problem recognizing the church’s role. The problem is the Roman claim that the church came first and that Rome has a guaranteed gift of infallibility whenever it says it has infallibility.
“And you still have the problem of the Eastern Orthodox, who have no pope yet have the same canon as the pope does. You can’t justify your religion just by attacking Rome.”
1. I agree we cannot justify our religion just by attacking Rome. Nobody is trying to present a full-on justification for Protestantism by attacking Rome. We’d settle for a less triumphant posture of the RCs based on, you know, the facts of history.
2. You are wrong about the EO. Their canon is not the same as Rome’s. They have an even larger OT canon despite following the same “consensus of Tradition.” Turns out the consensus of Tradition isn’t all that clear, doesn’t it?
Where do the Protestants, RCs and EOs agree—the NT canon. Turns out you don’t need tradition to be infallible after all to get it right.
The OT is not irrelevant. Jimmy Akin argues here that Luther cut out parts of it that disagreed with his own theologizing.
http://www.cin.org/users/james/files/deuteros.htm
So you’re still in the chicken-and-the egg. Luther starts with his theology, then his Bible and Church are built around it.
As for the EOs having 2 books the Catholics don’t, that’s a separate issue that doesn’t solve the problem Protestantism’s far more truncated canon.
But your last point is well-taken and it’s my opinion that Pope Leo’s successors largely wish he hadn’t opened that can of worms.* But the problem of Protestantism remains not with the pope, but with Luther and Calvin arrogating to themselves functions that belong to the entire church. Erasmus shared many of their dissents, but didn’t go off and start his own church.
___________________________________
*Although the theological and logical justification is not arbitrary, and the dozens or 100s of sects the Reformation split into is living proof of it:
I will add here that if you leave the Bible and the Christian faith in the hands of philological “experts,” the story of the adulteress in John 8 has got to go. So not only is your theology provisional, so is its foundation, the Bible itself.
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Brandon,
“I’m willing to grant that if your claims are true you’d have a cool advantage.”
I think I might cry. This conversation was about to end like 10 pages back when I thought Robert finally agreed to that. Then he pulled out the “but you would have to be personally infallible and omnisicient to have an advantage” schtick again and Jeff and sdb jumped in echoing same and it blew up all over again.
“But I find your claims about as compelling as a delusional man on the street claiming he speaks
infallibly for God.”
Fair enough. The entire point of this discussion was originally evaluating Protestantism and RCism granting their claims are true – that is simply doing an internal critique of both systems. This was apparently an impossible task or unfair request for some. I have always said examining the credibility of Rome’s claims is another issue entirely.
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vd, t, popes couldn’t tell the difference when they were prince and bishop. Just ask Edgardo Mortara.
Wasn’t the point. The point is that authority exists apart from infallibility. We trust fallible authority all the time. If we’re going to start now basing legitimate authority on infallibility, then I guess that’s good for you. You’re now longer ruled by your wife.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 30, 2015 at 6:15 pm | Permalink
vd, t, popes couldn’t tell the difference when they were prince and bishop. Just ask Edgardo Mortara. Wasn’t the point.
No, your point was blown out of the water. The Holy Spirit solved the problem of the Avignon [anti]Papacy. That’s the point. You speak as a schismatic, where one’s man’s theological or ecclesiastical claim is no better than the next. That’s why you have dozens if not 100s of varieties of Protestantism.
You have no valid method to prefer Calvin over Luther on this matter or that. It’s only a matter of taste.
The point is that authority exists apart from infallibility. We trust fallible authority all the time. If we’re going to start now basing legitimate authority on infallibility
As always, you get the equation exactly 180 degrees backwards. It’s a special talent you have.
then I guess that’s good for you. You’re now longer ruled by your wife.
That was very nearly witty, Darryl. Keep trying. 😉
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Robert
Posted October 30, 2015 at 7:01 am | Permalink
Mermaid,
Robert:
Whoa right there. Human beings communicate in words. God communicated to us in words. The philology matters.>>>>>
It matters for translation work. It does not determine what Scripture is. Philology tells you nothing about the canon of Scripture itself.
Philologists can’t even decide its role in Biblical interpretation.
Robert:
An accurate translation works just fine. The Apostles used the Septuagint and the Septuagint itself wasn’t divinely inspired.>>>>>
Yes, and the Septuagint includes the Deuterocanonical books. In fact, the NT quotes extensively from those books and considers them to be authoritative. Your argument fell apart.
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The Little Mermaid
Posted October 30, 2015 at 7:05 pm | Permalink
Robert
Posted October 30, 2015 at 7:01 am | Permalink
Mermaid,
Philologists can’t even decide its role in Biblical interpretation.
Robert:
An accurate translation works just fine. The Apostles used the Septuagint and the Septuagint itself wasn’t divinely inspired.>>>>>
Yes, and the Septuagint includes the Deuterocanonical books. In fact, the NT quotes extensively from those books and considers them to be authoritative. Your argument fell apart.
Oh, the New Philology is far more radical than that!
The Catholics and Orthodox use the Septuagint. The Reformation took upon itself the authority to pitch the Septuagint and go with the OT as defined by rabbinical Jewish scholars in the second century AD.
Sola scriptura? Whose scriptura? Here’s an Eastern orthodoxer:
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Cletus,
If they weren’t, then there would be no difference between supernatural and natural revelation (supernatural is above nature). As Newman said, “No revelation is given, if there be no authority to decide what it is that is given.” And before your anti-Newman bias goes into overdrive, we see this echoed in Scripture whose definition you should accept.
We see what echoed in Scripture? The authority to decide what is given. Sure. That’s the job of the Apostles and Prophets.
God spoke to Abraham. Are you communicating with God as Abraham did?
Every time I read the Bible God is communicating to me in the same way He communicated to Abraham. That’s the radical position of the Word of God being living and active.
Are you also claiming Abraham did not receive divine revelation on the authority of God?
He didn’t receive divine revelation on the authority of someone between Him and God, which is the Protestant position. You introduce a middleman whose witness is necessary. I receive divine revelation on the authority of God. That doesn’t require a explicit claim of infallibility. It actually requires humility and a willingness to be corrected by the revelation.
I said: “No one is saying divine revelation is provisional.”
You replied: Good. Problem is you can never offer any teaching that isn’t provisional, by your own disclaimers and semper reformanda. So your system can never actually identify divine revelation. Rome can. Thus the advantage.
That might be a problem if I was offering my teaching as guaranteed-to-be divine revelation. Strictly speaking, however, Rome doesn’t do that either. Divine revelation in itself can be non-provisional and our apprehension of it provisional. That’s the thing you somehow can’t get your mind around and the reality that you think Rome somehow solves. It doesn’t for YOU as long as YOU are fallible.
I mean what exactly happens to an outsider evaluating the MOC. He reads them and becomes convinced but not infallibly convinced. So then he trusts. What happens then, does the HS come in make up the part that he questions? What happens at the point of trust that goes from being unable to separate fact from opinion about what Rome is to being able to separate fact from opinion about what Rome says and means?
No, omniscience and personal infallibility would not be necessary for what I’m advocating. Peter wasn’t telling his hearers “know this teaching with some arbitrary percentage of likelihood”.
Omniscience and personal infalliblity are actually necessary to eliminate every shred of provisionality of knowledge. You have to become non-finite. Even when we know something truly, that knowledge is provisional because it can always be improved.
And true, Paul and Peter weren’t saying “know this teaching with some arbitrary percentage of likelihood.” But neither are the Protestant confessions saying that. Speaking in percentage ways isn’t really all that helpful because I’m not sure these things can be quantified. I’m also certain that Jeff and SDB wouldn’t say they are only 99.9999999999999999999% convinced. People are throwing numbers around because it’s hard to express in words what we’re talking about. Christianity isn’t a neat philosophical system where all the bows are tied tight and the corners are all sharp. But that’s what this CtC argument tries to make it.
The Apostles also said (at least Paul did) that if Christ is not raised, we are dead in our sin. That’s introducing a certain degree of provisionality to our knowledge.
Paul also said “I did not receive it from any man, nor was I taught it; rather, I received it by revelation from Jesus Christ.” Which is what grounded his claims and thus warranted assent of faith to his teaching.
Sure he did. Now if Rome wants to make an identical claim, we can talk. But Rome doesn’t make an identical claim. You don’t get to parallel my trust in Paul with your trust in Rome unless the claim is the same. That’s why your comparisons of the Magisterium to Jesus and the Apostles won’t work. The Mormon can make the comparison and allusion; you can’t.
So the Apostles did preach “we’re pretty sure we’re right, but might be wrong” hedging bets business?
Of course they didn’t. And Protestants don’t either.
No, but the claim itself is *necessary*, even as it isn’t sufficient.
But I don’t agree that the claim of infallibility is necessary for the warrant of faith. If you know God is speaking to you, He doesn’t have to say “It’s me, the infallible God.”
There is ample evidence for this in Scripture:
Gen. 6:9–22—God tells Noah to build the Ark and he doesn’t say “Infallible God here.” Noah just knew it was God, and knowing it was God He didn’t need the claim of infallibility. And Noah was commended for his faith.
Gen. 12:1–3—God calls Abraham and does not once say “This here is infallible God speaking.” And Abraham is commended for his faith in obeying the voice, however it came to him, but which did not say “infallible God here.”
Josh. 2—Rahab trusted in the God of Israel even though no one came to her and said, “Israelites here speaking infallibly on behalf of God.” She knew they served the one true God before they opened their mouth. And she was commended for her faith apart from a claim of infallibility.
Judges Samson narrative—God as far as I see never says “Samson, God here, let alone, “infallible God here.” The angel of the Lord talks to his parents, but how do they know he’s the angel of the Lord? Not because he says “angel of the Lord here.” They just know. And Samson is commended for his faith.
Hebrews 11 also refers to the people of the intertestamental period who believed in an era when there were no prophets. The best they had for an infallible testimony that you would recognize is the OT, and even then there is no infallible canon declaration. And yet they are commended.
You cite Aquinas as if we should care about his definition of believing things of faith but not based on faith, but Aquinas apparently missed Hebrews 11 and the scores of places where people are commended for their trust even though they had no one saying “this is infallible” or even God saying “God here, listen to me.” They just knew.
And then we have Jesus expecting the people to know that Genesis is Scripture even before He says anything about it. There was no infallible canon declaration in the oral Torah even if one accepts that Judaism followed one. Jesus continually tells them to look to the Scriptures as if they would already know what those were.
If Aquinas is right, then Scripture is wrong to commend any of these people for acting in faith.
And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where teachings are “gotten right” or “guided into truth” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right.”
Presumably whatever it is you are looking for will not come until the eschaton when we see Christ face to face. Until then we have what we gave us and by definition whatever God has given us is sufficient. So if all that He has given us is infallible Scripture that we fallibly apprehend, then it is sufficient no matter what Aquinas or Rome says.
So the question really needs to be more about what God has done and not what we think He ought to have done or what we think is necessary for Him to do. If you want to convince any Protestant of the tenability of your position, you are going to need to begin with Scripture, and Scripture never says the claim of infalliblity is necessary for the warrant of faith. I can find more evidence for the Assumption of Mary in Scripture than for the fact that I must have a claim of infalliblity in order to hold things of faith by faith.
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Tom,
You really should stop quoting EOers who are making stuff up. The Hebrew text was always regarded more highly than the Septuagint among the Jews. It simply isn’t the case that the Jews were like “We’ve got to find that Hebrew text that we haven’t been read for hundreds of years because we hate those Christians.”
In fact, the New Testament doesn’t quote the Septuagint exclusively. It often quotes other translations, including far more literal translations of the Hebrew than the Septuagint is in places, thereby reflecting the author’s knowledge and approval of the Masoretic text.
And modern RC translations at least use the Masoretic text as the base text for their OT translations, supplementing it at points with the Septuagint. Just like the Protestants do.
You know not of what you speak.
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CVD: I’m not very hung up on provisionality. I am very hung up on divine revelation which is non-provisional by definition.
Yes, exactly. So if we find something that is provisional, we understand that its provisionality is human, not divine.
CVD: Relatedly, I am also hung up on what is and what is not compatible with the assent of faith as defined in Scripture and Tradition. You should be too.
Yes, and I am. In particular, I want to make a very careful distinction between Word of God and word of man. The former is infallible, the latter is not.
JRC: “think about the fallible points in the chain: ”
CVD: Yup, and think about the fallible points in the chain of NT believers assenting to Christ/Apostles claims.
Yes, you’re getting warmer. We agree those points are real and that NT believers did not have an infallible memory or understanding of Jesus’ teaching, yet they assented to it anyway.
Think about where we are now: Provisionality is a human and not divine attribute…
CVD:Did that make their [Jesus/apostles] claims and authority unnecessary or useless or that NT believers were then to hold all their teachings as provisional? Nope.
Sharpen that a little bit. When was the canon infallibly defined (per Catholic teaching)? Trent.
And yet even prior to any “infallibly defined canon”, churches were generally AND PROVISIONALLY able to identify Scripture and sort it from non-Scripture. And they did not panic over the provisionality of their identification.
So unless you want to argue that (prior to canon definition), each individual church had infallible ability to identify Scripture, and I assume that you do not believe this, then your only other alternative is to acknowledge that God allowed churches to function with fallible understandings of infallible documents. He allowed Ignatius, Tertullian, Augustine, Jerome the author of the Vulgate, and Thomas Aquinas to function without an infallible definition of canon. As my grandma used to say, “If it was good enough for Polycarp, it’s good enough for me.”
Your own chain of reasoning, if you pay close attention and think it through, leads to the conclusion that provisionality is not the Kryptonite that you fear it is.
JRC: “If 99.9% is not good enough for you, then I have bad news.”
CVD: 99.9% is not good enough for divine revelation, by definition. That’s the whole point behind the certitude of faith. There are certainly radical skeptics in this discussion, just not on the RC side.
See above. The divine revelation is infallible, sure enough. But the human process by which it is communicated, transmitted, translated is fallible.
Think about this very carefully. The Nicene creed that you assent to is NOT an infallible copy and translation of the original, for the following reasons:
(1) The linguistic symbols on the page “We believe in one God…” etc have been fallibly printed by some bloke with a printer.
(2) Who relied on a printer’s proof or e-copy
(3) That was prepared by a translator
(4) Who received or chose a text
(5) That was some critical edition of either the creed of 325 or the creed of 381
(6) That was approved by the Church.
Do we agree that every link in the chain is fallible up through (5)?
If so, then we must agree that you did NOT assent to an infallible teaching when you assented to the truth of the Nicene Creed. You assented to, at strongest, a fallible copy of an infallible teaching.
Did that make the Nicene Creed unworthy of assent?
I believe we agree again that No, the Nicene Creed is in fact worthy of assent.
And I would argue that its various points of fallibility are negligible. They are small enough that I don’t really care about or feel threatened by them. And in your heart of hearts, I think you probably don’t care either. I think you can admit that (1)-(5) are real points of fallibility and admit at the same time that none of them are fatal to assent.
And if we can agree there, then you begin to understand my position. I’m simply arguing that (6) is also a mostly negligible point of fallibility as well.
—
SDB: “Re read Article 1 of the WCF. Note that they assert that the revelation from God’s Word is infallible. My disclaimer applies to the identification & interpretation of the scriptures.”
CVD: Yes, they assert it. Then they also assert: “All synods or councils, since the apostles’ times, whether general or particular, may err; and many have erred. …”
Which of course includes the WCF itself and men behind it and Article 1. So the disclaimer applies not only to you, but to any confessional and Protestant church teaching, including any identification and interpretation of Scripture they offer.
Naturally. Who’s on first.
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Mermaid,
It matters for translation work. It does not determine what Scripture is. Philology tells you nothing about the canon of Scripture itself.
This actually isn’t quite right. If the words actually claim to be inspired, they are telling you the book is canonical.
Philologists can’t even decide its role in Biblical interpretation.
This isn’t correct either. The Grammatical-Historical method is essentially accepted by liberal RCs, conservative RCs, as well as liberal and conservative Prots. What sets them apart is largely the fact that liberals go in believing its all a bunch of hooey. But even a liberal like Bart Ehrman can use philology to show that the gospel of John teaches the deity of Christ. He just doesn’t believe in the supernatural.
Yes, and the Septuagint includes the Deuterocanonical books.
Not correct. Some Septuagint collections have the Deuterocanonicals bound in, but that doesn’t mean they were regarded as Scripture. We have NT codices that included books that the church does not regard as Scripture. The mere presence of a book in a codex says absolutely nothing about its canonical status.
http://michaeljkruger.com/apocryphal-books-in-early-christian-codices-evidence-for-their-canonical-status/
In fact, the NT quotes extensively from those books and considers them to be authoritative. Your argument fell apart.
Please, oh please give me one NT quote from a deuterocanonical book that says “as it is written” or “as the Scripture says.” There is not one quote from the deuterocanonicals as Scripture. The best you have, as far as I know, are vague allusions to intertertestamental times (Heb. 11) or Jude’s reference to Enoch, a book that Rome does not consider authoritative.
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Tom quoting theorthodoxfaith dot com: This new form of the Hebrew canon was accepted widely by the 2nd century. Between the 6th to 11th century a group called the Masoretes would become the predominant copies of this Hebrew canon. Out of this group would eventually become what we now know today as the Masoretic Text. The Masoretic text is the basis for the majority of modern Old Testament translations since the 1500’s.
The Blunder of Luther
Why do many modern Christians use the Masoretic text for the Old Testament when it was specifically created to counteract Christians spreading the Gospel message? The answer can be found in a blunder by Martin Luther in the 1500’s….
Would you trust a source who acts like the Dead Sea Scrolls never existed?
Occam’s Razor: The EO use the Septuagint because it’s in Greek
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Robert
Posted October 30, 2015 at 8:38 pm | Permalink
Tom,
You really should stop quoting EOers who are making stuff up. The Hebrew text was always regarded more highly than the Septuagint among the Jews. It simply isn’t the case that the Jews were like “We’ve got to find that Hebrew text that we haven’t been read for hundreds of years because we hate those Christians.”
In fact, the New Testament doesn’t quote the Septuagint exclusively. It often quotes other translations, including far more literal translations of the Hebrew than the Septuagint is in places, thereby reflecting the author’s knowledge and approval of the Masoretic text.
And modern RC translations at least use the Masoretic text as the base text for their OT translations, supplementing it at points with the Septuagint. Just like the Protestants do.
You know not of what you speak.
Easy there, Sparky. The Masoretic text didn’t exist until well after the Apostolic Age. It was rendered by rabbinical Judaism, which is a successor to the Jewish religion of the Temple [was destroyed in 70AD], and not finalized until the 7th century AD, well after Nicaea!
I didn’t know the details of Luther not only pitching the Septuagint, but using 2nd century [perhaps adulterated by the Jews] Hebrew texts and starting the Bible over from scratch.
Whose scriptura? Luther’s or the one the Church used for 1500 years? Not only was the Church in error for at least 1000 years, it had the wrong Bible too?
By what authority did Luther rewrite the Bible the Christian religion used for 1500 years [and still does]? I can see perhaps [perhaps] correcting the Latin Vulgate, but not replacing the scriptures used by the early Church and still used on both sides of the Bosphurus.
Further, the Masoretic text rejects the “deuterocanonical” books of the Septuagint that the Catholics and Eastern orthodox accept. Your religion accepts the theological authority of Jews who rejected Christ [and thus the Holy Spirit] over the early Church, which accepted both.
This is not “reform” of Christianity, it’s a re-invention.
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Robert
Posted October 30, 2015 at 8:48 pm | Permalink
Mermaid,
Robert:
Please, oh please give me one NT quote from a deuterocanonical book that says “as it is written” or “as the Scripture says.” There is not one quote from the deuterocanonicals as Scripture. The best you have, as far as I know, are vague allusions to intertertestamental times (Heb. 11) or Jude’s reference to Enoch, a book that Rome does not consider authoritative.>>>>>
Robert, you are grasping at straws. What you say here shows that you know the Septuagint was quoted extensively in the NT. At least you do not deny that part, which is what many Protestant apologists try to do. It is part of the Scripture that Jesus used and quoted from. It is part of the Scripture that the apostles used and quoted from.
Reformers changed Scripture. Why did they do that? You are a good and honest Christian gentleman. You love God and His Word. The fact that Scripture was deliberately changed has to bother you.
Jeff Cagle:
Occam’s Razor: The EO use the Septuagint because it’s in Greek>>>>>
Occam’s Razor: The Deuterocanonical books are inspired by the Holy Spirit and He wants them in the Bible.
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I think Darryl’s comments highlighted in yellow might be the most RC thing about this thread. They remind me of the ‘our father’s’ in the rosary. Plus it plays on the visual engagement, uber RC.
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Jeff Cagle:
Occam’s Razor: The EO use the Septuagint because it’s in Greek>>>>>
Occam’s Razor: The Deuterocanonical books are inspired by the Holy Spirit and He wants them in the Bible.
The Little Mermaid stands head to head and toe to toe with those who would reduce the Bible and the Christian faith to mere philology. Girl got game, Jeff.
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Mermaid,
What Protestant apologist denies that the Apostles quote the Septuagint? And you are ignoring the point that merely quoting a Greek codex that includes the apocrypha doesn’t mean the Apostles accepted the Apocrypha. If that were so, then the church fathers believed the Shepherd of Hermas was Scripture.
The Reformers didn’t change anything. Trent defined the RC canon to include the Apocrypha over the objections of many. Jerome was pressured against his will to include it. The fact is that the Apocrypha as Scripture is a late development. Jesus gives us his canon and it was the Jewish canon.
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Tom,
You’re not a ref so much as a cheerleader.
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Tom,
The point is that viewing the Masoretic text as a 2nd century anti-Christian product is a misunderstanding at best and dishonest at worst. The Dead Sea Scrolls prove otherwise, and some of the most important scholars of the scrolls have been orthodox RCs. There’s not one textual scholar, RC, Prot, or EO that is advocating or buying what you’re selling. Did you find the EO equivalent of the KJV only folk?
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Good. Problem is you can never offer any teaching that isn’t provisional, by your own disclaimers and semper reformanda. So your system can never actually identify divine revelation. Rome can. Thus the advantage.
The more things change the more they remain the same.
Catholicus Von Devious is up to the same old same old he has been ever since he showed up on site. That Rome can infallibly identify divine revelation is his provisional opinion about Rome’s infallible opinion.
Welcome to the hall of mirrors pal. Your hypocritical one way skepticism bites both ways.
Not to mention for the ninetieth nine time, that the WCF admits that councils can and do err, is not ipso facto a statement of error on the part of the WCF.
Rather CVD needs to prove what he asserts, rather than going with the non sequitur, much more assuming what he is attempting to argue against: That all men can know the truth, sufficiently albeit imperfectly/fallibly without the infallible magisterium.
In short, take some philosophy classes on line and get back to us later when you got your contradictions worked out instead of trying to put this schtick over on us. You may be dumb enough to think it works, but we’re not that stupid.
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You’re not a ref so much as a Bronx cheer
leader.Their.
Korrected it.
Yu’re welcome.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 30, 2015 at 10:49 pm | Permalink
Tom,
You’re not a ref so much as a cheerleader.
All I did was deny you your self-proclaimed victory dance in front of your home crowd. She’s holding her own with you is all I said here, tough guy. Don’t whine at the ref. Ariel is no simpleton, fideist or Catholic-bot, is all. Answer her argument or don’t.
TVD
Posted October 30, 2015 at 10:40 pm | Permalink
Jeff Cagle:
Occam’s Razor: The EO use the Septuagint because it’s in Greek>>>>>
Occam’s Razor: The Deuterocanonical books are inspired by the Holy Spirit and He wants them in the Bible.
The Little Mermaid stands head to head and toe to toe with those who would reduce the Bible and the Christian faith to mere philology. Girl got game, Jeff.
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Your partiality is evident to all. Hence, you are a cheerleader rather than a ref.
Your “calls” are transparent advocacy.
Come out from behind the tree. We all see you.
For pity’s sake, man – you’re best friends with Mermaid. Do you really think anyone believes you can cast that off for “neutrality”? Why would you even want to!
Sheesh.
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I’d like to point out that this is the 1054th comment.
Time for an East-West split.
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@Jeff I dunno, another 500 rounds of “is not” “is too” might be fun.
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vd, t, if it’s re-invention, then why do the LCMS and OPC not only confess Nicea but teach it. Francis only appeals to it as an option. What RC theology department takes the Nicene Creed seriously? They even hire lesbyterians.
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Jeff, he doesn’t hide behind a skirt — behind a fin.
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vd, t, “All I did was deny you your self-proclaimed victory dance in front of your home crowd.”
And you still don’t have anything in response to Roman Catholic assessments of the Synod like the one I posted from Boniface at Unam Sanctam. Just ignore the criticism from devout RC’s. Hang out with loopey Protestant converts. (and don’t go to mass.)
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b,sd, but they have nothing to say about “Is it too much to ask”? Sometimes silence is not golden but revealing. Infalliblity is great in theory. Even better if you don’t have to go to church.
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“So if all that He has given us is infallible Scripture that we fallibly apprehend, then it is sufficient no matter what Aquinas or Rome says.”
learning from the discussion ( He gives teachers) Amen; sufficient for all His purposes and ends
Colossians 3: 1 Therefore if you have been raised up with Christ, keep seeking the things above, where Christ is, seated at the right hand of God
to think about Him (not the pope), to meditate on His the word He has given us (not the pope’s) , to depend on Him (not the pope) ;to find Him(not the pope)
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@ Ali:
Yes. There is a striking similarity between Cletus’ argument: “Humanly fallible recognition of infallible texts is inappropriate for divine revelation” and the docetic argument: “A humanly weak body is inappropriate for the divine Son of God.”
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Jeff, and like I said, an overestimation of infallibility leads to questions only only about pastors who are fallible but also about fathers and magistrates. Why trust or submit to them?
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@cvd
I haven’t followed all of Robert’s comments (sorry Robert!), but that is *not* what I am arguing. The question is whether *I* am better off as an RC if the RCC is right than *I* am as a presby if the WCF is right. Since I am fallible in both cases, I don’t see why I would be better off. Again, you want to take the identification of God’s revelation (STM-triad vs SS) out of the system for the RC and keep it in the system for the prot. This is a fundamental asymmetry that illegitimately stacks the deck.
@brandon
You wrote, “I’m willing to grant that if your claims [(the RCC) gives an advantage over Protestantism in identifying and defining divine revelation and irreformable dogma] are true you’d have a cool advantage.”
Why do you think that? I’ve gone round and round with CVD for 10pages and remain unconvinced, but of course maybe I’m just being dense and missing something obvious. We prots acknowledge that only God’s word is infallible and all the interpretations, summaries, etc… that we’ve come up with in the form of creeds, etc… must be judged against scripture. In fact even our identification of scripture could be wrong even if we are quite confident that it isn’t. The RCC says they can identify infallible teachings from revelation which is an advantage for RCs over prots (presumably epistemologically). So we agree that God’s revelation is by nature infallible, but purportedly RCs can have certainty about certain articles of faith that we don’t have access to.
But as Corso would say, “Not so fast my friend.”. The Catholic could never be certain that Rome is the true church. Since they are fallible in their identification of the church, they are in principle fallible about everything that rests on that foundation. Just as the prot *could* be wrong about the scope of the canon (though this is very unlikely) and our interpretation of the text and thus our confession is in principle fallible.
Now for the comparison of the RC if the RCC is write versus the RP if the WCF is right, it seems to me that neither has a clear epistemological advantage.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted October 31, 2015 at 12:06 am | Permalink
Your partiality is evident to all. Hence, you are a cheerleader rather than a ref.
Your “calls” are transparent advocacy.
Come out from behind the tree. We all see you.
For pity’s sake, man – you’re best friends with Mermaid. Do you really think anyone believes you can cast that off for “neutrality”? Why would you even want to!
Sheesh.>>>>>
This is all that Tom said. Why are you whining?
TVD:
All I did was deny you your self-proclaimed victory dance in front of your home crowd. She’s holding her own with you is all I said here, tough guy. Don’t whine at the ref. Ariel is no simpleton, fideist or Catholic-bot, is all. Answer her argument or don’t.>>>>
Below you can read what I said. That seems to have upset you. Can’t imagine why. Did you think you were the only one able to appeal to Occam’s Razor?
These Deuterocanonical books were quoted by Jesus and the writers of the NT as authoritative. They were then preserved in both eastern and western Churches – with slight differences – for 2,000 years now and accepted as sacred, inspired Scripture.
Why is that? Here is my simple answer.
“Occam’s Razor: The Deuterocanonical books are inspired by the Holy Spirit and He wants them in the Bible.”
Maybe someone who constantly appeals to provisional knowledge should show a little less dogmatism in his answers and a little less whining when someone disagrees. This is just a blog, remember. It is not football.
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MWF: Not upset. Just keeping things honest.
It would be a lot healthier for TVD if he recognized about himself that he’s not a neutral arbiter of truth, but a committed friend of yours — hence, partial. As he should be, really.
Also, it would be a lot healthier for TVD if he (and you?) recognized that most of us around here don’t keep score or do victory laps. That’s silly stuff. We — everyone here — don’t need refs and scores and cheerleaders. We need truth spoken in love.
—
If you want my thoughts on the Occam’s Razor bit:
(1) OR is not a great tool, so it’s probably my fault for bringing it up, BUT
(2) To use it well, you have to propose a hypothesis that simply accounts for the data.
Your hypothesis is that the Septuagint is the real Scriptural text, hence God ordained for the church to recognize it as such.
The data are that the Septuagint contains books not recognized by the RC church as Scripture (eg, Odes)
So we have a seemingly simple hypothesis that hides the complexity under a bushel. It turns out that God (in your hypothesis) is complex enough to let His Church adopt some of the Septuagint but not all — and different amounts in East and West.
Possibly true — but not simple.
Contrast with the hypothesis that the EO uses the Septuagint because it’s in Greek.
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Look, Jeff, I am fine with your rejection of the Deuterocanonical books. No big deal for me It does not affect me in the least.
…and you do victory laps and you have a great need to win. I have been characterized as a kind of mermaid living under water so long her brain has been affected. You bought into that and even added to it.
I am fine with my acceptance of the Deuterocanonical books as inspired Scripture that the Holy Spirit wants me to read and be taught by. I have no problem following the lead of my Church on that, since I accept she is following the lead of the Holy Spirit in that regard.
Your analysis of my application of Occam’s Razor applies to you. Back at you, Brother Jeff. There are always greater complexities, which is why Occam’s Razor cannot be used to infallibly determine truth. Besides, OR refers to the simplest explanation that fits the facts. Your little statement does not fit all the facts.
Jesus did make that little promise about the Holy Spirit leading into all truth. I just don’t think He got off to such a bad start by letting the writers of the NT quote the Deuterocanonical books without warning them He didn’t inspire them. Then there’s the problem of Jesus treating them as Scripture.
So, the EO does not accept the Septuagint simply because it is in Greek. That is only part of the reason. A whole lotta’ facts are left out.
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That is, Brother Jeff, a whole lotta’ facts are left out of your simplistic statement and flawed appeal to Occam’s Razor. The language it was written in is only one fact. Your explanation does not fit all the facts, so your appeal to OC was unwise. Mine actually fits more of the facts.
You said:
Occam’s Razor: The EO use the Septuagint because it’s in Greek
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Jeff,
Cletus’ argument: “Humanly fallible recognition of infallible texts is inappropriate for divine revelation”
Only Ive never argued that. Humans were fallible in their recognition of Christ and the Apostles authority. Ive already repeatedly said adherents are and remain fallible in both systems. That is irrelevant in the internal critique of either.
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Oh great, now RCs think they own Occam (even when they blame Occam for Protestantism).
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 31, 2015 at 5:04 pm | Permalink
Oh great, now RCs think they own Occam (even when they blame Occam for Protestantism).
The Protestants aren’t making very good use of him here.
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It was a flippant comment, but with a serious point behind it. Language (Greek v Latin) is considered a significant factor in the East/West split: Theologians from each side stopped talking to one another because the translation took too much effort (e.g. R.W. Southern).
It is not surprising that Eastern theologians would find the Septuagint congenial and the Masoretic text uncongenial.
The point behind my point was not literally that the EOs held a council and said “Yep, Greek — we’re taking it!” It was that language familiarity has a strong pull, making the LXX a natural fit for the EO.
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JRC in re: CVD’s argument: “Humanly fallible recognition of infallible texts is inappropriate for divine revelation”
CVD: Only Ive never argued that.
