The Big Discovery [by David, former Presbyterian]

Journeyof ImperfectSaint.blogspot.com ^ | October 4, 2009 | David

[Salvation]

Sunday, October 4, 2009

The Big Discovery

        I made some good friends outside my church and found out that they were all Catholics.  Now, I did not know much about Catholicism at the time.  By the way, the Mass did seem somewhat mysterious to me externally.  In fact, what little I had heard from other church members was all negative.  There was a Mrs. J at my church, who had just retired from her missionary post in China.  She was such a kind and endearing soul to all.  One day she got back from visiting someone at a hospital and looked extremely sad and disturbed.  It turned out that when she got to the hospital room, she saw that a Catholic priest was already there with the patient.  Now the question was if the patient would ever get to heaven. 

 

        Nevertheless, my Catholic friends all looked quite normal and happy.  Then could the Catholic Church, the largest church in the the world, be in error?  It so happened that at that time I was also beginning to question my Protestant faith.  The fact that there were numerous different denominations around the world bothered me.  Also, as a Protestant, whether you're a minister or lay person, you are free to marry and divorce any number of times.  It's hard to see that Jesus would be happy with these two facts.  Since I am the kind of person who always likes to find the answer to any question that's important, I decided to look into Catholicism.

 

        I made up my mind not to talk to anyone about my investigation.  I was single then and had a lot of free time to myself.  The local public library housed an excellent collection of books on Catholicism, so I started borrowing books on the subject.  I read every weekend, even taking notes as I read.  The went on for over a year.  I read all those books that viciously attack the Catholic Church too, but somehow they did not affect me much because I sensed that these attacks could not have been prompted by the Holy Spirit.  The books that really helped me were the ones on early Church history.  I could see that the continuity was there and the beliefs and practices of the early Church had been preserved to this day in the Catholic Church.  The only conclusion I could come to was that the Catholic Church was indeed the church Jesus had come and established.  Like Christ himself, the Church, being his body, must be accepted (or rejected) totally, with no middle ground. 

 

        Here's some advice for those who seek the truth.  Your chances of success will greatly improve if, first, you start out with a completely open mind and secondly, go to the source(s) directly to get the facts.  Many who misunderstand the Catholic Church today have already made up their mind that the Church is wrong, thus never bothering to pick up a copy of the Catechism of the Catholic Church to find out what the Church really teaches.  This is being close-minded. 

[Natural Law]

"for someone who claims to have been Catholic at one point,..."

All that we can really know is what is posted on these threads. Christian charity dictates that we take it at face value. That being said it is indeed comforting to know that that which is described, ridiculed and despised is in actuality something OTHER than the Catholic Church.

All we can do is continue to present the truth and overcome the denials of the truth.

"Grace, mercy and peace from God the Father and from Jesus Christ, the Father’s Son, will be with us in truth and love." - 2 John 1:3

[boatbums]

so where do we find any controversy on infant baptism in Church history? the answer is we don’t until the 16th century.

One of the best things about discussion on the Internet is the ability we have to access ancient writings that have been discoursed about over the centuries. One such is available HERE and it blows to smithereens your imagined history of the doctrine of infant baptism. I really hope you will take the time to at least glance through it. The main thing it brings up is that ALL the Apostles and nearly ALL the first and second century leaders of the Christian faith held that baptism was reserved for those who had FIRST come to saving faith in Jesus Christ. Scripture says clearly that "He that believes and is baptized shall be saved.", does it not? So, explain to me how an infant can repent of sins he has yet to commit and how he is capable of believing on Christ. When you can do that, it MIGHT make sense to "dunk" a baby, but that idea did NOT come from the Apostles and since it did not come from them, then it most certainly was NOT a doctrine they handed down to the church. It is NO WHERE found in Scripture and that alone is proof enough for me.

You can continue to join with others who choose to believe the myth perpetuated by an organization that has an awful lot riding on their fabricated version of history, but thank God, they could not erase or burn the true witness of history that God has preserved, and that is why I choose truth. That truth is STILL found in Holy Scripture for anyone who desires to know it and, through the illumination of the Holy Spirit, nothing is hidden from him who earnestly seeks after God. Athanasius and many other early church fathers remain part of the shared history of all those who follow after Jesus Christ. No one group OWNS it.

Again from the link http://www.earlychurch.net/Baptism.htm, we read:

Tertullian:(On Baptism-III:678)

"Unless a man be reborn of water and spirit he cannot enter the kingdom of heaven" has tied to faith the necessity of baptism. Accordingly, all thereafter who became believers used to be baptized...and so according to the disposition, circumstances and even the age of each individual, the delay of baptism is preferable, principally, in the case of little children....For the Lord does indeed say "Forbid them not to come to me". Let them come, then, while they are growing up. Let them come while they are learning; while they learn whither to come; let them become Christians when they have become able to know Christ. Why does the innocent period in life hasten to the "remission of sins"? ..Let them know how to "ask" for salvation, that it may seem to have given "to him that asketh".

If this is indeed the unanimous consent of the church, how did it happen that infant baptism became the norm? Although the answer may be somewhat speculative, we need to look to one of the baptismal texts from Irenaeus. Irenaeus, who held to the orthodox position regarding when one should be baptized, wrote a text which supported the common perception that we are born-again when we are baptized. He said in Against Heresies in 180 A.D.

