Posted on 12/04/2006 7:52:47 PM PST by Pyro7480
'The Nativity Story' Movie Problematic for Catholics, "Unsuitable" for Young Children
By John-Henry Westen
NEW YORK, December 4, 2006 (LifeSiteNews.com) - A review of New Line Cinema's The Nativity story by Fr. Angelo Mary Geiger of the Franciscans of the Immaculate in the United States, points out that the film, which opened December 1, misinterprets scripture from a Catholic perspective.
While Fr. Geiger admits that he found the film is "in general, to be a pious and reverential presentation of the Christmas mystery." He adds however, that "not only does the movie get the Virgin Birth wrong, it thoroughly Protestantizes its portrayal of Our Lady."
In Isaiah 7:14 the Bible predicts the coming of the Messiah saying: "Therefore the Lord himself shall give you a sign. Behold a virgin shall conceive, and bear a son, and his name shall be called Emmanuel." Fr. Geiger, in an video blog post, explains that the Catholic Church has taught for over 2000 years that the referenced Scripture showed that Mary would not only conceive the child miraculously, but would give birth to the child miraculously - keeping her physical virginity intact during the birth.
The film, he suggests, in portraying a natural, painful birth of Christ, thus denies the truth of the virginal and miraculous birth of Christ, which, he notes, the Fathers of the Church compared to light passing through glass without breaking it. Fr. Geiger quoted the fourth century St. Augustine on the matter saying. "That same power which brought the body of the young man through closed doors, brought the body of the infant forth from the inviolate womb of the mother."
Fr. Geiger contrasts The Nativity Story with The Passion of the Christ, noting that with the latter, Catholics and Protestants could agree to support it. He suggests, however, that the latter is "a virtual coup against Catholic Mariology".
The characterization of Mary further debases her as Fr. Geiger relates in his review. "Mary in The Nativity lacks depth and stature, and becomes the subject of a treatment on teenage psychology."
Beyond the non-miraculous birth, the biggest let-down for Catholics comes from Director Catherine Hardwicke's own words. Hardwicke explains her rationale in an interview: "We wanted her [Mary] to feel accessible to a young teenager, so she wouldn't seem so far away from their life that it had no meaning for them. I wanted them to see Mary as a girl, as a teenager at first, not perfectly pious from the very first moment. So you see Mary going through stuff with her parents where they say, 'You're going to marry this guy, and these are the rules you have to follow.' Her father is telling her that she's not to have sex with Joseph for a year-and Joseph is standing right there."
Comments Fr. Geiger, "it is rather disconcerting to see Our Blessed Mother portrayed with 'attitude;' asserting herself in a rather anachronistic rebellion against an arranged marriage, choosing her words carefully with her parents, and posing meaningful silences toward those who do not understand her."
Fr. Geiger adds that the film also contains "an overly graphic scene of St. Elizabeth giving birth," which is "just not suitable, in my opinion, for young children to view."
Despite its flaws Fr. Geiger, after viewing the film, also has some good things to say about it. "Today, one must commend any sincere attempt to put Christ back into Christmas, and this film is certainly one of them," he says. "The Nativity Story in no way compares to the masterpiece which is The Passion of the Christ, but it is at least sincere, untainted by cynicism, and a worthy effort by Hollywood to end the prejudice against Christianity in the public square."
And, in addition to a good portrait of St. Joseph, the film offers "at least one cinematic and spiritual triumph" in portraying the Visitation of Mary to St. Elizabeth. "Although the Magnificat is relegated to a kind of epilogue at the movie's end, the meeting between Mary and Elizabeth is otherwise faithful to the scriptures and quite poignant. In a separate scene, the two women experience the concurrent movement of their children in utero and share deeply in each other's joy. I can't think of another piece of celluloid that illustrates the dignity of the unborn child better than this."
See Fr. Geiger's full review here:
http://airmaria.com/
... and with the LXX two thirds to half of the time. What it shows is that the Inspired Writers did not consider and particualr text literally inerrant, and largely preferred LXX. The cumilative statistics you insist on do not address the distinction between St. Paul and other writers as you lump all of them up to inflate the Hebrew preference that we all agree was to be expected from St. Paul. You show that Matthew, John and Mark had instances of non-LXX rendering but you do not show its statistical significance. I do not claim that LXX was used exclusively by any writer. I basically think that different people used different versions and much of the quoting was form memory or in paraphrase. Still LXX preponderates.
my basic theology is Messianic Judaism
But you argue for Protestant, historically insignificant theology while giving it a Hebrew flavor. Form where I am standing, Messianic Judaism is traditional Catholic or Orthodox Christianity; what you have is a blend of Ashkenazi 15-19c culture and Baptist theology.