Sure you did.
The core of your argument is that the WCF, in the Protestant system, fallibly recognizes the canon of Scripture, and hence is “in a worse position” than the Catholic, who assents to the authority of the church, hence obtaining infallible teachings.
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MWF: I have been characterized as a kind of mermaid living under water so long her brain has been affected. You bought into that and even added to it.
I did tease you at one point (I thought about your eyesight), and then apologized when you took offense. But I’ve not bought into any view about your intelligence.
MWF: …and you do victory laps and you have a great need to win.
I’m not aware of victory laps. I am aware of being very stubborn and sometimes defensive, so there’s that.
If you have something specific in mind, speak away.
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Robert,
“I mean what exactly happens to an outsider evaluating the MOC. He reads them and becomes convinced but not infallibly convinced. ”
Precisely. The MOC make the assent of faith reasonable, they do not compel assent or make it intellectually necessary (a la mathematical proofs) – that’s what makes the assent of faith an assent of *faith* and what makes an act of faith virtuous and meritorious. And nowhere I have argued otherwise or that we somehow magically become personally infallible.
“Omniscience and personal infalliblity are actually necessary to eliminate every shred of provisionality of knowledge. ”
The certitude of faith does not entail omniscience and personal infallibility.
“And true, Paul and Peter weren’t saying “know this teaching with some arbitrary percentage of likelihood.” But neither are the Protestant confessions saying that.”
I ask again, have you read what you and Jeff have said? Everything must be proposed with room for doubt – Jeff’s arbitrary 99.9%, sdb’s “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”, WCF’s disclaimers and semper reformanda, your “infallible assurance we get things wrong, but might get it right later”. It’s endemic within your system – there’s nothing “hard to express in words what we’re talking about” – it’s quite clear. Contrast this with Peter’s preaching and Christ’s promises and others of its kind in which adherents weren’t made personally infallible or omniscient.
“The Apostles also said (at least Paul did) that if Christ is not raised, we are dead in our sin.”
Yes, and if Rome contradicts infallible dogma, she falls apart. Now, here’s the point again – when Paul assented in faith to the revelation he personally received from Christ, to be consistent with that, would he then be justified in teaching provisionally or holding perpetual doubt? No. If I assent in faith to Rome’s claims, afterwards, would I then be consistent with that assent by holding anything she teaches infallibly as provisional or “highly likely” or tentative? No – that would be inconsistent with the claims I supposedly assented to in the first place. Same for an NT believer submitting to Christ/Apostles. Does the same hold for Protestantism? No. *That* is the point which I was explaining in the reply to Jeff’s 1-2-3. *That* is the difference in the two systems when doing an internal critique comparing them. This seems to continually elude everyone except for possibly Brandon.
“Sure he did. Now if Rome wants to make an identical claim, we can talk.”
You always retreat to this. Grant Rome’s claims are true for argument’s sake – that is she has divine authority and infallibility without being inspired. Evaluate. Do the same with Protestantism. Evaluate. Then compare. You, Jeff, and sdb just cannot do it for some reason. Brandon could.
“That’s why your comparisons of the Magisterium to Jesus and the Apostles won’t work. ”
My comparison works for pointing out the red herring nature of your “but you’re always fallible!” retorts. The same applied to NT believers with Jesus and the Apostles, as you recognized earlier: “Me:it is a dismissal since that exact same condition applied to any NT believer. You: The condition of having to rely on one’s understanding, yes”.
“Of course they didn’t. And Protestants don’t either.”
What? I remind you, “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”.
“But I don’t agree that the claim of infallibility is necessary for the warrant of faith.”
So we see again Christ and the Apostles claims weren’t necessary.
“You cite Aquinas as if we should care about his definition of believing things of faith but not based on faith,”
Okay, can you give me an example of a scenario in which someone holds something that is of faith otherwise than by faith? Is the distinction even possible for you?
“Presumably whatever it is you are looking for will not come until the eschaton when we see Christ face to face.”
What a stunning admission. Everything remains provisional and tentative this side of heaven. The certitude of faith is simply incompatible with Protestantism apparently. This is just about on par with your earlier agreement “more or less” that the following holds: “In fact, NT believer Joe, because you are fallilble, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Christ/Apostles has said they possess the charism of infallibility. So you’re in no better position than me putting faith into synagogue rabbi Levi giving admitted provisional teaching over here.”
“Until then we have what we gave us and by definition whatever God has given us is sufficient.”
Which can never be offered by your side as actual divine revelation and an infallible dogma and still be consistent with your disclaimers.
“If you want to convince any Protestant of the tenability of your position, you are going to need to begin with Scripture”
Jumped the gun again – the canon and its attendant doctrines can never rise above provisional opinion by your own disclaimers. So this is just more question begging to avoid engaging or to bypass the underlying issue. And of course I have engaged Scripture – one side has done the following:
1. Make Christ and the Apostles claims to infallibility and divine authority unnecessary and superfluous because everyone is fallible.
2. Make Christ’s promises nonsensical or hopeless to actually cash out because everyone is fallible.
3. Make Peter and Paul’s preaching nonsensical or just hyperbole because everyone listening to them was fallible.
4. Liken supernatural faith with “faith” in science and math because everyone is fallible.
5. Eviscerate the notion and model of faith we see in Scripture because everyone is fallible.
6. Christ and the Apostles coming back to earth and sitting with me with unlimited time for ongoing clarification, discussion, and confirmation is of no advantage because I’m fallible.
And one side has not.
Maybe this will help. I’ve cited from Cath Ency before but I’ll do it again because I want to know if you agree with any of the following statements, or not:
“It should be noted, too, that in the common opinion of theologians there is a greater certitude in divine faith than in any human science.”
“The term natural certitude is sometimes used in another sense, in contradistinction from the certitude of Divine faith, which is supernatural certitude, and which, according to theologians generally, is greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err.”
“Certitude is contrasted with other states of mind in reference to a proposition: the state of ignorance, the state of doubt, and the state of opinion. The last-named signifies, in the strict use of the term, the holding of a proposition as probable … Certitude differs from opinion in kind, not in degree only; for opinion, that is assent to the probability of a proposition, regards the opposite proposition as not more than improbable; and therefore opinion is always accompanied by the consciousness that further evidence may cause a change of mind in favour of the opposite opinion. Opinion, therefore, does not exclude doubt; certitude does.”
“The certitude of faith is supernatural, being due to Divine grace, and is superior not merely to moral certitude, but to the certitude of physical science, and to that of the demonstrative sciences.”
“there are two orders of knowledge, distinct both in their source and their object; distinct in their source, for the truths of one order are known by natural reason, and those of the other by faith in divine revelation; and distinct in their object, because, over and above the truths naturally attainable, there are proposed to our belief mysteries hidden in God, which can be known through divine revelation alone.”
If no, I’d like to know why. If yes, I’d like to know how Protestantism warrants it, given its disclaimers. This may help clear some of the fog.
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Jeff,
“JRC in re: CVD’s argument: “Humanly fallible recognition of infallible texts is inappropriate for divine revelation”
CVD: Only Ive never argued that.
Sure you did.”
And then you cite from me “Once again, believers had to identify Christ and the Apostles. They had an advantage after assent – they didn’t just have provisional teaching.”
No where have I argued one was infallible in identifying Christ and the Apostles. Nor does my argument entail they had to be infallible or omniscient, yet that seems to be where the disconnect lies.
“CVD: Provisionality and probable opinions are not compatible with divine revelation, irreformable and infallible by definition.”
Which you agree with – “Me: divine revelation which is non-provisional by definition. You: Yes, exactly. So if we find something that is provisional, we understand that its provisionality is human, not divine.”
“CVD: The infallibility of the Scriptures, as well as the identification of it, are themselves provisional teachings and opinions in your system.”
Which you agree with per your earlier statements on the canon. And yet, “we understand that its provisionality is human, not divine”. See the problem yet?
“CVD: The teaching of the extent and scope of the Bible, its inerrancy, its inspiration, its closure, and its authoritative nature are not doctrines? WCF teaches it. And it doesn’t exclude those teachings from its disclaimers that apply to the whole of the confession.”
Which you agree with: “Me: Which of course includes the WCF itself and men behind it and Article 1. So the disclaimer applies not only to you, but to any confessional and Protestant church teaching, including any identification and interpretation of Scripture they offer. You: Naturally. Who’s on first.” And yet, “we understand that its provisionality is human, not divine”. See the problem yet?
“The core of your argument is that the WCF, in the Protestant system, fallibly recognizes the canon of Scripture, and hence is “in a worse position” than the Catholic, who assents to the authority of the church, hence obtaining infallible teachings.”
The core of my argument is what is consistent within each system based on its claims (or lack thereof), and then what each system can yield based on that consistency with those claims.
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Cletus,
“It should be noted, too, that in the common opinion of theologians there is a greater certitude in divine faith than in any human science.”
I believe I would agree.
“The term natural certitude is sometimes used in another sense, in contradistinction from the certitude of Divine faith, which is supernatural certitude, and which, according to theologians generally, is greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err.”
“Certitude is contrasted with other states of mind in reference to a proposition: the state of ignorance, the state of doubt, and the state of opinion. The last-named signifies, in the strict use of the term, the holding of a proposition as probable … Certitude differs from opinion in kind, not in degree only; for opinion, that is assent to the probability of a proposition, regards the opposite proposition as not more than improbable; and therefore opinion is always accompanied by the consciousness that further evidence may cause a change of mind in favour of the opposite opinion. Opinion, therefore, does not exclude doubt; certitude does.”
I think this is where the hang up might be. Let me see if I can attempt an answer by asking a question. Is there anything that might happen that would cause you to leave the Roman Catholic Church? For example, if tomorrow archaeologists in Jerusalem find the body of Jesus in a grave and can prove that it is indeed the body of Jesus, then would you leave the faith because the resurrection has been disproved.
I want you to answer the question. But my answer is, “Yes, I would stop being a Christian. After all, the core element of the faith has been proven to be false. And in keeping with what Paul has said, if Christ has not been raised it is better to eat drink and be merry for tomorrow you die.”
Now the fact that I can answer yes to that question indicates that there is a certain provisionality to my faith/knowledge. I am a Christian until they disprove the resurrection. I think Paul would in go with me.
Now, do I really think that such will ever happen. No. I don’t know that even if they found a body they thought was Jesus’ that they could prove it was his. Nevertheless, I can at least entertain the possibility in theory no matter how remote. And actually, my convictions are so deep that if Christianity isn’t true, there is no God. There’s no other contender. All other systems are fundamentally incoherent if you press them to their conclusions. And I think ultimately that is what Paul is saying when he says if Christ has been raised. I don’t think he’s saying, “If Christ has not been raised, go back to being Jewish.” I think he’s saying, “If Christ has not been raised, there’s no hope at all.
In any case, the fact that I can even entertain the possibility indicates to me that there is a degree of provisionality to my knowledge and certitude. Despite all your claims, I’m fairly certain that you would agree that if the body of Jesus were to be found, you would cease being a Christian. I’m also fairly certain that you don’t think that will ever happen. Nevertheless, the fact that you could entertain it indicates that your knowledge/faith is based on a view that does not escape provisionality.
That’s the kind of provisionality I have for all matters of faith. Call it opinion if you want, but I think it is wrong to call that as compatible with doubt. I don’t doubt the resurrection because my knowledge/faith is provisional. I don’t doubt the canon either. (I mean, there have been times in my life where I have had doubts, but that is true of any body who professes faith. But I will say I am more certain today than I was twenty years ago. I will also say that doubt is sin. But unless you want to tell me you’ve never had any doubts ever, then your faith/knowledge is no less provisional than mine.)
“The certitude of faith is supernatural, being due to Divine grace, and is superior not merely to moral certitude, but to the certitude of physical science, and to that of the demonstrative sciences.”
I’m not exactly sure what is meant here, to be honest. And again, let me give an example. As far as I know, Bart Ehrman is convinced that the Gospel of John teaches the deity of Christ. Even if he’s not, there have been plenty of atheists who are convinced that the Gospel of John teaches the deity of Christ. There are others, of course, like the Jehovah Witnesses who twist the Gospel of John to deny the deity of Christ. But in any case, the fact that some who never become Christians, even temporarily, can become certain of a divine, supernatural truth, namely that the Gospel of John teaches the deity of Christ, makes me question this business of the certitude of faith being some kind of supernatural gift. What I would say is the supernatural gift is the actual faith itself, and that faith brings with it supernatural assurance. But it is empirically verifiable that I am not more certain that John, or Paul, or any other Apostle teach the deity of Christ than the atheist who reads supernatural revelation, gets that insight, but just thinks it is all bogus myth. So it is unclear to me what the certitude of faith means.
“there are two orders of knowledge, distinct both in their source and their object; distinct in their source, for the truths of one order are known by natural reason, and those of the other by faith in divine revelation; and distinct in their object, because, over and above the truths naturally attainable, there are proposed to our belief mysteries hidden in God, which can be known through divine revelation alone.”
I don’t buy a sharp bifurcation in divine revelation. Both natural/general revelation and special revelation are divine in origin. 2+2=4 is a divine truth. It’s just not a divine truth that will save. Anyone who studies the natural order and expects to get truth from it is in some sense putting faith in divine revelation. They are operating as they were made to operate even if they aren’t always conscious of what they are doing.
But a better example is the testimony of creation to God’s existence. That is divine revelation. It is a truth from God Himself embedded in the natural order. Paul doesn’t say the problem is that some reason their way to God and then don’t believe because they don’t have extra revelation. He says the problem is that they have rightly received divine revelation such that they know God exists; they just refuse to put saving faith in Him.
But in short, natural revelation is as divine as special revelation. The difference is in the medium through which it comes and its content. The gift of grace and faith has more to do with turning from self-trust and resting in the divine revelation of salvation (that comes through special revelation) than it does with being something extra we need to figure out the mysteries of God. Anyone who sits down and reads the Bible can understand what it is saying and, I think, knows deep down that what it is saying is true. You can get that from “reason.” What you can’t get is actually taking what you know to be true and submitting to it for salvation.
(The Bible even gives examples of such people who have reasoned their way to God and are certain of Christ’s identity but then refuse to trust Him. Rich young ruler).
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CVD: No where have I argued one was infallible in identifying Christ and the Apostles.
Yes, I agree that you have not argued this. You have argued that there was fallible identification, followed by a voluntary assent.
CVD: Nor does my argument entail they had to be infallible or omniscient, yet that seems to be where the disconnect lies.
Yes, actually, it does. IF provisional knowledge is incompatible with divine teaching, and IF articles of faith must be divine teaching, THEN it follows that articles of faith cannot be known provisionally, for our knowledge would be incompatible with our articles of faith.
Let’s be more precise.
The Philippian jailer heard Peter explain the gospel after the earthquake. He believed.
What, exactly, did the jailer believe? He did not believe the idea that was in Peter’s head. Rather, he believed the idea that was in his own head, which was the result of his understanding of his hearing of the words Peter had spoken.
At all times, and in all ways, the jailer had fallible knowledge of the gospel that Peter had preached to him.
So when he believed, he was not believing in infallible teaching — which he had no access to — but in a fallible mental image, or model, of that teaching.
There is no Vulcan mind-meld between authority and believer. The communication process itself is fallible. For that reason, the believer is always believing fallible symbols, EVEN IF their source is an infallible authority.
Now, that’s no problem for the Protestant. This state of affairs is consistent with our claims. But for you, who insists that it is necessary to assent only to infallible teachings, this state of affairs is a mess.
Even given all of your claims, you still only assent to a fallible model of infallible claims. You cannot do what you claim is necessary to do.
To reiterate for clarity: Even after and during the act of assenting, the believer does not believe in infallible truth (even on his own understanding), but in a fallible model of (what he believes to be) infallible truth.
Analyzing your model carefully on its own grounds shows that your model is self-defeating. It requires belief in infallible articles of faith; it has no mechanism of delivering infallible articles of faith to the mind of the believer.
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Jeff Cagle:
I am aware of being very stubborn and sometimes defensive, so there’s that.>>>>>
Yes, there is that. At least we agree about something.
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Jeff, “There is no Vulcan mind-meld between authority and believer.”
But there is when Bryan is arguing motives of credibility and James Young is arguing infallibility.
And people wonder why comparisons with HAL 9000 come to mind. Doctrinaire Roman Catholicism doesn’t produce human flourishing. It produces cyber borgs.
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D. G. Hart
Posted October 31, 2015 at 11:45 pm | Permalink
Jeff, “There is no Vulcan mind-meld between authority and believer.”
But there is when Bryan is arguing motives of credibility and James Young is arguing infallibility.
And people wonder why comparisons with HAL 9000 come to mind. Doctrinaire Roman Catholicism doesn’t produce human flourishing. It produces cyber borgs.
When there’s dissent, it means Catholicism bad.
When there’s assent, it mean Catholicism bad.
Nice racket.
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The Philippian jailer heard *Paul* preach. Fallibility.
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vd, t, extremism over infallibility? The Pope disapproves.
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D.G.Hart : vd, t, extremism over infallibility? The Pope disapproves..
“May our prayer adhere fully to the will of God,” Francis added, “who desired that all men and women recognize themselves as brothers and sisters, and live as such, forming a human family that lives in the harmony of diversity.”
There may be a misunderstanding – God desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. Thereis one God, and one mediator also between God and men, the man Christ Jesus 1 Tim 2: 4 -5
“ “Pope Francis is a leader for all believers,” Muslim leader Rasoul Rasoulipour told journalists on Wednesday.”
Think there may be a misunderstanding :But as many as received Him (Jesus), to them He gave the right to become children of God, even to those who believe in His name, John 1:12
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Jeff Cagle:
What, exactly, did the jailer believe? He did not believe the idea that was in Peter’s head. Rather, he believed the idea that was in his own head, which was the result of his understanding of his hearing of the words Peter had spoken.
At all times, and in all ways, the jailer had fallible knowledge of the gospel that Peter had preached to him.
So when he believed, he was not believing in infallible teaching — which he had no access to — but in a fallible mental image, or model, of that teaching.>>>>>
I know you meant Paul. No big deal. It is a familiar story.
Why did you leave out the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of the Phillipian jailer? He would not, nor could he have believed without being regenerated first.
Your statements look Pelagian, not even semi-Pelagian. How would you defend yourself against such a charge, Jeff?
It looks as thought you are saying that even Paul was not 100% certain that the message he was preaching was true. He was preaching based on provisional knowledge as much as you are using provisional knowledge to defend your provisional position about truth.
If the Gospel is an infallible message,then what good is it if God is unable to communicate it to us infallibly? You have to factor John 3 and John 16 in at some point in your model, that is if you really believe that the Bible is the only infallible rule of faith and practice.
The Catholic Church does claim that the Holy Spirit is leading her into all truth. You disagree with that claim, of course, but wouldn’t you have to make a similar claim about the work of the Holy Spirit in the universal church?
Sure. No one gets it all right, but that does not negate the fact that Jesus did promise the Holy Spirit would lead His Church into all truth. I don’t see that as a provisional promise.
Your WCF claims that there is no salvation outside the church. God puts believers in Christ into His Body. We are God’s building blocks according to the Apostle Paul. Do you believe that, or do you allow yourself an element of doubt?
John 16
12 “I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. 13 When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth, for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come. 14 He will glorify me, for he will take what is mine and declare it to you. 15 All that the Father has is mine; therefore I said that he will take what is mine and declare it to you.
Ephesians 2:19-22
19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens,[a] but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by[b] the Spirit.
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Mermaid,
Sure. No one gets it all right, but that does not negate the fact that Jesus did promise the Holy Spirit would lead His Church into all truth. I don’t see that as a provisional promise.
No one is really saying that it is. It’s you guys stressing the certainty that Rome offers and believing all truth is provisional without someone saying, “This here is non-provisional.” Not one of us here is thinking, here I am trusting my provisional opinion, whatever will we do. But that’s what you all are doing. So if you’re going to stress that you’re somehow doing something we’re not, we’re going to point out that the only way you’d actually be doing something epistemologically different is if you were omniscient and infallible. Otherwise you are trusting your own fallible apprehension of truth no less than we are.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 1, 2015 at 8:37 am | Permalink
vd, t, extremism over infallibility? The Pope disapproves.
Non sequitur, warrior child. Always fighting.
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MWF: Why did you leave out the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of the Phillipian jailer?
Because the topic was “infallible statements of faith.” If you want to understand my view of the work of the Spirit, you can just ask.
MWF: He would not, nor could he have believed without being regenerated first.
Agreed.
MWF: Your statements look Pelagian, not even semi-Pelagian. How would you defend yourself against such a charge, Jeff?
With a chuckle. No-one takes a charge of Pelagianism seriously when leveled against a Calvinist.
But the charge does reveal something about the accuser: That she is willing to read into silence and accuse people based on what she finds there.
MWF: It looks as thought you are saying that even Paul was not 100% certain that the message he was preaching was true.
It doesn’t look that way to any fair reader. I said nothing about Paul’s state of mind (or Peter’s, even). You bring forward yet another argument from silence.
Love is honest, Mermaid. That means being careful with the truth.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted November 1, 2015 at 4:43 pm | Permalink
MWF: Why did you leave out the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of the Phillipian jailer?
Because the topic was “infallible statements of faith.” If you want to understand my view of the work of the Spirit, you can just ask.
MWF: He would not, nor could he have believed without being regenerated first.
Agreed.
MWF: Your statements look Pelagian, not even semi-Pelagian. How would you defend yourself against such a charge, Jeff?
With a chuckle. No-one takes a charge of Pelagianism seriously when leveled against a Calvinist.
Not when he argues like a sophist. The individual’s fallibility is not the topic here, you’re just trying to make it the topic.
Because the topic was “infallible statements of faith.” If you want to understand my view of the work of the Spirit, you can just ask.
MWF: He would not, nor could he have believed without being regenerated first.
Agreed.
Which makes the fallibility of the individual moot, and puts the Holy Spirit, not human fallibility, in its proper primary place. NOW you can start arguing like a Calvinist.
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That’s a good point. I should have said “No one but Tom takes seriously…”
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Jeff Cagle
Posted November 1, 2015 at 4:43 pm | Permalink
MWF: Why did you leave out the work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of the Phillipian jailer?
Jeff Cagle:
Because the topic was “infallible statements of faith.” If you want to understand my view of the work of the Spirit, you can just ask.>>>>>
He had nothing to do with any part of your argument. If you wish to show where He fits into your model, feel free to shoehorn Him in.
MWF: He would not, nor could he have believed without being regenerated first.
Jeff Cagle:
Agreed.>>>>
Under duress? Is the miraculous work of the Holy Spirit in the heart of a person a key point in your understanding of the Gospel or not? You were talking Gospel, but unlike any Calvinist I have ever seen.
MWF: Your statements look Pelagian, not even semi-Pelagian. How would you defend yourself against such a charge, Jeff?
Jeff Cagle:
With a chuckle. No-one takes a charge of Pelagianism seriously when leveled against a Calvinist.>>>>
Like I said. I have never seen a Calvinist make the mistake you made – leaving out the work of the Holy Spirit in the life of the jailer, thus enabling him to believe.
Jeff Cagle:
But the charge does reveal something about the accuser: That she is willing to read into silence and accuse people based on what she finds there.>>>>
Hmmm. Is that the defensive Jeff talking? Just pointing out a problem in the presentation of your theology. Regeneration is a key point in your (our) understanding of the Gospel. It is conspicuous in its absence in this whole discussion.
MWF: It looks as thought you are saying that even Paul was not 100% certain that the message he was preaching was true.
Jeff Cagle:
It doesn’t look that way to any fair reader. I said nothing about Paul’s state of mind (or Peter’s, even). You bring forward yet another argument from silence.>>>>>
Was Paul convinced that what he was preaching was 100% certain?
Jeff Cagle:
Love is honest, Mermaid. That means being careful with the truth.>>>>
Seriously, Jeff? You were careless with the truth. Be more careful. You sound like a Pelagian.
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Dear Webfoot,
I don’t know what has possessed you recently to create falsehoods and double down on them.
When you created falsehoods about DGH in re: Dalieden, I appealed to you to be careful with the truth. But you would not.
When you created falsehoods about me in re: Mary, I tried to get you to correct the record, because it would have been good for your soul and helpful for your standing in this community. But you would not.
Out of concern for you, I refrained from being blunt, hoping to bring you along by a gentler appeal. But you would not.
Now here you are again, making up accusations that are silly and self-evidently false. The infallible word of God calls that “slander”, and Ephesians 4 tells us to put that away. For all your hectoring about exegeting Ephesians 4, you missed the point: Unity is maintained by telling the truth, in love.
Put away your slander. Repent. Until you can repent, we’re done. I’m drawing a hard line here because you have betrayed trust.
I hope that you will be able to repent. It would be nice to have you as an honest participant here.
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Mermaid and Tom,
Cletus has already said that the Holy Spirit doesn’t make the individual fallible. So Jeff and my point stands-your faith is based on a fallible apprehension. As Jeff said, there’s no Vulcan mind meld. Your foundation is no less provisional than ours. There may be good reasons to choose Rome over Geneva. The elimination of provisionality isn’t one of them.
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Robert
Posted November 1, 2015 at 7:02 pm | Permalink
Mermaid and Tom,
Cletus has already said that the Holy Spirit doesn’t make the individual fallible. So Jeff and my point stands-your faith is based on a fallible apprehension. As Jeff said, there’s no Vulcan mind meld. Your foundation is no less provisional than ours. There may be good reasons to choose Rome over Geneva. The elimination of provisionality isn’t one of them.
You still don’t appreciate the Catholic argument.
To believe in the Catholic Church is no more than believing in Christ, and his promises in the Bible, to leave a Church behind and send the Spirit to the apostles. Pentecost doesn’t descend on all believers, right? Just the apostles. This is why apostolic succession is so key.
There is no “provisional” in this belief. The trust in Christ’s promises is absolute.
What is the “confessing” Protestant placing his faith in? In a document written by men. In himself, his own reason and discernment, his own [provisional] agreement with the Confession[s].
His own will to believe. Christ, the Holy Spirit simply don’t enter into your scheme. It is you whose
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“Pentecost doesn’t descend on all believers, right? Just the apostles.”
No. All believers are filled with the Holy Spirit.
“What is the “confessing” Protestant placing his faith in?”
Christ alone.
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sdb
Posted November 1, 2015 at 7:18 pm | Permalink
“Pentecost doesn’t descend on all believers, right? Just the apostles.”
No. All believers are filled with the Holy Spirit.
“What is the “confessing” Protestant placing his faith in?”
Christ alone.
Nice in theory, not in fact. You’re up to your eyebrows in theology, so much so that “reformation” is synonymous with “constant schism over theology.”
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You still don’t appreciate the Catholic argument.
There is no argument, only assertions, much more a fallacies. The missing middle term categorically doesn’t seem to register with papists.
To believe in the Catholic Church is no more than believing in Christ, and his promises in the Bible, to leave a Church behind and send the Spirit to the apostles. Pentecost doesn’t descend on all believers, right? Just the apostles. This is why apostolic succession is so key.
IOW there’s Tom Bombadil and there’s Tom Bombast and the song goes “Hey, nonnie nonnie non sequitur.”
Provisional, that is.
As below.
What is the “confessing” Protestant placing his faith in? In a document written by men. In himself, his own reason and discernment, his own [provisional] agreement with the Confession[s].
Yet another provisional opinion of something or other.
Thanks for sharing.
If Christ promised to leave a church behind and sent his Spirit to the apostles to establish that church and the Roman church claims to be that church, then
shazzamergo the true church it is.See how simple that was? Just name it and claim it.The fact that since Christ’s promises are at least found in Scripture, that the same Scripture just might give us some idea of what that true church might really look is a total non show. Not that that bothers our papist ‘pologists. They operate on a grab and go basis when it comes to Scripture.
Likewise skepticism. Somehow because the pope is infallible, that means their apprehension of the pope’s infallible statements are infallible.
Go figure.
Hey nonnie nonnie nincompoop.
cheers
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Bob S
Posted November 1, 2015 at 8:33 pm | Permalink
Hey nonnie nonnie nincompoop.
cheers.
Thank you. The witness is excused.
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Tom,
There were more than just Apostles at Pentecost. I’m pretty sure Rome would not limit the Spirit to tha Apostles then. If they do, their hermeneutic is worse than I thought.
But you do show the difference. Protestants fallibly trust Christ. RCs fallibly trust the church. Which might explain why we see a lot about Christ when Protestants speak and not much at all from the RCs. Who needs Jesus when you’ve got the superior epistemology?
Meanwhile, it looks like Francis is going to go against the majority opinion of the bishops and open up the Eucharist to all the divorced whether they get an annulment or not. But infallible Rome never changes dogma. Francis, the gift to Protestants who keeps on giving.
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Are we talking about trusting a person or trusting words here?
That really matters, and the conversation keeps vacillating between the two.
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Robert
Posted November 1, 2015 at 8:43 pm | Permalink
Tom,
There were more than just Apostles at Pentecost. I’m pretty sure Rome would not limit the Spirit to tha Apostles then. If they do, their hermeneutic is worse than I thought.
But you do show the difference. Protestants fallibly trust Christ. RCs fallibly trust the church. Which might explain why we see a lot about Christ when Protestants speak and not much at all from the RCs. Who needs Jesus when you’ve got the superior epistemology?
The only epistemology is that the Catholic Church is still around even if you only date it from 300 or 400, and Protestantism has a far weaker claim to the time before that than Catholicism does. Christianity as you practice and theologize it never existed until 500 years ago.
The rest of the argument you’re just ignoring. The faith in the Catholic Church is faith in Christ’s promises in the Bible. Neither have you or can you refute the vulnerability of “confessionalism”
Meanwhile, it looks like Francis is going to go against the majority opinion of the bishops and open up the Eucharist to all the divorced whether they get an annulment or not.
A separate issue [albeit a valid one], if you want to nuke this discussion. I don’t think you should do your victory dance quite yet, though. I know you and Darryl are hoping it’s true, because it will indeed shake the Catholic Church’s earth and make it as messed up as your church.
http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/01/opinion/sunday/letter-to-the-catholic-academy.html?_r=0
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vd, t, “Nice in theory, not in fact.”
unjawdroppingbelievable.
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Tom,
The only epistemology is that the Catholic Church is still around
That’s not what the RCs here are arguing. Well, not CVD anyway. That’s the subordinate point.
even if you only date it from 300 or 400, and Protestantism has a far weaker claim to the time before that than Catholicism does.
Christianity as you practice and theologize it never existed until 500 years ago.
Well that’s simply not true. Only a cheerleader for Rome would say such a thing. I thought you were an impartial umpire?
The rest of the argument you’re just ignoring.
The rest of the argument is that CVD et al stack the deck going in, and even so give us a theory that can’t overcome the limitations of our fallibility, as he has continually asserted.
The faith in the Catholic Church is faith in Christ’s promises in the Bible. Neither have you or can you refute the vulnerability of “confessionalism”
Thank you for proving that the dogma (confession) really isn’t that important in Rome. The only thing one need believe is that Rome is the church Christ founded. Who cares about the rest?
What is the “confessing” Protestant placing his faith in? In a document written by men. In himself, his own reason and discernment, his own [provisional] agreement with the Confession[s].
His own will to believe. Christ, the Holy Spirit simply don’t enter into your scheme. It is you whose
“faith is based on a fallible apprehension”
What is the RC placing his faith in? In his own reason, discernment, and provisional conclusion that Rome is the church Christ founded.
The Holy Spirit doesn’t make us infallible. CVD has already agreed with that. The strange thing is you believing that he has to make us infallible to believe and to believe rightly.
A separate issue [albeit a valid one], if you want to nuke this discussion. I don’t think you should do your victory dance quite yet, though. I know you and Darryl are hoping it’s true, because it will indeed shake the Catholic Church’s earth and make it as messed up as your church.
But apparently, the fix is in: http://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/paranoia-pope-francis-ross-douthat/#post-comments
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Tom,
Both you and CVD are analyzing Prots as if they were Catholics but with a fallible Confession.
That’s not the system. We actually have differences in understanding on
* What provisionality means. For you, it appears to mean that anything is up for grabs. For a Protestant, it simply means “revisable in theory.” We don’t seriously entertain the notion that the canon will change in any substantive way.
* How faith works. For a Catholic, faith is a meritorious exercise of the will in which he chooses to believe the MOC on a fallible basis. For the Protestant, faith is an act of the Spirit in which He convinces people of the truth of the Gospel.