We are lepers in sin, we are made clean by means of the sacred water and invocation of the Lord, from our old transgression; being spiritually regenerate as new born babes, even as the Lord has declared "except a man be born again through water and the Spirit, he shall not enter the kingdom of heaven.

Years later, we see some Christian writings taking Irenaeus' words and interpreting "spiritually regenerate, as newborn babes" as meaning that we are baptized as new-born babes! In the proper historical and textual context however, this is inconceivable. Thus, sometime in the mid 3rd century and in contradiction to the norm, the practice of baptizing infants started, built largely on a misinterpretation of Irenaeus.

[Titanites]

When all else fails, accuse the other person of making stuff up. A typical Catholic’s tactic of last resort.

The truth is not a last resort.

Roman Catholics didn’t consider them *real* Catholics.

Again, you've presented no evidence to support your claim.

Ukrainian Catholics rightly perceived the spiritual snobbery

What "spiritual snobbery"? What are you talking about?

Roman Catholics who looked down their noses at them as being not quite good enough.

Can you please provide specific examples of which Latin Catholics looked down their noses at Ukraininan Catholic?

Hardly unity within Catholicism.

The Ukrainian Catholic Church is fully Catholic and is in full communion (unity) with the Pope. They abide by the same dogma.

information provided on Ukrainian Catholicism

The article, from 1976, does not provide evidence that the Ukrainian Catholics aren't in full communion with the pope. It also does not prove your original claim that "the Roman Catholics don't consider Ukrainian Catholics quite good enough," whatever that is supposed to mean.

Ukrainian Catholics are in full communion with the Church, no matter how much some bitter ex-Catholics might wish it to be otherwise.

Divine Liturgy Celebrated in Rome by the New Head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church

On March 23, the bishops of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church elected as their new leader the youngest member of their hierarchy, 41 year-old Bishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, of the Eparchy of Santa Maria del Patrocinio in Argentina. He succeeds as Major Archbishop of Kiev-Halych Lubomyr Cardinal Husar, who retired on February 10 due to failing eyesight. After the confirmation of the election by Pope Benedict XVI on March 25, Archbishop Shevchuk was enthroned in the still-to-be completed Cathedral of the Resurrection in Kiev on March 27th. Almost immediately thereafter, he and several members of the Permanent Synod of the UGCC hierarchy came to Rome, and were received in audience by the Holy Father on April 1.


Cardinal Sandri reads Pope Benedict's letter confirming
the election of Archbishop Shevchuk.

Yes, Latin Catholics, including the Pope, consider Ukrainian Greek Catholics to be *real* Catholics.

[Titanites]

I think we are seeing evidence of a persecution complex.

Indeed. And evidence of being desperate to denigrate the Church in any way they can regardless of the truth.

[Titanites]

The typical Roman Catholics condemning to hell anyone who doesn’t agree with their church doctrine or is not Roman Catholic.

That sounds like something spewed by a bitter, failed Catholic who knows little about what the Church actually believes or teaches.

[daniel1212]

Actually that as in the story of the “good thief” (though it does not say he was a thief.) would not challenge that, as it is still only one baptism as regards forgiveness, but substitutes for the actual act, the desire of perfect contrition (contritio caritate perfecta) being counted as the act.

And which is akin to holding that God justifies the contrite soul who believes with a faith that will effect obedience toward its Object, and thus will be baptized, and for some baptism my be the occasion of their believing. There is no real difference btwn a “sinners prayer” (Lk. 18:13) and baptism, but in neither case is a work saving Him, but the faith that effect such appropriates justification, which works “justify” (and thus the person) as having faith.

The account of Cornelius and company (Acts 10:43-47; cf. 11:1-18; 15:7-9) clearly substantiates souls being washed, justified and sanctified prior to baptism, though that immediately followed, as it should, yet i have debated someone who unreasonably denied that they were born again prior to baptism, due to his commitment to baptism being necessary for regeneration.

[Iscool]

the question those who attack the Church can’t seem to deal with is, how did the One, Holy, Catholic and Apostolic Church come into existence? was it due to man or God?

It was created by man...That's why the bible condemns your religion in so many places...And prophecies the end of your religion in the book of Revelation...

After all the Apostles died, the men they ordained continued in the Apostles doctrine, whether they received the teaching by letter ( Scripture ) or by word of mouth ( Sacred Tradition )

The other Catholics are going to spank you for saying that...

I've read the Catholic position enough times to know that the 'tradition' received by word of mouth is not the same as the written tradition...Thus, giving your religion to make up it's own tradition as the centuries floated by...

now, the local churches planted by the Apostles soon compared notes with each other, compared and shared what they each received from the Apostles and what did they discover? THEY RECEIVED THE SAME FAITH, WHETHER ONE WAS IN JERUSALEM, CORINTH, INDIA, GREECE, TURKEY, EGYPT OR ROME. this “universal” Faith became known as the Catholic Faith,

It did not...This is mythology at it's finest...

now, the local churches planted by the Apostles soon compared notes with each other, compared and shared what they each received from the Apostles and what did they discover? THEY RECEIVED THE SAME FAITH, WHETHER ONE WAS IN JERUSALEM, CORINTH, INDIA, GREECE, TURKEY, EGYPT OR ROME.

Really??? How did they do that??? Hundreds or thousands of local churches just memorized all the teaching, word for word since the people back then were too dumb to be able to know how to write...

it was the Church that compiled the books of the NT, using the oral Tradition to determine the genuine books from the spurious.

