Posted on 06/26/2010 10:46:26 AM PDT by Natural Law
It is true that all religious institutions and groups of believers have been victimized by men of evil intent. It is no less true today than 500 years ago. Those who rail against today's evil doers while at the same time defending with a perverse piety the evils done 500 years ago are the hypocrites Christ warned us against.
Although I will not go so far as to say that Calvin was the prince of darkness he was certainly and provable a prince of darkness. His sins are at least as great in both scope and scale as those of the perverted men who abused their positions as priests to harm children.
Let him who is without sin throw the first stone.
Not quite, Alexander VI didn’t teach any theology as far as I know, Calvinism is built on Calvin’s theology.
The white flag offered in recognition of the futility of defending the indefensible? Besides there are more important things to do, what with all of the lies left untold about the Pope and the Catholic Church.
Alexander VI was too busy ignoring the rule of celibacy and fathering children: four with one mistress; and three others with women who were unknown.
And were here condeming Calvin because he was punished by the Catholic Church for the sin of sodomy?
YOU were the one who brought up Alexander VI and I don't think there is anything in my post that can be construed as defending him.
tit for tat
Lies? You mean articles like this:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100627/ap_on_re_eu/eu_vatican_belgium
Oh, who have I thrown a stone at?
You haven’t.
The point of the thread was about the character of the man.
Calvin pales in comparison to Alexander VI.
Besides, as pope, he was allegedly Christ’s representative on earth and so was in charge of the Roman Catholic Church theology, so he would have been ultimately responsible for the teaching of theology so that argument is a bit weak.
For all the visibility that Calvinists have on FR, I’ve met very few in real life. Most Protestant churches hold to doctrine that is more Arminian in nature, which also played a role in the Reformation but is virtually ignored in these debates.
The Reformation and Protestantism are not strictly Calvinistic by any means.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Arminianism
Straining at a gnat while swallowing a camel.
So your argument in defense of Calvin is that the Pope is a greater representative than was Calvin and should therefore be held to a higher standard? Thank you, I think.
If you mean, "Do ALL Protestants think Calvin was modern prophet?", I suspect you will have to ask all Protestants. I personally don't think he was anything more than an astute Bible student that noticed the Scriptures told an entirely different story than Rome told.
It was not that no one had understood the true Gospel of grace during the prior 1200 or so years (since was beginning to be suppressed in Augustine's time), it is just that the sacerdotal/papist/ceremonial/tradition views of Rome dominated the landscape. Calvin, really after much work by other reformed minded men, simply documented many of the errors Rome had subsituted for the clear teaching of the Bible. It is for these works that many are grateful. But, "prophet"?, no.
I can’t speak for metmom but myself.
This thread is really just a hit piece. There are religious leaders galore that provide fodder to further that cause.
In music? Yeah, sure.
No one would accuse me of being a Calvinist, but this article is just slander. Refute the man’s views, but don’t pretend this article is honest. It is a bunch of lies bundled with distortion.
“Do Protestants think Calvin was a modern prophet?”
Some, perhaps. Others disagree, including me.
http://evangelicalarminians.org/taxonomy/term/10
However, this article is disgustingly dishonest.
It shows a pathetic grasping at straws in an effort to defame a man by criticizing that a child *recedes into historical obscurity and is never heard from again*, who died in infancy. It goes to show that those looking to defame him will lie about him before even finding out the facts. If that's the best the RCC can do, they really don't have much on him.
The other issue is that Calvin was accused of sodomy, and the very Catholics who protest the loudest that an accusation is not conviction and that priests who are simply accused of pedophilia are innocent until proved guilty, are quick enough to latch on to this *tidbit* and condemn Calvin as guilty without evidence.
The same standard of judgment needs to be applied in both cases otherwise, those who apply such a double standard rightly wear the label of "hypocrite".
Accusing Calvin of sodomy is no different that accusing priests of pedophilia and if that accusation against Calvin is enough to invalidate his ministry, then the accusation against the priests is enough to invalidate their ministry.
OTOH, if a priests service in performing mass is not hindered while living in sin because his intent is pure, then Calvin's teachings and performance as a pastor cannot be hindered even if he did live in sin, of which there is no more than hearsay that that was the case. Presently we have priests who admitted that the accusations against them are true.
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.