Posted on 03/31/2014 7:54:31 PM PDT by NKP_Vet
What if Protestantism were true? What if the Reformers really were heroes, the Bible the sole rule of faith, and Christ's Church just an invisible collection of loosely united believers?
As an Evangelical, Devin Rose used to believe all of it. Then one day the nagging questions began. He noticed things about Protestant belief and practice that didn't add up. He began following the logic of Protestant claims to places he never expected it to go—leading to conclusions no Christians would ever admit to holding.
In The Protestant's Dilemma, Rose examines over thirty of those conclusions, showing with solid evidence, compelling reason, and gentle humor how the major tenets of Protestantism—if honestly pursued to their furthest extent— wind up in dead ends of absurdity.
The only escape? Catholic truth, which Rose patiently unpacks. In each instance, he shows how Catholicism solves the Protestant's dilemma through the witness of Scripture, Christian history, and the authority with which Christ himself undeniably vested his Church.
The Protestant's Dilemma is the perfect book to give non-Catholics trying to work through their own nagging doubts, or for Catholics looking for a fresh way to deepen their understanding of the Faith.
(Excerpt) Read more at protestantsdilemma.com ...
Protestant Pedos go to prison, they don't just shuffle the deck like the Catholics do.
Thanks for making my point Xone.
No problem.
Convert? From Christian to Christian?
Now there's a new argument that I've not heard before. (Some) Catholic priests sexually assaulted male children and minors in order to sexually stimulate Protestants.
And all done in a spirit of ecumenism, I'm sure.
26and when he had found him he brought him to Antioch. For a whole year they met with the church and taught a large number of people, and it was in Antioch that the disciples were first called Christians.*
You do believe the Bible, correct?
All the time. If I had my list of converts from other denominations to Catholicism ridded of all the duplicates I would post them to you.
Believe me, there are a lot!
...eternally, eternity, Ethiopian, eunuch, eunuchs, eutychus, evangelist...
No Eucharist. Should be right in the middle of that list...
While not a follower of either religious sect, I do have two favorite Christian groups: Catholics and Baptists.
Of course both are equally “wrong”, but God will sort us all out eventually.
Myself, I thank the Catholics for their help in fighting against spiritual evil, and I also thank the Baptists for their help in the fight against physically evil human acts.
I have found great comfort, when I needed it most, amidst both denominations.
Imagine the Disciples' surprise.
You must have missed the inherent sarcasm of what I meant. If someone converts from one Christian religion to another, what is accomplished? A new soul isn’t saved. That’s like transferring money from one of my savings accounts to another, and then claiming I’m putting extra money away.
Unless of course, you argue that only Catholics are saved. You aren’t saying that are you? ,,,,,,, are you?
Because the dialogue at FR is pointed and direct, lots of good happens here, even though there is occasional noisy rancor. We need to move beyond that and focus on what is true.
Many Protestants convert because one Catholic dared to share the truth.
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Many Catholics are considering converting to Islam based on the Pope’s recent comments equating the two. If he’s your lead salesman I don’t want any part of the product.
“The faith that your parents instilled in you will always help you move on”...........as a suicide bomber perhaps.
The Pope was talking to Muslims and said all but the last 5 words.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MlqgL-hAC-M
He’s very ‘daring’ with other people’s souls.
Free Republic is a conservative meeting place. I don’t like posts that try to divide us. I align with people who hate Marxists and other anti-American scum.
Good points all.
“Catholics were the first Christians. It’s in the Bible!”
Not in mine.
Jews and Samaritans were the first Christians; Jesus’ disciples and others converted before His death; the woman at the well, along with others in her town, up to and including the thief who died next to Him.
And those disciples at Antioch where the first called Christians. Acts 11:26
Please show where Catholics are even mentioned.
A reductio ad absurdam argument assumes a premise to be true-or-false, and argues validly towards an absurd conclusion, showing the original premise to be false-or-true. It is a valid form of argument. The use of a strawman has similarities to the reductio, however, the strawman relies upon a deceitful presentation of the original premise, which they wish to prove false. A strawman is used by someone who knows they cannot win an argument directly, while a reduction is a valid tool used by mathematicians, logicians, and lovers of wisdom.
I don’t speak Italian, so I am going by the subtitles (like the movies:). Earlier in the video he speaks of carrying the cross. If we “move on” to carrying the cross after, or on account of, having lived out what our parents taught us, how is that a problem? As far as I can tell, parents cannot decide for their children the sacrifices those children will freely and willingly make.
“...Christians want to have a voice in church government, and to be treated like adults, not children. This is the same impetus that gave rise to the American Revolution. Which was a largely protestant movement, as it happens.”
This may well explain why so many Catholics are Democrats, or supportive of the stuff that is anti-Constitution, for abortion, for everything that undermines the Republic that our mostly non-Catholic forefathers founded.
Thanks for posting this, I missed it the last time around.
The reformed world of Christianity is not an end state.
Chesterton summarizes it quite well:
“It is always easy to let the age have its head; the difficult thing is to keep one’s own. It is always easy to be a modernist, as it is easy to be a snob. To have fallen into any of those open traps of error and exaggeration which fashion after fashion and sect after sect set along the historic path of Christendom — that would indeed have been simple. It is always simple to fall: there are an infinity of angles at which one falls: only one at which one stands. To have fallen into any one of the fads from Gnosticism to Christian Science would indeed have been obvious and tame. But to have avoided them all has been one whirling adventure; and in my vision the heavenly chariot flies thundering through the ages, the dull heresies sprawling and prostrate, the wild truth reeling but erect.”
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