When you are writing your own history, you can make it up as you go along...What do you mean by using oral tradition???

God said he would preserve his words for the generations...It has nothing to do with your Catholic, man made traditions...

so where do we find any controversy on infant baptism in Church history? the answer is we don’t until the 16th century.

Oh, you mean at the beginning of the Reformation...When God's word was universally put into the language of the people so they could read and find out for themselves that there was no justified baby baptism in the scriptures???

You seem to forget that the Reformers were devout Catholics...And the Reformed were devout Catholics...

So what's a Catholic to do when he/she gets his/her eyes opened to the words of God???

Many if not most leave your religion and follow God...

Does anyone not believe the same thing would have happened in the 1st or 2nd century if infant baptism was not an Apostolic teaching, received by the Universal Church everywhere?

There is no Universal Church in Christianity...That's a name your religion gave itself...

And of course the early church would not have baptized babies...That was added by your corrupt religion to hold the people in bondage to your religion...And it still works today...

[daniel1212]

Perhaps it is a condemning attitude that was referred to, and while it is true that modern Catholics can generally affirm baptized Protestants as Christians, most of what is seen in posts is denigration of them, as a result of the regular succession of articles on FR in promotion of a Church® as supreme, to whom all are to submit, and the resultant censure from the other side.

And while you see Catholics who hold that extra Ecclesiam nulla salus leaves non-Catholics damned as being bitter, failed Catholics who know little about what the Church actually believes or teaches, Lumen Gentium is open to some interpretation, and there are many Catholics who hold to what i believe is the more historical position of Rome, which does condemn “schismatics” to Hell, as seen here: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2891087/posts?page=316#316

[Iscool]

kinda like me claiming to be a doctor and then saying the heart is in the foot.

Well that's pretty much what you guys do when you spew your so-called Church history on us...

ignorance exposes one and some have no shame as they are exposed every time they claim some knowledge of what the Church teaches.

Same can be easily said of some of you guys when it comes to scripture...EXAMPLE:

Here is one of your most oft quoted verses to try to get people to falsely believe that water baptism is required for salvation...

Mar 16:16 He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.

Belief + baptism = salvation...
Unbelief + baptism = damnation...

Unbelief + anything = damnation...

Do I really have to tell you where babies fit in???

[daniel1212]

When you are writing your own history, you can make it up as you go along...What do you mean by using oral tradition???

When you infallibly define that your are infallible when speaking in accordance with your infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula (thus rendering the assertion of infallibility to be infallible) then any such interpretation of Tradition, Scripture and history cannot be challenged, but it it what it is (said to be).

It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine...

I may say in strict truth that the Church has no antiquity. It rests upon its own supernatural and perpetual consciousness. Its past is present with it, for both are one to a mind which is immutable. Primitive and modern are predicates, not of truth, but of ourselves. — Most Rev. Dr. Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, Lord Archbishop of Westminster, The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost: Or Reason and Revelation (New York: J.P. Kenedy & Sons, originally written 1865, reprinted with no date), pp. 227-228; http://www.archive.org/stream/a592004400mannuoft/a592004400mannuoft_djvu.txt.

The other Catholics are going to spank you for saying that...

► Archbishop Roland Minnerath, who was a contributor to the Vatican’s 1989 Historical and Theological Symposium, which was directed by the Vatican’s Pontifical Committee for Historical Sciences, at the request of the then Cardinal Ratzinger’s Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, on the theme: “The Primacy of the Bishop of Rome in the First Millennium: Research and Evidence,” has made the admission that the Eastern Orthodox churches “never shared the Petrine theology as elaborated in the West.”

In the first millennium there was no question of the Roman bishops governing the church in distant solitude. They used to take their decisions together with their synod, held once or twice a year. When matters of universal concern arose, they resorted to the ecumenical council. Even [Pope] Leo [I], who struggled for the apostolic principle over the political one, acknowledged that only the emperor would have the power to convoke an ecumenical council and protect the church.

At the heart of the estrangement that progressively arose between East and West, there may be a historical misunderstanding. The East never shared the Petrine theology as elaborated in the West. It never accepted that the protos in the universal church could claim to be the unique successor or vicar of Peter. So the East assumed that the synodal constitution of the church would be jeopardized by the very existence of a Petrine office with potentially universal competencies in the government of the church (How Can the Petrine Ministry Be a Service to the Unity of the Universal Church? James F. Puglisi, Editor, Grand Rapids, MI and Cambridge, U.K.: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Company, ©2010, pgs. 34-48). http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2011/06/archbishop-says-eastern-orthodox-never.html

Orthodox research institute:...throughout the first ten centuries Rome never claimed to have been granted its preferred position of jurisdiction as an explicit privilege” (Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism and Anglicanism by Methodios Fouyas, p. 70). Avery Dulles considers the development of the Papacy to be an historical accident. “The strong centralization in modern Catholicism is due to historical accident. It has been shaped in part by the homogeneous culture of medieval Europe and by the dominance of Rome, with its rich heritage of classical culture and legal organization” (Models of the Church by Avery Dulles, p. 200) http://www.orthodoxresearchinstitute.org/articles/ecumenical/maxwell_peter.htm

► [Pro-Orthodox author] While the early Church Councils conceded to the Papacy the position of primus inter pares, "first among equals," this did not give to the Popes any special authority. Second place in precedence was acknowledged for the Patriarch of Constantinople by the Ecumenical Council II of 381, though this was somewhat resented by the older Patriarchates at Alexandria and Antioch. The elevated status for Constantinople was because, of course, this had become the seat of the Emperor, beginning with Constantine, and the principal capital of the Roman Empire. Even when there was a Western Emperor, his seat was no longer at Rome, but in Milan and Ravenna. Indeed, more of the Ecumenical Councils were held in Constantinople (II, V, VI, VIII) than elsewhere -- and Council IV was held just across the Bosporus in Chalcedon.

