Posted on 05/25/2005 10:35:49 PM PDT by sinkspur
Well, I know there are rather large gay RC groups too but no one takes them seriously either.
Our Lord's grace comes into the world through the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, His Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity on the altars and in the tabernacles of Catholic Churches throughout the world. This is why Satan and his agents (both knowing agents and unwitting agents) attack the mass and those with the power to offer the Holy Sacrifice, the Catholic priesthood.
Well, I disagree with so much of your post that it almost gives me a headache to try and parse it and express my disagreements. But just so that you know that I don't accept a single word of that post as a given.
No kidding. However your opinion has absolutely zero bearing on whether or not my statements are valid. Truth is true whether you recognize it as such or not. While there is breath there is hope though, so I'll keep you in my prayers.
You're awfully comfortable with the metaphor. That's quite an admission. LOL
I don't mind running with it (to a point).
When you are eating His Flesh and drinking His Blood, get back to us for further instruction. THAT IS IN SCRIPTURE.
I vow not to waste time on the methodology I condemn in you but let's take a look at what my handy, dandy King James Bible has to say in John 6:47-71:
"47 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life.
48 I am that bread of life.
49 Your fathers did eat manna in the wilderness, and are dead.
50 This is the bread which cometh down from heaven, that a man may eat thereof, and not die.
51 I am the living bread which hath come down from heaven; if any man eat of this bread, he shall live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh, which I will give for the life of the world.
52 The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying, How can this man give us his flesh to eat?
53 Then Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Except ye eat the flesh of the Son of man, and drink his blood, ye have no life in you.
54 Whoso eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, hath eternal life; and I will raise him up at the last day.
55 For my flesh is meat indeed, and my blood is drink indeed.
56 He that eateth my flesh, and drinketh my blood, dwelleth in me a\nd I in him.
57 As the living Father hath sent me, and I live by the Father; so he that eateth me, even he shall live by me.
58 This is that bread that came down from heaven; not as your fathers did eat manna, and are dead; he that eateth of this bread shall live forever.
59 These things said he in the synagogue, as he taught at Capernaum.
60 Many therefore of his disciples, when they had heard this, said, This is an hard saying; who can hear it?
61 When Jesus knew in himself that his disciples murmured at it, he said unto them, Doth this offend you?
62 What and if ye shall see the Son of man ascend up where he was before?
63 It is the spirit that quickeneth; the flesh profiteth nothing; the words I speak unto you, they are the spirit, and they are the life.
64 But there are some of you that believe not. For Jesus knew from the beginning who they were that believed not, and who should betray him.
65 And he said, Therefore said I unto you, that no man can come unto me, except it were given unto him of my Father.
66 From that time many of his disciples went back, and walked no more with him.
67 Then said Jesus unto the twelve, Will ye also go away?
68 Then Simon Peter answered him, Lord, to whom shall we go? thou hast the words of eternal life.
69 And we believe and are sure that thou art that Christ, the Son of the living God.
70 Jesus answered them, Have I not chosen you twelve, and one of you is the devil?
71 He spake of Judas Iscariot, the son of Simon, for he it was that should betray him, being one of the twelve.
As a "reformed" Christian, you will want to stress verses 6:63 and 6:68. Catholics will stress verses 6:50-61 and 6:64-66. We note that even among Jesus Christ's own disciples who were with Him and in His very Presence, FOUND IT A HARD SAYING that He was giving them His Flesh to eat and His Blood to drink an requiring them to eat His Body and drink His Blood as a condition of salvation. They walked away from him and walked with Him no more. Ever since, there have been those who deemed themselves His disciples but walked away. As many of you demonstrate by your contortions of Scripture, many who deem themselves His "reformed" disciples still walk away from Him and will walk with Him no more.
You reject these words of Scripture because you are required to do what can only be done in the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches and in the SSPX in schism and perhaps the Thuc line in schism (though Anglicans think they still have Apostolic Succession and are closest to it of those who do not), i.e. eat His Flesh and drink His Blood as He required.
You will rationalize your rejection of those verses by dancing around on 6:63 and 6:68. How very convenient but, in the context, your interpretation makes no sense. Christ gave His Body to be eaten and His Blood to be drunk exacty as He said He did and for the purposes He stated. He ALSO had the words of life eternal as noted by Simon Peter.
However wrong you are in your personal interpretations and spin control of Scripture, you and others like you who are "reformed" Christians clearly love much of Scripture. Your attention to it and love of it is admirable. Your approach and methodology is not admirable.