As for 2 Thess 2:14, I see nowhere where Sha'ul defines what traditions he had in mind.
Therefore, brethren, stand fast; and hold the traditions which you have learned, whether by word, or by our epistle.He is clearly referring to the entirety of the doctrine the Thessalonians had received in different forms from the Apostles. You cannot exclude any tradition that never made it to the Gospel, such as for example, the day of the Sabbath. Your position that "God's commands in the Torah, ... were never annulled in the NT" is inaccurate: at the very least the dietetic restrictions and circumcision were annulled as binding, and the New Testament tells us so.
They did not speak of the Apocrypha with the terms that indicated that they thought it Scripture
St. Paul writes to Timothy that "all scripture" that Timothy learned since childhood is inspired and good and profitable. If St. Paul wanted to draw a distinction between certain books of the Septuagint and other books, this was a good place to mention it.
The Council approved pork and lobster sandwiches right after St. Peter spoke, so I would think they understood him better than you, not being there, did.
I agree, by the way, that the ceremonial purity and dietetic laws of the Old Testament played an important part in the economy of Salvation. They are prefigurement of Our Lady's purity.
When was Sunday first celebrated as Resurrection Day?
In the purity laws in particular, I see Mary, and in the OT law in general, and expression of God's desire to be with us and teach us how to be with Him. The Tabernacle had to be ready for Christ to come.
My friend, are you even trying to understand Sha'ul's point, or are you just looking for strawman arguments? I think you've got a hostility towards the Apostle that is blinding you to his point.
Sha'ul has just established through the preceding three chapters that no one can claim to be righteous, because everyone has broken God's Law: The Gentiles break the Law by violating their own consciences, while the Jews, who were given the Torah so that they might know God's requirements more clearly, still broke that, as the Tanakh professes. Therefore, "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God" (Rom. 3:23). Therefore, no one gets into heaven by their own merits, but only by receiving the righteousness that God has made available to us in the Messiah Yeshua by trusting Him.
Here Sha'ul finds it necessary to counter-balance that truth briefly; just as chapters 4 and 5 build on the idea of salvation by faith that he establishes in 3:19-30, chapters 6 and 7 build on 3:31--"Do we then make the Torah of no effect through faith?" In other words, do we toss the Torah out the window because we are not saved by it, but by our faith in Yeshua? "Let it not be! But we establish the Torah."
The word "establish" (istumen) seems to be your stumbling block here. According to Thayer's Lexicon, while the word primarily means "to stand" or "to make stand," used in the context of Rom. 3:31 it means, "to establish a thing, cause it to stand, i.e., to uphold or sustain the authority or force of any thing," and it is used in this context in the LXX of Gen. 26:3, where God promises, "And I will establish (stehsu, a different tense of the same word) My oath, which I swore to Abraham your father." God wasn't establishing a new oath--He was upholding and sustaining the authority of the promise He had made to Isaac's father.
In the same way, we who are in the Messiah Yeshua are not to set aside the Torah, but are to keep it--upholding its authority--in faith. We are to trust the Messiah Yeshua enough to follow His example in keeping the Torah.
In fact, the law makes us slaves to sin, the Apostle says.
No, he states as a matter of fact that we were slaves to sin, and that sin took the Torah and made it death for us in the same way that HaSatan took God's commandment not to eat of the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and made it death to Adam and Eve. Sha'ul makes it clear that the weakness is not in the Torah, which is "spiritual" (7:14), "holy, just, and good" (v. 12), but in our own carnality, our own sinful inclination. Sha'ul delights in the Torah in his inmost self, but finds the sin in him leading him to disobey it (vv. 21-22).
The weakness is not in the Torah, but in us. Therefore, when God announced that He would make a new covenant, He specified that in addition to forgiving our sins, He would write His Torah on our hearts (Jer. 31:33) and by His Spirit make us able to keep His commandments (Ezk. 36:26-27). It doesn't happen all at once, but we see as we walk with Him in faith day-by-day that He changes us from the inside-out.
Oooh, that really makes sense, now! The holy and spiritual God's Law puts us under a curse?
