The journey back - Dr. Beckwith explains his reasons for returning to the Catholic Church

Open Book ^ | May 6, 2007 | Amy Wellborn

[NYer]

Dr. Francis Beckwith explains his reasons for returning to the Catholic Church. (He was raised Catholic and received the sacraments of initiation as a child and young person). 

Most of the post centers on the tussle over ETS matters and leadership, (he has resigned from the presidency) but:

There is a conversation in ETS that must take place, a conversation about the relationship between Evangelicalism and what is called the “Great Tradition,” a tradition from which all Christians can trace their spiritual and ecclesiastical paternity.  It is a conversation that I welcome, and it is one in which I hope to be a participant. But my presence as ETS president, I have concluded, diminishes the chances of this conversation occurring.  It would merely exacerbate the disunity among Christians that needs to be remedied. 

The past four months have moved quickly for me and my wife. As you probably know, my work in philosophy, ethics, and theology has always been Catholic friendly, but I would have never predicted that I would return to the Church, for there seemed to me too many theological and ecclesiastical issues that appeared insurmountable. However, in January, at the suggestion of a dear friend, I began reading the Early Church Fathers as well as some of the more sophisticated works on justification by Catholic authors.  I became convinced that the Early Church is more Catholic than Protestant and that the Catholic view of justification, correctly understood, is biblically and historically defensible. Even though I also believe that the Reformed view is biblically and historically defensible, I think the Catholic view has more explanatory power to account for both all the biblical texts on justification as well as the church’s historical understanding of salvation prior to the Reformation all the way back to the ancient church of the first few centuries. Moreover, much of what I have taken for granted as a Protestant—e.g., the catholic creeds, the doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation, the Christian understanding of man, and the canon of Scripture—is the result of a Church that made judgments about these matters and on which non-Catholics, including Evangelicals, have declared and grounded their Christian orthodoxy in a world hostile to it.  Given these considerations, I thought it wise for me to err on the side of the Church with historical and theological continuity with the first generations of Christians that followed Christ’s Apostles.

(Comments are open over there, btw. Worth a visit to add your support, if you like!)

[ears_to_hear]

You are right , I attributed to you words you did not say but did defend Sorry !Here was your post

To: ears_to_hear What are you saying is "the kind of same distinction" that Mormons make? I don't see any similarity. Would YOU please tell us what holiness is?
Another frequent antagonist on this forum likes to pose either/or questions, questions which strike me as all about how an eagerness to win a point can obscure the truth. I think that challenging someone to "define" holiness and to explain what is meant by localizing it in any way is not going to do any of us much good.
We have read about holy people and holy places, have we not? If God tells Moses to take his shoes off because the ground is holy, what questions should we ask God? 188 posted on 05/09/2007 5:49:32 PM EDT by Mad Dawg ( St. Michael: By the power of God, fight with us!) [ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 186 | View Replies | Report Abuse ]

You seem to agree with the original author I quoted, So I will just ask you, what made that ground holy?

[Campion]

This just proves you do not know what sola scriptura is or means

So why don't you define "what it is" or "what it means"?

As I told you, I have enough to do with my own stuff, without getting entangled in the multifarous debates and quarrels of the Protestant world. There are at least 3 flavors of sola scriptura I can point to right off ... of which one are you a proponent?

[editor-surveyor]

"I’m the only “usual suspect” who’s posted to the thread so far. Please ping me next time, instead of referring to me in the third person."

New rule on the forum:

Always ping every comment to Alex, Cuz as we all have come to know, it's all about Alex.

[Mad Dawg]

You seem to agree with the original author I quoted, So I will just ask you, what made that ground holy?

You first. I'mm really trying hard not to play games. I'm also waiting not only for your apology for jumping to conclusions about who said what but for judging me on the basis of the conclusions you reached through carelessness.

Please, as a brother in Christ (as I assume, possibly incorrectly, you to be), you seem to me to have some point you want to make about holiness. So make it already.

As I said, I do NOT want to play games. I did my high school forensics when I was in high school. You know I am likely to disagree with some part of what you say and you are likely to disagree with some part of what I say. But we can still learn from one another to God's glory and the benefit of his people. I will fight if that's the only way to proceed. But I'd much rather not.

(And, whoever it was who suggested I am a Christian Jihadist: - note how polemical all this is, how unwilling people are to act as brethren. And having noted it, whom will you call Jihadist then?)