In Constantinople it was unmistakable that the Emperor imposed a unity on the Church that it would not otherwise have, and that would not otherwise be claimed until the Papacy began arrogating powers to itself that otherwise had belonged only to the Emperor or to Church Councils. — http://www.friesian.com/popes.htm

► The Roman Catholic writer Francis Sullivan, in his work From Apostles to Bishops (New York: The Newman Press), painstakingly works through all possible mentions of “succession” from the first three centuries, and concludes from that study not only that “the episcopate [development of bishops] is a the fruit of a post New Testament development], but he interacts with the notion that there is a single bishop in Rome through the middle of the second century, and he flatly dismisses it. [Sullivan, 221-222].

Klaus Schatz, in his Papal Primacy: From its Origins to the Present, not only acknowledges that in the case of the process of the development of “the historically developed papacy” the initial phases of this long process “extended well into the fifth century” (Schatz pg 36) http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/search/label/Klaus%20Schatz

► Klaus Schatz called “Papal Primacy: from its origin to the present:”

Jesuit Father Klaus Schatz on Priesthood, Canon, and the Development of Doctrine in his work, “Papal Primacy”:

..if we ask whether the historical Jesus, in commissioning Peter, expected him to have successors, or whether the authority of the Gospel of Matthew, writing after Peter’s death, was aware that Peter and his commission survived in the leaders of the Roman community who succeeded him, the answer in both cases is probably “no” (page 1)

.. if we ask in addition whether the primitive church was aware, after Peter’s death, that his authority had passed to the next bishop of Rome, or in other words that the head of the community at Rome was now the successor of Peter, the Church’s rock and hence the subject of the promise in Matthew 16:18-19, the question, put in those terms, must certainly be given a negative answer. (page 2)

"If one had asked a Christian in the year 100, 200, or even 300 whether the bishop of Rome was the head of all Christians, or whether there was a supreme bishop over all the other bishops and having the last word in questions affecting the whole Church, he or she would certainly have said no." (page 3, top)

We probably cannot say for certain that there was a bishop of Rome [in 95 AD]. It is likely that the Roman church was governed by a group of presbyters from whom there very quickly emerged a presider or ‘first among equals’ whose name was remembered and who was subsequently described as ‘bishop’ after the mid-second century. (Schatz 4). http://thulcandra.wordpress.com/2007/11/30/klaus-schatz-on-priesthood-canon-and-the-development-of-doctrine/

► Peter Lampe is a German theologian and Professor of New Testament Studies at the University of Heidelberg, whose work, “From Paul to Valentinus: Christians at Rome in the First Two Centuries,” was written in 1987 and translated to English in 2003. The Catholic historian Eamon Duffy (Irish Professor of the History of Christianity at the University of Cambridge, and former President of Magdalene College), said “all modern discussion of the issues must now start from the exhaustive and persuasive analysis by Peter Lampe.” (“Saints and Sinners,” “A History of the Popes,” Yale, 1997, 2001, pg. 421).

The picture that finally emerges from Lampe’s analysis of surviving evidence is one he names ‘the fractionation of Roman Christianity’ (pp. 357–408). Not until the second half of the second century, under Anicetus, do we find compelling evidence for a monarchical episcopacy, and when it emerges, it is to manage relief shipments to dispersed Christians as well as social aid for the Roman poor (pp. 403–4). Before this period Roman Christians were ‘fractionated’ amongst dispersed house/tenement churches, each presided over by its own presbyter–bishop. This accounts for the evidence of social and theological diversity in second-century Roman Christianity, evidence of a degree of tolerance of theologically disparate groups without a single authority to regulate belief and practice, and the relatively late appearance of unambiguous representation of a single bishop over Rome. Review of this work, from Oxford’s Journal of Theological Studies. — http://reformation500.blogspot.com/2008/08/review-of-from-paul-to-valentinus.html)

► Roger Collins (http://www.shc.ed.ac.uk/staff/hon_fellows/rcollins) has written a very thorough history of the papacy: http://www.amazon.com/Keepers-Keys-Heaven-History-Papacy/dp/0465011950/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&s=books&qid=1236398577&sr=8-1

“There was … no individual, committee or council of leaders within the Christian movement that could pronounce on which beliefs and practices were acceptable and which were not. This was particularly true of Rome with its numerous small groups of believers. Different Christian teachers and organizers of house-churches offered a variety of interpretations of the faith and attracted particular followings, rather in the way that modern denominations provide choice for worshipers looking for practices that particularly appeal to them on emotional, intellectual, aesthetic or other grounds (15-16).