Yes it does, as I've already quoted you. God's holy and spiritual commandment not to eat of a certain tree put the curse of sin and death on all Mankind, did it not? And why? Because we, in Adam, did not obey it. In the same way the Torah has blessings for those who obey it (Deu. 28:1-14) and curses for those who do not (27:15-26). Even in the Torah, God showed His grace by permitting those who broke the Torah--and we all do--to be atoned for by the priests' sacrifice, and by demonstrating through Abraham that ultimate righteousness was not obtained by perfect obedience, but by trusting Him (Gen. 15:6).
But nevertheless, the curse--the righteous punishment for transgressing the Law--remained over Israel's heads until the Messiah Yeshua took that curse, our just punishment, upon Himself at the Cross! Now for those who trust in Him, there is no curse for our failings, only the blessings of walking with Him.
Who is already saved? You will be judged for what you have done, says the Bible. There is no salvation on earth. Being saved here and now is a Protestant heresy. Salvation is in the world to come.
Salvation, like the Kingdom of Heaven, is one of those "already/not yet" issues in the Bible.
1) I am already saved from the penalty of my sin, for "Messiah has redeemed us from the curse of the law" (Gal. 3:13) and "He who believes in Him is not condemned" (John 3:13).That's commendable, but what exactly won't you eat?2) I am being saved from bondage to sin, "For if we have been united together in the likeness of His death, certainly we also shall be in the likeness of His resurrection, knowing this, that our old man was crucified with Him, that the body of sin might be done away with, that we should no longer be slaves of sin" (Rom. 6:5-6) and "'He who believes in Me, as the Scripture has said, out of his heart will flow rivers of living water.' But this He spoke concerning the Spirit, whom those believing in Him would receive" (John 7:38-39).
3) I will be saved from this body of sin and death at the Resurrection, "for now our salvation is nearer than when we first believed" (Rom. 13:11), "eagerly waiting for the adoption, the redemption of our body" (8:23) and, "Now when these things begin to happen, look up and lift up your heads, because your redemption draws near" (Luke 21:28).
Non-kosher meats: Pork, shellfish, etc.
Did not +Peter have a 'vision' that says 'kill, eat' and that everything God gave us is good?
Already addressed back in post 7285, which I pinged you to, so you already know my answer to that one.
If anything, the OT makes sure everyone understands that NO ONE can atone for someone else's sins; yet that is the foundation of Protestant Christianity.
Hello? Lambs, bulls, and goats? And what about when Moses interceded repeatedly for the sins of Israel? "Now it came to pass on the next day that Moses said to the people, 'You have committed a great sin. So now I will go up to the LORD; perhaps I can make atonement for your sin'" (Exo. 32:30).
I would say the poor goat is rather innocent.
As would I. It's interesting how you contradict yourself in the space of two paragraphs. Methinks you are not thinking this out very thoroughly before putting fingers to keyboard.
Christ was not the Yom Kippur goat but the Passover Lamb that delivered potentially all men, not just believers, from certain death.
He is both, but unlike Passover, Yom Kippur is not yet prophetically completed. The High Priest has made His sacrifice for the people, and now stands within the true Holy of Holies making intercession for them. Yom Kippur will be completed when, like Moses returning from Mt. Sinai with the second set of tablets or the Levitical High Priest emerging from the earthly Temple with a red ribbon that turns white in the sight of the people, Yeshua HaMashiach, our great High Priest, appears with the sign that God's people Israel have been forgiven, and He has restored His covenant with them.
The Passover lamb has nothing to do with atoning for sins, but with deliverance from death.
Yes, and death is the penalty for sin, is it not? Moreover, the Passover Lamb was the means by which Israel was freed from the bondage of the Egyptians, just as He is the means by which we are redeemed from our bondage to sin and the 'Olam Hazeh, the World That Is.
The juridical approach to Christ's sacrifice is exactly where +Pauline Christainity begins to diverge form the rest.
On the contrary, "I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly" (John 10:10). And how do we receive this life? "And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up (referring to the Crucifixion), that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have eternal life" (3:14-15).
If Yeshua was not sacrificed in atonement for our sins, then the entire Levitical sacrificial system is meaningless. Only the ultimate Sacrifice of the Innocent One gives the entire concept of the sin offering any sense.
I won't say that I am not wrong, but Didache was a little closer to the times when the events we are speaking of were taking place.
And Sha'ul's letters and the rest of the NT written closer still--and we see that the Apostles did not distance themselves from their people, but continued to function as fully Jewish.
Asked where he can stay?
Cute, but no. Read Acts 28:17-21.