* What a Confession is. For a Catholic, creeds and confessions must be irreformable and infallible articles of faith in which you place your trust. For a Protestant, creeds and confessions are the collective wisdom of the church concerning the understanding of Scripture, which itself is infallible.
We don’t place our trust in the confession (as you mistakenly said above).
* What authority is and how it functions. For the Catholic, being authorized confers the ability to define truth. For the Protestant, being authorized confers the right in the temporal realm to render judgment, but not the ability to define truth.
—
Generally speaking, your argument has proceeded on a faulty understanding of what “provisional” means. As a result, you attribute a much greater level of uncertainty to the Protestant than he actually has.
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Jeff, “For a Catholic, creeds and confessions must be irreformable and infallible articles of faith in which you place your trust. For a Protestant, creeds and confessions are the collective wisdom of the church concerning the understanding of Scripture, which itself is infallible.”
That’s maybe true for an apologist who needs to make a point, but for Roman Catholic theologians that’s so yesterday. But we ordain lesbyterians so the pope still rocks.
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Jeff said,
For the Protestant, faith is an act of the Spirit in which He convinces people of the truth of the Gospel.
And this fact cannot be underlined enough. For all of this infallible articles of faith business, in the Roman Catholic system save for some Thomists and Augustinians, the Holy Spirit is a failure with some people he’s trying to convince. On the other hand, the Reformed teach that the Spirit infallibly convinces every one He seeks to convince.
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SDB,
To be clear, I only concede that it’d be cool *if* the church were able to infallibly interpret Scripture. I still believe that your criticisms of CVD are largely valid. The only valid point CVD makes is that he’s in a slightly different epistemic position. He claims there is a body that infallibly interprets the Apostolic Deposit. We claim to fallibly interpret the infallible Deposit.
If CVD’s claims were true that’d be great because there would be a body that infallibly defines articles of faith. I still think you’re right, however, to point out that it doesn’t really hold much apologetic value–at least in the manner CVD has attempted to use it. As people here continue to point out, even with an infallible interpreter the best you can do is fallibly interpret it.
CVD has taken great pains to show he’s in a *slightly* different epistemic position, so I’ll grant him that. I won’t grant him that it is substantively different neither will I grant him that his philosophical speculation even approximates pre-Medieval ecclesiology.,
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Jeff,
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Robert,
“It should be noted, too, that in the common opinion of theologians there is a greater certitude in divine faith than in any human science.”
– I believe I would agree.”
First, your tentative on this which is a red flag – it should not be scary *at all* to affirm (it is “greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err” – this is the point). Secondly, I fail to see how you can agree and be consistent with the way you’ve been arguing.
“Is there anything that might happen that would cause you to leave the Roman Catholic Church?”
Yes, as I already agreed in my reply to you – Paul gave such a scenario.
“There’s no other contender. All other systems are fundamentally incoherent if you press them to their conclusions.”
Which is what I’ve argued Protestantism falls prey to – incoherence – thus failing as a contendor.
“Call it opinion if you want, but I think it is wrong to call that as compatible with doubt. I don’t doubt the resurrection because my knowledge/faith is provisional. I don’t doubt the canon either.”
But there’s no reason for you to not hold room for doubt (even Jeff’s 0.001%) the resurrection or canon, given your disclaimers. You’re not just holding that your provisional apprehension of a teaching might be wrong. You’re holding that any offered teaching in your system (despite your provisional apprehension of it) is itself provisional and subject to revision. That’s the problem – such is not compatible with divine revelation, by definition irreformable and infallible.
“Both natural/general revelation and special revelation are divine in origin.”
Yes but one requires faith (working with reason), one requires reason alone. Supernatural truth is not natural truth. Divine revelation cannot be reduced to a book of mathematical proofs so that anybody who rejects it would be considered just as insane as someone rejecting 2+2=4 or affirming the earth is flat. Matters of faith can be shown to be reasonable, but they cannot compel assent or be intellectually necessary – otherwise the assent of “faith” to divine truths is no different than the assent of “faith” to or putting “trust” in 2+2=4, and thus we have rationalism and Pelagianism.
“Despite all your claims, I’m fairly certain that you would agree that if the body of Jesus were to be found, you would cease being a Christian … Nevertheless, the fact that you could entertain it indicates that your knowledge/faith is based on a view that does not escape provisionality.”
Here again is the disconnect. Yes if the body of Jesus was found, I would cease being Christian. I am not rationally compelled to be a Christian, I gave the assent of faith and so the claims assented to were shown to be reasonable, but not intellectually necessary – thus the room for faith. NT believers were under the same condition as were the Apostles themselves. Now, once that assent is given, what must happen to be *consistent* with the claims I assented to in the first place? *That* is what the citations I provided about certitude of faith are meant to demonstrate. I am not justified in holding any future or current teaching of the authority assented to as provisional or tentative or 99.9% likely or subject to my debate and argument – doing so would entail I never actually assented to the claims to divine authority and infallibility made in the first place. In Protestantism, I am as your confessions, you, Jeff, sdb keep gladly affirming. That is why I can never get anything more than provisional opinion, being *consistent* with Protestantism’s disclaimers and why liberal Protestantism is just conservative Protestantism waiting to happen. On the other hand, that is why I can get more than provisional opinion, being *consistent* with Rome’s claims – which is what also obtained with NT believers under Christ/Apostles. Does that mean those who follow Rome or Christ/Apostles never misunderstand or are omniscient – no. Does that mean those who follow Rome or Christ/Apostles claims to authority had no advantage just because they weren’t omnisicient and were fallible – no.
As I said in the reply to you, when Paul assented in faith to the revelation he personally received from Christ, to be consistent with that, would he then be justified in teaching provisionally or holding perpetual doubt? No. If I assent in faith to Rome’s claims, afterwards, would I then be consistent with that assent by holding anything she teaches infallibly as provisional or “highly likely” or tentative? No – that would be inconsistent with the claims I supposedly assented to in the first place. Same for an NT believer submitting to Christ/Apostles. Does the same hold for Protestantism? No. *That* is the point which I was explaining in the reply to Jeff’s 1-2-3. *That* is the difference in the two systems when doing an internal critique comparing them.
As I said in the reply to you, What a stunning admission [i.e. that “And since teachings always remain provisional, I don’t see how or where you reach the point where teachings are “gotten right” or “guided into truth” – it never gets better than “highly likely” they are right.”” is just part of life until the eschaton]. Everything remains provisional and tentative this side of heaven. The certitude of faith is simply incompatible with Protestantism apparently. This is just about on par with your earlier agreement “more or less” that the following holds: “In fact, NT believer Joe, because you are fallible, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Christ/Apostles has said they possess the charism of infallibility. So you’re in no better position than me putting faith into synagogue rabbi Levi giving admitted provisional teaching over here.”
As I said in the reply to you, one side has done the following:
1. Make Christ and the Apostles claims to infallibility and divine authority unnecessary and superfluous because everyone is fallible.
2. Make Christ’s promises nonsensical or hopeless to actually cash out because everyone is fallible.
3. Make Peter and Paul’s preaching nonsensical or just hyperbole because everyone listening to them was fallible.
4. Liken supernatural faith with “faith” in science and math because everyone is fallible.
5. Eviscerate the notion and model of faith we see in Scripture because everyone is fallible.
6. Christ and the Apostles coming back to earth and sitting with me with unlimited time for ongoing clarification, discussion, and confirmation is of no advantage because I’m fallible.
And one side has not.
The above are the problems. None of those problems are due to me being fallible, but due entirely to the type of claims being made in both systems and what type of teachings and assent is consistent with those claims.
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Jeff,
“Yes, actually, it does. IF provisional knowledge is incompatible with divine teaching…There is no Vulcan mind-meld between authority and believer.””
Which I never argued nor is entailed by my argument. If you think it does, then the disconnect is still present.
“Even given all of your claims, you still only assent to a fallible model of infallible claims. You cannot do what you claim is necessary to do.”
The only thing I claim is necessary to do is follow the model of faith and authority the NT models with the Apostles and Christ (and none of their followers became infallible and omniscient). Protestantism actively rejects the capability to offer such a model. So it fails as a contendor.
“What provisionality means. For you, it appears to mean that anything is up for grabs. For a Protestant, it simply means “revisable in theory.””
No, I don’t mean anything is up for grabs. I mean “revisable in theory”. That’s the problem – “Me: divine revelation which is non-provisional by definition. You: Yes, exactly. So if we find something that is provisional, we understand that its provisionality is human, not divine.”
“How faith works. For a Catholic, faith is a meritorious exercise of the will in which he chooses to believe the MOC on a fallible basis. For the Protestant, faith is an act of the Spirit in which He convinces people of the truth of the Gospel.”
What a charitable analysis. Yes, faith in RCism is not due to an act of Spirit. And if faith is an act of Spirit in Protestantism, then you should have no problem affirming the certitude of faith – but then we get things like 2+2=4 and everything is provisional.
“What a Confession is. For a Catholic, creeds and confessions must be irreformable and infallible articles of faith in which you place your trust. For a Protestant, creeds and confessions are the collective wisdom of the church concerning the understanding of Scripture, which itself is infallible.”
Scripture being inerrant and inspired and its identification remain a provisional teaching in your system, consistent with the system’s disclaimers. So you jumped the gun again.
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Cletus,
First, your tentative on this which is a red flag – it should not be scary *at all* to affirm (it is “greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err” – this is the point). Secondly, I fail to see how you can agree and be consistent with the way you’ve been arguing.
I think the tentativeness is more with the definition of what faith is, which as Jeff has noted is not the same as the one you are proposing. Which may make the whole discussion moot. We’re talking past each other because you are starting off with philosophical precommitments that you don’t even attempt to ground in Scripture but in Aquinas. Such as “holding the faith but not by faith.”
Yes, as I already agreed in my reply to you – Paul gave such a scenario.
Okay, so your submission to Rome is provisional. You’ll submit until they discover the body of Jesus. Got it. Welcome to Protestantism.
Which is what I’ve argued Protestantism falls prey to – incoherence – thus failing as a contendor.
There’s nothing incoherent about believing that divine revelation exists and that we fallibly apprehend it in the act of trusting it. The only thing that is incoherent is if you accept that a claim of infallibility is absolutely required for the assent of faith.
But there’s no reason for you to not hold room for doubt (even Jeff’s 0.001%) the resurrection or canon, given your disclaimers. You’re not just holding that your provisional apprehension of a teaching might be wrong. You’re holding that any offered teaching in your system (despite your provisional apprehension of it) is itself provisional and subject to revision. That’s the problem – such is not compatible with divine revelation, by definition irreformable and infallible.
You just said that if the body of Jesus were found, you’d cease being a Christian. So you’re not just holding that your provisional apprehension of a teaching might be wrong. You’re holding that any offered teaching in your system, despite your provisional apprehension of it, is itself provisional and subject to revision. Discover the body of Jesus, and there’s a whole lot of reform that Roman Catholicism will undergo. The system is so large its not going to go away overnight. We’ll have theologians revisit the well of tradition and say, “Well we really only meant a SPIRITUAL resurrection.” If you don’t think that will happen, go look at what the JWs have done over the years. The approach you are endorsing dovetails nicely with their “the Watchtower can teach no wrong” mentality.
Yes but one requires faith (working with reason), one requires reason alone. Supernatural truth is not natural truth. Divine revelation cannot be reduced to a book of mathematical proofs so that anybody who rejects it would be considered just as insane as someone rejecting 2+2=4 or affirming the earth is flat. Matters of faith can be shown to be reasonable, but they cannot compel assent or be intellectually necessary – otherwise the assent of “faith” to divine truths is no different than the assent of “faith” to or putting “trust” in 2+2=4, and thus we have rationalism and Pelagianism.
Sure they can’t be reduced to a book of mathematical proofs. But here is where you could benefit from a little Scripture. Paul says that the revelation is so clear that it actually does compel assent and is intellectually necessary; the irrationality of sin is that it knows what is true but rejects it/supplants it/etc. (see Rom. 1)
And quite frankly, if you don’t believe the Apostles would think it is just as insane to reject Christ as it would be to reject 2+2=4, then you need to spend time reading nothing but the New Testament for about 6 months.
Here again is the disconnect. Yes if the body of Jesus was found, I would cease being Christian. I am not rationally compelled to be a Christian, I gave the assent of faith and so the claims assented to were shown to be reasonable, but not intellectually necessary – thus the room for faith. NT believers were under the same condition as were the Apostles themselves. Now, once that assent is given, what must happen to be *consistent* with the claims I assented to in the first place? *That* is what the citations I provided about certitude of faith are meant to demonstrate. I am not justified in holding any future or current teaching of the authority assented to as provisional or tentative or 99.9% likely or subject to my debate and argument – doing so would entail I never actually assented to the claims to divine authority and infallibility made in the first place.
But the fact that if the body of Jesus were found you would cease being a Christian indicates that you are only provisionally certain of the resurrection and thus provisionally certain of Rome’s authority to propose it as infallible. Consequently, you only remain RC insofar as you continue to find its teachings reasonable. The second you don’t, you’ll fall away—if you’re a thinking person.
Thus, in theory, every single one of your beliefs is provisional and up for revision. But does that mean you doubt Rome even if only by .000001 percent? I don’t think so. I don’t doubt the canon or the resurrection.
In Protestantism, I am as your confessions, you, Jeff, sdb keep gladly affirming. That is why I can never get anything more than provisional opinion, being *consistent* with Protestantism’s disclaimers and why liberal Protestantism is just conservative Protestantism waiting to happen. On the other hand, that is why I can get more than provisional opinion, being *consistent* with Rome’s claims – which is what also obtained with NT believers under Christ/Apostles. Does that mean those who follow Rome or Christ/Apostles never misunderstand or are omniscient – no. Does that mean those who follow Rome or Christ/Apostles claims to authority had no advantage just because they weren’t omnisicient and were fallible – no.
Well, as others have noted, you have a trivial advantage that has no cash value when it comes to apologetics. It might make you feel good and intellectually superior or something, but at the end of the day, you haven’t escaped your fallibility. Your faith is as provisional as mine is, given that there are scenarios under which you would cease being a Christian.
As I said in the reply to you, when Paul assented in faith to the revelation he personally received from Christ, to be consistent with that, would he then be justified in teaching provisionally or holding perpetual doubt?
This is a bit unclear. Apparently you think semper reformanda means everything is up for grabs. Well, in the absence of a state authority to kill heretics, maybe that’s how it works out in practice. But we see the same thing in Roman Catholicism, people just don’t leave over heresy even though there are high profile RCs that should have been kicked to the curb long ago.
But in any case, Paul holds out a scenario (if Christ has not been raised) that introduces a degree of provisionality to faith. Does that mean he taught provisionally or was in persistent doubt? Of course not. As Paul presents it, it is at best a theoretical possibility that Christ was not raised. That’s basically what the Protestant confessions are doing: at best it’s a theoretical possibility that the WCF is wrong. It’s not a certainty. Fallible bodies can produce inerrant documents. They do it all the time.
What I don’t get is why you think Rome has the right to do what even the Apostles didn’t do. If Paul can present a theoretical possibility and then say, “No, that’s not the case,” why can’t Rome? An even stronger example is when Paul holds out the possibility that an Apostle might teach a different gospel. Why is that possible for an Apostle but not for Rome. Rome can’t say, “If anyone, even the Magisterium, teaches you a different gospel, don’t believe it” because by definition it is absolutely impossible for the Magisterium to teach a different gospel.
No. If I assent in faith to Rome’s claims, afterwards, would I then be consistent with that assent by holding anything she teaches infallibly as provisional or “highly likely” or tentative? No – that would be inconsistent with the claims I supposedly assented to in the first place. Same for an NT believer submitting to Christ/Apostles. Does the same hold for Protestantism? No. *That* is the point which I was explaining in the reply to Jeff’s 1-2-3. *That* is the difference in the two systems when doing an internal critique comparing them.
So now there is no scenario under which you would cease being a RC? Because if there is at least one, even in theory, your assent is in some degree provisional. So I fail to see the difference.
Everything remains provisional and tentative this side of heaven.
To some degree yes. We see through a glass darkly. But you don’t seem to understand what Protestants mean by provisional.
The certitude of faith is simply incompatible with Protestantism apparently.
Well, it’s not unheard of for a Roman Catholic theological category to be simply incompatible with Protestantism. We don’t hold that the church believes for us and must therefore be infallible.
This is just about on par with your earlier agreement “more or less” that the following holds: “In fact, NT believer Joe, because you are fallible, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Christ/Apostles has said they possess the charism of infallibility. So you’re in no better position than me putting faith into synagogue rabbi Levi giving admitted provisional teaching over here.”
The advantage is trivial if you can’t infallibly know that Christ/Apostles actually were what they claimed. That’s the point. But ironically, we can have infallible assurance that Christ is who he says he is. Read the WCF.
1. Make Christ and the Apostles claims to infallibility and divine authority unnecessary and superfluous because everyone is fallible.
They’re not absolutely necessary, as evident by the many biblical examples of people holding to truths apart from claims of infallibility and authority.
2. Make Christ’s promises nonsensical or hopeless to actually cash out because everyone is fallible.
This assumes Christ’s promise is a church that can infallibly define doctrine, which you have by no means established. We don’t accept that presupposition, and with good reason.
3. Make Peter and Paul’s preaching nonsensical or just hyperbole because everyone listening to them was fallible.
We’re not the ones touting the glories of an infallible church to make you better off epistemologically. Their preaching isn’t nonsensical or hyperbole; it’s just that you can’t leap from the Apostles to the Magisterium or think that you’ve solved an epistemological issue for the individual simply because some people in Rome profess infallibility for themselves.
4. Liken supernatural faith with “faith” in science and math because everyone is fallible.
You haven’t shown where they are fundamentally different. I see a difference in medium and content. I don’t see a difference in certainty unless one is a Thomist. I’m not a Thomist. I think Thomas is singularly unhelpful on this whole business.
5. Eviscerate the notion and model of faith we see in Scripture because everyone is fallible.
Except that you are the one ignoring where the book of Hebrews commends people for holding things of faith but not by faith. As well as the numerous biblical examples of people believing and obeying without a direct claim of infalliblity.
6. Christ and the Apostles coming back to earth and sitting with me with unlimited time for ongoing clarification, discussion, and confirmation is of no advantage because I’m fallible.
1. That is an advantage only for those whom Christ is convincing. Otherwise, it is a distinct disadvantage for those who refuse to be convinced. In fact, they’re better off never to have heard the name of Christ.
2. Rome isn’t Christ and the Apostles, so you don’t get to parallel them until Rome claims inspiration of the same kind.
3. Rome has no power to overcome my fallible apprehension to bring me to conviction or compel the assent of faith. Jesus and the Apostles do.
The above are the problems. None of those problems are due to me being fallible, but due entirely to the type of claims being made in both systems and what type of teachings and assent is consistent with those claims.
According to your fallible, provisional opinion that is.
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James Young, “The only thing I claim is necessary to do is follow the model of faith and authority the NT models with the Apostles and Christ”
Right so you turn the infallible pope into another apostle or Jesus. No recognition there that the popes only gain their authority by teaching what Christ and the apostles taught. Which makes papal infallibility and BAOM odd since neither are what the apostles taught.
Pope as oracle. That’s work. Nope.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 2, 2015 at 3:51 pm | Permalink
James Young, “The only thing I claim is necessary to do is follow the model of faith and authority the NT models with the Apostles and Christ”
Right so you turn the infallible pope into another apostle or Jesus. No recognition there that the popes only gain their authority by teaching what Christ and the apostles taught. Which makes papal infallibility and BAOM odd since neither are what the apostles taught.
Pope as oracle. That’s work. Nope.
Dr. Hart still doesn’t understand–or refuses to understand–how the Magisterium works. The Magisterium is more than the pope getting up one morning and nullifying the Trinity, or promulgating the Assumption.
The Catholic argument is that Christ left behind a universal and apostolic Church and the Catholic Church is it. The rest is details, and cutting out the sacramental nature of the Christian religion in favor of debating the same small handful of theological fine points is to stipulate the truncated Protestant [esp the Reformed] ontology, and ignoring the far greater circle that Christian thought and practice inscribes.
The Eucharist is not “provisional.”
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vd, t, that’s odd. Everyone knows that Christianity is a revealed religion. But for you and James Young, it’s an institutional religion. How do you know? The institution tells you it is and the institution has a special line to God that no one else does.
And you wonder where Dan Brown gets his ideas.
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JRC: “Even given all of your claims, you still only assent to a fallible model of infallible claims. You cannot do what you claim is necessary to do.”
CVD: The only thing I claim is necessary to do is follow the model of faith and authority the NT models with the Apostles and Christ
I think we can agree that this is the necessary thing to do.
You have drawn up some parameters from that model. One parameter is that articles of faith must be infallible, yes? Another is that the church must have infallible teaching authority, yes?
Are those parameters infallibly derived from the New Testament?
CVD: No, I don’t mean anything is up for grabs. I mean “revisable in theory”. That’s the problem –
I don’t see a problem.
The Scripture is the Word of God. Its truth is non-provisional.
The canon is our best effort at identifying the Scripture. Its accuracy is provisional.
Translations are our best effort at rendering meaning. Their accuracy is provisional.
Exegesis and sermons are our best efforts at communicating meaning. Their accuracy is provisional.
All of that is the word of man for the simple reason that the Holy Spirit did not superintend the words so as to guarantee infalliblity.
The Protestant has a clear view of the difference between the Word of God and the word of man. The Catholic blurs that view because he has Spirit-led infallible divine articles of faith that are not actually Scripture.
You make a huge deal out of the Protestant’s provisional identification of Scripture, and you cry “red herring” at the Catholic’s provisional identification of the infallible authority.
Why is this not special pleading?
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JRC: “Yes, actually, it does. IF provisional knowledge is incompatible with divine teaching…There is no Vulcan mind-meld between authority and believer.””
CVD: Which I never argued nor is entailed by my argument. If you think it does, then the disconnect is still present.
I do. So by all means, let’s connect here.
True or false: In your model, provisional knowledge is incompatible with divine teaching
If True, then does it not follow that (in your model) the believer who has provisional knowledge cannot assent to it in faith?
Hence, for the believer to assent in faith, he must have an infallible understanding of the church teaching?
If False, then why is it a problem for the Protestant to have provisional knowledge of the canon of Scripture?
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 2, 2015 at 4:23 pm | Permalink
vd, t, that’s odd. Everyone knows that Christianity is a revealed religion. But for you and James Young, it’s an institutional religion. How do you know? The institution tells you it is and the institution has a special line to God that no one else does.
You still don’t get it, or you believe your own BS, it’s so hard to tell. The Church includes the laity, the sensus fidei. If the pope denied the Trinity tomorrow, it would be held as null and void. This is the part you continually misrepresent.
Christianity as practiced up until Protestants reinvented it was a revealed religion of course, but it was also a <sacramental religion–and it still is in the Catholic and Orthodox, as well as with the Lutherans and Anglicans.
You try to pound everything into your little sola scriptura box, but Christianity is a lot more than the pale theological debating society you’ve made of it, a rabbinic Christianity.
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Darryl,
“Everyone knows that Christianity is a revealed religion.”
Then why does everyone on your side keep arguing as if its not? See the problem yet?
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JRC: “How faith works. For a Catholic, faith is a meritorious exercise of the will in which he chooses to believe the MOC on a fallible basis. For the Protestant, faith is an act of the Spirit in which He convinces people of the truth of the Gospel.”
CVD: What a charitable analysis. Yes, faith in RCism is not due to an act of Spirit.
The intent is not to be uncharitable, but to reflect back what you said to me. So let’s work at this until you can agree that it’s fair.
I believe you would say that the work of the Spirit occurs prior to faith, enabling the individual to exercise faith. Yes? If so, then we could amend the difference to
The key point is that faith for Protestants does not involve a free act of choosing, whether Spirit-enabled or no. The Protestant hears that Gospel and says, “Yes, that is right”, and his conviction is from the Spirit.
CVD: And if faith is an act of Spirit in Protestantism, then you should have no problem affirming the certitude of faith – but then we get things like 2+2=4 and everything is provisional.
I do have a problem affirming the “certitude of faith” in the sense you mean it.
I’m not even sure that the Catholic Encyclopedia affirms the “certitude of faith” in the sense that you mean it.
— Cath En “Certitude”
So when you rail against Protestants for saying that the canon has a bare possibility of being inaccurate, you seem to be more scrupulous than CathEn.
On the theological side, I think the kind of certitude you demand is really a demand for God to remove our “seeing through a glass darkly.” You want a kind of knowledge that we can’t have, yet have wanted since Eve was tempted.
On the philosophical side, certitude as defined by the Catholic church is defined as an argument on the ground of authority:
— Cath En “Belief”
Belief on the basis of authority is a logical fallacy. God Himself, who is omniscient and cannot lie, is an infallible authority. Everyone else, anyone else, is not.
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Jeff Cagle:
If False, then why is it a problem for the Protestant to have provisional knowledge of the canon of Scripture?>>>>
At the risk of being told to repent again – which I would direct back at you – are you saying that Protestants believe themselves to have only provisional knowledge of the canon of Scripture?
I have never heard anything like that before. It would be nice if you explained without referencing the Greek texts.
Who is in charge of the Canon of Scripture? God left the Jews in charge of the OT until the time of the NT. Who is in charge now? Is each believer now in charge of figuring out what the canon really is, and each believer can have only provisional knowledge, which gives provisional faith?
That would make the Christian life kind of iffy I’d say. St. Sir Thomas More was right.
You know, today is All Souls Day. Here is one of the readings from Mass today.
Echoes of St. Paul and 1 Cor. 3:12,13 and the Bema Seat of Christ, except the Wisdom passage came first. It’s more like Paul is echoing the Deuterocanonical book of Wisdom. Fancy that. How about going with the canon of the OT that Paul used?
Reading 1 Wis 3:1-9
The souls of the just are in the hand of God,
and no torment shall touch them.
They seemed, in the view of the foolish, to be dead;
and their passing away was thought an affliction
and their going forth from us, utter destruction.
But they are in peace.
For if before men, indeed, they be punished,
yet is their hope full of immortality;
chastised a little, they shall be greatly blessed,
because God tried them
and found them worthy of himself.
As gold in the furnace, he proved them,
and as sacrificial offerings he took them to himself.
In the time of their visitation they shall shine,
and shall dart about as sparks through stubble;
they shall judge nations and rule over peoples,
and the LORD shall be their King forever.
Those who trust in him shall understand truth,
and the faithful shall abide with him in love:
because grace and mercy are with his holy ones,
and his care is with his elect.
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Jeff:
Put away your slander. Repent. Until you can repent, we’re done. I’m drawing a hard line here because you have betrayed trust.
I hope that you will be able to repent. It would be nice to have you as an honest participant here.>>>>
Now you’re talking like a Calvinist. Everyone else needs to repent.
I will keep my eye on you, Jeff.
Who will hold you accountable? Your buddies won’t. They let you go on and on for days peddling your man centered theology as though it had anything to do with Reformed faith and practice.
I read here about how much your good brothers reject man centered theology. I agree with them on that particular point. I see that exceptions are made in your case.
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DGH: “Everyone knows that Christianity is a revealed religion.”
CVD: Then why does everyone on your side keep arguing as if its not? See the problem yet?
We don’t. Rather, we argue that what it means to be a revealed religion is that there is a sharp divide between Word of God and word of man.
I see the problem. You want to think of Protestants as if they were Catholics, except with a fallible Confession.
If that were the case, then we would have a problem. But it’s not — and I don’t think we do.
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I said:
At the risk of being told to repent again – which I would direct back at you – are you saying that Protestants believe themselves to have only provisional knowledge of the canon of Scripture?>>>>
Ah! I think I figured out what was bothering me about the whole appeal to textual criticism and provisional knowledge. Jeff is just following what he was taught in seminary, I am sure.
The argument probably runs like this. Because we do not have the autographs, we cannot say with certainty exactly what Scripture is. We can get really, really close – high 90% even – but we cannot get 100% since the autographs no longer exist.
Since we do not have the autographs, we cannot say with 100% certainty what the canon of Scripture even is. We can be accurate in the high 90%s because of the multitudes of manuscripts we have available. A lot of them are really, really old.
So, that tiny element of uncertainty is carried over to the canon itself.
Somehow, that ends up casting doubt on everything, including the theology that is based on sola scriptura. Sure, only a little, bitty doubt, but doubt is a lot like leaven. Eventually it will leaven the whole lump – which is what it has done in the rest of Presbyterianism. A little doubt here. A little doubt there, and soon you have slipped into unbelief if you are not careful.
Think you guys are safe? I say the leaven is in your group and you don’t even see it spreading.
You see the problems in the Catholic Church. Check a little closer to home. The enemy is always busy, always a ravenous lion. You think you see him in one place and then he slips over to another.
If you are not careful, the false assumption that textual criticism gives us the Bible might be hiding in your arguments.
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Mermaid,
The issue of the autographs is completely irrelevant to the canon. And RC text scholars agree that we don’t have the autographs.
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Robert – You have the patience of Job, if not his autograph.
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James Young, so far everyone on this side is arguing for the Bible.
Oh, you mean that the pope functions like the Mormon apostle and reveals new revelation?
See the problem? Cool.
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Mermaid, at least we know the difference between the canon and the apocrypha.
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Jeff, that’s really what James Young meant? That because our confession is fallible we don’t believe in the Bible?
Odd since it is precisely because James Young insists on papal infallibility that he has yet to appeal to Scripture. You know, pope as oracle.
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Jeff,
“I think we can agree that this is the necessary thing to do.”
Good. Then we should then keep that in mind when making arguments and see if points we try to make undermine the model we see in the NT witness, or affirm and are compatible with it.
“One parameter is that articles of faith must be infallible, yes? Another is that the church must have infallible teaching authority, yes?”
Correct.
“Are those parameters infallibly derived from the New Testament?”
Are they infallibly derived by me? No, because I’m fallible. Do you see why this question is different and not relevant to answering the first 2? Do you then see why this question is irrelevant to discerning whether a proposed system is consistent with affirming the first 2?
“I don’t see a problem.”
You don’t see a problem saying every teaching is “revisable in theory” (i.e. provisional) but affirming that divine revelation is non-provisional by definition?
“The Scripture is the Word of God. Its truth is non-provisional.”
But this teaching is not offered as infallible divine revelation, by your own disclaimers.
“The canon is our best effort at identifying the Scripture. Its accuracy is provisional.”
Right, as is every teaching of your system. Which we would expect since as you say “For a Protestant, creeds and confessions are the collective wisdom of the church concerning the understanding of Scripture, which itself is infallible.” but since all extra-scriptural sources of teaching (including the “collective wisdom of the church”, translations, exegesis, sermons as you note) are not guaranteed to be divinely protected from error (including of course the teaching that Scripture itself – whatever its identification – exists and is infallible in the first place), the identification of the canon can never be assumed to be such. And basing its identification on the “collective wisdom of the church” sidesteps the cart before the horse question begging since you discern the church from the canon and exclude the “wisdom” of Rome, the East, and liberal Protestants as not part of the church that counts.
“The Protestant has a clear view of the difference between the Word of God and the word of man. The Catholic blurs that view because he has Spirit-led infallible divine articles of faith that are not actually Scripture.”
And you jumped the gun again – by your own admission and to be consistent with your disclaimers, what you identify as Scripture cannot be offered as an infallible divine article of faith. So you’re in no position to then equate divine articles of faith to Scripture. And if there was a “clear view” between the two offered in your system, there wouldn’t be differences concerning the books of the canon, as well as passages contained therein.
“You make a huge deal out of the Protestant’s provisional identification of Scripture, and you cry “red herring” at the Catholic’s provisional identification of the infallible authority. Why is this not special pleading?”
Again, we both provisionally identify. So did NT believers. That did not mean they would be justified in holding current or future teachings of Christ/Apostles as provisional or up for continued and perpetual debate and argument. That would not have been consistent with the claims to divine authority Christ/Apostles made that said believers supposedly assented to in the first place. The same applies in RCism. The same does not apply in Protestantism, per your disclaimers. That’s the point of difference and why it’s not special pleading. We are all fallible (for the millionth time) – that is irrelevant to performing an internal critique and contrast between the 2 systems.
“True or false: In your model, provisional knowledge is incompatible with divine teaching”
False – provisional knowledge is compatible. Admitted provisional teaching (i.e. opinion) is incompatible because, as you agree divine revelation is non-provisional by definition.