Your practices grow out of some truths but others of your practices (whatever they may be) from your errors whether you simply reject the Eucharist and refuse to believe Jesus Christ When he told you that the Eucharist consists of His Flesh and His Blood or rejecting the papacy whose incumbent at any time is Christ's Vicar on Earth to believing in salvation by Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide and Sola Gratia (three things, each of them alone?????? Never mind) or to the wilder shores of rolling around in ecstasies to speaking in tongues in such a way (unlike on Pentecost) that the speaker speaks in a strange language (glossalalia) and no one understands rather than the speaker talking in his own language and all hearers understanding in their own respective languages.
We Catholics have priests in an order of priesthood established by Jesus Christ Himself. Our priests can do what you cannot do and what I, as a non-priest, cannot do. Our priests say Mass at our altars. When they do so, the one-time sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross about 1970 years ago is made present upon those altars (not a new sacrifice, just the once and only once sacrifice of Jesus Christ). If you want to understand but do not understand the mystery of immanence of the sacrifice on the altar at Mass, you can seek guidance and explanation from those more scholarly than I or many others here. The RC priest is a PRIEST and not simply an elder and not simply a presbyter.
Sitting around and bleating: "BUT where is THAT in Scripture?" will not suffice in any argument between the "reformed" and the Catholic, however much it may induce "reformed" mutual high fives. It makes us think you more than passing strange. The Biblical gotcha games of the "reformed" carry no weight among adequately catechized Catholics. Why should they? You guys start off with the ludicrous presumption that Jesus Christ was incarnated, born, lived, entered into a public ministry, was betrayed, arrested, suffered, died, was buried, rose from the dead, walked the earth in a glorified state and ascended into heaven, sending the Paraclete very soon thereafter, so that a renegade Augustinian monk with a yen for a nun whom he later married could found the Church of Jesus Christ. Not very likely.
This requires you to believe that Christ left Christians without a Church for about 1500 years until the Wittenberg wonderboy could betray the Church founded by Jesus Christ in order that Luther could do as he pleased and create a Scriptural debating society/moral anarchy in which you can choose whichever of the ever-burgeoning and squabbling Tower of Babel of tens of thousands of "reformed" churches, each with its own set of cherished heresies.
Gladly would I refrain from some of the less charitable statements above but you guys just WILL NOT MYOB. Neither I nor any other Catholic needs your interventions to attain salvation. Most of us do not want your inteventions. Be the best kind of whatever that you can know how to be. Pat yourselves on the back for being "right" as much as you like. Do as you please but MYOB.
Newgeezer: The more you make a fool out of yourself by the insistent posting of ludicrous and unwanted posts and by rooting around in Catholic underwear drawers where you do not belong, you produce the results that I am looking for. Your execrable manners and silly distortions of theology mark you for what you are and that too has a purpose. Fast hoof incoming! Smack and squish!
Biblewonk: OOOOOOOH, a bouncer! I like that! I may well use it. A tip of the antlers and a resounding clapping of the front hooves to you!
Maybe you missed it when I asked (rhetorically) what kind of a self-important boor thinks he has the right to tell others on a public forum to "MYOB." Everything posted in a public forum is fair game for any and all interested parties.
If you want private communication, try email. If you're not interested in someone's posts, ignore them. It works for the 99% of us not on an ego trip. The fact that you ping your friends is indicative of your real mission here.
The word you're looking for is "intercessor".
Nothing in Scripture spells out the duties of an elder within the assembly. It spells out his qualifications, but doesn't tell you what he does. You're assuming that what your church calls an "elder" is what an "elder" was in the First Century church; that is, you're setting your own tradition up as judge and jury.
It might make more sense to actually go back to First C. Christian writings and let them tell you.
What you'll find -- summarizing -- is that "elders" report back to the "overseer" (bishop) and preside over the Sunday Eucharistic assembly, which is uniformly described as a "sacrifice".
Your move if you wish, but to me and mine: checkmate.
You posted, "If it were not for the Roman Catholic Church, you would not have a Bible" and I responded. Then, you got all whiny about my not minding my own business. Since when is the history of the Bible none of my business?
It's a public forum. Deal with it as best you can.
Ummmnhh...
Perhaps you've not noticed, but your ridiculous claims about priesthood in the RC Church were more than adequately addressed by your interlocutor.
Was atheism bad for your reading skills?
Actually, using mosquito repellent is NOT what we should be using.
However, FR management has restricted our use of flamethrowers.
Frankly, P and BE, the 'ignore' button works very well for me.
Well, no, an elder is a bishop. Their duties are not that terribly huge but are described withing their qualifications. They teach and they lead. There is no Ecumenical(sp) service and the very thought of not having that totally confuses an RC who just wants more. My Son in Law to be is a good example.
See there you go again, this time with murphE. You get a response you cannot challenge and you punt. You either do not know your Bible or your doctrine or you are only interested in slandering and undermining the Catholic Church. Perhaps all three.
You are just a religious vandal.
=^D
I had the same thought.
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