This is not an esoteric or a “liberal” interpretation of history. This is a mainstream historical position. — http://reformation500.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/historical-literature-on-the-earliest-papacy/

► Major Catholic Biblical scholar Raymond Brown (twice appointed to Pontifical Biblical Commission) states,, “The claims of various sees to descend from particular members of the Twelve are highly dubious. It is interesting that the most serious of these is the claim of the bishops of Rome to descend from Peter, the one member of the Twelve who was almost a missionary apostle in the Pauline sense – a confirmation of our contention that whatever succession there was from apostleship to episcopate, it was primarily in reference to the Puauline tyupe of apostleship, not that of the Twelve.” (“Priest and Bishop, Biblical Reflections,” Nihil Obstat, Imprimatur, 1970, pg 72.)

The Catholic historian Paul Johnson goes a bit further than Brown, in his 1976 work “History of Christianity”:

By the third century, lists of bishops, each of whom had consecrated his successor, and which went back to the original founding of the see by one or the other of the apostles, had been collected or manufactured by most of the great cities of the empire and were reproduced by Eusebius…– “A History of Christianity,” pgs 53 ff.)

Eusebius presents the lists as evidence that orthodoxy had a continuous tradition from the earliest times in all the great Episcopal sees and that all the heretical movements were subsequent aberrations from the mainline of Christianity.

Looking behind the lists, however, a different picture emerges. In Edessa, on the edge of the Syrian desert, the proofs of the early establishment of Christianity were forgeries, almost certainly manufactured under Bishop Kune, the first orthodox Bishop.

In Egypt, Orthodoxy was not established until the time of Bishop Demetrius, 189-231, who set up a number of other sees and manufactured a genealogical tree for his own bishopric of Alexandria, which traces the foundation through ten mythical predecessors back to Mark, and so to Peter and Jesus.

Even in Antioch, where both Peter and Paul had been active, there seems to have been confusion until the end of the second century. Antioch completely lost their list; “When Eusebius’s chief source for his Episcopal lists, Julius Africanus, tried to compile one for Antioch, he found only six names to cover the same period of time as twelve in Rome and ten in Alexandria. http://reformation500.wordpress.com/2010/01/14/historical-literature-on-the-earliest-papacy/

Before the second half of the second century there was in Rome no monarchical episcopacy for the circles mutually bound in fellowship. Peter Lampe's extensive work, "From Paul to Valentinus," chapter 41, pages 397 http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2010/08/this-bridge-should-be-illuminated.html

► we are fairly certain today that, while the Fathers were not Roman Catholics as the thirteenth or nineteenth century world would have understood the term, they were, nonetheless, ‘Catholic,’ and their Catholicism extended to the very canon of the New Testament itself.” (Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, Principles of Catholic Theology: Building Stones for a Fundamental Theology, trans. Sister Mary Frances McCarthy, Theolgische Prinzipienlehre ]San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1987], p. 141.)

► American Roman Catholic priest and Biblical scholar Raymond Brown, in “Priest and Bishop: Biblical Reflections,” could not prove on historical grounds, he said, that Christ instituted the priesthood or episcopacy as such; that those who presided at the Eucharist were really priests; that a separate priesthood began with Christ; that the early Christians looked upon the Eucharist as a sacrifice; that presbyter-bishops are traceable in any way to the Apostles; that Peter in his lifetime would be looked upon as the Bishop of Rome; that bishops were successors of the Apostles, even though Vatican II made the same claim.. (from, "A Wayward Turn in Biblical Theory" by Msr. George A. Kelly at http://www.catholic.net/rcc/Periodicals/Dossier/Jan-Feb00/Article5.html)

More:

The Nonexistent Early Papacy

House Churches in Rome

The Roman Catholic Hermeneutic 1

The Roman Catholic Hermeneutic 2

[metmom]

Sounds like typical Catholic projecting onto non-Catholics what they’re thinking.

[metmom]

That sounds like something spewed by a bitter, failed Catholic who knows little about what the Church actually believes or teaches.

That's a pretty typical reaction. When someone can't refute the data or facts, to attack the integrity of the person presenting them.

When former Catholics present what they know to be the facts of Catholicism and what they experienced as Catholics and it casts the RCC in a bad light and cannot be refuted, then the charges are laid of vindictiveness, bitterness, ignorance of church teaching, and all manner of personal character failures in an attempt to discredit what they say as being biased or inaccurate.

Since the facts cannot be disputed or refuted, the only option left is to imply that the messenger is unreliable.

[metmom]

Perhaps it is a condemning attitude that was referred to, and while it is true that modern Catholics can generally affirm baptized Protestants as Christians, most of what is seen in posts is denigration of them, as a result of the regular succession of articles on FR in promotion of a Church® as supreme, to whom all are to submit, and the resultant censure from the other side.

Someone gets it. I'm not surprised that it's a non-Catholic.

Catholics just can't seem to see their own attitudes reflected in what they say towards others. No empathy.

As a matter of fact, the very condemning comments here on these threads *bitter*, *failed Catholics*, etc, are EXACTLY the kinds of attitudes that I've encountered out of Catholics I've known personally. Catholics on these threads are no different than them. There is much condemnation of non-Catholics by Catholics on all levels.