“Hence, for the believer to assent in faith, he must have an infallible understanding of the church teaching?”
No. The virtue of faith does not entail one must have an infallible understanding – faith seeks understanding (and correction) – that would not be the case if the assent of faith entailed omniscience before or afterwards. As Aquinas noted when he distinguished between heresy and those in error, but who still have faith: “Now it is manifest that he who adheres to the teaching of the Church, as to an infallible rule, assents to whatever the Church teaches; otherwise, if, of the things taught by the Church, he holds what he chooses to hold, and rejects what he chooses to reject, he no longer adheres to the teaching of the Church as to an infallible rule, but to his own will. Hence it is evident that a heretic who obstinately disbelieves one article of faith, is not prepared to follow the teaching of the Church in all things; but if he is not obstinate, he is no longer in heresy but only in error. Therefore it is clear that such a heretic with regard to one article has no faith in the other articles, but only a kind of opinion in accordance with his own will.”
“If False, then why is it a problem for the Protestant to have provisional knowledge of the canon of Scripture?”
Again, the issue is what is consistent with the claims offered by each system. You affirm any and all teaching remains provisional (and not just your understanding). And you are consistent with your confessions in doing so. An RC does not do this and cannot do this to be consistent with the claims offered by Rom – all teaching does not remain provisional. Nor could an NT believer do that to be consistent with the claims offered by Christ and the Apostles – all teaching did not remain provisional.
“The key point is that faith for Protestants does not involve a free act of choosing, whether Spirit-enabled or no. The Protestant hears that Gospel and says, “Yes, that is right”, and his conviction is from the Spirit.”
Anyone can claim personal illumination. I have no good reason to then believe what you propose is actually an article of faith, given you upfront admit you cannot offer it since everything you do offer is provisional opinion and subject to revision by your own disclaimers. If you did claim to offer irreformable teaching, that would start to shift the story – I would then have to investigate the credibility of your claims to such ability and authority.
“On the theological side, I think the kind of certitude you demand is really a demand for God to remove our “seeing through a glass darkly.” You want a kind of knowledge that we can’t have, yet have wanted since Eve was tempted.”
Again, the Apostles were quite aware we saw through a glass darkly. And in what manner did they preach? Provisionally and tentatively with high likelihood? The exact opposite – NT believers were not justified in saying “Excuse me Christ and the Apostles, don’t you know we see through a glass darkly? Why are you giving all these infallible teachings I’m supposed to accept given my fallibility?”
“We don’t. Rather, we argue that what it means to be a revealed religion is that there is a sharp divide between Word of God and word of man.”
This teaching itself, let alone the identification of something called “Word of God”, cannot be offered as anything more than provisional by your own disclaimers.
“I see the problem. You want to think of Protestants as if they were Catholics, except with a fallible Confession.”
No, I want to think of Protestants as believing divine revelation is irreformable by definition. Which they supposedly do. And yet they argue and hold claims incompatible with that. The fallible confessions and semper reformanda are not the root of the problem, it’s a symptom of it.
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Cletus,
You don’t see a problem saying every teaching is “revisable in theory” (i.e. provisional) but affirming that divine revelation is non-provisional by definition?
Wait—I thought divine revelation being non-provisional by definition is a truth of natural reason or a natural truth, not a supernatural truth. In which case, there should be no problem for your.
That divine revelation is non-provisional would not seem to be a supernatural truth.
But this teaching is not offered as infallible divine revelation, by your own disclaimers.
To get down to brass tacks, the base truth is that divine revelation is non-provisional by definition. Our recognition and understanding of it carries with it a degree of provisionality.
An RC does not do this and cannot do this to be consistent with the claims offered by Rom – all teaching does not remain provisional.
Therefore, there is nothing that could ever make you change your mind about Rome. Even if they were to find the body of Jesus and Rome would say, “what we really meant is a SPIRITUAL resurrection,” it would be irrelevant because your submission is not provisional. You’d continue to drink the kool-aid.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 2, 2015 at 8:27 pm | Permalink
James Young, so far everyone on this side is arguing for the Bible.
Oh, you mean that the pope functions like the Mormon apostle and reveals new revelation?
See the problem? Cool.
Shoddy work, Dr. Hart. Shame on you.
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vd, t, great. So where did the bishops come up with your favorite, the bodily assumption of Mary?
Side show Bob alert.
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@cvd
You wrote,
We do not hold the teachings of Christ/Apostles as provisional. We hold our identification and interpretation of those teachings as provisional. That is what our disclaimers apply to.
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No. Christ’s infallibility is necessary. The infallible middle man doesn’t add anything to the infallible word of God interpreted by the Holy Spirit as our identification and interpretation of the middle man is at least as fallible as our interpretation and identification of the infallible word.
Not at all. Simply not adding to what scripture actually promises.
I’m sorry I was unclear. This was not my point at all in bringing up science. You stated earlier that without an infallible authority, we are left adrift in mere opinion. I pointed out that we have much more than “opinion” even if our authority is fallible. No one would say that E=mc^2 is mere opinion just because Einstein was fallible. As I noted before, I am not suggesting that scientific and religious knowledge are identical. But simply asserting that they are different, so this doesn’t apply is not a convincing response. Redefining “opinion” to mean fallible theological statements doesn’t advance the conversation.
Your model of the role of tradition and teaching authority standing equal to scripture does not make sense of how our own Lord made use of scripture to judge tradition and legitimate religious authorities. Both could err. Scripture could not.
No advantage relative to what in what way? This is simply absurd. Christ said he needed to leave to send his Holy Spirit. Seems like quite an advantage to me.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 2, 2015 at 8:28 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, at least we know the difference between the canon and the apocrypha.>>>>>
Protestantism has no mechanism for determining what the canon of Scripture is.
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Mermaid, sure we do. The Holy Spirit.
You guys are always demeaning God in favor of your holy father.
Why? It’s not very Christian.
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word of God (canon closed):
1 Cor 7:10 But to the married I give instructions, not I, but the Lord,..
word of man:
1 Cor 7:12 But to the rest I say, not the Lord, …1 Cor 7: 25 Now concerning virgins I have no command of the Lord, but I give an opinion as one who by the mercy of the Lord is trustworthy. …40 But in my opinion she is happier if she remains as she is; and I think that I also have the Spirit of God.
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I said:
Protestantism has no mechanism for determining what the canon of Scripture is.>>>>
D. G. Hart
Posted November 3, 2015 at 6:26 am | Permalink
Mermaid, sure we do. The Holy Spirit.
You guys are always demeaning God in favor of your holy father.
Why? It’s not very Christian.>>>>
Question: Where did Protestants get the New Testament?
Answer: From the “Papists”.
Question: Where did Protestants get the Old Testament?
Answer: From 2nd Century Jews who rejected their Messiah and the NT.
In the case of the OT, Protestants rejected the OT that Jesus, the NT writers, and Christians had used until the time of Martin Luther.
It is a bit late, Brother Hart, to be claiming the leading of the Holy Spirit in Protestantism’s choice of its canon. Martin Luther was not the Holy Spirit.
Who is relying on the word of man? You guys take yourselves way, too seriously. After days and days of man centered reasoning about provisional knowledge you suddenly remember the Holy Spirit?
————————————————–
“Martin Luther wrote in his commentary on John, “We are compelled to concede to the Papists that they have the word of God, that we received it from them, and that without them we should have no knowledge of it at all.” Luther’s embrace of the so-called Palestinian canon was no doubt also driven by his new found theology. Just as the Jews found the Messianic texts unpalatable, so too the reformers had their theology driven agenda. Luther rejected the Macabees because 2 Macabees 12:45-46 contradicted his denial of Purgatory when it says “…it was a holy and pious thought…” to make “…atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin.” This clearly shows the Jews believed in praying for the dead and suggests the dead might be purified of their sins, lending credence to the doctrine of purgatory which Luther had rejected. “
http://www.catholicfaithandreason.org/the-canon-of-the-old-testament.html
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Mermaid, sure take credit for the Bible. Take credit for Christ too? Why not? Would you know Jesus if not for the church?
Or might you want to put a brake on that argument?
BTW, for the record, the agreement on the canon happened well before any pope was asserting primacy. Even Roman Catholic historians know that papal supremacy doesn’t begin until the 8th and 9th centuries. The canon came in the fourth without any help from Rome, thank you very much. It was the Eastern Church councils — spell it with me -C-O-U-N-C-I-L — that agreed on the canon, no P-O-P-E. (It really is odd the way you flip back and forth between council and papacy when giving credit to the church. In case you don’t remember, popes are not really all that wild about C-O-U-N-C-I-Ls. )
But like a good Yankees fan, you take credit for everything.
Like I said, not very Christian. Not very smart either.
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Robert,
“We’re talking past each other because you are starting off with philosophical precommitments that you don’t even attempt to ground in Scripture ”
Um, I’ve been the one using the examples of Christ/Apostles preaching. I haven’t been the one whose side has people offering howlers like sdb’s “I’m not really sure Christ even claimed infallibility”. I’m not the one likening supernatural faith to “faith” in science. So let’s drop the pretense that I’m not “even attempting” to ground my claims in Scripture.
“Okay, so your submission to Rome is provisional. You’ll submit until they discover the body of Jesus. Got it. Welcome to Protestantism.”
Still not getting it. That is not the difference. Christ/Apostles and Rome make similar claims to ability/authority. There are implications to that. Protestantism does not make the same type of claim. There are implications to that. Paul affirming the faith is in vain if Christ’s body is found is not “welcome to Protestantism”.
“There’s nothing incoherent about believing that divine revelation exists and that we fallibly apprehend it in the act of trusting it. ”
Agreed.
“You’re holding that any offered teaching in your system, despite your provisional apprehension of it, is itself provisional and subject to revision.”
Nope. That wouldn’t be consistent with the claims to authority I assented to in the first place.
“Discover the body of Jesus, and there’s a whole lot of reform that Roman Catholicism will undergo”
Yup. That means the credibility of the claims I assented to initially goes out the window. So I’d have to find a different contendor.
“Sure they can’t be reduced to a book of mathematical proofs. But here is where you could benefit from a little Scripture. Paul says that the revelation is so clear that it actually does compel assent and is intellectually necessary”
God as creator is part of natural revelation (CCC: By natural reason man can know God with certainty, on the basis of his works. But there is another order of knowledge, which man cannot possibly arrive at by his own powers: the order of divine Revelation). That can be discerned from natural revelation as Vat1 affirms. Christ is divine is not, as Christ’s reply to Peter affirms (which you strangely reduced to just another form of rationalism by saying flesh and blood didn’t reveal to Peter 2+2=4 either – so there’s no difference in natural and supernatural revelation.)
“And quite frankly, if you don’t believe the Apostles would think it is just as insane to reject Christ as it would be to reject 2+2=4, then you need to spend time reading nothing but the New Testament for about 6 months.”
It’s not insane based on reason alone – otherwise there’s no room for the assent of faith. Stop reducing faith and divine truths to a book of mathematical proofs. I agree they think it would be insane though – why? because of the certitude of faith your system rejects. As Vat1 states: “This faith, which is the beginning of human salvation, the Catholic Church professes to be a supernatural virtue, by means of which, with the grace of God inspiring and assisting us, we believe to be true what He has revealed, not because we perceive its intrinsic truth by the natural light of reason, but because of the authority of God himself, who makes the revelation and can neither deceive nor be deceived.”
“But the fact that if the body of Jesus were found you would cease being a Christian indicates that you are only provisionally certain of the resurrection and thus provisionally certain of Rome’s authority to propose it as infallible. Consequently, you only remain RC insofar as you continue to find its teachings reasonable. The second you don’t, you’ll fall away—if you’re a thinking person. Thus, in theory, every single one of your beliefs is provisional and up for revision. But does that mean you doubt Rome even if only by .000001 percent? I don’t think so. I don’t doubt the canon or the resurrection.”
Again, NT believers were under the same condition as were the Apostles themselves. Now, once that assent is given, what must happen to be *consistent* with the claims I assented to in the first place? *That* is what the citations I provided about certitude of faith are meant to demonstrate. I am not justified in holding any future or current teaching of the authority assented to as provisional or tentative or 99.9% likely or subject to my debate and argument – doing so would entail I never actually assented to the claims to divine authority and infallibility made in the first place. This is not difficult. Take the claims of both systems. Evaluate what is *consistent* with those claims. See the difference.
“It might make you feel good and intellectually superior or something, but at the end of the day, you haven’t escaped your fallibility.”
No kidding. As I said at the very beginning. I’m fallible. You’re fallible. Not news.
“Apparently you think semper reformanda means everything is up for grabs.”
Well it ultimately ends up that way (hence conservative protestantism being just liberalism waiting to happen) because of the disclaimers in your system. But even if we go with Jeff’s more modest everything is “revisable in theory”, the same point applies.
“Well, in the absence of a state authority to kill heretics, maybe that’s how it works out in practice.”
Were Paul and the Apostles killing heretics when preaching? So no, that’s not “how it works out in practice”.
“But in any case, Paul holds out a scenario (if Christ has not been raised) that introduces a degree of provisionality to faith. Does that mean he taught provisionally or was in persistent doubt? Of course not.”
Only that’s exactly what your side keeps arguing.
“As Paul presents it, it is at best a theoretical possibility that Christ was not raised. That’s basically what the Protestant confessions are doing”
Really. So since in RCism it’s a theoretical possibility Christ was not raised, its claims to authority and ability are identical to what Protestant confessions claim? Of course they aren’t. The confessions are offering no ability or claim to define irreformable dogma – it’s precluded from the start.
“at best it’s a theoretical possibility that the WCF is wrong. It’s not a certainty. Fallible bodies can produce inerrant documents. They do it all the time.”
Sure. But there’s no guarantee WCF is inerrant, by its own admission and disclaimers.
“What I don’t get is why you think Rome has the right to do what even the Apostles didn’t do.”
The Apostles preached and taught infallibly. Rome claims that authority and ability. Protestantism does not.
“An even stronger example is when Paul holds out the possibility that an Apostle might teach a different gospel.”
Yup, and what are adherents to compare it to – the gospel they *received* from Paul initially. Paul isn’t saying “the gospel I preached to you might have been wrong, but probably wasn’t”. More support for the RC model of faith in the NT witness and more refutation of the Protestant model you’re advancing.
“So now there is no scenario under which you would cease being a RC? Because if there is at least one, even in theory, your assent is in some degree provisional. So I fail to see the difference.”
I would cease being RC if Christ’s body was found. Just as Apostles and NT believers would. That does not entail that if an NT believer assented to their claims to authority in faith, they would then be justified in constantly questioning or holding the Apostles’ future teaching as provisional, tentative, subject to debate, highly likely – if so, they didn’t assent to the claim to authority in the first place. As I said, If I assent in faith to Rome’s claims, afterwards, would I then be consistent with that assent by holding anything she teaches infallibly as provisional or “highly likely” or tentative? No – that would be inconsistent with the claims I supposedly assented to in the first place. Same for an NT believer submitting to Christ/Apostles. Does the same hold for Protestantism? No. *That* is the difference in the two systems when doing an internal critique comparing them.
“But you don’t seem to understand what Protestants mean by provisional.”
Everything is “revisable in theory”. Not difficult.
“Well, it’s not unheard of for a Roman Catholic theological category to be simply incompatible with Protestantism.”
The category that is derived and supported by the NT witness.
“The advantage is trivial if you can’t infallibly know that Christ/Apostles actually were what they claimed. That’s the point.”
Another remarkable doubling down. This is what we get from you “In fact, NT believer Joe, because you are fallible, all you can give me is your provisional opinion that Christ/Apostles has said they possess the charism of infallibility. So you’re in no better position than me putting faith into synagogue rabbi Levi giving admitted provisional teaching over here.”
Do you really not see this as a problem? Levi is an admitted fallible teacher and says upfront he has no divine authority or ability, offering his self-admitted provisional teaching, identification, and interpretation of revelation or the OT. And you’re cool with submitting to that? That’s completely irrational and sheer fideism. And such an affirmation completely precludes in principle anything remotely approaching the certitude of faith.
“They’re not absolutely necessary, as evident by the many biblical examples of people holding to truths apart from claims of infallibility and authority.”
Right, like Abraham who spoke with God. Like the prophets who spoke with God and claimed authority for their adherents who followed them. Like Christ and the Apostles who claimed infallibility and authority for their adherents who followed. All this infallibility and authority throughout Scripture was a waste of ink.
“But ironically, we can have infallible assurance that Christ is who he says he is”
I remember you have infallible assurance you “get things wrong, but might get things right later”.
“This assumes Christ’s promise is a church that can infallibly define doctrine, which you have by no means established. We don’t accept that presupposition, and with good reason.”
No it means Christ’s promise is that the HS “will guide you into all the truth”. This never cashes out in your system – everything remains provisional (even when granting the truth of this statement – see the problem?), and the best we get is “infallible assurance we get things wrong, but might get things right later”.
“We’re not the ones touting the glories of an infallible church to make you better off epistemologically.”
Peter preached for his listeners to “know most certainly”/”beyond a doubt” – the exact opposite of what your side says is even possible because we’re all fallible, thus you make their preaching throughout the NT nonsensical or just hyperbole.
“You haven’t shown where they are fundamentally different.”
Another remarkable doubling down. Supernatural and natural revelation are not fundamentally different. Hello rationalism and Pelagianism.
“That is an advantage only for those whom Christ is convincing. Otherwise, it is a distinct disadvantage for those who refuse to be convinced. In fact, they’re better off never to have heard the name of Christ.”
One can be corrected of their error and refuse to submit. Your argument was that I had no advantage. Joyce giving me his live feedback and clarification reading FW is an obvious advantage over someone who doesn’t, even if we’re both fallible.
“Rome isn’t Christ and the Apostles, so you don’t get to parallel them until Rome claims inspiration of the same kind.”
Rome claims divine and apostolic authority. I can easily parallel them since followers are fallible in both cases. Which your argument hinges on.
“Rome has no power to overcome my fallible apprehension to bring me to conviction or compel the assent of faith. Jesus and the Apostles do.”
One can be corrected of their error and refuse to submit. Your argument was that I had no advantage. Joyce giving me his live feedback and clarification reading FW is an obvious advantage over someone who doesn’t.
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sdb,
“We do not hold the teachings of Christ/Apostles as provisional. We hold our identification and interpretation of those teachings as provisional. That is what our disclaimers apply to.”
Your disclaimers also apply to the teaching itself that “the teachings of Christ/Apostles exist and are divine revelation and infallible”. That’s the problem – nothing escapes the realm of opinion, even your bedrock doctrines, because of the starting disclaimers.
“Christ’s infallibility is necessary.”
Robert didn’t get the memo. And if it was necessary, odd that you were arguing that He might not have made claims to infallibility.
“The infallible middle man”
It’s not a “middle man” again, but rather essential if one is to affirm divine revelation is irreformable and infallible.
“Not at all. Simply not adding to what scripture actually promises.”
Scripture promises to guide into truth and for people to know without a doubt and most certainly amongst other things. Those promises never cash out in your system due to your disclaimer – even if, here’s the important point – we grant those promises and guarantees as true in the first place. Why not? Apparently because we’re all fallible.
“I’m sorry I was unclear. This was not my point at all in bringing up science.”
Robert ran with it.
“No one would say that E=mc^2 is mere opinion just because Einstein was fallible.”
Is it revisable in theory? Yes.
“As I noted before, I am not suggesting that scientific and religious knowledge are identical. But simply asserting that they are different, so this doesn’t apply is not a convincing response.”
I’ve done more than “simply assert” – I’ve explained the implications of your and Robert’s position to both of you. It ends up in rationalism and Pelagianism.
“Redefining “opinion” to mean fallible theological statements doesn’t advance the conversation. ”
I’ve never defined it to mean only fallible theological statements. As I already stated earlier, Opinion: “the holding of a proposition as probable … Certitude differs from opinion in kind, not in degree only; for opinion, that is assent to the probability of a proposition, regards the opposite proposition as not more than improbable; and therefore opinion is always accompanied by the consciousness that further evidence may cause a change of mind in favour of the opposite opinion. Opinion, therefore, does not exclude doubt; certitude does.”
That definition seems to fit your characterization.
“Your model of the role of tradition and teaching authority standing equal to scripture does not make sense of how our own Lord made use of scripture to judge tradition and legitimate religious authorities. Both could err. Scripture could not. ”
Your model of faith does not make sense of how our own Lord made use of his divine authority – it was impossible for him to actually exercise it because we’re all fallible.
“No advantage relative to what in what way? This is simply absurd. Christ said he needed to leave to send his Holy Spirit. Seems like quite an advantage to me.”
You’re fallible. So you have no and can never have any advantage. That’s your side’s argument. And the HS promises never cash out in your system, so you neutered the advantage Christ promised all on your own.
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James Young, “You’re fallible. So you have no and can never have any advantage.”
Doesn’t apply to James Young. James-Young exceptionalism.
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@cvd I don’t concede your definition of opinion. It certainly isn’t generally true nor have you demonstrated why it would apply in the special case of divine revelation (simply asserting that to do other wise is this or that heresy doesn’t demonstrate anything).
Further, you insist on treating the foundational aspect of protestantism (the infallibility of scripture) which we concede that we fallibility identify and interpret as part of the system while treating the foundational aspect of catholcism (the infallibility of the STM) though you fallibly identify and intepret it as outside of the system.
It seems that you think that because once you assent to STM everything that follows secure whereas when a prot assents to scripture, he holds out that he could be wrong about that so that nothing that follows is secure. Simply denying that you will question your first step doesn’t give you an advantage. You can only be as certain about the divine revelation you accept from the church as you are that you have properly identified the church and interpret her teachings. The prot can only be as sure of his beliefs as he is sure that he has properly identified scripture and interpreted it.
Your argument boils down to, “the catholic is better off epistemologically because if he rejects the RCC as the true, infallible church he is not really part of the church anymore, while the protestant can reject SS and still be a good protestant.”
The definition of opinion that you have embraced is obscurantist. The idea that a scientific law that is falsifiable makes it opinion is a bridge it seems we aren’t going to cross.
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sdb,
“I don’t concede your definition of opinion.”
So tell me what you would like to term the definition outlined.
” It certainly isn’t generally true nor have you demonstrated why it would apply in the special case of divine revelation (simply asserting that to do other wise is this or that heresy doesn’t demonstrate anything). ”
If any and all articles of “faith” are rationally compelling, such articles are ones of reason, not faith. Divine revelation and supernatural truths must be taken on the authority of another, by definition, so one must trust in some authority that would guarantee such articles are true expressions of divine revelation, that is irreformable and infallible. If you disagree with that, offer your case and tell me how it isn’t rationalism and Pelagianism. If you don’t, you must explain how such is compatible with your continued efforts to analogize faith to science.
“Further, you insist on treating the foundational aspect of protestantism (the infallibility of scripture) which we concede that we fallibility identify and interpret as part of the system while treating the foundational aspect of catholcism (the infallibility of the STM) though you fallibly identify and intepret it as outside of the system.”
Here again is the problem. If a system precludes the possibility of distinguishing infallible dogma and divine revelation from provisional opinion and judgments and interpretations of something called “Scripture”, that same principle precludes the ability to identify any alleged religious authority as having any greater authority than that of provisional opinion, including of course a proposed authority such as something called “Scripture”. And this applies just as much to the foundational doctrines you want to take for granted – such as the inspiration, inerrancy, and identification of Scripture – to then jump the gun and say “Scripture isn’t fallible, only our interpretation is”. Scripture’s inerrancy, inspiration, and authority (not just its identification) are teachings and doctrines and they are not exempt from your disclaimers, hence they never rise as more than just another opinion amongst others.
“It seems that you think that because once you assent to STM everything that follows secure whereas when a prot assents to scripture, he holds out that he could be wrong about that so that nothing that follows is secure. Simply denying that you will question your first step doesn’t give you an advantage.”
I can question my first step. I can’t continually question everything after that first step and be consistent with Rome’s (or Christ/Apostles) claims. I can in Protestantism. Hence your disclaimers and semper reformanda.
“Your argument boils down to, “the catholic is better off epistemologically because if he rejects the RCC as the true, infallible church he is not really part of the church anymore, while the protestant can reject SS and still be a good protestant.” ”
No, my argument boils down to, the catholic is better off because if he is consistent with the claims offered by the authority he assented to, he is warranted in having the certitude of faith because he has an authority/mechanism to distinguish and judge divine revelation from opinion, while the protestant is not better off because of the disclaimers inherent in the system he subscribes to – to be on equal footing to the catholic he would have to violate those disclaimers.
“The idea that a scientific law that is falsifiable makes it opinion is a bridge it seems we aren’t going to cross.”
I don’t hold a scientific law is opinion. Cath Ency (again): “Physical certitude is that which rests upon the laws of nature. These laws are not absolutely unchangeable, but subject to the will of the Creator; they are not self-evident nor demonstrable from self-evident truth; but they are constant, and discoverable as laws by experience, so that the future may be inferred from the past, or the distant from the present. It is with physical certitude that a man knows that he shall die, that food will sustain life, that electricity will furnish motive power. Astronomers know beforehand with physical certitude the date of an eclipse or of a transit of Venus.”
Scientific laws are not infallibly set forth, but there is no rational basis for denying them – you would be insane to reject the law of gravity. The same does not apply in matters of faith and a revealed religion because they are, well, matters of *faith* – they can only be shown to be reasonable, not rationally compel assent as natural and scientific truths do.
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JRC: “Are those parameters infallibly derived from the New Testament?”
CVD: Are they infallibly derived by me? No, because I’m fallible.
Are they infallibly derived by anyone? If so, how do you know that?
CVD: You don’t see a problem saying every teaching is “revisable in theory” (i.e. provisional) but affirming that divine revelation is non-provisional by definition?
I said every human teaching is revisable in theory. Since divine revelation is not human teaching, there is no conflict.
JRC: “The Scripture is the Word of God. Its truth is non-provisional.”
CVD: But this teaching is not offered as infallible divine revelation.
What do you mean by “this teaching”? If you mean, the Scripture is not offered as infallible divine revelation, then you are mistaken. It certainly is (WCF 1).
If you mean that WCF 1 is not offered as infallible divine revelation, then you are correct. But that’s not a problem. As we have already agreed, there is no problem with fallibly identifying infallible revelation.
CVD: (including of course the teaching that Scripture itself – whatever its identification – exists and is infallible in the first place)
There’s an error here. If divine revelation exists, it is infallible by definition. That proposition is “infallible” in the sense that it is tautological. If divine revelation were fallible, God would be a liar hence not God.
Existence is a separate question, and is answered by a point-at reference: Here is divine revelation.
CVD: And basing its identification on the “collective wisdom of the church” sidesteps the cart before the horse question begging since you discern the church from the canon and exclude the “wisdom” of Rome, the East, and liberal Protestants as not part of the church that counts.
This is not right. I’ve already given you the Protestant criterion: Universal early consent. We don’t exclude Rome or the East, but we don’t accept their word as infallible either. We take the intersection of sets.
JRC: “The Protestant has a clear view of the difference between the Word of God and the word of man. The Catholic blurs that view because he has Spirit-led infallible divine articles of faith that are not actually Scripture.”
CVD: And you jumped the gun again…
You say this a lot and I don’t understand what you mean by it. Is there a timer that I’m supposed to wait for? I haven’t waited for a starting gun since high school cross-country.
CVD: – by your own admission and to be consistent with your disclaimers, what you identify as Scripture cannot be offered as an infallible divine article of faith.
Not at all. To be consistent with my view, what I identify as Scripture is offered as a fallibly identified infallible divine article of faith. I said this before.
CVD: So you’re in no position to then equate divine articles of faith to Scripture.
I just did equate them. More specifically, I equate divine articles of faith and the original autographs.
CVD: And if there was a “clear view” between the two offered in your system, there wouldn’t be differences concerning the books of the canon, as well as passages contained therein.
Why ever not? Isn’t identification fallible?
JRC: “You make a huge deal out of the Protestant’s provisional identification of Scripture, and you cry “red herring” at the Catholic’s provisional identification of the infallible authority. Why is this not special pleading?”
CVD: Again, we both provisionally identify.
I see that you continue to admit this, and I REALLY DO appreciate it. But when the rubber meets the road, you turn Protestant provisional identification into … well, the stuff I responded to above. You read Protestant provisional identification as “you can never say that anything is divine revelation.” But you refuse to apply the same standard to the Catholic.
I don’t get that. It appears to me to be highly motivated reasoning.
CVD: Again, we both provisionally identify. So did NT believers. That did not mean they would be justified in holding current or future teachings of Christ/Apostles as provisional or up for continued and perpetual debate and argument. That would not have been consistent with the claims to divine authority Christ/Apostles made that said believers supposedly assented to in the first place. The same applies in RCism. The same does not apply in Protestantism, per your disclaimers.
This is not right either. Protestants do not believe that the teachings of Christ are provisional.
They do believe that those teachings are not infallibly understood, which is a legitimate Cath/Prot difference. Hence, your system on your own terms is more precise. You claim not only infallible teachings, but an infallible understanding of those teachings at the church level.
CVD: Again, the issue is what is consistent with the claims offered by each system. You affirm any and all teaching remains provisional (and not just your understanding)
No, I don’t. I affirm that any and all human teaching remains provisional.
JRC: “The key point is that faith for Protestants does not involve a free act of choosing, whether Spirit-enabled or no. The Protestant hears that Gospel and says, “Yes, that is right”, and his conviction is from the Spirit.”
CVD: I have no good reason to then believe what you propose is actually an article of faith, given you upfront admit you cannot offer it since everything you do offer is provisional opinion and subject to revision by your own disclaimers.
OK, this is descent into silliness. Here’s a good reason that what I propose is an article of faith:
— WCF 14.1-2
Follow the logic: We have strong evidence that Scripture is divine revelation. We have strong evidence that Scripture teaches that faith is a work of the Spirit causing the believer to believe the Word of God, which is logically identical to what I proposed.
Hence, we have strong evidence that what I propose is an article of faith. Fallibly identified as such? Yes. Therefore fallible Scripture? No.
The problem with your analysis is and continues to be that you have no understanding of what “good reason” means in the context of inductive reasoning. You continue to assert that any smidgen of fallibility is logically equal to “no good reason.”
CVD: [I]n what manner did [the Apostles] preach? Provisionally and tentatively with high likelihood?
Back at you: Did the Apostles exercise the gift of infallibility each and every time they preached?
Do your bishops and priests?
CVD: No, I want to think of Protestants as believing divine revelation is irreformable by definition. Which they supposedly do. And yet they argue and hold claims incompatible with that. The fallible confessions and semper reformanda are not the root of the problem, it’s a symptom of it.
You are mistaken. You are trying to merge Catholic categories with Protestant, and getting a mess. The Catholic and Protestant categories don’t play well together.
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SDB: The definition of opinion that you have embraced is obscurantist. The idea that a scientific law that is falsifiable makes it opinion is a bridge it seems we aren’t going to cross.
Just wanted to repeat that.
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CVD: Divine revelation and supernatural truths must be taken on the authority of another, by definition
Whose definition? This is one instance where you are trying to merge Cath and Prot categories.
This is a Catholic understanding of divine revelation, and the Protestant does not share it. If you wish to evaluate Protestantism on its own terms (which you have forcefully set out to do), then you can’t use this definition.
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CVD: the catholic is better off because if he is consistent with the claims offered by the authority he assented to, he is warranted in having the certitude of faith because he has an authority/mechanism to distinguish and judge divine revelation from opinion
Not so.
And this gets to the heart of the CtC claims. Suppose for the sake of argument that the catholic church does in fact have infallible authority and the charism to make infallible definitions of articles of faith.
The catholic believer STILL has no infallible access to the primary sources setting forth those infallible definitions. He STILL has no infallible translation of those infallible definitions.
At best, he has fallible copies, translations, and interpretations of the infallible definitions.
You, CVD, have never seen the original Nicene Creed. In fact, you don’t even know whether the “real” Nicene creed is the 325 or 381 creed. You don’t have an infallible creed to say at Mass.
(Which is why, even assuming good faith, there is just as much diversity of opinion amongst Catholics as there is amongst Protestants about the articles of faith.)
If you can live with a little bit of fallibility, then this is not a real problem for you, and I don’t think it should be. But then you would have to give up your argument, and that might be hard.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted November 3, 2015 at 3:47 pm | Permalink
CVD: the catholic is better off because if he is consistent with the claims offered by the authority he assented to, he is warranted in having the certitude of faith because he has an authority/mechanism to distinguish and judge divine revelation from opinion
Not so.