Can you provide a link to that?
http://www.catholic-forum.com/saints/stj06103.htm
As for Jerome's assertion almost 400 years after Christ, and a solitary one too, one must really take it with a grain of salt.
Papias (150-170 CE) - Matthew composed the words in the Hebrew dialect, and each translated as he was able.The Pope did not fully agree with him, as you know.Ireneus (170 CE) - Matthew also issued a written Gospel among the Hebrews in their own dialect.
Origen (210 CE) - The first [Gospel] is written according to Matthew, the same that was once a tax collector, but afterwards an apoltle of Jesus Christ who having published it for the Jewish believers, wrote it in Hebrew.
Eusebius (315 CE) - Matthew also, having first proclaimed the Gospel in Hebrew, when on the point of going also to the other nations, committed it to writing in his native tongue, and thus supplied the want of his presence to them by his writings.
Epiphanius (370 CE) - They [The Nazarenes] have the Gospel according to Matthew quite complete in Hebrew, for this Gospel is certainly still preserved among them as it was first written, in Hebrew letters.
Jerome ( 382 CE) - Matthew, who is also Levi, and from a tax collectore came to be an Apostle first of all evangelists composed a Gospel of Christ in Judea in the Hebrew language and letters, for the benefit of those of the circumcision who had believed, who translated it into Greek is not sufficiently ascertained. Furthermore, the Hebrew itself is preserved to this day in the library at Caesarea, which the martyr Pamphilus so diligently collected. I also was allowed by the Nazarenes who use this volume in the Syrian cityof Borea to copy it. In which is to be remarked that, wherever the evangelist.... makes use of the testimonies of the Old Scripture, he does not follow the authority of the seventy translators, but that of the Hebrew
Isho'dad (850 CE) - His [Matthew's] book was in existence in Caesarea of Palestine, and everyone acknowledges that he wrote it with his hands in Hebrew.
Do you have a specific quote on that, or are you just making assumptions? And so what if he didn't? Jerome was the one who had actually done the research.
Isn't it funny that the Church Fathers who brought Christain canon into being did not find LXX quotes, or Greek as the original language objectionable?
There's nothing objectionable about Greek being the original language of most (not all--Matthew, Hebrews, and Revelation are all definitely exceptions, though Yochanan probably translated Revelation himself) of the NT. And certainly, those who spoke Greek used the LXX, just like those of us who speak English use English translations. But anyone who thinks it was the original language of the Tanakh is just being stupid--Koine Greek wasn't even invented until after the closing of the Tanakh.
Nor do they mention any Matthew written in Hebrew until Jerome?
Already answered, but repeated here to demonstrate that you've not done your homework. Feel free to write me back when you have.
Funny, I'm not seeing anything about a debate over the validity of kosher. All I see is an acceptance of the Gentiles.
Eisegesis much?
I agree, by the way, that the ceremonial purity and dietetic laws of the Old Testament played an important part in the economy of Salvation. They are prefigurement of Our Lady's purity.
They aren't, but if you believe they are, why don't you follow her example?
Also, Mary is not the Tabernacle, unless you're taking the position that post-Resurrection, Christ crawled back into her womb to make intercession for us (per Hebrews 9). The Tabernacle was a model of Heaven (as a comparison with Rev. 4-5 shows), not of Mary.
When was Sunday first celebrated as Resurrection Day?
If you're referring to the specific anniversary of the Resurrection, about 1500 years before the event, when God ordained the Feast of Firstfruits. If you mean, "When did Sunday replace the Sabbath?" Biblically speaking, the answer is never; historically speaking, there was debate on that point right up through the fourth century.
Looks like on one side we have Protestants who have the 'sell by date' of the Church was somewhere 100-400 AD and the Messianic Jews who have the 'sell by date' of the Church prior to even that.
Glad the Apostles okayed lobster though.
The moment the Church said "it hath seemed good to the Holy Ghost and to us, to lay no further burden upon you", the kashrut was deprecated. It became a private habit of some Christians that they were free to have or not have.
Mary is not the Tabernacle, unless you're taking the position that post-Resurrection, Christ crawled back ...
Mary carried the Word to man. This is functionally the Tabernacle. After the Resurrection, she is in Heaven and the Tabernacle is on the altar. "It is consummated".
there was debate on that point right up through the fourth century.
Thank you. So, there was a debate and the Church settled it. "Whatsoever you shall bind upon earth, shall be bound also in heaven; and whatsoever you shall loose upon earth, shall be loosed also in heaven".