James 2:1-13 My brothers, show no partiality as you hold the faith in our Lord Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. 2 For if a man wearing a gold ring and fine clothing comes into your assembly, and a poor man in shabby clothing also comes in, 3 and if you pay attention to the one who wears the fine clothing and say, “You sit here in a good place,” while you say to the poor man, “You stand over there,” or, “Sit down at my feet,” 4 have you not then made distinctions among yourselves and become judges with evil thoughts? 5 Listen, my beloved brothers, has not God chosen those who are poor in the world to be rich in faith and heirs of the kingdom, which he has promised to those who love him? 6 But you have dishonored the poor man. Are not the rich the ones who oppress you, and the ones who drag you into court? 7 Are they not the ones who blaspheme the honorable name by which you were called?

8 If you really fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture, “You shall love your neighbor as yourself,” you are doing well. 9 But if you show partiality, you are committing sin and are convicted by the law as transgressors. 10 For whoever keeps the whole law but fails in one point has become accountable for all of it. 11 For he who said, “Do not commit adultery,” also said, “Do not murder.” If you do not commit adultery but do murder, you have become a transgressor of the law. 12 So speak and so act as those who are to be judged under the law of liberty. 13 For judgment is without mercy to one who has shown no mercy. Mercy triumphs over judgment.

[daniel1212]

Scripture is clearly the supreme authority as the assuredly infallible Word of God, but in holding to it then it is clear that “tradition” has a place, but not as the assuredly infallible Word of God, which class of revelation Scripture is affirmed to be, but such is subject to proof by Scripture.

By “tradition” can be meant a general understanding or way of doing things which may not be spelled out in Scripture, but is supported by it. A wedding ceremony is one example, in which a bride dressed in white has a ring placed on her hand, but the typology behind it is easily conformable to Scripture, and does not contradict it.

However, the difference here is that you do not make such into legal moral requirements. The practice of washings after or before most any activity, after “the tradition of the elders” (Mk. 7:3ff) could find support in principle from Scripture as being a good idea, but not fore being made into a doctrine, so that those who fail to wash after they come from the market are unclean sinners, which would be legalism.

SS type evangelical churches hold to a certain historical tradition of hermeneutics, in which historical narratives are held as being literal (unlike the predominate school of Rome), and in conservative interpretations, but both are manifestly Scriptural, and would represent a different level of tradition.

Paul’s affirmation of oral “traditions” (2Ths. 2:15) was not to some some eons-old nebulous oral tradition of tales, but to known teaching which could have been written, and which was the norm for anything called the Word of God in Scripture,

The affirmation of tradition by so-called church fathers (the apostles were) was to basic beliefs which could be passed on mainly by writing (and we have our commentaries with the substantial common consent), but which i think became elevated above measure due to their problems in trying to defeat those who misused Scripture to teach heresy, for the devil knows the Bible.

However, when confronted with the devil’s misuse of Scripture, the Lord responded by “it is written” which refers to Scripture, while RC “Tradition, by definition, is not written, though expressions of it may be in that form.

[metmom]

Aside from the irony of you ridiculing the the Roman Catholics for allegedly feeling towards another group exactly like you appear to feel about the all Catholics, how could you possibly know this?

Stating facts is not ridicule.

Show me the ridicule you're accusing me of. Post numbers, please....

[one Lord one faith one baptism]

one of the worst things about the internet is somebody will post something who has no understanding of Church history and then someone else who has even less understanding of Church history will think it’s true and copy it.

the article is laughable.

first of all, let’s note that NO BAPTISTS were quoted in the ist three centuries, only Catholics are quoted.
second of all, all of the Catholics quoted ( Tertullian, Irenaeus, Justin Martyr ) all believed in BAPTISMAL REGENERATION ( something all Baptists think is a doctrine straight from the pit of hell, do i have that right BB? ) in addition, they all practiced infant baptism.
HOW DO I KNOW? i will post a link of an articel that quotes Iraneus directly supporting infant baptism.

i think it would be helpful to those who don’t know Church history to know who Irenaeus was. The Apostle John taught Polycarp, Polycarp taught Irenaeus and Irenaeus taught a Church Father named Hippolytus. so if anyone would know what Irenaeus thought about infant baptism, it would be Hippolytus.
Hippolytus wrote a book in 215ad titles “the apostolic tradition”. in it we find him saying “ baptize first the children, and if they can speak fo themselves, let them do so. Otherwise let their parents or other relatives speak for them”
i guess Hippolytus had a lot riding on this “myth”
again for those in rio linda land Jesus to John to Polycarp to Irenaeus to Hippolytus. by the way, Hippolytus says the Church received the practice of infant baptism from the Apostles.
but someone sitting in the comfortable 21st can attack great men of God such as Irenaeus and Hippolytus, men who risked being put to the sword by the Roman authorities.

folks, the reason there NEVER was a controversy over infant baptism until the 16th century, is the whole Church from the beginning practiced it.

Again, put your common sense hat on. does it pass the laugh test that the early Church practiced “believers baptism “ and then someone misinterpreted a passage from Irenaeus and then suddenly and without a protest from anyone, the whole Church ( including Athanasius ) went apostate by “dunking babies” it would be funny if it wasn’t so sad.

by the way, what stake did Luther and Calvin have in perpetrating this “myth”? they held to “sola scriptura”, not the apostolic tradition.

[one Lord one faith one baptism]

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Although many Protestant traditions baptize babies, Baptists—and “Bible churches” in the Baptist tradition—insist that baptism is only for those who have come to faith. Nowhere in the New Testament, they point out, do we read of infants being baptized.