And this gets to the heart of the CtC claims. Suppose for the sake of argument that the catholic church does in fact have infallible authority and the charism to make infallible definitions of articles of faith.
The catholic believer STILL has no infallible access to the primary sources setting forth those infallible definitions. He STILL has no infallible translation of those infallible definitions.
At best, he has fallible copies, translations, and interpretations of the infallible definitions.
You, CVD, have never seen the original Nicene Creed. In fact, you don’t even know whether
You’re still substituting philology for faith. The faith is that the Holy Spirit guided the transmission of the Bible and of Tradition, infallibly. This is why you would cut out the pericope adulterae* and the Catholic Church has no need or desire to.
Even your Bible is provisional, which is a helluva pickle for a sola scripturist.
*http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2008/aprilweb-only/117-31.0.html
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Once again, Dr. History gets taken to school by a little mermaid.
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D.G. Hart:
But like a good Yankees fan, you take credit for everything.
Like I said, not very Christian. Not very smart either.>>>>>
I thought Luther was one of yours. He gave the Papists credit for the canon of Scripture. It was a point that he was compelled to concede.
———————————————————————
““Martin Luther wrote in his commentary on John, “We are compelled to concede to the Papists that they have the word of God, that we received it from them, and that without them we should have no knowledge of it at all.” Luther’s embrace of the so-called Palestinian canon was no doubt also driven by his new found theology. Just as the Jews found the Messianic texts unpalatable, so too the reformers had their theology driven agenda. Luther rejected the Macabees because 2 Macabees 12:45-46 contradicted his denial of Purgatory when it says “…it was a holy and pious thought…” to make “…atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin.” This clearly shows the Jews believed in praying for the dead and suggests the dead might be purified of their sins, lending credence to the doctrine of purgatory which Luther had rejected. “
http://www.catholicfaithandreason.org/the-canon-of-the-old-testament.html
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Tom,
This is why you would cut out the pericope adulterae* and the Catholic Church has no need or desire to.
Except of course for all those Vatican-approved Bible scholars that do so. Maybe the system doesn’t, but then we already knew Rome couldnt care less about what the Apostles actually said.
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The faith is that the Holy Spirit guided the transmission of the Bible and of Tradition, infallibly.
That’s not what you say when you recite the creed. You say, “I believe in one God, Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth…”
Are those words infallible? If so, then by what process did you get an infallible English creed? If not, why berate Protestants?
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vd, t, first, now Luther is reliable?
Second, you pick cherries.
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Mermaid, like I said, so you also take credit for Jesus and Mary?
You have a good manner of avoiding hard questions or difficult posts.
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Falsifiable inference? Inductive conclusion? Evidence based inference?
Hmmm… I’m not sure I fully agree here. The reformed confessions talk about “good and necessary consequence” from scripture. If I find a belief rationally compelling based on a deduction from special revelation, can it be an article of faith? The prot would say yes. Our articles of faith are rationally inferred from scripture.
I’m not sure that is the definition of divine revelation. At least I would word it slightly differently. Namely, divine revelation rests on the authority of the triune God. Not merely any “another”. However, that revelation is mediated (for most of us…perhaps you had your own Road to Damascus experience?) and we perceive it faultily. But not utterly so.
Of course, that authority can be none other than the Holy Spirit. The question is what means does the Holy Spirit employ? Why must those means be infallible and why must the inferences we draw from that revelation be infallible? Let’s say we add an infallible definer of articles of faith because the scripture is not sufficient (we misread it, disagree on its scope, and disagree about what it teaches). So we add a middle man who distills what we should believe (into a catechism longer than the Bible?) and leaves us with an infallible STM triad about which RCs disagree about scope, what the doctrines mean, and what are actually unchanging doctrine (witness the modernists priests and theologians throwing down with the con-RCs). If the Bible is not good enough, I don’t see how extra layers help (reminds me of what Abraham said to the rich man about the prophets…).
Well I don’t know about Pelagianism (which my autocorrect keeps trying to turn into Plagiarism!), but I would say the following: we use reason to interpret the scriptures, but we cannot accept them unless we are regenerate. So we can be rationally compelled to certain theological truths from scripture, but not independent of the Holy Spirit’s regenerating work. Further, those whom God elects, he effectually calls,…, and brings into sufficient knowledge of the scriptures to express saving faith… Not an infallible understanding of all things, but a sufficient understanding of the necessary basics of the gospel. So there are similarities to science in that learning science requires inferring truths from infallible data and trust (faith?) in a process and in (fallible) people. But there are differences as well – namely through God’s common grace, all of humanity is granted the ability to read the book of nature, not all of humanity can adequately read special revelation.
Here we disagree again. If you disagree with,
then everything else in the system falls apart. We could be wrong about this, but then nothing else really follows – in other words you cease to be a reformed Christian in any meaningful sense. I don’t see how this is different from the RC. You could be wrong about the church. If so, then the system falls apart and you aren’t really RC anymore (well I guess some insist they are, but not really).
But there *can* be a rational basis for denying them. There can also be an a-rational basis for denying a scientific theory. For example, which law of gravity are you denying? Newton’s, Einstein’s, MOND? It isn’t insane at all to look for ways to revise the theory even if we can be confident under certain circumstances. To be sure the source material of science and theology is very different, but from the source material, I see no reason why one couldn’t compel assent given agreement about the source. Whether one buys the source is a different issue and I think we agree requires a work of the holy spirit.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 3, 2015 at 7:53 pm | Permalink
vd, t, first, now Luther is reliable?
Second, you pick cherries.
D. G. Hart
Posted November 3, 2015 at 7:54 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, like I said, so you also take credit for Jesus and Mary?
You have a good manner of avoiding hard questions or difficult posts.
She nailed you thoroughly about Luther’s philology, on which you base your version of Christianity, so you tried to change the subject. You must think your fans are stupid.
You’re probably right.
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To the faithful RCC folks out there — @CVD, @Mermaid, and @Kevin in Newark (where art thou?) – may I (a non-Presby eeevangelical) interrupt the conversation about philosophy/doctrine here, and ask a sincere question about how, exactly, the RCC binds your conscience in a practical way?
Suppose you were in Bohemia in the early 1400’s, and the Pope specifically asked you, personally, to light the match to burn Mr. Hus. Do you do it? If not, why not?
Suppose that the only RCC church within 500 miles of where you live is run by liberal lesbian nuns (yes, I know of such a place). And, suppose that within 5 miles of where you live there are any number of orthodox Presby churches (albeit, curmudgeonly ones) available. Do you dutifully attend that local incarnation of the visible RCC church? If so, why? If not, why not?
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vd, t, you comment the way NFL referees referee.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 3, 2015 at 9:34 pm | Permalink
vd, t, you comment the way NFL referees referee.
says Dr. Driveby
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Petros
Posted November 3, 2015 at 9:12 pm | Permalink
To the faithful RCC folks out there — @CVD, @Mermaid, and @Kevin in Newark (where art thou?) – may I (a non-Presby eeevangelical) interrupt the conversation about philosophy/doctrine here, and ask a sincere question about how, exactly, the RCC binds your conscience in a practical way?
Suppose you were in Bohemia in the early 1400’s, and the Pope specifically asked you, personally, to light the match to burn Mr. Hus. Do you do it? If not, why not?
Suppose that the only RCC church within 500 miles of where you live is run by liberal lesbian nuns (yes, I know of such a place). And, suppose that within 5 miles of where you live there are any number of orthodox Presby churches (albeit, curmudgeonly ones) available. Do you dutifully attend that local incarnation of the visible RCC church? If so, why? If not, why not?
After you read this, kindly explain it to Dr. Hart. 😉
http://www.romancatholicism.org/duty-resist.html
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whose driveby is it?
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@TVD – right, I understand. But then, don’t your citations here beg the next obvious question, which is how does an RCC adherent avoid being his own pope by resisting the supreme head of the church? The Catholic paradigm involves submission to the authority/teaching of the church, right? If one resists/disobeys the pope, is he not being practically schismatic? How is visible unity of the church to be maintained in such circumstances?
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Petros,
Great questions. Let’s see the answers. In my online discussions with RCs of a more philosophical bent, it seems at the end of the day they present a view that might seem good in theory but never actually works in practice. It’s an ideal insulated RCism that can’t really deal with difficult questions.
Like how the individual believer was supposed to submit to the pope when there are three claimants to the throne?
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@Mermaid – as I recall, you particularly have an evangelistic zeal for outreach. That’s wonderful. But, you may be aware how stridently so many local incarnations of the RCC in Latin America virulently oppose Protestant missionary efforts. Those RCC folks in opposition may have RCC on their nameplate but can be devotees of voodoo (been to Haiti?) and all kinds of other spiritism. How is the visible unity of the church to be maintained there? Are gospel-loving protestants supposed to leave those RCC/voodoo folks to die in their sins?
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@TVD. What do you think of this citation, courtesy of wikipedia, of Unam Sanctum (circa 1302) “Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.”
So, how does a regular RCC schmuck resolve the personal ethical dilemma of either a) submit to a looney pope and commit a capital crime, or b) disobey the pope, thus being de facto schismatic, and lose their salvation (according to Unam Sanctum, anyway)?
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Petros
Posted November 3, 2015 at 11:08 pm | Permalink
@TVD. What do you think of this citation, courtesy of wikipedia, of Unam Sanctum (circa 1302) “Furthermore, we declare, we proclaim, we define that it is absolutely necessary for salvation that every human creature be subject to the Roman Pontiff.”
So, how does a regular RCC schmuck resolve the personal ethical dilemma of either a) submit to a looney pope and commit a capital crime, or b) disobey the pope, thus being de facto schismatic, and lose their salvation (according to Unam Sanctum, anyway)?
Every papal utterance is not infallible. Don’t follow Darryl’s road hunting for error in a sentence from 700 years ago instead of seeking truth. It’s a dead end. You are certainly not under the authority of the pope when he is wack.
http://www.romancatholicism.org/duty-resist.html
But normatively, the Catholic argument is that the Catholic Church is the one and only true Church, and the pope is the highest authority in it. Whether or not you “separated brethren” accept that authority is your problem–it does not change the truth of the matter.
You should check yourself on schism though, 1 Corinthians 12:25-27. Some people around here seem to perversely revel in schism. Sola scriptura matters, except when it doesn’t.
Petros
Posted November 3, 2015 at 10:06 pm | Permalink
@TVD – right, I understand. But then, don’t your citations here beg the next obvious question, which is how does an RCC adherent avoid being his own pope by resisting the supreme head of the church? The Catholic paradigm involves submission to the authority/teaching of the church, right? If one resists/disobeys the pope, is he not being practically schismatic? How is visible unity of the church to be maintained in such circumstances?
I guess you haven’t been following the discussion. The magisterium is more than just the pope–it’s the bishops, Tradition and also the faithful laity, the sensus fidei. The Church may temporarily fall into error by the work of bad men, but the Holy Spirit will guide and correct.
The papacy survived the Borgias; Francis is a minor annoyance.3
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It’s not a “middle man” again, but rather essential if one is to affirm divine revelation is irreformable and infallible.
The root of the matter. The papists’ claim for the pope supplants that of the Holy Spirit for protestantism, but then again since Rome has got the Holy Spirit bottled up on tap in the sacraments and holy water, not to worry. The pope can suck whatever out of his thumb because he is infallible and inspired, because performatively – one of Bryan’s favorite terms – the Scripture is a dead letter.
Neither is Scripture capable of witnessing of or testifying about itself. Rather Scripture supposedly and briefly says that is the pope’s job and goes back to sleep.
Well maybe, maybe not, but all these folks who claim a divine right to being infallible in their apprehension of the pope’s infallible statements is a little much.
After all, which communion teaches that assurance of faith (i.e. that saving faith is not provisional) is an anathema?
It can’t be the Roman church because the pope is infallible and likewise again the papal apologists apprehension of his infallible statements, so that must mean it’s the prots? Right?
Right?
A pope “who attempts to destroy the Church” is not to be obeyed but “it is lawful to resist him by not doing what he orders and preventing his will from being executed.”
The ole feckless nincompoop blathers on. Who is he to judge? How are we to know that pope A or pope B is trying to destroy the church? Some folks think this pope is. Some don’t, but we’re supposed to take their fallible/provisional word for it now here in the combox.
Or is The Veronian Disciple, an email front for Francis?
That might explain a lot of things.
After all as reformed catholics, that’s what we did at the Reformation. Resisted the papal deformations of the catholic undoubted Christian faith. And got kicked out for it. Thanks a lot.
You should check yourself on schism though, 1 Corinthians 12:25-27. Some people around here seem to perversely revel in schism. Sola scriptura matters, except when it doesn’t.
Intelligence and honesty matter too. IOW dis-ting-uish be-tween schism and sep-a-ra-tion. Ca-piche?
Rome apostasized and it scandalizes the papal faithful that continuing church can’t be identified like a big box store.
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“You should check yourself on schism though, 1 Corinthians 12:25-27. Some people around here seem to perversely revel in schism. Sola scriptura matters, except when it doesn’t.”
Intelligence and honesty matter too. IOW dis-ting-uish be-tween schism and sep-a-ra-tion. Ca-piche?
Sophistry.
Rome apostasized and it scandalizes the papal faithful that continuing church can’t be identified like a big box store.
And then the Reformationists promptly apostatized from each other, into dozens if not 100s of sects. You have no claim to “catholicism,” no claim to the apostolic Church.
Had the Reformers simply “separated” and reformed the Church, instead of turning it into a theological Wild Wild West, you would have a point. But that’s not how it went down.
_________
Neither is Scripture capable of witnessing of or testifying about itself.
Eureka!
http://edwardfeser.blogspot.com/2015/07/feyerabend-on-empiricism-and-sola.html
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Tom, you wrote,
““You should check yourself on schism though, 1 Corinthians 12:25-27. Some people around here seem to perversely revel in schism. Sola scriptura matters, except when it doesn’t.””
Keenly perceptive, for that passage is not only the most crucial in rightly defining schism in sola scripture terms, but is also the one equally despised by your interlocutors here.
It grieves me, a non-RC, to see you ad hommed all the time. My only relief is your wit, tenacity, and consistency.
Oh, and your meekness when the “Barton” opprobrium is flown your way. How ever did you let that one lie down (well done)?
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Tom,
The magisterium is more than just the pope–it’s the bishops, Tradition and also the faithful laity, the sensus fidei. The Church may temporarily fall into error by the work of bad men, but the Holy Spirit will guide and correct.
But of course the question is how do you know when the church has temporarily fallen into error by he work of bad men and how do you recognize the Holy Spirit’s guiding and correcting work?
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vd, t, “The papacy survived the Borgias; Francis is a minor annoyance.”
Then where did Protestantism come from?
That’s like you’re believing that Presbyterianism survived the PCUSA.
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“Feyerabend notes that (a) scripture alone can never tell you what counts as scripture, (b) scripture alone cannot tell you how to interpret scripture, and (c) scripture alone cannot give us a procedure for deriving consequences from scripture, applying it to new circumstances, and the like.”
As a neutral referee, I’m sure your next post will be to explain how Feyerabend’s construal of Sola Scriptura is not consistent with what the reformed confessions claim about scripture. Feser’s description is akin to the prot claiming papal infallibility implies the pope is never wrong about the weather (speaking of which, I never got your impartial ruling mwf’s lies…curious behavior for an impartial blog referee).
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DG Hart: That’s like you’re believing that Presbyterianism survived the PCUSA.
Probably won’t if it would decide to be a part of embracing this …
PCUSA Report Shows Evangelists Shifting Away From Calls to Repentance? Millennials Don’t Feel Guilt and Shame the Same Way as Older Generations, Report Reveals: “Telling them that they are sinners and need to repent does not work. Millennials respond to evangelism that tells them the world is [broken], and it is only through Jesus that it can be fixed.” http://www.christianpost.com/news/pcusa-report-shows-evangelists-shifting-away-from-calls-to-repentance-148996/
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Die, thou foul thread, die, lest judgment come upon you. Now you will wander forty years in the Valley of Perpetuity, where you cannot stop even if you plead. Yea, and you will continue to comment long after it brings you pleasure – raw fingers and bloody keyboards because you despise nature, whose light tells you it is unnatural for a thread to live this long.
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aw Muddy, would that all the LORD’S people were prophets, that the LORD would put His Spirit upon them!”
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though I will say your prophesy is slightly suspect, for the spirit of prophecy is this – the testimony of Jesus
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Ali, the other day I saw a bumper sticker. In small letters: “Do you follow Jesus this closely?”
I thought of you.
But that is it. I will not plow this field; the more it is worked, the less it will yield.
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oh, I forgot mud, only some know how to joke correctly.
your ‘prophecy ‘ made me chuckle -thus my first Bible quote; then I thought I ought at least be partly serious and honor God by giving the other Bible quote….
anyway, as ‘we’ like to say around here – we sure seem to like to think the worst of each other
have a good day
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and btw, of course, I’m thinking I’m probably ‘better than you’,… ‘cause though it ‘seemed’ that your comment might be a mocking, I chose not to make go with this presumption
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@TVD, yes, I have been following the discussion. Yes, the magisterium is more than just the pope. And, yes, every papal utterance is not infallible. The essential unanswered question is this: on what principled means can a person determine if a pope (or any teaching by the RCC by any particular priest/bishop/cardinal or whomever) is in ‘error’, or not.
That is, it would appear that there is no principled means for a schmuck to make that determination, other than using his own conscience/reason enlightened by whatever light the Holy Spirit has given him. In other words, the lowly RCC guy ultimately has to make his choices in the same way Prots do.
Easy to do a macro gloss and assert that, over time, the papacy and the RCC have survived its errors. Ok, they obviously have. But, my hypotheticals have to do with the micro level – what should an individual do when it appears that they either must violate their own conscience or disobey/separate from their local incarnation of the RCC?
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Petros,
That is, it would appear that there is no principled means for a schmuck to make that determination, other than using his own conscience/reason enlightened by whatever light the Holy Spirit has given him. In other words, the lowly RCC guy ultimately has to make his choices in the same way Prots do.
Ding, ding, ding. There goes the “advantage.” All the RC has is more infallible stuff to fallibly interpret.
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Jackals sniff and do not enter, for the thread is accursed.
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Petros:
That is, it would appear that there is no principled means for a schmuck to make that determination, other than using his own conscience/reason enlightened by whatever light the Holy Spirit has given him. In other words, the lowly RCC guy ultimately has to make his choices in the same way Prots do.>>>>>
Is the illumination of the Holy Spirit a principled means? Is the guidance of the Holy Spirit a principled means?
Actually, Protestants don’t even know much about Catholicism, so it is not as though they reject Catholicism based on any means, principled or otherwise.
The Catholic Church just won’t go away. Have you ever wondered why not? It’s not as though people have not tried to make her go away, after all. Why is she still here? Why do you Protestants always think a good and faithful parish is hard to find? I have been all over the US and parts of western Canada this year, and have had no trouble finding Catholic Churches. All of them rather full even at Mass during the noon hour in downtown Dallas, TX. The cathedral in downtown Victoria, B.C. Canada was quite well attended at 8AM Mass on a weekday.
Now, maybe they are really worshipping Satan in a side room, but there has been no evidence of rank apostasy in any of the churches I have visited. You know, I even bought a cross and ear ring set beaded by a Catholic First Nations guy at the Calgary Stampede. Faithful Catholics are all over the place, but you may not have noticed.
It seems to me you are engaging in wishful thinking. Do you wish there were no faithful parish within 500 miles of you?
Check out the history of Pope Pius VII vs. Napoleon.
” Evidently, Napoleon himself announced to the Pope that he was going to destroy the Church, to which Pius VII responded, “Oh my little man, you think you’re going to succeed in accomplishing what centuries of priests and bishops have tried and failed to do!”
– Bishop Robert Baron
BTW, I don’t believe all that Brother Hart says about the demise of Evangelicalism, either. This is kind of a negative blog, but I am sure you noticed that already. The Evangelicals around these parts are pretty committed to Jesus it seems, and not all that interested in trashing Catholics.
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Petros – …on what principled means can a person determine if a pope (or any teaching by the RCC by any particular priest/bishop/cardinal or whomever) is in ‘error’, or not.
They’ll let you know in purgatory.
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@Mermaid – can you address the hypotheticals that I’ve posed? They are not concocted (nice that you have credible RCC incarnations in your area – but, take a trip to Haiti some time, and let me know if you see the RCC brand in the same way or not, after that). But, aside from that, I think the hypotheticals are useful to determine the principles by which individuals should, or shouldn’t, base their ecclesial decisions. So, yeah, I’m not interested in bashing Catholics, but just trying to make sense of what circumstances are conscience-binding upon the average RCC, and which ones are not, and why. The nut of the dilemma, it seems to me, is that there are times when a person must either violate their personal conscience and submit to RCC authority, or disobey and be schismatic.
@Muddy – ha ha. Your sniffer is obviously not as sensitive as jackals, is it.
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“@Muddy – ha ha”
Today your car will break down. You will begin to walk. That’s all I can tell you.
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You know, I don’t accept the premises of your hypotheticals. In the first place, I am not old enough to even be faced with what you ask about Hus. I have never even been to Bohemia. The Catholic Church does not have a standing army.
I think there are more recent moral dilemmas that can be appealed to, such as do I as a Catholic support Kim Davis? The answer is “yes”.
As I pointed out, everywhere I have ever lived there has been a Catholic Church within a few miles. Now if any of them were devil worshipping or full of lesbian nuns I think that I would know. I cannot address your 500 miles scenario.
Now, as far as Haiti and Voodoo go – or any superstitious practices anywhere in the world – the Catholic Church does not promote superstitious religion. She is especially opposed to Voodoo and all such pagan religions.
So are Evangelicals, but if you think that their groups are free of superstitious practices throughout Latin America, you need to take a closer look or ask someone with some experience in such cultures. An honest person will tell you that superstition in Latin American Evangelicalism is also a big problem, one that has to be addressed regularly if not constantly.
Traditional Protestant churches have those issues as well. One kind of superstition that has infiltrated traditional groups is Masonry. Then there’s yoga and New Age.
The devil is very busy. Take a look at the article below. It is about Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI. Also, check out statements made by Cardinal Chibly Langlois of Haiti. Langlois was appointed by Pope Francis.
So, it looks to me like the Church is very concerned about Voodoo. The problem is that many hide the fact that they are actually practicing the Voodoo religion, but pretending they are Catholic or Evangelical or Pentecostal, even. Think it can’t happen in your churches?
Remember the Jewish Sorcerer Elymas? Remember Simon the Sorcerer who wanted to buy some of Peter’s spiritual power? Remember the girl with the spirit of divination who followed Paul around?
Why should it surprise you that the devil likes to hide inside churches, even yours if you are not careful.
Now, the OPC brethren think they can run from the devil and hide inside their safe community. After seeing the appeals to rationalism here, I am not so sure they are all that safe.
———————————————
In voodoo capital, Benedict blasts ‘occultism and evil spirits’
Ouidah, Benin
In a West African city widely regarded as the spiritual capital of voodoo, Benedict XVI today urged Catholics to resist a “syncretism which deceives” and to uphold a Christian faith that “liberates from occultism” and “vanquishes evil spirits.”
The pope was speaking this morning to an audience of priests, seminarians, religious and laity gathered in the St. Gall Seminary in Ouidah, on day two of the pontiff’s Nov. 18-20 trip to Benin.
Located on Benin’s Atlantic coast, Ouidah is a onetime major slave port that today has a population of roughly 80,000. Benin is historically the cradle of the Vodun faith in West Africa, better known in the West as “voodoo,” and Ouidah is more or less its Vatican, hosting an annual international conference on Vodun. The city also boasts a famous voodoo python temple.
Though Vodun takes a wide variety of forms in different parts of the world, it’s a highly syncretistic movement that draws on traditional African tribal worship and magic, sometimes blending it with elements of Christianity, especially Catholicism. Practitioners generally recognize a single deity assisted by helpers known as Orishas. (That, by the way, is the name of the restaurant at the hotel in Cotonou where reporters covering the papal trip are lodged.)
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…and Petros, have you quit beating your wife?
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Mermaid, Check out Alexander VI and Julius II. Do you know Roman Catholicism?
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Robert
Posted November 4, 2015 at 6:08 am | Permalink
Tom,
The magisterium is more than just the pope–it’s the bishops, Tradition and also the faithful laity, the sensus fidei. The Church may temporarily fall into error by the work of bad men, but the Holy Spirit will guide and correct.
But of course the question is how do you know when the church has temporarily fallen into error by he work of bad men and how do you recognize the Holy Spirit’s guiding and correcting work?
D. G. Hart
Posted November 4, 2015 at 6:21 am | Permalink
vd, t, “The papacy survived the Borgias; Francis is a minor annoyance.”
Then where did Protestantism come from?
That’s like you’re believing that Presbyterianism survived the PCUSA.
You two need to talk this out before you even think about the Catholic Church. You each have the other’s answer.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 4, 2015 at 3:29 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, Check out Alexander VI and Julius II. Do you know Roman Catholicism?
Caveat emptor: Dr. Hart trolls the history books for ammunition, not truth. He didn’t even know what’s in the Rosary.
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8507 Apperson
Posted November 4, 2015 at 3:33 am | Permalink
Tom, you wrote,
““You should check yourself on schism though, 1 Corinthians 12:25-27. Some people around here seem to perversely revel in schism. Sola scriptura matters, except when it doesn’t.””
Keenly perceptive, for that passage is not only the most crucial in rightly defining schism in sola scripture terms, but is also the one equally despised by your interlocutors here.
Yes, the dodging of this scriptural fact is conspicuous. What about Pope Alexander VI 500 years ago? Look, a squirrel!
It grieves me, a non-RC, to see you ad hommed all the time. My only relief is your wit, tenacity, and consistency.
Aw, shucks. But they treat everyone like crap, including each other. And they consider themselves the “true” Reformation. If so, its fruits are pretty sour.
Oh, and your meekness when the “Barton” opprobrium is flown your way. How ever did you let that one lie down (well done)?
The Barton thing is interesting. Not that he doesn’t have brickbats coming, but I defend the half he gets right; others simply join their lefty pals in the stoning. He’s an easy whipping boy for those with an animus against the Religious Right.
Oh, thx for the ups, mate. I have learned much about both Protestantism and Catholicism from Dr. Hart. despite his best intentions. Glad you enjoy the journey.
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Tom,
You two need to talk this out before you even think about the Catholic Church. You each have the other’s answer.
Actually, Darryl and I would agree that the PCUSA is an apostate denomination.
But obviously you have no answer as to how you know when the pope is right and when he’s wrong. Except when it seems to be that way according to conscience.
How Protestant of you.
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Robert
Posted November 4, 2015 at 4:04 pm | Permalink
Tom,
You two need to talk this out before you even think about the Catholic Church. You each have the other’s answer.
Actually, Darryl and I would agree that the PCUSA is an apostate denomination.
But obviously you have no answer as to how you know when the pope is right and when he’s wrong. Except when it seems to be that way according to conscience.
How Protestant of you.
You still don’t get the magisterium and the sensus fidei, or you’re doing everything you can to ignore everything posted so far. It’s not all the pope. As long as you keep wallowing in Dr. Hart’s false premises, the truth will remain outside your grasp.
The point is that the Reformation’s solution to apostasy is schism. It is the Catholic Church that reforms, that corrects, internally, presumably by the work of the Holy Spirit. Erasmus, John XXIII, John Courtney Murray, those were reformers. Luther and Calvin were schismatics, whose fruit was more and more schism, a theological Wild West.
Unlike the Catholic Church, “Protestantism” has no mechanism for reform that draws a line,
‘This far you may come and no farther;
Here shall thy proud waves be stayed’
Actually, Darryl and I would agree that the PCUSA is an apostate denomination.
No, it’s you traditionalist cementheads who refuse to keep reforming; you are the apostates. Schismatics never get the irony of that.
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Now, as far as Haiti and Voodoo go – or any superstitious practices anywhere in the world – the Catholic Church does not promote superstitious religion. She is especially opposed to Voodoo and all such pagan religions.
So are Evangelicals, but if you think that their groups are free of superstitious practices throughout Latin America, you need to take a closer look or ask someone with some experience in such cultures. An honest person will tell you that superstition in Latin American Evangelicalism is also a big problem, one that has to be addressed regularly if not constantly.
Traditional Protestant churches have those issues as well. One kind of superstition that has infiltrated traditional groups is Masonry. Then there’s yoga and New Age.
But, Ariel, the point is that you are the ones who say the infallible magisterium settles all doctrinal disputes and disparities. Well, if that’s the case then what gives with all the doctrinal disputes and disparities within your communion? Prots don’t make that prior claim so the fact (see, what I did there?) that we have problems doesn’t have the kind of upshot for us that it does for you.
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Every cradle everywhere, particularly the pope, are hoping the trad converts will just stop already.
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Tom,
You still don’t get the magisterium and the sensus fidei, or you’re doing everything you can to ignore everything posted so far. It’s not all the pope. As long as you keep wallowing in Dr. Hart’s false premises, the truth will remain outside your grasp.
As long as the sensus fidei is signed off by the Magisterium.
But again, I’m not ignoring “everything” that has been posted thus far. You are a decidedly theologically liberal RC who goes with what the Magisterium says when it is convenient for you. Mass? Assumption? Who cares? The others posting here aren’t. I want to know the principled way by which you are right that Assumption and attending Mass are irrelevant and the way that CVD knows that they aren’t.
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Zrim
Posted November 4, 2015 at 4:47 pm | Permalink
Now, as far as Haiti and Voodoo go – or any superstitious practices anywhere in the world – the Catholic Church does not promote superstitious religion. She is especially opposed to Voodoo and all such pagan religions.
So are Evangelicals, but if you think that their groups are free of superstitious practices throughout Latin America, you need to take a closer look or ask someone with some experience in such cultures. An honest person will tell you that superstition in Latin American Evangelicalism is also a big problem, one that has to be addressed regularly if not constantly.
Traditional Protestant churches have those issues as well. One kind of superstition that has infiltrated traditional groups is Masonry. Then there’s yoga and New Age.
But, Ariel, the point is that you are the ones who say the infallible magisterium settles all doctrinal disputes and disparities. Well, if that’s the case then what gives with all the doctrinal disputes and disparities within your communion?
Better study your Church history. 2015 is nothing next to the first couple hundred years of the Church.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Christian_heresies
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Robert
Posted November 4, 2015 at 5:00 pm | Permalink
Tom,
You still don’t get the magisterium and the sensus fidei, or you’re doing everything you can to ignore everything posted so far. It’s not all the pope. As long as you keep wallowing in Dr. Hart’s false premises, the truth will remain outside your grasp.
As long as the sensus fidei is signed off by the Magisterium.
But again, I’m not ignoring “everything” that has been posted thus far. You are a decidedly theologically liberal RC who goes with what the Magisterium says when it is convenient for you. Mass? Assumption? Who cares? The others posting here aren’t. I want to know the principled way by which you are right that Assumption and attending Mass are irrelevant and the way that CVD knows that they aren’t.
I don’t discuss my personal religious life at this here “theological society.” Kindly play straight. The object is clarity, and truth.
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Zrim:
But, Ariel, the point is that you are the ones who say the infallible magisterium settles all doctrinal disputes and disparities. Well, if that’s the case then what gives with all the doctrinal disputes and disparities within your communion? Prots don’t make that prior claim so the fact (see, what I did there?) that we have problems doesn’t have the kind of upshot for us that it does for you.>>>>
Well,in the case of Protestantism, there are no real boundaries by which to define heretical teachings. You can’t even define sola scriptura from Scripture because Protestantism has no mechanism for determining the canon of Scripture. You had to accept the work of others – Papists for the NT and unbelieving Jews for the OT.
The Church is pretty united on established doctrine. Not even the Pope can change that. The Pope cannot retool the Trinity, for example. He cannot explain away the Incarnation. He cannot deny the literal, physical resurrection of Jesus Christ. He cannot rewrite the Nicene Creed. He cannot take books out of the Bible. …and so forth. If he tries to do any of that – and more, like redefine marriage to include gay “marriage” – no one is obligated to follow him. He is also under authority.
Protestants can change any and all doctrine whenever they please – and they do. Check out the Whitby Forum sometime. It’s run by a graduate of DTS. Take a look at who her husband is.
Think you guys are safe?
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Jeff,
“I said every human teaching is revisable in theory. Since divine revelation is not human teaching, there is no conflict.”