Certainly, the same way we all "prefer" the translation of the Bible into our own language or (in the case of, for example, missionaries) the language of our audience. But if the Apostles considered the LXX a good translation, but not inerrant, what were they checking it against? That's right, the Hebrew. Ea
Thank you for conceding the argument. We can probably move on to other subjects now.
But you argue for Protestant, historically insignificant theology while giving it a Hebrew flavor.
It depends on the situation. Since Catholics and Eastern Orthodox lump all of those not in their sect as "Protestants," I just go along with the label rather than waste time arguing about the term. However, you can find me on Protestant threads arguing many of the same things with my brethren there.
Form where I am standing, Messianic Judaism is traditional Catholic or Orthodox Christianity; what you have is a blend of Ashkenazi 15-19c culture and Baptist theology.
Actually, my congregation sides on the Sephardic side, but thanks once again for making assumptions instead of simply asking.
And no, Catholicism has nothing to do with true, Biblical, Messianic Judaism. The apostles never used icons, never venerated Mary (loved and respected yes; prayed to, no), kept the Sabbath on the seventh day (Acts 16:13, Heb. 4:1-11), kept the Passover (1 Co. 5:7-8) and other Feasts (Acts 20:16, Col. 2:16-17), and worshiped and even sacrificed in the Temple (Acts 2:46, 3:1, 21:26). Sha'ul remained a Pharisee (Acts 23:6), which meant that he kept not only the Torah but their traditions as well--nor was he the only one (Acts 15:5).
Not only your practices don't fit, your very thought processes don't either. Your thinking is Greek, not Jewish. Greek thinking is philosophical, whereas Jewish thinking is concrete. You try to parse down worship and veneration into different categories to avoid the charge of worshiping beings other than God, whereas a Jew says, "Well, if it looks like a duck and quacks like a duck . . ."
When your sect manages to get even the second and fourth commandments down correctly, we'll talk. Until then, don't even try to claim that Catholicism is Messianic Judaism.
He is clearly referring to the entirety of the doctrine the Thessalonians had received in different forms from the Apostles. You cannot exclude any tradition that never made it to the Gospel, such as for example, the day of the Sabbath.
Most certainly I can! God inscribed the Sabbath into stone with His own finger! Therefore only God, in the person of the Messiah Yeshua, has the authority to change it--and if He had done so, the Apostles would certainly have had to record it and defend the practice. History tells us that they did not do so.
Furthermore, Heberews 4 tells us that
There remains a Sabbath-keeping (Sabbatismos) to the people of God. For he who has entered His rest has himself also ceased from his works as God did from His. Let us therefore be diligent to enter that rest, lest anyone fall according to the same example of disobedience. (vv. 9-11)And how do we cease from our works as God did from His? "For He has spoken in a certain place of the seventh day in this way: 'And God rested on the seventh day from all His works'" (v. 4). Hmm, not that difficult to figure out, especially since there's no contradicting passage anywhere else in Scripture.
Your position that "God's commands in the Torah, ... were never annulled in the NT" is inaccurate: at the very least the dietetic restrictions and circumcision were annulled as binding, and the New Testament tells us so.
I've already dealt with the dietary restrictions here. As for circumcision, it was not required for Gentiles, but it remains incumbant on Jewish believers (Acts 21:21, 1 Co. 7:18)--oh, which by the way, your sect forbade Jewish believers to do in direct defiance of the Apostle's commands!
As for why the Apostles didn't put lay that command on the Gentiles, it had more to do with a rabbinic misuse of the command than with a change in the Torah: To the rabbis, a person who became circumcised became fully Jewish, required to keep all of the Torah and all of the Jewish traditions. If the Apostles made Gentiles get circumcised, they were in effect agreeing that Gentiles had not place in the World to Come, and that salvation was by faith plus being Jewish.
But what does Sha'ul say? "Circumcision (Jewishness) is nothing and uncircumcision (Gentileness) is nothing, but keeping the commandments of God is what matters" (1 Co. 7:19).
And before you try to cite Acts 15, let me point out that neither Baptism nor the Eucharist is listed there either--and yet, the RCC and EOC both consider them necessary prerequisites for salvation. Obviously then, the four commands there were not intended to be a ending point for the Gentiles, but a starting-point for fellowship--all of which were designed to prohibit the Gentiles from taking part in the pagan temples, btw. In v. 21, Ya'akov points out that the Gentiles, once separated from the pagan temples by the four commands, could hear Moses preached in the synagogue every Sabbath.