On the other hand, nowhere do we read of children raised in believing households reaching the age of reason and then being baptized. The only explicit baptism accounts in the Bible involveconverts from Judaism or paganism. For children of believers there is no explicit mention of baptism—either in infancy or later.
This poses a problem for Baptists and Bible Christians: On what basis do they require children of believers to be baptized at all? Given the silence of the New Testament, why not assume Christian baptism is only for adult converts?

This, of course, would be contrary to historical Christian practice. But so is rejecting infant baptism. As we will see, there is no doubt that the early Church practiced infant baptism; and no Christian objections to this practice were ever voiced until the Reformation.

The New Testament itself, while it does not explicitly say when (or whether) believers should have their children baptized, is not silent on the subject.

Luke 18:15–16 tells us that “they were bringing even infants” to Jesus; and he himself related this to the kingdom of God: “Let the children come to me
. . . for to such belongs the kingdom of God.”

When Baptists speak of “bringing someone to Jesus,” they mean leading him to faith. But Jesus says “even infants” can be “brought” to him. Even Baptists don’t claim their practice of “dedicating” babies does this. The fact is, the Bible gives us no way of bringing anyone to Jesus apart from baptism.

Thus Peter declared, “Repent, and be baptized, every one of you, in the name of Jesus Christ for the forgiveness of your sins; and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. For the promise is to you and to your children” (Acts 2:38–39).

The apostolic Church baptized whole “households” (Acts 16:33; 1 Cor. 1:16), a term encompassing children and infants as well as servants. While these texts do not specifically mention—nor exclude—infants, the very use of the term “households” indicates an understanding of the family as a unit. Even one believing parent in a household makes the children and even the unbelieving spouse “holy” (1 Cor. 7:14).

Does this mean unbelieving spouses should be baptized? Of course not. The kingdom of God is not theirs; they cannot be “brought to Christ” in their unbelief. But infants have no such impediment. The kingdom is theirs, Jesus says, and they should be brought to him; and this means baptism.

Baptism is the Christian equivalent of circumcision, or “the circumcision of Christ”: “In him you were also circumcised with . . . the circumcision of Christ, having been buried with him in baptism and raised with him through your faith in the power of God, who raised him from the dead” (Col. 2:11–12). Thus, like circumcision, baptism can be given to children as well as adults. The difference is that circumcision was powerless to save (Gal. 5:6, 6:15), but “[b]aptism . . . now saves you” (1 Pet. 3:21).

The first explicit evidence of children of believing households being baptized comes from the early Church—where infant baptism was uniformly
upheld and regarded as apostolic. In fact, the only reported controversy on the subject was a third-century debate whether or not to delay baptism until the eighth day after birth, like its Old Testament equivalent, circumcision! (See quotation from Cyprian, below; compare Leviticus 12:2–3.)

Consider, too, that Fathers raised in Christian homes (such as Irenaeus) would hardly have upheld infant baptism as apostolic if their own baptisms had been deferred until the age of reason.

For example, infant baptism is assumed in Irenaeus’ writings below (since he affirms both that regeneration happens in baptism, and also that Jesus came so even infants could be regenerated). Since he was born in a Christian home in Smyrna around the year 140, this means he was probably baptized around 140. He was also probably baptized by the bishop of Smyrna at that time—Polycarp, a personal disciple of the apostle John, who had died only a few decades before.

Irenaeus

“He [Jesus] came to save all through himself; all, I say, who through him are reborn in God: infants, and children, and youths, and old men. Therefore he passed through every age, becoming an infant for infants, sanctifying infants; a child for children, sanctifying those who are of that age . . . [so that] he might be the perfect teacher in all things, perfect not only in respect to the setting forth of truth, perfect also in respect to relative age” (Against Heresies 2:22:4 [A.D. 189]).

“‘And [Naaman] dipped himself . . . seven times in the Jordan’ [2 Kgs. 5:14]. It was not for nothing that Naaman of old, when suffering from leprosy, was purified upon his being baptized, but [this served] as an indication to us. For as we are lepers in sin, we are made clean, by means of the sacred water and the invocation of the Lord, from our old transgressions, being spiritually regenerated as newborn babes, even as the Lord has declared: ‘Except a man be born again through water and the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven’ [John 3:5]” (Fragment34 [A.D. 190]).

Hippolytus

“Baptize first the children, and if they can speak for themselves let them do so. Otherwise, let their parents or other relatives speak for them” (The Apostolic Tradition 21:16 [A.D. 215]).

Origen

“Every soul that is born into flesh is soiled by the filth of wickedness and sin. . . . In the Church, baptism is given for the remission of sins, and, according to the usage of the Church, baptism is given even to infants. If there were nothing in infants which required the remission of sins and nothing in them pertinent to forgiveness, the grace of baptism would seem superfluous” (Homilies on Leviticus 8:3 [A.D. 248]).

“The Church received from the apostles the tradition of giving baptism even to infants. The apostles, to whom were committed the secrets of the divine sacraments, knew there are in everyone innate strains of [original] sin, which must be washed away through water and the Spirit” (Commentaries on Romans 5:9 [A.D. 248]).

Cyprian of Carthage

“As to what pertains to the case of infants: You [Fidus] said that they ought not to be baptized within the second or third day after their birth, that the old law of circumcision must be taken into consideration, and that you did not think that one should be baptized and sanctified within the eighth day after his birth. In our council it seemed to us far otherwise. No one agreed to the course which you thought should be taken. Rather, we all judge that the mercy and grace of God ought to be denied to no man born” (Letters 64:2 [A.D. 253]).