Right, divine revelation is not human teaching (though authorized humans can teach it – e.g. prophets and Apostles), nor is it provisional. So it must be distinguished from provisional teaching. But there’s no way to do that within Protestantism, given its disclaimers.
“What do you mean by “this teaching”? If you mean, the Scripture is not offered as infallible divine revelation, then you are mistaken. It certainly is (WCF 1).”
And WCF is provisional by its own disclaimers. So we didn’t get anywhere.
“If you mean that WCF 1 is not offered as infallible divine revelation, then you are correct. But that’s not a problem. As we have already agreed, there is no problem with fallibly identifying infallible revelation.”
Right – so if WCF claimed the necessary authority (a la Rome or Christ/Apostles), then we’d be on equal footing. But it doesn’t, because if it did, it would violate its own disclaimers and provide the means to distinguish divine revelation from opinion.
“If divine revelation exists, it is infallible by definition.”
Correct. But “the teaching that Scripture itself – whatever its identification – exists and is infallible in the first place” cannot be offered as more than provisional by your own disclaimers.
“Here is divine revelation.”
Right, but I have no reason to buy that teaching/identification as a matter of faith, given your disclaimers.
“This is not right. I’ve already given you the Protestant criterion: Universal early consent.”
Except for the consent that you discount – such as Rome and the East and the early Christians who rejected books you accept or accept books you reject, or those that accepted passages in your books you now reject as canonical, or liberals who reject passages you accept. So it’s simply special pleading and cart before the horse in discerning the church from the canon.
“I just did equate them. More specifically, I equate divine articles of faith and the original autographs.”
Right, and I have no reason to assent to your teaching because of your disclaimers. What you’re offering never rises above provisional opinion, by your own disclaimers.
“Why ever not? Isn’t identification fallible?”
You said, “The Protestant has a clear view of the difference between the Word of God and the word of man.”
And yet the identification of the “Word of God” (and the teaching that it even exists in the first place) never rises above provisional opinion in your system – hence the differing canons, disputed passages, etc within your system. So the “clear view” is not clear at all – that’s why it’s the Protestant side that “blurs that view” being consistent with its claims, whereas the RC side does not, being consistent with its claims.
“But you refuse to apply the same standard to the Catholic. ”
The same standard I’m applying to both systems is what’s consistent with the claims (or lack thereof) made in both systems. Every teaching is provisional is consistent with the claims of your system. It is not in RCism. Semper reformanda is consistent with the claims of your system. It is not in RCism. That our apprehension of those teachings is provisional is consistent with the claims of both systems, which you keep pointing out, and I keep agreeing with.
“This is not right either. Protestants do not believe that the teachings of Christ are provisional.”
The teaching that “the teachings of Christ exist and are infallible” itself remains provisional, consistent with your disclaimers.
“They do believe that those teachings are not infallibly understood, which is a legitimate Cath/Prot difference. Hence, your system on your own terms is more precise. You claim not only infallible teachings, but an infallible understanding of those teachings at the church level.”
No, this is part of the disconnect. We claim infallible teaching (and concordantly an authority to normatively judge, identify, and interpret that teaching). If we claimed infallible understanding, then your side’s repeated argument we must hold to omniscience or personal infalliblity would go through. But no one has argued that.
“No, I don’t. I affirm that any and all human teaching remains provisional. ”
And your system provides no way to distinguish human teaching from divine revelation (infallible teaching). Thus the problem.
“Here’s a good reason that what I propose is an article of faith:”
And you quote WCF, which I have no reason to follow in matters of faith given its and your disclaimers.
“You continue to assert that any smidgen of fallibility is logically equal to “no good reason.””
In matters of faith? Absolutely. Divine revelation is infallible and irreformable by definition, as we agreed. It must be taken on the authority of another given its divine and supernatural origin and nature. An authority that therefore must guarantee it is divinely protected from error.
“Back at you: Did the Apostles exercise the gift of infallibility each and every time they preached?”
This is an evasion. Were the Apostles preaching tentatively and provisionally and hedging bets? Were they undermining and acting against their own claims to divine authority or claiming semper reformanda? No. RCism follows this model. Protestantism does not, and cannot.
“Whose definition? This is one instance where you are trying to merge Cath and Prot categories.”
Well, this is certainly interesting. You agree divine revelation is infallible and irreformable and non-provisional. Yet you disagree that it must be taken on the authority of another? Please explain how this does not reduce supernatural revelation to natural revelation and end up in rationalism. And please explain how such a position is consistent with the Scriptural witness in which such authority is all over the place (prophets, God Himself, Christ, Apostles, etc), an authority which preached to its followers to “know most certainly”/”without a doubt” (why? because of the certitude of faith – something that is impossible in your system given its disclaimers).
“The catholic believer STILL has no infallible access to the primary sources setting forth those infallible definitions. He STILL has no infallible translation of those infallible definitions.”
You’re still stuck in thinking because we both provisionally apprehend and “live with … fallibility”, there’s therefore no difference. I’ve already pointed out the difference, namely in the paragraph you were replying to here. You’ve never actually engaged the point I’ve given to you repeatedly – what type of assent and teaching and behavior is consistent with the types of claims (or disclaimers) being made by Christ/Apostles, Rome, and Protestantism. One of the three is not like the other. As you said, “If you wish to evaluate Protestantism on its own terms (which you have forcefully set out to do)”, now do the same for Rome (hint: that we’re all fallible won’t matter in the internal critique any more than we all breathe oxygen)
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@cvd
You wrote, ”
“You continue to assert that any smidgen of fallibility is logically equal to “no good reason.””
In matters of faith? Absolutely.”
That’s really curious. So before Trent was there *no good reason* to take the OT as authoritative? I’m no canon lawyer, but my meager understanding of the ordinary magisterium is that it is fallible but still commands your religious assent. I understand that this isn’t the same as religious submission, but it still sounds like a pretty big deal. Do you really have “no good reason” to assent to fallible religious teaching?
On the other hand even on matters of dogma conscience is still supreme. RAtzinger wrote, “over the pope as the expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority there still stands one’s own conscience, which must be obeyed before all else.” Almost sounds like that other German theologian.
Regarding your convo with jeff about scripture, note that it is irreformable in the system. Once you assent to it, you are bound. Of course modernists reject this, but this is no different than the poison afflicting all Christian groups. The parallel is much closer than you allow as Bryan notes at ctc. His response is that the living magisterium is better than “dead letter”. Of course we prots believe that isn’t the case as the word is alive by the holy spirit. He acknowledges this and turns to empirical considerations. This is whybI have turned to polls in the past – his claims don’t hold to scrutiny.
Anyway, if you know what I am missing about the ordinary magisterium above let me know. Otherwise I’ll”see” you around.
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Mermaid, “The Church is pretty united on established doctrine. Not even the Pope can change that. The Pope cannot retool the Trinity, for example. He cannot explain away the Incarnation.”
Great. The truth transcends the office that has the authority to determine infallible truth.
Welcome to Protestant land. Yup.
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James Young, “Please explain how this does not reduce supernatural revelation to natural revelation and end up in rationalism.”
In case you didn’t notice, you have lots of rationalism on your side, like motives of credibility that are air tight in a HAL 9000 kind of way.
Why on earth would you need someone else’s authority if you have Christ, the prophets and the apostles? Why would you need the blankie of an infallible pope if not to demean Protestants?
That’s on you.
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CVD: You’ve never actually engaged the point I’ve given to you repeatedly – what type of assent and teaching and behavior is consistent with the types of claims (or disclaimers) being made by Christ/Apostles, Rome, and Protestantism.
It’s not for lack of trying!
For my part, I do not see any active engagement with my question: Do you in fact have access to any infallible copy of the church’s infallible teaching? If not, then how are you assenting to infallible teaching? Any time I broach this issue, you dismiss it as “evasion”, yet this is precisely where (I believe) the Catholic system’s internal weakness lies: On the one hand, it demands infallibility in its teachings; on the other, it cannot deliver perfectly infallible teachings to its followers, but rather copies of translations of critical texts. This is neither evasion nor “sophistry” on my part, but a considered criticism whose source lies in my experience with classroom teaching on the one hand and data systems on the other.
So that’s really where our impasse lies.
I think the root of it is that you have an “authority” model of faith in which it is considered a valid move to believe the words of another solely on the basis of that person’s authority. You write,
CVD: You agree divine revelation is infallible and irreformable and non-provisional. Yet you disagree that it must be taken on the authority of another? Please explain how this does not reduce supernatural revelation to natural revelation and end up in rationalism.
Stepping back, it is clear that the only possible alternatives you can envision are either “taking on the basis of authority” or “rationalism.”
I would argue that there is a third alternative; namely, that God’s authority is dispositive because God cannot be mistaken or lie, but all others are derivative and therefore fallible. And I would argue that this does not lead to epistemic despair (as you suppose a Protestant must have), but to an inductive method of understanding the infallible word of God.
I would argue further that the Catholic employs the exact same inductive method, but on a larger set of teachings that he considers infallible, and that he does so because in the end, “authority” is an unstable ground for faith.
So. I will give my best shot at engaging your point, and I would ask you to engage mine.
I would suggest that we each take another three rounds and call it a day. Muddy G is right.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 4, 2015 at 8:26 pm | Permalink
James Young, “Please explain how this does not reduce supernatural revelation to natural revelation and end up in rationalism.”
In case you didn’t notice, you have lots of rationalism on your side, like motives of credibility that are air tight in a HAL 9000 kind of way.
I’m not remotely participating in the actual elements of this discussion, but look, a squirrel!
Why on earth would you need someone else’s authority if you have Christ, the prophets and the apostles? Why would you need the blankie of an infallible pope if not to demean Protestants?
Because Protestants [the “Reformers”] took it upon themselves to act like popes, even to the point of re-writing the Bible!
“Blankie?”
“Blankie?”
Rather unbefitting a church elder and an alleged scholar. I’ve never seen such behavior this side of an old John Hagee video.
That’s on you.
No schism, no Trent. It was Luther who made the canon an issue by rejecting part of it. As Ms. Mermaid points out, not much of an issue except that Luther voided the theology of “purgatory” simply by nuking 2 Maccabees.
Sola scriptura certainly works if you arrogate the authority to determine what scripture is. Luther rigged the game.
That’s on you.
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Darryl,
“In case you didn’t notice, you have lots of rationalism on your side, like motives of credibility that are air tight in a HAL 9000 kind of way.”
Sure, faith works with reason. But that’s not rationalism or fideism. And consistency/coherency is a necessary, though not sufficient, condition and indicator of truth. Inconsistency/incoherency is an indicator of falsehood. God gave us reason for a reason.
“Why on earth would you need someone else’s authority if you have Christ, the prophets and the apostles?”
So you do agree with me that divine revelation must be taken on the authority of another. Kudos. You can claim personal illumination as I already said, but if you did so, you wouldn’t actually be actively arguing against the certitude of faith, but rather endorsing it. You’d also be making similar claims as Rome does to irreformable teaching. But you don’t, and if you did, I’d have reason to consider you as a contendor and would have to investigate the evidence for the credibility of your claims, but since you don’t even bother making the claim in the first place, there’s no reason for me to do so.
“Why would you need the blankie of an infallible pope if not to demean Protestants?”
This is a joke right? I’m demeaning Protestants and the history of your articles and comments don’t demean RCs? All of a sudden we have a thin skin? We see the demeaning in this very sentence so I’ll let the irony sink in. Please point out where I’ve demeaned Protestants in this discussion – I’m simply evaluating both systems on their own terms, consistent with their claims and evaluating and comparing.
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vd, t, oh come on. You know it was Occam that set Protestantism into motion. That’s on Rome.
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James Young, you’re the one who keeps asserting that Roman Catholicism is superior because of infallibility. We keep saying we are not infallible. Who’s got the thin skin when you keep doing victory laps over a point here that no one is disputing. What people dispute is that you have the infallibility that you so proudly claim. All of your arguments don’t add up unless someone gets a mind meld with HAL 9000 and buys Bryan Cross’s paradigm. You have yet to concede that most people even on your side don’t give a rats rear for your allegedly air-tight claims on behalf of an institution that has done a lot more harm than good.
Then you keep saying that we are in the same position as you (although always inferior) as in “So you do agree with me that divine revelation must be taken on the authority of another.” No I don’t agree if that means that the authority of those “others” also include the popes. There are the authorities that you yourself and many of your bishops have said are essential to revealed religion — others who have been inspired by God — prophets, apostles, Christ (as God and man). The authority of those men does not lead to the authority of your men. And if it did, then you would be putting popes on a par with the Bible which you always say you’re not doing even though you really are.
The demeaning part is to continually argue for your system as superior when in fact you can’t prove it and when in fact both systems rely on the Holy Spirit and faith. I’ve brought that up several times. Silence from you but more “we’re the Yankees.” Yup.
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Round 1
CVD: NT believers were under the same condition as were the Apostles themselves. Now, once that assent is given, what must happen to be *consistent* with the claims I assented to in the first place? *That* is what the citations I provided about certitude of faith are meant to demonstrate. I am not justified in holding any future or current teaching of the authority assented to as provisional or tentative or 99.9% likely or subject to my debate and argument – doing so would entail I never actually assented to the claims to divine authority and infallibility made in the first place.
I will have to read between the lines here, but I believe you are saying something like this:
Is that fair?
If so, this would make sense of your incredulity at my views. For on your view, I should not be able to simultaneously say, “I believe the Scriptures” and at the same time, “I have some doubt as to whether the pericope of the woman taken in adultery is genuine.” In your view, I should only know the canon of the Scripture on the ground of an authorized authority, which must of course then be the church. In doubting the authenticity of the pericope, I am doubting the authority of the church — which should mean that I am rejecting the entirety of the Scripture, the message of the church.
So your critique makes some sense IF we temporarily adopt the view of authority and faith that you put forward.
I would counter that the model of believing the person rather than the message is not the NT model of faith, nor of authority. I would radically reject that entire picture of faith and understanding on the grounds that the Bible knows nothing of it.
(1) In the NT, only one Person is held up as the one in whom we place our faith. That person is of course Jesus Christ. We are to place our faith in him because He alone is God. Scriptural warrant: John 3.22-30; 2 Cor 11.2-3; Col 2.1-10; 1 Tim 6.3.
2 Cor 4.5: For we do not preach ourselves, but Christ Jesus as Lord, and ourselves as your bondservants for Jesus’ sake.
(2) The concept of authority (exousia) is legitimately found in the New Testament (and Old — the book of Daniel is structured as a contrast between the authority of men and the authority of God).
But authority is never presented as the right to command belief upon the strength of the person.
Rather, it is the right to make decisions and be respected — but always with reference to truth.
I cannot think of a place in which a NT speaker other than Jesus points to his own person or his own authority as the ground for belief. Can you?
(3) Accordingly, authorities in both OT and NT are considered to have authority, but provisional upon actual truthfulness.
Hence, OT prophets were respected. But if their prophecy failed to come true, they were to be deposed and executed.
— Deut 18.19 – 22
Note carefully that the people were commanded to check the words of the prophet against reality. This means that they could not give the words of the prophet assent without any provisionality. The provisionality is stated there in Deuteronomy: Listen to the prophet, but only provided that his prophecies come true.
The same applies in the NT. Paul says,
— Gal 1.8-12
Note carefully that the ground for belief is the truthfulness of the gospel because its source is direct revelation from Jesus. At no point does Paul present his own authority as the ground for their belief, and he even disqualifies the authority of himself, or of angels, or of any apostle to overturn the message.
This is important. For Paul, it is the message and not the person who is to be believed.
So your statement, “I am not justified in holding any future or current teaching of the authority assented to as provisional or tentative…” is exactly backwards from the Biblical position.
In the Bible, prophets, apostles, and angels are viewed as potentially able to teach falsehood, and their utterances should be tested against known truth. This is why the Bereans were noble.
(4) This point is entirely consistent with the uniform language of the NT. Everywhere in the Gospels and in Acts, a message is preached. The hearers place their faith in that message or in the person of Jesus, but never in the authority of an apostle. I am unable to find any passage in which the hearers placed their faith in Peter, Paul, or the apostles.
(5) The act of speaking infallibly was not a function of the authority of the person, but of the direct work of the Spirit. Balaam’s donkey had no authority (Balaam did have authority, but he knew when to shut up and listen, more or less). Amos had no sacramentally conferred authority, but God spoke to him and expected the authorities to listen to him (Amos 7.10ff).
But know this first of all, that no prophecy of Scripture is a matter of one’s own interpretation, for no prophecy was ever made by an act of human will, but men moved by the Holy Spirit spoke from God. — 2 Peter 1.20-21
We have a two-fold point here. On the speaking side, prophecy does not occur by virtue of authority, but because of the direct work of the Spirit (v 21). On the interpreting side, the meaning of prophecy is not subject to one’s own interpretation — I cannot twist Scripture whichever way I wish and declare my meaning “correct.” Rather, its meaning is the intent of the Holy Spirit. The “for” has causative force in this passage.
(6) Even the apostles were fallible authorities. Peter was sharply rebuked by Paul. It is likely that Paul erred in disputing with Mark and Barnabus.
I know you do not disagree that authorities may err, yet you fail to draw out the implication. Namely, it is entirely possible for an authority to be wrong. Hence, it is an error to reason from authority to unprovisional acceptance.
Paul and Peter’s listeners had no infallible rule to know when Paul and Peter were erring.
On your model, they would logically have had to embrace Peter’s words and actions even when he was wrong. And I am sure that we agree that this is absurd conclusion.
In short, Scripture knows nothing of unprovisionally accepting the words of an authority on the ground of his authority.
The exception, of course, is Jesus — precisely because He is the omniscient and infallible God of the Universe. He alone is capable not merely of proclaiming truth, but defining it.
Instead of unprovisionally accepting authority, Scripture speaks consistently of placing faith in a message called the gospel concerning the person and work of Jesus. That message trumps human and angelic authority, and it is that message that we are to believe, not the authority proclaiming it.
If we are to be true to the Biblical model of teaching and authority, we must reject the one you have presented.
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The Church is pretty united on established doctrine. Not even the Pope can change that. The Pope cannot retool the Trinity, for example.
Ariel, how about a ball with that dodge? Yes, I know what the pope cannot do. But the point was what can he really do? Some of you here have admitted there is great diversity within your communion, and the question is how that can be when there’s a mechanism that’s supposed to settle disputes? You can keep dinging Protestantism all you want for being fractured, but since it never claims to have a mechanism to avoid fracture in the first place, so what? Are you blaming Protestantism for not making the same claims as Catholicism? If it’s not even working for you guys, why would we?
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 4, 2015 at 9:33 pm | Permalink
vd, t, oh come on. You know it was Occam that set Protestantism into motion. That’s on Rome.
Look, a squirrel!
It was your surrogate Mr. Cagle who brought up “Occam’s Razor” in reference to the Septuagint. And was properly corrected by the nice Catholic lady, whom you yourself mocked as “Little Mermaid.”
Mrs. Webfoot turned your mockery around at you and took it as her “name.” The Dumb Ox.
The Dumb Mermaid is your superior in both heart and mind. [Mine too.] We are each fortunate to know her
it was Occam that set Protestantism into motion
Occam was a theological and philosophical lightweight, a non-entity, remembered for nothing except the simplistic formulation of “Occam’s Razor,” the last refuge of somebody losing the debate.
That you and yours should choose to hide behind his skirts tells all, Dr. Calvinism. Ms. Mermaid would never resort to such a cheat.
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Tom, it’s all sophistry on your part, if not skepticism, i.e. the theological version of a venereal disease. Your system has more outs and qualifiers than Congress when it comes to balancing the budget.
After all you and Mermaid are still spraying champagne about the deutero canonical books and Luther’s opinion on certain books even as he translated all of them for the German bible.
Pay attention closely because we’ve already been through this with Susan and she beat a hasty retreat without having the decency to admit her error.
The DC are written in Greek, not Hebrew and are not quoted in the NT.
Yes, the DC quote some of the same OT passages that the NT quotes, but just because the pope might get around to quoting Scripture some day, doesn’t make the rest of what he says inspired in the real world.
But the real bottom line again, if not the scandal and stumbling block for the romanists in this discussion is that protestantism actually has a place for the Holy Spirit, to blow wherever he wills, instead of being mechanically poured into every Roman sacrament ex opere.
In short, popery is all about walking by sight, not faith and if you can’t see, smell, taste, touch or hear it, it doesn’t exist for Rome. Scripture has to have a visible infallible interpreter – even though neither the pope or even the Roman magisterium do to much infallibly authoritative exposition of Scripture – to be understood or it cannot be understood at all.
Well that’s one way to understand Christianity, but it still is pretty carnal, which is why the romanists don’t get it.
FTM God doesn’t bless unbelief or praying to a piece of bread. So the broken record routine will continue.
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Bob S
Posted November 5, 2015 at 12:07 am | Permalink
Tom, it’s all sophistry on your part, if not skepticism, i.e. the theological version of a venereal disease.
BobS, don’t. Please don’t. This makes Old Life bigtime ugly. There are ladies here.
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TVD: It was your surrogate Mr. Cagle…
I’m no-one’s surrogate.
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vd, t, right, Brad Gregory, Richard Weaver, and Christopher Dawson thought Occam trivial:
Are you the David Barton or Roman Catholic apologists? He doesn’t go to Mass either.
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Bob,
I second the plea. Treat Tom better than he treats us.
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#ithrowrocksandhidebehindskirts
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James Young, wake up! You say infallible, Douthat says muddle through:
Like we’re not supposed to notice. Like comments in a comm box correspond to reality?
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The leviathan picks his teeth
And tastes again the reckless soul
Yesterday’s guest
Who had to comment
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Jeff’s post brings up a fundamental issue as to whether our trust is based on the authority of a person, if so, which person, and the authority of the message. A few things are clear:
1. Jesus proclaimed HIs message on the authority of His person, but we all agree He’s God incarnate. So He can do that.
2. The Apostles proclaimed their message not on their own authority as the Magisterium but as representatives of Christ.
3. The Apostles never ask us to put our faith in the church or to ask the church to grant us faith via baptism.
The argument of CVD et al really breaks down at points 2 and 3. Sure the Magisterium can claim to be merely representatives of Christ, but I think it is pretty clear once these discussions carry on to any length that the Magisterium is making the implicit claim at least to be far more than representatives. It is very evident that the traditionalists here, at least, believe that the modern Christian should say, “Rome to whom else we should go, you have the words of eternal life.” There’s an identification of Christ with the Magisterium that is simply too close. There’s no real distinction in practice between the head of the church, Jesus, and His body. Perhaps at times Protestants have been guilty of separating the two too much, but the solution isn’t the opposite error of putting the pope in the place of Christ.
And when you read conversion narratives of RCs, it is clear that they haven’t been converted to Christ or even to a better way of following Christ. It is a conversion to the church. The church solves all your epistemological problems. The church is where you find rest from the troubles of the world. The church is what grants you faith in baptism. etc. etc.
It’s also a bit of a bait and switch to say “First century Jews who trusted Christ” weren’t placing their faith provisionally as an excuse to put your faith in Rome provisionally. If Rome want’s to claim to actually be Christ and have the same inspiration, you can make that parallel. But then you’d be making Mormon claims.
What comes across is that for all the qualification, the default RC position historically really seems to be that there is no meaningful distinction between Christ/Apostles and the Magisterium.
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and Muddy proceeded from Iowa to OL, and the Spirit of God came upon him also, so that he went along prophesying continually and he also stripped off his clothes, and he too prophesied and lay down naked all that day and all that night.
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sdb,
“Falsifiable inference? Inductive conclusion? Evidence based inference?”
Okay, so no teaching in Protestantism can ever rise above falsifiable inference. The point is the term doesn’t matter – the definition cath ency offered for opinion is what you have repeatedly affirmed and doubled down as the best Protestantism can offer.
“The reformed confessions talk about “good and necessary consequence” from scripture.”
Scripture is not a math book of proofs. Articles of faith are not articles of reason. And WCF’s teaching is provisional, by its own disclaimers.
“Namely, divine revelation rests on the authority of the triune God”
Correct. Hence Cath Ency again: “The term natural certitude is sometimes used in another sense, in contradistinction from the certitude of Divine faith, which is supernatural certitude, and which, according to theologians generally, is greater than any degree of certitude to be had in science, because it rests not upon human reason, which is liable to be mistaken, but upon the authority of God, who cannot err.”
“However, that revelation is mediated (for most of us…perhaps you had your own Road to Damascus experience?)”
Exactly – the Road to Damascus experience could be offered by Protestants – that would make them a plausible contendor. But of course no one does that.
“Of course, that authority can be none other than the Holy Spirit.”
Great. Then stop arguing against the certitude of faith. And explain why everyone else who claims divine illumination disagree with each other on not just articles of faith, but the very nature of divine revelation in the first place.
“So we add a middle man who distills what we should believe”
Is Scripture a middle man between you and the Holy Spirit?
“If the Bible is not good enough”
More jumping the gun – have to identify the Bible first, as well as define its inerrancy and inspiration and authority. None of which can be offered as more than opinion and falsifiable inference by your disclaimers.
“Further, those whom God elects, he effectually calls,…, and brings into sufficient knowledge of the scriptures to express saving faith”
So those who disagree with you on saving faith have not been effectually called. So this is just question begging. People who disagree with your opinion on the nature and identification of revelation, as well as its interpretation on the “essentials” (more question begging) are just sinful unregenerate.
” Not an infallible understanding of all things, but a sufficient understanding of the necessary basics of the gospel. ”
And “the necessary basics of the gospel” is offered as nothing more than provisional opinion based on your disclaimers.
“So there are similarities to science in that learning science requires inferring truths from infallible data and trust (faith?) in a process and in (fallible) people. ”
And yet as you said above, “Namely, divine revelation rests on the authority of the triune God” – that’s the problem.
“not all of humanity can adequately read special revelation.”
Right, only the enlightened ones. I’m supposed to just assume you are enlightened (even despite your disclaimers) while others who vehemently disagree with you aren’t. What evidence do you have to support such a claim so that I should take your position seriously and worthy of consideration?
“Here we disagree again. If you disagree with,
The supreme judge by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture. ”
This is offered in WCF as nothing more than provisional opinion by its own disclaimers. So this doesn’t get you anywhere.
“We could be wrong about this, but then nothing else really follows – in other words you cease to be a reformed Christian in any meaningful sense”
You missed the entire point – this is exactly why I said conservative Protestantism is just liberalism waiting to happen. Liberal Protestants are not disobeying Protestant principles (disclaimers) any more than conservative ones are. Conservative doctrines and teachings are just one set of opinions amongst others – including liberal ones. That is the point and again why “the catholic is better off because if he is consistent with the claims offered by the authority he assented to, he is warranted in having the certitude of faith because he has an authority/mechanism to distinguish and judge divine revelation from opinion, while the protestant is not better off because of the disclaimers inherent in the system he subscribes to – to be on equal footing to the catholic he would have to violate those disclaimers.”
“But there *can* be a rational basis for denying them.”
If someone walking around tells you he believes the earth is flat and there’s no gravity affecting him, do you think he’s rational? And you just nixed any possibility for Protestantism to distinguish divine revelation (irreformable and infallible by definition) from provisional opinion and falsifiable inference yet again by likening them in this way.
“I see no reason why one couldn’t compel assent given agreement about the source.”
So the Holy Spirit compels you to believe only things that are always revisable in theory?
“Regarding your convo with jeff about scripture, note that it is irreformable in the system.”
Really – which confessions teaches such? None, because doing so would violate its disclaimers.
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Cletus van Damme
Posted November 5, 2015 at 11:45 am | Permalink
“We could be wrong about this, but then nothing else really follows – in other words you cease to be a reformed Christian in any meaningful sense”
You missed the entire point – this is exactly why I said conservative Protestantism is just liberalism waiting to happen. Liberal Protestants are not disobeying Protestant principles (disclaimers) any more than conservative ones are. Conservative doctrines and teachings are just one set of opinions amongst others – including liberal ones. That is the point and again why “the catholic is better off because if he is consistent with the claims offered by the authority he assented to, he is warranted in having the certitude of faith because he has an authority/mechanism to distinguish and judge divine revelation from opinion, while the protestant is not better off because of the disclaimers inherent in the system he subscribes to – to be on equal footing to the catholic he would have to violate those disclaimers.”
That is the point. Everyone’s an apostate except you and me and I’m not so sure about you.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 5, 2015 at 6:34 am | Permalink
James Young, wake up! You say infallible, Douthat says muddle through:
But as far as the church as an official teacher goes, the church as a permanent settler of questions — well, there the actual outcome of the synod was itself a characteristic post-Vatican II muddle, a compromise that offered more to liberals than the last two pontificates but also less than they (and Francis) plainly desired, and that didn’t take Catholicism over the precipice into doctrinal self-contradiction or Anglican-style geographical schism.
And though that muddle is too much of one to be a permanent solution on these issues, though in the long run I think the church will either reassert its teaching more firmly or go further down the path to liberalization and schism (or both!)
In the long run
Dr. Hart doesn’t read his own cites.
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Jeff Cagle
Posted November 5, 2015 at 6:26 am | Permalink
Bob,
I second the plea. Treat Tom better than he treats us.
D. G. Hart
Posted November 5, 2015 at 6:26 am | Permalink
#ithrowrocksandhidebehindskirts
You don’t think everyone doesn’t see your abominable behavior? You’re fooling nobody, except possible yourselves.
8507 Apperson
Posted November 4, 2015 at 3:33 am | Permalink
Tom, you wrote,
““You should check yourself on schism though, 1 Corinthians 12:25-27. Some people around here seem to perversely revel in schism. Sola scriptura matters, except when it doesn’t.””
Keenly perceptive, for that passage is not only the most crucial in rightly defining schism in sola scripture terms, but is also the one equally despised by your interlocutors here.
It grieves me, a non-RC, to see you ad hommed all the time. My only relief is your wit, tenacity, and consistency.
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James Young, “conservative Protestantism is just liberalism waiting to happen”
So what explains Roman Catholicism’s about face on Pius X’s condemnation of modernism? Wasn’t he infallible?
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TVD
Posted November 5, 2015 at 2:24 pm | Permalink
Jeff Cagle
Posted November 5, 2015 at 6:26 am | Permalink
Bob,
I second the plea. Treat Tom better than he treats us.
D. G. Hart
Posted November 5, 2015 at 6:26 am | Permalink
#ithrowrocksandhidebehindskirts
You don’t think everyone doesn’t see your abominable behavior? You’re fooling nobody, except possible yourselves.>>>>>
Maybe someday they will repent, right?
———————————-
8507 Apperson
Posted November 4, 2015 at 3:33 am | Permalink
Tom, you wrote,
““You should check yourself on schism though, 1 Corinthians 12:25-27. Some people around here seem to perversely revel in schism. Sola scriptura matters, except when it doesn’t.””
Keenly perceptive, for that passage is not only the most crucial in rightly defining schism in sola scripture terms, but is also the one equally despised by your interlocutors here.
It grieves me, a non-RC, to see you ad hommed all the time. My only relief is your wit, tenacity, and consistency.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 5, 2015 at 4:06 pm | Permalink
James Young, “conservative Protestantism is just liberalism waiting to happen”
So what explains Roman Catholicism’s about face on Pius X’s condemnation of modernism? Wasn’t he infallible?
Look, a squirrel!
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CvD:
The skepticism is on your side actually. You’re the one arguing because we’re all fallible, then the certitude of faith as explained in Cath Ency, Newman, Aquinas is impossible and is actually illegitimate – we can never do better than highly likely doctrines because we’re all fallible and it’s hopeless and we should throw up our arms. Such skepticism eviscerates even the very notion of faith as described in Scripture and Tradition, then mutates it into a crude form of Pelagianism and rationalism by likening it to things like science and math.>>>>>>
The “Gospel” being preached here at OL is nothing more than an infinity of incertidumbre. This “faith” cannot save anyone. It is no faith at all, but rather unbelief.
It looks like a weird kind of religious nihilism driven by philology.
Maybe God will grant them repentance and faith.
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Just saw an RC bumper sticker: The Eucharist is Jesus/Jesus is the Eucharist.
So there you go.
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vd, t, how un-American. With those kind of dismissals, you’d have never rebelled against King George and birthed your American creation.
We were right to suspect RC’s (especially lapsed ones) of disloyalty.
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Mermaid, like I said, you wouldn’t answer. Without pride, your faith is pointless.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 5, 2015 at 5:57 pm | Permalink
Mermaid, like I said, you wouldn’t answer. Without pride, your faith is pointless.