St. Paul writes to Timothy that "all scripture" that Timothy learned since childhood is inspired and good and profitable. If St. Paul wanted to draw a distinction between certain books of the Septuagint and other books, this was a good place to mention it.
What a fallacious argument! Sha'ul doesn't specify which books he considered Scripture, so you can't use that to prove the Apocrypha!
It's amazing how Catholics will always try to pour a gallon into a thimble in order to justify their unBiblical practices.
Oysters.
If oysters ain't allowed, I'm converting.
Thank you for that explanation; I see now what you were getting at before.
And vice versa, in the more numerous instances where Septuagint was the immediate source.
The apostles never used icons, never venerated Mary (loved and respected yes; prayed to, no), kept the Sabbath on the seventh day (Acts 16:13, Heb. 4:1-11), kept the Passover (1 Co. 5:7-8) and other Feasts (Acts 20:16, Col. 2:16-17), and worshiped and even sacrificed in the Temple (Acts 2:46, 3:1, 21:26). Sha'ul remained a Pharisee (Acts 23:6), which meant that he kept not only the Torah but their traditions as well--nor was he the only one (Acts 15:5).
Check on the word "eikona" (or "image") in the New Testament and you'll find plenty of scripture for the veneration of icons, which are called holy images of God, contemplation of which makes us holy.
Naturally, Christians differ in their practices much from the Jewish converts of the 1c. But if fulfillment of the Jewish law by the Messiah means anything, it means we are messianic Judaism. The issue is not the trappings and decoration, nor the pharisaic following of the letter of the OT law, but the continuation of the sacrificial priesthood in the apostolic Churches -- the very thing that defines you broadly as Protestant, -- even if I failed to describe your particular flavor right.
God inscribed the Sabbath into stone with His own finger!
And Christ rose on Sunday and told us "do it im memory of" Him. Not in memory of Moses. There was an argument. I can see your argument, at least for the preservation of Saturday as a day of rest, and distinct from a day of worship. The Church settled the argument. Likewise with circumcision and kashrut. These are private practices, just like venerating a particular saint or visiting Medjugorie.
Sha'ul doesn't specify which books he considered Scripture
Sure he did. He said, "all" of them.
As do many other christian and pseudo christian sects..
As the Yiddish idiom suggests.. "The Hunchback cannot see his own hunch but can see the hunchs of everybody else"... In the sense we are all hunchbacks..
Impasse to you (I now how you "harmonize" very well: works are mere evidence of faith, etc. You've "harmonized" a lot in that counterscriptural fashion).
No impasse to a Bible-believin' Christian.
Rom 3:28, and the several Galatioans references speak of works of law and not the works of love that St. James speaks.
Rom 5:1 does not say anything of what role works played in forming that faith.
If Paul was of the opinion that faith alone is what saves, he would not have written in the same letter to Romans
[God] will render to every man according to his works. 7 To them indeed, who according to patience in good work, seek glory and honour and incorruption, eternal life: 8 But to them that are contentious, and who obey not the truth, but give credit to iniquity, wrath and indignation.(Rom 2)
But St. Paul agrees with St. James and with my Church. Good works of love done without obligation and for no temporal reward, are together with faith necessary for salvation.
Seriously, my first experience one-on-one with Messianic Jews was a conductor on a train in CA and his, um, partner, fiancee, wife? They were very clear on what scum the Catholics are, until I gently let him know that he was dissing the paying passengers, that I was willing to hear, but not to be gratuitously insulted, not on MY nickel
But my impression is that Judaism as much rejected us as we them. Now some, whose fathers abandoned the early Jewish converts when they declared with their lips and believed in their hearts that Jesus was Lord, are coming two thousand years later to the Gospel and telling us we're doing it all wrong -- or, maybe, that we're doing it all right for pig-eating Gentiles, but that being blood descendants from Abraham entitles them to tell us how very wrong and inferior we and our practices and dogmas are.
It's cute, it's interesting, but it's not persuasive. As always, one tries to overlook the insult and garner what is good. Certainly the OT is undervalued. Almost all the good stories (except for the very best one) and poetry are there.
You are both so arrogant and misinformed that it boggles the mind. Please don't bother me again. Brrrr.
I've asked Kosta and buddy not to post to me again. Their arrogance and disdain is disgusting to me and to other protestants, I'm sure.
Yes, it is.
Please don't post to me again. I'm tired of your nastiness toward the protestants who are born again Christians. Go away.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.