With so much, tough guy, so is yours.
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Come on Jeff, I’ve treated our very own (The) Veronian Disciple just fine.
But as usual he wants to quibble and nitpick without responding substantively.
Whatever.
The skepticism only goes one way and these guys can’t handle the fact that the Holy Spirit blows where he wills. That faith is the evidence of things unseen scandalizes them. They are members of what used to be part of the original catholic church but now is not the catholic church, rather it is the roman (per)version and they’re not happy the
peonsseparated brethren disagree.Sorry, but that’s the way the wafer crumbles.
The suppressed premise/hidden assumption/foregone conclusion is that the Roman church as the incarnation/body of Christ partakes of the infallibility of the head because – natch – the Roman church/magisterium says so. Neither is it “provisional” because the Roman church says it isn’t.
Natch.
Sounds like an argument to me.
That somebody is incompetent to the question.
And is only capable of a grab it and go mini mart attitude to Scripture.
Vide the appeal to 1Cor. 12:25-27.
Gal. 1:8,9?
It’s not in my bible.
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@cvd Your comments are really hard to follow. I’ve tried to respond to below, but I think we’ve lost the context. I’m still interested in the following exchange you had with Jeff.
That’s really curious. So before Trent was there *no good reason* to take the OT as authoritative? I’m no canon lawyer, but my meager understanding of the ordinary magisterium is that it is fallible but still commands your religious assent (isn’t it a mortal sin to knowingly reject the ordinary magisterium of the church?). I understand that this isn’t the same as religious submission, but it still sounds like a pretty big deal. Do you really have “no good reason” to assent to fallible religious teaching?
On the other hand even on matters of dogma conscience is still supreme. RAtzinger wrote, “over the pope as the expression of the binding claim of ecclesiastical authority there still stands one’s own conscience, which must be obeyed before all else.” So one can only be as certain as one’s conscience allows. Not sure where that fits in with the comparison of the prot and cath systems.
===on to my responses…not sure this conversation is very fruitful anymore===
But of course a factual inference is not the same as an opinion.
You can deduce facts from texts other than math books. This is just silly.
You keep referencing the WCF’s disclaimers – keep in mind that the disclaimer is:
“The supreme judge by which all controversies of religion are to be determined, and all decrees of councils, opinions of ancient writers, doctrines of men, and private spirits, are to be examined, and in whose sentence we are to rest, can be no other but the Holy Spirit speaking in the Scripture.”
So of course councils – works of men – have to be judged against scripture. But there is no disclaimer about scripture. It is posited as properly basic. For the protestant – the identification of scripture is equivalent to the identification of the church. If you grant for the sake of comparison that protestantism is true, you don’t get to make scripture provisional (unless you keep the provisionality of the identification of the church in yours).
No. You’ve granted that protestantism is true for the sake of our comparison. The bible is foundational and this foundation is the so-called disclaimer you keep referring to. It isn’t an opinion at all unless you are going with your obscurantist definition of opinion which would make your identification of the RCC as the true church as a mere provisional opinion (and thus every thing you assent to is just an opinion and you are in the exact same place as the prot).
No. You’ve already allowed that our system is true for sake of argument. The question is how is better off epistemologically. There’s nothing incoherent in Article I of the WCF. Our assurance comes from the Holy Spirit. But of course we are sinful and see through a glass darkly as it were. This is true in the RC system as well of course. Take Mother Theresa – As saintly as she was, evidently she doubted even God’s existence. Was she really better off epistemologically than the bible believing prot (assuming protestantism is true).
This is simply untrue. The “disclaimer” as you call it is that the scripture is the judge of everything. To reject it as the final judge is reject Christianity. This is why Machen referred to liberalism (modernism) as a different religion from Christianity.
So the fact that there can be a rational basis for denying the “law of gravity” means that anything goes? I would have to consider a guy who says the earth is flat and there’s no gravity affecting him rational? Of course not. This is absurd. Newtonian gravitational theory is false. Not falsifiable, but false. It is a pretty good approximation, but we know that general relativity is a much better description of gravity, though we know it is false too. This doesn’t mean that anything goes. My sin, ignorance, and creaturely limitation may mean that I don’t receive the Holy Spirit’s revelation (including the identification and meaning of scripture) perfectly. That doesn’t mean that anything goes as you suggest.
No, but my understanding of the HS is fallible, which makes it revisable. Of course since your identification o the church is fallible everything you assent to is fallible. You can’t escape this by asserting it away. But you can be quite confident in what you believe and have a high degree of assurance. But it does rely on hope not sight.
The WCF 1 teaches this. It is the source of the disclaimer you keep referring to.
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sdb
Posted November 5, 2015 at 10:55 pm | Permalink
@cvd Your comments are really hard to follow.
His comments are logical, ordered and quite easy to follow. Whatever the problem is, it lies with you. [What you mean by “fallibility,” I guess.]
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b, sd, “it is fallible but still commands your religious assent (isn’t it a mortal sin to knowingly reject the ordinary magisterium of the church?). I understand that this isn’t the same as religious submission, but it still sounds like a pretty big deal. Do you really have “no good reason” to assent to fallible religious teaching?”
Which is why James Young’s argument for infallibility is finally rationalist. It is a mathematical formula that has no resonance with human beings or even his bishops.
On the up side, it gives him a hobby.
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@dgh maybe so…at least in form if not in substance.
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sdb,
“So before Trent was there *no good reason* to take the OT as authoritative?”
Of course there was, because Tradition and Scripture is part of the STM-triad.
“So of course councils – works of men – have to be judged against scripture. But there is no disclaimer about scripture.”
Sure there is. Your confessions teach the following: Scripture exists, is inspired, inerrant, solely ultimately authoritative, perspicuous, and consists of these books. All of these are provisional teachings based on its disclaimers that it has no ability or authority to offer irreformable teaching which applies to itself just as much as it does to any other group of men or confessions. Do you want to say any of these teachings are not doctrines? And yet you say “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”.
“If you grant for the sake of comparison that protestantism is true, you don’t get to make scripture provisional ”
Again, as I already said to you, you’re handwaving the problem: If a system precludes the possibility of distinguishing infallible dogma and divine revelation from provisional opinion/judgments/interpretations of something called “Scripture”, that same principle precludes the ability to identify any alleged religious authority as having any greater authority than that of provisional opinion, including of course a proposed authority such as something called “Scripture”.
And this applies just as much to the foundational doctrines you want to take for granted – such as the inspiration, inerrancy, and identification of Scripture – to then jump the gun and say “Scripture isn’t fallible, only our interpretation is”. Scripture’s inerrancy, inspiration, and authority (not just its identification) are teachings and doctrines and they are not exempt from your disclaimers, hence they never rise as more than just another opinion amongst others (or if you don’t like opinion – “probable” (however that’s arbitrarily defined) teaching that is revisable in theory).
“No. You’ve granted that protestantism is true for the sake of our comparison.”
Correct – which includes the rejection of the ability and authority to define or identify infallible or irreformable dogma and distinguish it from revisable in theory teaching. That’s why you get semper reformanda and the disclaimers of your confessions, whereas you don’t get such things in RCism.
“You’ve already allowed that our system is true for sake of argument.”
Correct.
“The question is how is better off epistemologically.”
We’ve been over this. One system claims the ability and authority to define and identify divine revelation that is irreformable and infallible by definition (and thus distinguish it from human opinion or provisional teaching). One explicitly rejects that claim. One system warrants the certitude of faith based on those claims, one system does not based on its claims which its defenders happily agree to in arguing against such certitude. One system claims semper reformanda and “all of our doctrines are in principle provisional” being *consistent* with their claims, one system does not *being consistent* with its claims.
As I’ve said before, was Joe in NT times better off epistemologically under Christ/Apostles claims to authority and teaching than Jack who was subscribing to synagogue rabbi Levi who rejects any claims to divine authority or ability to distinguish divine revelation from provisional opinion and admits upfront the best he can offer are fallible judgments and interpretations? Grant both Christ/Apostles claims and Levi’s claims are true – Joe has no advantage over Jack simply because they are both fallible?
“Our assurance comes from the Holy Spirit.”
The assurance that “you get things wrong, but might get things right later” that others have advanced? Why does the HS assure you not to have the certitude of faith that you keep arguing against?
“This is simply untrue. The “disclaimer” as you call it is that the scripture is the judge of everything. To reject it as the final judge is reject Christianity.”
Protesting is not an argument. Liberal Protestants are not disobeying Protestant principles (disclaimers) any more than conservative ones are. You want to exempt “Scripture is the judge of everything” from your disclaimers, but there is no justification for doing so in your system – why? Because your system rejects the very ability to offer such a teaching as divine revelation or infallible and irreformable. Scriptural inerrancy and inspiration, or the opinion that this passage is authentic and this isn’t, or that Christ was physically resurrected, and so on are never offered as more than tentative provisional teachings in your system. Hence liberalism is no more violating Protestant principles than conservatism does – they’re just 2 sides of the same coin.
“No, but my understanding of the HS is fallible, which makes it revisable.”
And yet you say, “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”, not “the reality is that while all my understanding of infallible doctrines is in principle provisional”. That’s why the “but you’re fallible too” argument has never been relevant.
“But it does rely on hope not sight. ”
Does science and math rely on hope and not sight? What happened to the equivalence of supernatural truths to natural revelation and truths your side kept advancing?
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SDB:: “No. You’ve granted that protestantism is true for the sake of our comparison.”
CVD: Correct – which includes the rejection of the ability and authority to define or identify infallible or irreformable dogma and distinguish it from revisable in theory teaching.
Which is only a problem IF being able to “define or identify infallible or irreformable dogma” is a necessary condition for articles of faith.
In the Protestant system, it is not. Problem solved.
Is this epistemically inferior? In the Protestant system, claiming to be able to “define or identify infallible or irreformable dogma” is not even possible for fallible humans. So the Protestant, in the Protestant system, is in the epistemically superior state to the RC because he is not deluding himself.
Meanwhile, the RC within his own system is in the position of believing that the church has infallibly defined dogma — yet he himself has no infallible access to that dogma. So he can never assent to an infallible statement, which his system requires him to do.
CVD: Does science and math rely on hope and not sight? What happened to the equivalence of supernatural truths to natural revelation and truths your side kept advancing?
It was never there. SDB made clear that that was an analogy.
CVD: Liberal Protestants are not disobeying Protestant principles (disclaimers) any more than conservative ones are.
Surely you jest. Liberal Protestants reject sola scriptura.
This should be a sign to you that your analysis of Protestantism is flawed, given that you are getting answers this far off reality.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 6, 2015 at 5:33 am | Permalink
b, sd, “it is fallible but still commands your religious assent (isn’t it a mortal sin to knowingly reject the ordinary magisterium of the church?).
Do your homework, Dr. Hart.
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Jeff,
“In the Protestant system, it is not. Problem solved.”
Right, the problem is “solved” if you think divine revelation is not infallible and irreformable and you’re warranted in putting faith into admitted opinions and provisional teachings. The problem is “solved” if you think fideism is dandy.
“Is this epistemically inferior? In the Protestant system, claiming to be able to “define or identify
infallible or irreformable dogma” is not even possible for fallible humans.”
Right. Which is why we see your disclaimers littered throughout your confessions and bodies. Because they reject the *divine* authority that would enable the ability to define and identify infallible or irreformable dogma in the first place that Rome claims. So you’re merely reinforcing the issue and point of contrast.
“So the Protestant, in the Protestant system, is in the epistemically superior state to the RC because he is not deluding himself.”
So I guess a Jew could tell the Apostles and their followers he is in an epistemically superior state to them and their followers because the Apostles and their followers are human and deluding themselves.
“Meanwhile, the RC within his own system is in the position of believing that the church has infallibly defined dogma — yet he himself has no infallible access to that dogma. So he can never assent to an infallible statement, which his system requires him to do.”
I don’t have to be infallible to assent to infallible dogma. Christ/Apostles followers weren’t infallible when assenting to their teaching. That didn’t entail Christ/Apostles teachings were all in principle provisional and revisable.
“Surely you jest. Liberal Protestants reject sola scriptura.”
SS is a teaching and doctrine offered as nothing more than provisional teaching by your confessions and bodies due to their disclaimers. So no jesting – they are following Protestant principles (e.g. the rejection of the authority and ability to offer teachings as infallible divine revelation) just as much as conservatives do. That’s the problem.
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Cletus,
Sure there is. Your confessions teach the following: Scripture exists, is inspired, inerrant, solely ultimately authoritative, perspicuous, and consists of these books. All of these are provisional teachings based on its disclaimers that it has no ability or authority to offer irreformable teaching which applies to itself just as much as it does to any other group of men or confessions. Do you want to say any of these teachings are not doctrines? And yet you say “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”.
Aye, Aye, Aye. This is getting ridiculous. Both sides are starting with a premise: If God exists and if He has spoken then everything He has said is true and He cannot err, and we call that divine revelation. From there we get:
1. RC—Divine revelation must be fallibly identified by the individual before assent can be made. You fallibly identify it as the church based on motives of credibility.
2. Protestant—Divine revelation must be fallibly identified by the individual before assent can be made. We fallibly identify it as the Scriptures based on motives of credibility.
The only significant difference is that after the assent of faith, your provisional knowledge/view is that sometimes Rome infallibly identifies the meaning and extent of revelation. However, that’s really not that different from us. We have provisional knowledge/view that the church has inerrantly identified the meaning and extent of revelation. Both systems are provisional. It’s theoretically and logically possible that Rome will abandon the Trinity, find the body of Jesus, adopt universalism full on, etc. Same with Protestantism. Is it likely. Absolutely not.
Protestants don’t have an infallibly defined canon of divine revelation. You don’t either. At best you have a canon of Scripture that neither the East nor the Protestants agree with even though in Rome’s eyes we’re all supposed to be meaningfully Christian. You don’t have a canon of infallible dogmas. You don’t have a canon of infallible tradition. The Roman church has fallibly identified tradition (if you want to call it identification) and you are left largely on your own to fallibly identify what is dogma and what isn’t. It’s no virtue to fault us for not having the green infallible light go on everytime we publish a canonical list when you don’t have the same thing for tradition or the scope of dogma.
As a consequence of this, it is nearly impossible to see any advantage that Rome has given you. In practice you are a Protestant, evaluating the dogma and admitting that your submission is altogether provisional. Remember, you’ll leave if x happens.
I’ve had this discussion with Stallman, and he finally admitted that the advantage Rome has is that at least Rome, if it wanted to, could produce all of those things I just listed that Rome lacks. I’m sorry, but better is the lawn mower that cuts but misses a few blades here and there than the perfect lawn mower that nobody ever takes out of the garage AND, in the off chance it comes out of hiding, you and Tom sit on the sidewalk debating which 2 square centimeters of lawn it has actually cut.
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Clete,
SS is a teaching and doctrine offered as nothing more than provisional teaching by your confessions and bodies due to their disclaimers. So no jesting – they are following Protestant principles (e.g. the rejection of the authority and ability to offer teachings as infallible divine revelation) just as much as conservatives do. That’s the problem.
Are you out of your freaking mind. Liberals don’t believe in divine revelation except maybe the spark of the divine in all of us. They don’t even fallibly identify what divine revelation is.
You are either clueless or a liar. And I don’t want to believe the second.
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Robert,
“We have provisional knowledge/view that the church has inerrantly identified the meaning and extent of revelation.”
And why do you think the church has inerrantly identified the meaning and extent of revelation given you reject the church has authority and ability to identify and define divine revelation and irreformable dogma from provisional teachings and tentative judgments?
And how do you identify the church that did this in the first place? From your canon? Cart before horse.
“Divine revelation must be fallibly identified by the individual before assent can be made. We fallibly identify it as the Scriptures based on motives of credibility.”
Yes and any interpretation/judgment of Scripture can never be offered as more than provisional opinion in your system. Why? Because of the rejection of divine authority/ability to do so. And this same disclaimer applies not only to the interpretation/judgment of the source, but the teaching of any supposed religious authority having greater authority than that of provisional opinion – including of course a proposed collection of writings as being inerrant and inspired, rather than merely a fallible mundane historical record of what some people thought and wrote about God at some time.
“The only significant difference is that after the assent of faith, your provisional knowledge/view is that sometimes Rome infallibly identifies the meaning and extent of revelation.”
Because it claims the ability to do so, and Protestantism does not and cannot without violating its disclaimers.
“It’s theoretically and logically possible that Rome will abandon the Trinity, find the body of Jesus, adopt universalism full on, etc. Same with Protestantism. Is it likely. Absolutely not.”
Of course Protestantism has done that. You’re just handwaving liberals as Protestants that don’t count. But they are no more violating Protestant principles (e.g. the rejection of ecclesial divine authority and ability to distinguish divine revelation from provisional opinion and human teaching) than conservatives are. Thus, conservative Protestantism is just liberalism waiting to happen, there’s no mechanism to prevent it given Protestantism’s disclaimers.
“Protestants don’t have an infallibly defined canon of divine revelation. You don’t either.”
Right. And you hold to SS. Rome and the East doesn’t. So please explain how SS functions as a coherent rule of faith while its identified canon and passages therein remain perpetually provisional and subject to revision.
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CVD: Right, the problem is “solved” if you think divine revelation is not infallible and irreformable and you’re warranted in putting faith into admitted opinions and provisional teachings. The problem is “solved” if you think fideism is dandy.
No, you’re attacking a straw man. If you are going to evaluate the Protestant position, then you need to use the Protestant position and not your own version thereof.
I get that you think that “provisional” is a problem for our side. But you can’t use that problem to wish away the fact that we also believe that divine revelation is in fact infallible, which has been repeatedly stated on this side of the table.
There is a difference between the position as we have articulated it, and the items that you believe our position ought to entail. You’re getting those two confused.
To be clear, and hopefully this is the last time we need to say this: Divine revelation is infallible. That is a core tenet of the historic Protestant position.
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CVD: Yes and any interpretation/judgment of Scripture can never be offered as more than provisional opinion in your system. Why?
Now would be good time to interact with the criticism. How do you escape provisionality? You have no direct access to infallible documents.
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CVD,
Sorry, my friend, but you’re beating a dead horse and, IMHO, not making a very compelling case.
Protestants claim our knowledge of the infallible Word of God is provisional. You claim that your understanding of the infallible Magisterium (which infallibly interprets God’s Word) is provisional. You have an “advantage” in the sense that you move your “problem” one step back. Ok granted. You’ve found a mechanism to infallibly declare doctrinal statements derived from Scripture (and Tradition) and Protestantism does not.
It seems you think this state of affairs is a very big problem for Protestantism. You haven’t done a good job showing why coping to fallibility is such a disastrous thing, however. It would seem to me that coping to fallibility is the *natural* thing to do.
This has been brought up ad infinitum, but no such infallible mechanism existed in the OT. Why is there one in the NT? Perhaps you can speak to typological fulfillment, but this undercuts your entire argument on the necessity of infallible interpreters of Divine revelation.
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Cletus,
Robert,
And why do you think the church has inerrantly identified the meaning and extent of revelation given you reject the church has authority and ability to identify and define divine revelation and irreformable dogma from provisional teachings and tentative judgments?
Because you don’t have to be infallible to make an inerrant statement.
And how do you identify the church that did this in the first place? From your canon? Cart before horse.
Essentially, Scripture and history. Rome and the East are essentially out of the running from the get go because they reject the OT canon that predated the church.
Yes and any interpretation/judgment of Scripture can never be offered as more than provisional opinion in your system. Why? Because of the rejection of divine authority/ability to do so. And this same disclaimer applies not only to the interpretation/judgment of the source, but the teaching of any supposed religious authority having greater authority than that of provisional opinion – including of course a proposed collection of writings as being inerrant and inspired, rather than merely a fallible mundane historical record of what some people thought and wrote about God at some time.
No teaching of Rome can FOR YOU rise any higher than provisional because you’ve admitted that there are circumstances under which you would leave Rome. You have provisionally accepted that the Trinity is true. You have provisionally accepted that Rome is the church.
“It’s theoretically and logically possible that Rome will abandon the Trinity, find the body of Jesus, adopt universalism full on, etc. Same with Protestantism. Is it likely. Absolutely not.”
Of course Protestantism has done that. You’re just handwaving liberals as Protestants that don’t count. But they are no more violating Protestant principles (e.g. the rejection of ecclesial divine authority and ability to distinguish divine revelation from provisional opinion and human teaching) than conservatives are. Thus, conservative Protestantism is just liberalism waiting to happen, there’s no mechanism to prevent it given Protestantism’s disclaimers.
If a liberal Protestant is following Protestant principles, then Nancy Pelosi is following RC principles in advocating for abortion on demand and homosexuality according to her conscience. She hasn’t been excommunicated. Rome infallibly identifies what is proper and what isn’t. Ergo, Pelosi’s view of the Magisterium and the orthodoxy of abortion on demand is fully acceptable.
Right. And you hold to SS. Rome and the East doesn’t. So please explain how SS functions as a coherent rule of faith while its identified canon and passages therein remain perpetually provisional and subject to revision.
They remain perpetually provisional in the sense that Christianity is provisional if Jesus hasn’t been raised from the dead. Which for some reason you can’t seem to get, although you’ll somehow deny that Rome is provisional because of the (basically impossible) possibility of finding Jesus’ body.
But in any case, there’s no infallible definition of T or M or the statements of M, so I don’t see how the three-legged stool actually functions as a true coequal authority. The reality is that the real authority for conservative RCs is whatever the Magisterium says today.
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Jeff,
“Divine revelation is infallible. ”
Right. And our fallible apprehension of divine revelation does not entail all teaching must therefore be provisional and tentative either in theory or fact. One side keeps blurring this distinction in their arguments, the other does not.
” How do you escape provisionality? You have no direct access to infallible documents.”
I don’t – I’m human and fallible. That doesn’t mean an NT believer under Christ/Apostles claims and authority/ability were in no different or better position than someone under synagogue rabbi’s claims and admitted lack of authorit/ability just because both people were fallible and without a vulcan mindmeld. The teachings of the former were infallible and proposed as such, being consistent with Christ/Apostles claims and warranted the certitude of faith for their adherents. The teachings of the latter were fallible and provisional and proposed as such, being consistent with the rabbi’s claims and would not warrant the certitude of faith for their adherents.
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Brandon,
“It would seem to me that coping to fallibility is the *natural* thing to do.”
I’m fallible. I hope everyone is satisfied now. Nothing has changed in the argument or points.
“but no such infallible mechanism existed in the OT.”
Prophets and God speaking directly to people didn’t exist?
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CVD: I’m fallible. I hope everyone is satisfied now.
Duly noted and appreciated.
CVD: Nothing has changed in the argument or points.
Well, you’re right in that we all knew this and suspected you knew it also.
But the admission does draw attention to the possibility that your argument might have a flaw here or there, just as ours might.
For my part, I would like to see much greater precision. Such phrases as
That doesn’t mean an NT believer under Christ/Apostles claims and authority/ability were in no different or better position than someone under synagogue rabbi’s claims and admitted lack of authorit/ability just because both people were fallible and without a vulcan mindmeld.
contain a lot of jargon. What does “under Christ/Apostles claims and authority/ability” mean? I can understand “who heard Jesus’ teaching and believed it.” I can understand “who believed in Jesus” or who professed “Jesus is Lord.”
But I don’t understand being “under claims.”
—
I’m assuming you’re still working on a reply to Round 1. Is that correct? No hurry, I just want to make sure we’re connecting here.
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Robert,
“Because you don’t have to be infallible to make an inerrant statement.”
Right, but divine revelation is infallible by definition. Are inerrant teachings provisional and subject to revision?
“Essentially, Scripture and history. Rome and the East are essentially out of the running from the get go because they reject the OT canon that predated the church.”
So you discerned the church from the canon. As I said, cart before the horse. There was no uniform OT canon amongst Jews before the NT church. This is where you’ll say “But Jesus identified the canon as the Hebrew one” – which you got from the NT canon. See, cart before the horse.
“No teaching of Rome can FOR YOU rise any higher than provisional because you’ve admitted that there are circumstances under which you would leave Rome. You have provisionally accepted that the Trinity is true. You have provisionally accepted that Rome is the church.”
No I have not provisionally accepted all dogmas proposed by Rome, because doing so would be *inconsistent with her claims to authority I supposedly assented to in the first place*. This is the point (again). Any teaching in Protestantism, however, cannot rise higher than provisional opinion, being *consistent with the claims (or rather disclaimers)* it offers in the first place. Hence the analogy between Christ/Apostles and their followers and the followers of random synagogue rabbi. Until you recognize that difference and distinction, you’ll keep misfiring.
“If a liberal Protestant is following Protestant principles, then Nancy Pelosi is following RC principles in advocating for abortion on demand and homosexuality according to her conscience.”
Another red herring. Dissent from teaching does not entail the authority’s claims are useless or have no power any more than dissent from Christ/Apostles teaching entailed their claims and authority were useless or have no power. Rome claims the ability and authority to distinguish and define divine revelation from human teaching and provisional opinion. It has done this through various mechanisms in its history – the Trinity and Resurrection is not up for grabs. Arianism is not an option. The Eucharist is not up for grabs. Pelagianism is not an option. And so on. Protestantism cannot do this based on its disclaimers and principles – there is no mechanism to ward off liberalism (or conservativism if you are of a liberal bent) because it rejects the ability and authority to distinguish and define irreformable dogma from provisional teaching and affirms semper reformanda. And the foundational doctrines of the canon, SS, inerrancy, inspiration, and the like are not somehow magically exempt.
“They remain perpetually provisional in the sense that Christianity is provisional if Jesus hasn’t been raised from the dead.”
Paul said that our faith is in vain if Jesus isn’t raised. That didn’t mean everything he then taught was provisional and revisable or that those who listened to him and assented to his claims should then hold everything he teaches in perpetual doubt or for possible revision – doing so would be inconsistent with his claims to authority/ability in the first place. The canon remains provisional in your system and always will due to the disclaimers. Just see how textual criticism continues to slice and dice it – there’s no mechanism for saying “go no further, this is inspired” – it’s just reduced to battles amongst fallible scholars of various fields and disciplines duking it out and you siding with whomever. Yet this is supposed to function as the basis for SS as the infallible rule of faith.
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BA: “You’ve found a mechanism to infallibly declare doctrinal statements derived from Scripture (and Tradition) and Protestantism does not.
… no such infallible mechanism existed in the OT. but no such infallible mechanism existed in the OT.”
CVD: Prophets and God speaking directly to people didn’t exist?
Talk about blurring distinctions! Protestants (once again!) are very clear. Prophets existed. God spoke to them, infallibly. But fallible people had no infallible mechanism for determining when God had spoken to those prophets, as opposed to when “prophets” had “made stuff up.”
Hence Deuteronomy: A fallible mechanism for sorting infallible teaching from “made up stuff.”
That’s what is under discussion. You keep wanting to make the fallibility of the identification somehow a fallibility of the teaching itself.
That would be analogous to saying “because my understanding of gravity is fallible, gravity itself is fallible.”
Subject and object must be kept distinct at all times.
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CVD,
What Jeff said, mostly.
What infallible mechanism existed in the OT for the interpretation of God’s Word? Saying the Prophets spoke God’s Word is agreeable, but what infallible mechanism existed for the interpretation of the Torah, for example? You’ll need to prove a mechanism existed uninterrupted through the OT as well. Also, please make sure that this mechanism is a single person, since this is the way the natural world operates (at least according to Bryan et. al. at CtC).
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Clete,
So you discerned the church from the canon. As I said, cart before the horse. There was no uniform OT canon amongst Jews before the NT church.
Actually that’s not exactly correct. But in any case, we do know Jesus’ canon and it wasn’t yours.
This is where you’ll say “But Jesus identified the canon as the Hebrew one” – which you got from the NT canon. See, cart before the horse.
It’s not the cart before the horse to note that the best historical sources we have for Jesus are the canonical gospels. I could, in theory, hold that they are ordinary historical documents prior to giving them any kind of canonical status. Good history. Jesus makes claims. He claims that the Jewish canon is his canon. I follow Jesus based in part on the good history of the sources (motives of credibility), ergo I reject Rome and Constantinople for claiming to follow Jesus but not His Bible.
No I have not provisionally accepted all dogmas proposed by Rome, because doing so would be *inconsistent with her claims to authority I supposedly assented to in the first place*. This is the point (again). Any teaching in Protestantism, however, cannot rise higher than provisional opinion, being *consistent with the claims (or rather disclaimers)* it offers in the first place.
Sure you have. Every single doctrine of Rome relies on whether or not Jesus actually rose from the dead. Since you have provisionally accepted that teaching, you provisionally adopt all else. If your submission is merely provisional at the outset, which you admit in acknowledging your fallible identification of the church and of the resurrection, all other submission is provisional.
At best you can suggest that the doctrines aren’t offered AS provisional by Rome, which of course is not exactly correct either since Rome presumably agrees with Paul that if Jesus has not been raised, faith is in vain. So effectively Rome is saying “Doctrine X is infallible, predicated on the assumption that Jesus rose from the dead, which is in some (insignificant) sense provisional, for Paul holds out the possibility, at least in bare theory, that it didn’t happen.”
Hence the analogy between Christ/Apostles and their followers and the followers of random synagogue rabbi. Until you recognize that difference and distinction, you’ll keep misfiring.
But Paul admits a degree of provisionality in holding out, at least in theory, the consequences if Christ isn’t risen from the dead. And he can do that without saying “guys, what I’m saying here is really up for grabs.” Sounds awfully Protestant to me.
Another red herring. Dissent from teaching does not entail the authority’s claims are useless or have no power any more than dissent from Christ/Apostles teaching entailed their claims and authority were useless or have no power.
Dissent that is openly tolerated proves that the position from which is dissented is in practice provisional.
Rome claims the ability and authority to distinguish and define divine revelation from human teaching and provisional opinion.
Yes, I agree that is your fallible, provisional opinion of what Rome has claimed. Other RC in good standing with your church differ. If the Magisterium admits them to the Eucharist and the Magisterium has final say, I have no good reason to believe your view is any more correct than theirs.
It has done this through various mechanisms in its history – the Trinity and Resurrection is not up for grabs. Arianism is not an option. The Eucharist is not up for grabs. Pelagianism is not an option.
Yes, I agree that is your fallible, provisional opinion of what Rome has claimed about the Trinity, Resurrection, Arianism, the Eucharist, and Pelagianism. Other RC in good standing with your church differ. If the Magisterium admits them to the Eucharist and the Magisterium has final say, I have no good reason to believe your view is any more correct than theirs.
And so on. Protestantism cannot do this based on its disclaimers and principles – there is no mechanism to ward off liberalism (or conservativism if you are of a liberal bent) because it rejects the ability and authority to distinguish and define irreformable dogma from provisional teaching and affirms semper reformanda.
The mechanism is the interpretation of Scripture in its historical context. Apparently we can’t do that we confidence but you can exercise your provisional, fallible opinion of Rome in its context to determine that Rome has a mechanism to ward off liberalism that Protestantism doesn’t have. Seems awfully one-sided. Stack the deck going in: Cletus’ fallible provisional opinion of what Rome has said and meant, even though it in all likelihood doesn’t represent the beliefs of even half of RCs worldwide, is certainly correct and worthy of trust. But the Protestant’s fallible provisional opinion isn’t.
And by the way, maybe you could give me a principled way to determine whether your fallible, provisional opinion of Rome and its role more accurately reflects the Magisterium than Pelosi’s fallible, provisional opinion of Rome and its role. I need something more than my fallible, provisional opinion please.
And the foundational doctrines of the canon, SS, inerrancy, inspiration, and the like are not somehow magically exempt.
The base foundational doctrine is that if divine revelation exists it is infallible. All else are essentially related to recognizing what the revelation is. But Rome has no more an infallible mechanism for doing that than we do. Which is why you can’t give me a canon of tradition or at least a canon of infallibly defined dogma.
Because while on the one hand you want to speak as if dogma somehow transcends the Magisterium, for you it really doesn’t. You don’t need a canon because you have the Magisterium of the moment. Sola Ecclesia.
Paul said that our faith is in vain if Jesus isn’t raised. That didn’t mean everything he then taught was provisional and revisable or that those who listened to him and assented to his claims should then hold everything he teaches in perpetual doubt or for possible revision
Agreed. And for Protestants, it works the same. The provisionality and revisability are trivially possible. Just as they were for Paul. Simple.
– doing so would be inconsistent with his claims to authority/ability in the first place.
Well, Protestants don’t exercise such submission to the Word of God provisionally in any way that is significantly different than your provisional submission unto the church of Rome. Remember, your submission is provisional, contingent upon the body of Christ never being found or Rome never denying the Trinity or any other foundational doctrine.
The canon remains provisional in your system and always will due to the disclaimers.
Trivially so. Just as the extent of the church remains provisional in your system and the identification of tradition remains provisional in your system and the identification of the full scope of dogmatic definitions remains provisional. Heck, I could even foresee your church changing the canon one day. If Rome and Constantinople were to sit down and agree on all except the canon, I could definitely foresee Francis leading the way to say, “Hey guys, let’s accept those last couple of books we’ve never added to the list. After all, we’ve never said they’re NOT on the list (wink, wink).”
Just see how textual criticism continues to slice and dice it – there’s no mechanism for saying “go no further, this is inspired” – it’s just reduced to battles amongst fallible scholars of various fields and disciplines duking it out and you siding with whomever. Yet this is supposed to function as the basis for SS as the infallible rule of faith.
Honestly, this is the absolute weakest part of your argument. If Rome didn’t employ textual criticism or have some of the best text critics in the field working for its biblical commission, this would carry more weight. It’s also rather inconsistent to think that fallible motives of credibility haven’t been established for text criticism but that they have been for Rome, and then to believe that it’s okay to trust those fallible motives of credibility for Rome but not for the text of the Bible. Very one-sided.
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Jeff,
“Prophets existed. God spoke to them, infallibly. But fallible people had no infallible mechanism for determining when God had spoken to those prophets, as opposed to when “prophets” had “made stuff up.””
Right, but prophets made the claim to divine authorization in the first place. Protestants don’t claim and reject such authority or ability. That’s the point.
“You keep wanting to make the fallibility of the identification somehow a fallibility of the teaching itself.”
On the contrary, that’s what your side wants to do. Hence why your side keeps saying things along “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”, not “The reality is that while all our understanding of infallible doctrines are in principle provisional”. That’s precisely why you then argue against the concept of the certitude of faith as legitimate or even possible, even granting the claims to divine authority prophets, Christ/Apostles, or Rome makes as true that Protestantism rejects.
“Subject and object must be kept distinct at all times.”
Precisely. So my fallible apprehension of a teaching and my lack of “direct access to infallible documents” and my lack of vulcan mindmelding does not entail “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”. Your side keeps arguing that consequence must follow from the (agreed upon) premise that we are all fallible. But of course it doesn’t, any more than it did in NT times for followers under Christ/Apostles.
“What does “under Christ/Apostles claims and authority/ability” mean?”
It means Christ and the Apostles claim divine authority and ability to distinguish and define divine revelation/irreformable dogma from provisional opinion or tentative human teaching. It means believers assenting to those claims would afterwards not be justified in holding their teachings in perpetual doubt or only as “highly likely” and probable or subject them to constant debate and argument – doing so would be *inconsistent* with the claims to authority Christ/Apostles made that their followers assented to in the first place.
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CVD,
No, this is not right. Protestants don’t claim to be prophets themselves, but they do claim that when the prophets speak they are infallible. You are not talking about prophets. You are talking about infallible interpreters of the prophets. We are agreed that the Prophets exist. We disagree that in order to understand them we need an infallible interpreter.
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CVD: Protestants don’t claim and reject such authority or ability. That’s the point.
You’re actually wrong about this. They do not reject such ability. But the ability has nothing to do with authority, as I pointed out earlier (Amos, Balaam’s donkey). 2 Peter is once again relevant: Prophecy does not come about by an act of the will of the prophet, but men were carried along by the HS.
JRC: “You keep wanting to make the fallibility of the identification somehow a fallibility of the teaching itself.”
CVD: On the contrary, that’s what your side wants to do.
You are mistaken.
CVD: Hence why your side keeps saying things along “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”, not “The reality is that while all our understanding of infallible doctrines are in principle provisional”.
Your mistake comes about because you are overcomplicating something very simple. The latter is what we have affirmed over and over. The former is true only if “our doctrines” is understood to mean “our understanding of Scripture.”
You need to get Protestant doctrine straight before charging in with a critique.
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CVD: the Apostles claim divine authority and ability to distinguish and define divine revelation/irreformable dogma from provisional opinion or tentative human teaching.
Where in the Bible did that happen?
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James Young, “Right, the problem is “solved” if you think divine revelation is not infallible and irreformable and you’re warranted in putting faith into admitted opinions and provisional teachings. The problem is “solved” if you think fideism is dandy.”
That’s funny. It was Protestants who defended the infallibility of Scripture. Your guys were hand wringing over Edgardo Mortara, Italy, and papal pride — I mean authority.
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Darryl,
“It was Protestants who defended the infallibility of Scripture”
Um, I thought Mortara and Italy were all in the timeframe you like to play up as when RCism actually proactively and valiantly fought against modernism (though its mechanisms of authority) as opposed to now. So which is it?
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Brandon, which is why James Young winds up making the pope into a Mormon apostle — someone with prophetic and aposotlic authority, status, and function.
New Revelations anyone? Climate change?
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Jeff, it didn’t happen in the Bible. A pope said so.
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Jeff,
“They do not reject such ability.”
Then you should not affirm semper reformanda and “highly likely” or “99.9%” probable doctrines. Nor should WCF affirm:
“All synods or councils, since the apostles’ times, whether general or particular, may err; and many have erred. Therefore they are not to be made the rule of faith, or practice; but to be used as a help in both.”
“The purest Churches under heaven are subject both to mixture and error; and some have so degenerated, as to become no Churches of Christ, but synagogues of Satan.”
And how does one determine if a council has erred? By his provisional identification and interpretation of Scripture of course. Thus refuting the affirmation that the church or any Protestant body has the ability to define or identify divine revelation/irreformable dogma.
“The former is true only if “our doctrines” is understood to mean “our understanding of Scripture.””
You jumped the gun again if by understanding you mean interpretation – it’s not just “our understanding of Scripture”. Your doctrines include the identification, inerrancy, inspiration, sole ultimate authority, sufficiency/perspicuity of Scripture, not just proposed interpretations (hence the critique on liberalism). Further, can you give me an irreformable doctrine then? One that isn’t offered as provisional by you or your confessions? And on what basis is it offered as such?
“Where in the Bible did that happen?”
Where in the Bible did Apostles and Christ claim divine authority from God and that their teaching reflected such and should be taken as such? You dispute this? Passages can be provided but I just find it an odd request. As I said earlier, “It is undeniable the NT witness endorses submission and assent to the Apostles’ living authority in faith, consistent with the claims to authority they were making. There was no hedging bets, provisional and highly likely teachings, arguing and debating them afterwards, semper reformanda, etc.” but apparently it is after all.
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Darryl,
“which is why James Young winds up making the pope into a Mormon apostle — someone with prophetic and aposotlic authority, status, and function.”
Hardly. The magisterium has divine authority while not being inspired – the deposit of faith is fixed and revelation has ended. The analogy with Christ/Apostles is simply to point out the “but we’re all fallible!” argument – such as it is – is nothing more than a red herring and distraction. If Christ and the Apostles came down to earth today and started teaching, apparently it wouldn’t matter – we’re all fallible remember.
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Robert,
“If your submission is merely provisional at the outset, which you admit in acknowledging your fallible identification of the church and of the resurrection, all other submission is provisional. ”
Again with the disconnect. Examine what is *consistent* with the claims being made that are assented to in both systems. I am not justified in holding every teaching proposed by Rome as provisional and subject to debate or rejection after assenting to her claims to authority. I am in Protestantism because every doctrine and teaching is provisional and revisable by its own admission and *consistent* with the disclaimers to authority and ability it makes in the first place.
“At best you can suggest that the doctrines aren’t offered AS provisional by Rome”
It’s not just a suggestion at best – that is necessary to be *consistent* with the claims Rome makes.
“But Paul admits a degree of provisionality in holding out, at least in theory, the consequences if Christ isn’t risen from the dead. And he can do that without saying “guys, what I’m saying here is really up for grabs.” Sounds awfully Protestant to me.”
So Protestantism is claiming apostolic authority a la Rome to define and identify divine revelation and distinguish such from provisional teaching and tentative human opinion? Of course it doesn’t, hence its disclaimers, which is the entire point. Semper reformanda is not consistent with Paul’s preaching. It is not consistent with Rome. It is with Protestantism.
“The mechanism is the interpretation of Scripture in its historical context.”
Let’s see what teachings are taken for granted here: Scripture exists, has been identified, is inspired, is inerrant, is solely ultimately authoritative, is perspicuous, and is to be interpreted ultimately according to GHM. Yet all of these teachings are not offered as irreformable or divine revelation by your system, because they cannot be. So you’re just begging the question to try to ward off liberalism. Are liberals not practicing GHM correctly? And what happens when liberals interpret Scripture in its historical context to reject Scriptural inerrancy, or to reject certain doctrines conservatives hold to? Nothing. Because there’s no mechanism in place given the rejection of divine authority/ability to define irreformable dogma and distinguish divine revelation from provisional human teaching in the first place.
“The base foundational doctrine is that if divine revelation exists it is infallible. All else are essentially related to recognizing what the revelation is.”
Right and “all else” remains nothing more than provisional teaching by your system. Hence liberalism. You are absolutely correct on your foundational doctrine as I’ve repeatedly said – the problem is your system can’t ever cash it out.
“Agreed. And for Protestants, it works the same. The provisionality and revisability are trivially possible. Just as they were for Paul. Simple.”
No, not simple. Paul’s teachings weren’t subject to semper reformanda, adherents couldn’t keep arguing and correcting him (such would be inconsistent with his claims to divine authority), he wasn’t offering them as “highly likely” or provisional – he was preaching them as revelation and the word of God. There was no hedging bets, no hemming and hawing, no “we might be wrong, but might be right later”.
“The canon remains provisional in your system”
– Trivially so.”
So textual criticism has ended right? No more asterisks in the future? Early Christians who blew it with the canon just weren’t illuminated enough? But we know now we’ve been “guided into truth”? But we can never know that according to you. It doesn’t matter if it ever changes or not. What matters is the basis for accepting it. Protestantism can never offer it as irreformable dogma or divine revelation, because of its disclaimers. So it can never rise above just a long-standing opinion currently held by some arbitrary subset of Protestants who agree with each other for now. And yet SS somehow is coherent with a fallible and provisional canon.
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D. G. Hart
Posted November 6, 2015 at 5:46 pm | Permalink
James Young, “Right, the problem is “solved” if you think divine revelation is not infallible and irreformable and you’re warranted in putting faith into admitted opinions and provisional teachings. The problem is “solved” if you think fideism is dandy.”
That’s funny. It was Protestants who defended the infallibility of Scripture.
From whom? Other Protestants.
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But not every doctrine taught by STM is infallible. Prior to Trent the canon was defined fallibly. But you said there is no good reason to believe fallible statements. But the RCC notes that the ordinary magisterium is fallible and it commands your assent. Why does your church command assent to doctrine you said there was no good reason to believe?
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How are these “disclaimers”? Keep in mind that the disclaimer is that scripture is the chief judge.
My apologies. I mistakenly assumed that you understood thay provisional to be modulo the scripture. The disclaimer of scripture as chief judge. So everything we teach must be judged by scripture just as everything taught by your church is provisional on being consistent with STM. If the pope “infallibly” taught a doctrine that contradicted STM he would be wrong and you would have the duty to resist. The epistemological structure is the same and there is no advantage I see assuming either is true.
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sdb
Posted November 6, 2015 at 8:52 pm | Permalink
So before Trent was there *no good reason* to take the OT as authoritative?”
Of course there was, because Tradition and Scripture is part of the STM-triad.
But not every doctrine taught by STM is infallible. Prior to Trent the canon was defined fallibly. But you said there is no good reason to believe fallible statements. But the RCC notes that the ordinary magisterium is fallible and it commands your assent. Why does your church command assent to doctrine you said there was no good reason to believe?
Maybe because it doesn’t actually say that? The “fallibility” here is Old Life’s inability to state the Church’s position without caricaturing it into a patent nonsense as is Old Life’s practice and custom.
I imagine you do it with your fellow Protestants too, but then again it may not be necessary, since “Protestantism” now includes lesbian couple ordained as priests or ministers or whatever you call them.
There is an illustration here, though, just why a magisterium is needed. [Even John Calvin intended a magisterium; he just intended to be the pope of it, more or less. You could look it up.]
Whatever truth there is in Jeff’s statement is this: the Church’s “ordinary magisterium” [or what I call “normative doctrine”] claims only first call on your conscience, but only to listen, consider, pray. Then if you disagree, you have move to the “Informed Conscience.” This much Catholicism admits, and has in common with Protestantism’s “liberty of conscience.”
Can a Catholic disagree with the pope?
Of course he can. Don’t be an idiot. Don’t be a liar.
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CVD: prophets made the claim to divine authorization in the first place. Protestants don’t claim and reject such authority or ability.
JRC: “They do not reject such ability.”
CVD: Then you should not affirm semper reformanda and “highly likely” or “99.9%” probable doctrines. Nor should WCF affirm: “All synods or councils, since the apostles’ times, whether general or particular, may err; …
That’s settled then. Protestants do, in fact, believe that God gave infallible messages to prophet and apostle, and you do not claim otherwise.
Rather, your argument is that Protestants are inconsistent given that they also affirm semper reformanda and that all councils and popes may in fact err.
So, I haven’t gotten an answer: are you intending to respond to Round 1 above?
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TVD: Whatever truth there is in Jeff’s statement is this: the Church’s “ordinary magisterium” [or what I call “normative doctrine”] claims only first call on your conscience
I have no idea what statement of mine you’re referring to.
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sdb
Posted November 6, 2015 at 8:52 pm | Permalink
So before Trent was there *no good reason* to take the OT as authoritative?”
Of course there was, because Tradition and Scripture is part of the STM-triad.
But not every doctrine taught by STM is infallible. Prior to Trent the canon was defined fallibly. But you said there is no good reason to believe fallible statements. But the RCC notes that the ordinary magisterium is fallible and it commands your assent. Why does your church command assent to doctrine you said there was no good reason to believe?
I do believed you tripped over a truth. The ordinary magisterium is provisional in that it does not command affirmative assent at the threat of going to hell if you don’t pick up your pom-poms and preach it.
But you should have a damned good reason to oppose it. An “informed conscience.”
Is every Catholic who has used birth control going to hell? According to what’s being sold at Old Life here, yes, but you have not a shred of evidence from the Catholic Church itself that it says or believes that.
Do your homework.
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And yet you say “The reality is that while all of our doctrines are in principle provisional”.
Cletus Van Doofus, can you distinguish between admitting the possibility of error and committing error? The WCF admits it is not infallible per se. OK, can you then show us where it errs?
Not just assert for the nth time that it doesn’t claim to be infallible like the pope whenever the little red light is on over the confessional?
Or if you insist, fallible though yrs truly is, 2+2=4 is without error.
This is the fundamental distinction you refuse to make in this discussion beginning way back when you brought up your Reader’s Digest version of “semper reformandum”.
It’s getting old, boring and only pounds home the conclusion that you are incompetent to the question, i.e. you don’t have a clue what you are talking about no matter how longwinded you are. While that might get points from Bryan, it doesn’t work here.
ciao
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CVD: The Apostles claim divine authority and ability to distinguish and define divine revelation/irreformable dogma from provisional opinion or tentative human teaching.
JRC: Where in the Bible did that happen?
CVD: Where in the Bible did Apostles and Christ claim divine authority from God and that their teaching reflected such and should be taken as such? You dispute this?
That’s a different question. I asked where in the Bible that the apostles (not Christ) claim “divine authority and ability to distinguish and define divine revelation/irreformable dogma from provisional opinion or tentative human teaching.”
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CVD: You jumped the gun again…
I’m sorry, could you explain what your use of this phrase means? I’m used to it meaning “you started too early”, but that meaning doesn’t fit the context.
CVD: “… if by understanding you mean interpretation – it’s not just “our understanding of Scripture”. Your doctrines include the identification, inerrancy, inspiration, sole ultimate authority, sufficiency/perspicuity of Scripture, not just proposed interpretations (hence the critique on liberalism). Further, can you give me an irreformable doctrine then?”
It’s hard to answer your question because it presupposes foundationalism: a bottom layer of irreformable doctrine upon which other doctrine and moral teaching rests.
I’m operating on a completely different picture. There is an irreformable stratum of divine revelation.
Now comes the church, who fallibly identifies and interprets that stratum according to its best understanding of the original meaning. Some doctrines are so perspicuously taught in Scripture that they are “practically irreformable.” Others are less so, and it is these that are (rarely) reformed as a result of greater understanding of Scripture.
This is entirely unlike the liberal theological project, which rejects Grammatical-Historical Method, rejects propositional understanding of Scripture, and rejects the notion of divine revelation.
You can’t get from historic sola scriptura to liberalism without taking … erm … liberties.
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Cletus,
Again with the disconnect. Examine what is *consistent* with the claims being made that are assented to in both systems. I am not justified in holding every teaching proposed by Rome as provisional and subject to debate or rejection after assenting to her claims to authority. I am in Protestantism because every doctrine and teaching is provisional and revisable by its own admission and *consistent* with the disclaimers to authority and ability it makes in the first place.
No disconnect at all. If there is anything that could cause you to stop being RC, then your submission is entirely provisional. You’ve given at least two things that would make you stop being RC—Rome denies the Trinity or they find the body of Jesus.
You only eliminate provisionality altogether if you tell us there is absolutely nothing that Rome could do or any discovery to be made that would make you change your mind. You submit unto Rome unless and until something makes you change your mind. IOW, your submission is no less provisional than mine.
So Protestantism is claiming apostolic authority a la Rome to define and identify divine revelation and distinguish such from provisional teaching and tentative human opinion? Of course it doesn’t, hence its disclaimers, which is the entire point.
Protestantism claims fallible authority. Not this weird “hey-we’re-not-inspired-like-the-apostles-but-there’s-no-worry-cause-we-say-so” authority of the Magisterium.
Semper reformanda is not consistent with Paul’s preaching. It is not consistent with Rome. It is with Protestantism.
It’s absolutely consistent with Paul’s preaching if revelation has truly ceased and the Apostles were truly unique.
Are liberals not practicing GHM correctly?
Actually, honest liberals do. They conclude that the Apostles saw themselves as bearers of infallible revelation, they just reject the claim altogether. Dishonest liberals don’t employ GHM correctly. If you need people with funny hats to tell you that Paul really didn’t endorse homosexuality even when liberals want to somehow say that they did, then you need to stop with all this philosophy and take a basic logic class.
And what happens when liberals interpret Scripture in its historical context to reject Scriptural inerrancy, or to reject certain doctrines conservatives hold to?
Well in my denomination, they’re kicked to the curb. They can’t get a job at a conservative evangelical seminary, but no worries, plenty of official RC universities will hire them.
Nothing. Because there’s no mechanism in place given the rejection of divine authority/ability to define irreformable dogma and distinguish divine revelation from provisional human teaching in the first place.
Unlike Rome’s superior system, where pagan lesbians can teach theology at Boston College for generations and then be kicked out not for teaching heresy but because the school isn’t following Title IX. That mechanism sure works great in theory, though.
Right and “all else” remains nothing more than provisional teaching by your system. Hence liberalism. You are absolutely correct on your foundational doctrine as I’ve repeatedly said – the problem is your system can’t ever cash it out.
Until you get the Vulcan mindmeld with God, your submission to Rome is entirely provisional. Rome might claim it doesn’t offer provisional teaching, but you’ve already admitted you submit provisionally. Remember, you submit unless and until Rome does something like deny the Trinity that you, according to your fallible opinion, doesn’t think she can do.
No, not simple. Paul’s teachings weren’t subject to semper reformanda, adherents couldn’t keep arguing and correcting him (such would be inconsistent with his claims to divine authority), he wasn’t offering them as “highly likely” or provisional – he was preaching them as revelation and the word of God. There was no hedging bets, no hemming and hawing, no “we might be wrong, but might be right later”.
Trivially provisional. Paul said if Christ isn’t raised, then ignore Him. This is the same kind of provisionality that Protestantism has. But you are correct that there is a difference between Paul and the church. We’re still waiting for you to see that difference between Paul and Rome.
So textual criticism has ended right? No more asterisks in the future?
Irrelevant to canon. I don’t know why you keep bringing it up, since the Vatican approves Bibles with asterisks in them.
Early Christians who blew it with the canon just weren’t illuminated enough?
Actually the early Christians were far more in line with the Protestants on this than Trent.
But we know now we’ve been “guided into truth”? But we can never know that according to you.
If you mean we can’t know it infallibly on this side of heaven, then no, we can’t. But you can’t infallibly know when Rome has been guided into the truth either.
It doesn’t matter if it ever changes or not. What matters is the basis for accepting it. Protestantism can never offer it as irreformable dogma or divine revelation, because of its disclaimers. So it can never rise above just a long-standing opinion currently held by some arbitrary subset of Protestants who agree with each other for now. And yet SS somehow is coherent with a fallible and provisional canon.
You never answered my question as to how fallible and provisional me can know whether your fallible and provisional reading of the Magisterium is any better than the fallible and provisional reading of Nancy Pelosi. And the truth is, if we want to be radical skeptics in order to pretend as if Rome is meaningfully better epistemologically, then you can’t answer my question. Because as clear as Rome gets, you are still fallible and there’s a chance, even if it is trivial, that Pelosi is orthodox and you’re going to hell for being against abortion. And yet somehow you live your life just fine, but we Protestants are clueless and hapless liberals in waiting because we admit some trivial degree of provisionality in our system.
It’s a glaring double standard.
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TVD
Posted November 5, 2015 at 11:23 pm | Permalink
sdb
Posted November 5, 2015 at 10:55 pm | Permalink
@cvd Your comments are really hard to follow.
His comments are logical, ordered and quite easy to follow. Whatever the problem is, it lies with you. [What you mean by “fallibility,” I guess.]
Ever notice the papist proclivity to pontificate?
There’s no need to state an argument, just assert and figure on buffaloing through.
Thanks for sharing TVD.
Now go feed some squirrels.
And by the way, maybe you could give me a principled way to determine whether your fallible, provisional opinion of Rome and its role more accurately reflects the Magisterium than Pelosi’s fallible, provisional opinion of Rome and its role. I need something more than my fallible, provisional opinion please.
Ding, ding, ding.
Stop embarassing CVD like this Robert. It’s not charitable.
FTM Rome did change the canon. It is not the Jews’s or Jesus’s canon. It includes no Hebrew material and is not quoted in the NT by Christ and the apostles.
(When is CVD gonna shut up and stop cementing his place in the idiots’s hall of fame?)
Right, but prophets made the claim to divine authorization in the first place. Protestants don’t claim and reject such authority or ability. That’s the point.
And backed it up by miracles as well as not contradicting previous scripture, if not fulfilling it.
That’s perennially missing in the papist claim for the kind of prophetic infallibility that the pope has.
Because he said so.
Vicious circle much?
Precisely. So my fallible apprehension of a teaching and my lack of “direct access to infallible documents” and my lack of vulcan mindmelding does not entail . . . .
Fallible = provisional.
Shut up. You just denied your argument that romanism has an advantage over protestantism only you are too stupid to see it.
Hardly. The magisterium has divine authority while not being inspired – the deposit of faith is fixed and revelation has ended.
And for all the boohoo/crying over prot semper reformanudm and provisional ID of the Scripture, Rome has yet to give us an . . . . even an infallible table of contents/index of the infallible teachings of the magisterium and tradition, never mind those teaching themselves.
Hypocrite much, Doctor Quack?
No, not simple. Paul’s teachings weren’t subject to semper reformanda
Cletus Von Doofus, for the nth time you don’t get it. Paul’s teaching is not reformable, but our understanding and practice of his teaching is We’re sinners, even though redeemed by grace and we don’t have perfection down here even as much as we want it. Of course if the bar is so low Pelosi can go to communion, maybe you don’t have a perfect church either and could use some reformandum yourself.
Protestantism can never offer it as irreformable dogma or divine revelation, because of its disclaimers.
Thou art a fool and doth do as a fool.
Yet Scripture alone – not the magisterium or tradition – is the infallible rule for faith and life.
Deal with it.
Maybe because it doesn’t actually say that? The “fallibility” here is Old Life’s inability to state the Church’s position without caricaturing it into a patent nonsense as is Old Life’s practice and custom.
But TVD and CVD don’t have that problem with reformed catholicism. Like Bryan they nail it every time. In their dreams.
I imagine you do it with your fellow Protestants too, but then again it may not be necessary, since “Protestantism” now includes lesbian couple ordained as priests or ministers or whatever you call them.
We get it. Sensus fidei for thee, but not for me.
Mighty white of you, pal.
Can a Catholic disagree with the pope?
Well yeah provisionally as long as he is not being infallible, he can be mistaken but – big but here – we’re not real sure when he is infallible. Like you know, there’s not an infallible list of the same. So yeah, there’s lots of sensus fidei there to go around/pick and choose from, which really means when all else fails, fall back on the implicit faith of saving ignorance in whatever the church believes, i.e. it will all pan out in the end.
And remember boys and girls, this state of affairs beats the prots hands down anyway you equivocate about it.
cheers
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@jeff
He’s just trolling. Speaking of which…
@neutralref
Stop trolling. You wrote in response to my question to CVD:
You are incorrect. The church commands religious submission of will and intellect the teachings of the Bishops even when they are not speaking infallibly. CVD says there is no good reason to do so if the belief one is to adopt isn’t infallible. Here is something from CDF:
You go on to ask,
After I wrote,
Again, stop trolling.
Nothing I’ve written would suggest that. You’re trolling again. That being said, the CCC refers to contraception as “intrinsically evil”. Obviously committing a mortal sin does not automatically consign one to hell in the RC system, but dying not in a state of grace isn’t so ideal. So it looks like we do have a “shred of evidence” that in the RC system, people who use BC are potentially committing a mortal sin (culpability and all that) and thus not in a state of grace. If one dies while not in a state of grace, you don’t get purgatory (as I’ve corrected you before). So just as you were wrong about dogma and doctrine, you are wrong here…again.
PhysicianNeutral ref heal thyself. Or at least try honesty.LikeLike
James Young, “And how does one determine if a council has erred?”
Back at you. How do you tell if a pope has erred? Do you need an infallible pope to do so? Can you on your own tell if the pope denies the Trinity? If a pope does deny the Trinity, what do you do?
Since a pope can sin, a pope can err.
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James Young, why would the return of Christ and the apostles make any difference in your scheme? You have the pope. Why pay attention to the apostles?
Wait. You don’t. That’s why you defend the infallibility not of the Bible but of the pope.
If Christ returns, revelation isn’t necessary. If the apostles do, something odd is happening. If a pastor claims to be infallible, something is wrong and he is proud.
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sdb:
You are incorrect. The church commands religious submission of will and intellect the teachings of the Bishops even when they are not speaking infallibly. CVD says there is no good reason to do so if the belief one is to adopt isn’t infallible. Here is something from CDF:
I, N., with firm faith believe and profess each and everything that is contained in the Symbol of faith, namely…Moreover, I adhere with religious submission of will and intellect to the teachings which either the Roman Pontiff or the College of Bishops enunciate when they exercise their authentic Magisterium, even if they do not intend to proclaim these teachings by a definitive act.>>>>>
Here is the full context of your quote. The Symbol of Faith is the Nicene Creed.
Catholics are to accept the whole Word of God – which includes the Deuterocanonical books. We are also expected to accept the Church’s teachings on faith and morals.
Notice the reference to the authentic Magisterium.
Why would someone join the Catholic Church if they didn’t at the very least accept these basic beliefs? What does your congregation require for membership?
I think in the OPC people have to sign a membership contract, right? If a person deviates significantly from what they have agreed to, can’t they be put under discipline?
It seems like you guys sometimes complain that the Catholic Church doesn’t apply enough discipline. At other times you act like the Catholic Church applies too much discipline. Which is it? Is the Church too lax, or too strict?
I’m not sure why you are taking your frustrations out on TVD. Maybe you meant to accurately present Church teaching, but you really didn’t. If you meant to refute TVD, well, better luck next time.
Take care, sdb, and have a wonderful weekend.
——————————————
PROFESSION OF FAITH
I, N., with firm faith believe and profess each and everything that is contained in the Symbol of faith, namely:
I believe in one God, the Father almighty, maker of heaven and earth, of all things visible and invisible. I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God,
born of the Father before all ages. God from God, Light from Light, true God from true God, begotten, not made, consubstantial with the Father; through him all things were made. For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven, and by the Holy Spirit was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, and became man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, he suffered death and was buried, and rose again on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures. He ascended into heaven and is seated at the right hand of the Father. He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead and his kingdom will have no end. I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of life, who proceeds from the Father and the Son, who with the Father and the Son is adored and glorified, who has spoken through the prophets. I believe in one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church. I confess one baptism for the forgiveness of sins and I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. Amen.
With firm faith, I also believe everything contained in the word of God, whether written or handed down in Tradition, which the Church, either by a solemn judgment or by the ordinary and universal Magisterium, sets forth to be believed as divinely revealed.
I also firmly accept and hold each and everything definitively proposed by the Church regarding teaching on faith and morals.
Moreover, I adhere with religious submission of will and intellect to the teachings which either the Roman Pontiff or the College of Bishops enunciate when they exercise their authentic Magisterium, even if they do not intend to proclaim these teachings by a definitive act.
http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_19880701_professio-fidei_en.html
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Mermaid:Which is it? Is the Church too lax, or too strict?
Both? egs.
too lax- annulment; too strict-annulment
too lax- priest sex scandals ;too strict –women who have had abortions
too lax- indulgences; too strict: indulgences
http://www.catholic.com/tracts/myths-about-indulgences
“How does one determine by what amount penalties have been lessened?”
Before Vatican II each indulgence was said to remove a certain number of “days” from one’s discipline—for instance, an act might gain “300 days’ indulgence”—but the use of the term “days” confused people, giving them the mistaken impression that in purgatory time as we know it still exists and that we can calculate our “good time” in a mechanical way. The number of days associated with indulgences actually never meant that that much “time” would be taken off one’s stay in purgatory. Instead, it meant that an indefinite but partial (not complete) amount of remission would be granted, proportionate to what ancient Christians would have received for performing that many days’ penance. So, someone gaining 300 days’ indulgence gained roughly what an early Christian would have gained by, say, reciting a particular prayer on arising for 300 days.
“Isn’t it better to put all of the emphasis on Christ alone?”
If we ignore the FACT of indulgences..Catholics should not be defensive about indulgences. They are based on principles straight from the Bible, and we can be confident not only that indulgences exist, but that they are useful and worth obtaining. Pope Paul VI declared, “[T]he Church invites all its children to think over and weigh up in their minds as well as they can how the use of indulgences benefits their lives and all Christian society…. Supported by these truths, holy Mother Church again recommends the practice of indulgences to the faithful. It has been very dear to Christian people for many centuries as well as in our own day. Experience proves this” (Indulgentarium Doctrina, 9, 11).
HOW TO GAIN AN INDULGENCE
To gain a plenary indulgence you must perform the act with a contrite heart, plus you must go to confession (one confession may suffice for several plenary indulgences), receive Holy Communion, and pray for the pope’s intentions. (An Our Father and a Hail Mary said for the pope’s intentions are sufficient, although you are free to substitute other prayers of your own choice.) The final condition is that you must be free from all attachment to sin, including venial sin. If you attempt to receive a plenary indulgence, but are unable to meet the last condition, a partial indulgence is received instead….
• An act of spiritual communion, expressed in any devout formula whatsoever, is endowed with a partial indulgence.
• A partial indulgence is granted the Christian faithful who devoutly spend time in mental prayer.
• A plenary indulgence is granted when the rosary is recited in a church or oratory or when it is recited in a family, a religious community, or a pious association. A partial indulgence is granted for its recitation in all other circumstances.
• A partial indulgence is granted the Christian faithful who read sacred Scripture with the veneration due God’s word and as a form of spiritual reading. The indulgence will be a plenary one when such reading is done for at least one-half hour [provided the other conditions are met].
• A partial indulgence is granted to the Christian faithful who devoutly sign themselves with the cross while saying the customary formula: “In the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”
oh boy, one thing though, the more I learn, the more spectacular the Lord’s patience looks.
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Ali, oh come on. The church is (and always) just right.
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