“If, in the case of the worst sinners and those who formerly sinned much against God, when afterwards they believe, the remission of their sins is granted and no one is held back from baptism and grace, how much more, then, should an infant not be held back, who, having but recently been born, has done no sin, except that, born of the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of that old death from his first being born. For this very reason does he [an infant] approach more easily to receive the remission of sins: because the sins forgiven him are not his own but those of another” (ibid., 64:5).

Gregory of Nazianz

“Do you have an infant child? Allow sin no opportunity; rather, let the infant be sanctified from childhood. From his most tender age let him be consecrated by the Spirit. Do you fear the seal [of baptism] because of the weakness of nature? Oh, what a pusillanimous mother and of how little faith!” (Oration on Holy Baptism 40:7 [A.D. 388]).

“‘Well enough,’ some will say, ‘for those who ask for baptism, but what do you have to say about those who are still children, and aware neither of loss nor of grace? Shall we baptize them too?’ Certainly [I respond], if there is any pressing danger. Better that they be sanctified unaware, than that they depart unsealed and uninitiated” (ibid., 40:28).

John Chrysostom

“You see how many are the benefits of baptism, and some think its heavenly grace consists only in the remission of sins, but we have enumerated ten honors [it bestows]! For this reason we baptize even infants, though they are not defiled by [personal] sins, so that there may be given to them holiness, righteousness, adoption, inheritance, brotherhood with Christ, and that they may be his [Christ’s] members” (Baptismal Catecheses in Augustine, Against Julian 1:6:21 [A.D. 388]).

Augustine

“What the universal Church holds, not as instituted [invented] by councils but as something always held, is most correctly believed to have been handed down by apostolic authority. Since others respond for children, so that the celebration of the sacrament may be complete for them, it is certainly availing to them for their consecration, because they themselves are not able to respond” (On Baptism, Against the Donatists 4:24:31 [A.D. 400]).

“The custom of Mother Church in baptizing infants is certainly not to be scorned, nor is it to be regarded in any way as superfluous, nor is it to be believed that its tradition is anything except apostolic” (The Literal Interpretation of Genesis 10:23:39 [A.D. 408]).

“Cyprian was not issuing a new decree but was keeping to the most solid belief of the Church in order to correct some who thought that infants ought not be baptized before the eighth day after their birth. . . . He agreed with certain of his fellow bishops that a child is able to be duly baptized as soon as he is born” (Letters 166:8:23 [A.D. 412]).

“By this grace baptized infants too are ingrafted into his [Christ’s] body, infants who certainly are not yet able to imitate anyone. Christ, in whom all are made alive . . . gives also the most hidden grace of his Spirit to believers, grace which he secretly infuses even into infants. . . . It is an excellent thing that the Punic [North African] Christians call baptism salvation and the sacrament of Christ’s Body nothing else than life. Whence does this derive, except from an ancient and, as I suppose, apostolic tradition, by which the churches of Christ hold inherently that without baptism and participation at the table of the Lord it is impossible for any man to attain either to the kingdom of God or to salvation and life eternal? This is the witness of Scripture, too. . . . If anyone wonders why children born of the baptized should themselves be baptized, let him attend briefly to this. . . . The sacrament of baptism is most assuredly the sacrament of regeneration” (Forgiveness and the Just Deserts of Sin, and the Baptism of Infants 1:9:10; 1:24:34; 2:27:43 [A.D. 412]).

Council of Carthage V

“Item: It seemed good that whenever there were not found reliable witnesses who could testify that without any doubt they [abandoned children] were baptized and when the children themselves were not, on account of their tender age, able to answer concerning the giving of the sacraments to them, all such children should be baptized without scruple, lest a hesitation should deprive them of the cleansing of the sacraments. This was urged by the [North African] legates, our brethren, since they redeem many such [abandoned children] from the barbarians” (Canon 7 [A.D. 401]).

Council of Mileum II

“[W]hoever says that infants fresh from their mothers’ wombs ought not to be baptized, or say that they are indeed baptized unto the remission of sins, but that they draw nothing of the original sin of Adam, which is expiated in the bath of regeneration . . . let him be anathema [excommunicated]. Since what the apostle [Paul] says, ‘Through one man sin entered into the world, and death through sin, and so passed to all men, in whom all have sinned’ [Rom. 5:12], must not be understood otherwise than the Catholic Church spread everywhere has always understood it. For on account of this rule of faith even infants, who in themselves thus far have not been able to commit any sin, are therefore truly baptized unto the remission of sins, so that that which they have contracted from generation may be cleansed in them by regeneration” (Canon 3 [A.D. 416]).

posted from the Catholic Answers web site.

[one Lord one faith one baptism]

at least my organization was not founded by Charles Taze Russell in the 1870’s.

it hard to have a discussion with anyone who rejects the Trinity. if you don’t understand who God is, what basis do we have for a discussion?

[count-your-change]

In all the evidence we have from the Scriptures only adults are said to be baptized.

When Jesus sent out the eleven they were to make disciples, baptize them, teach the commandments and that is the order and pattern that was followed where ever it may be determined for certainty. No newborn, no little baby could be made a disciple.

[one Lord one faith one baptism]

only adults were said to be baptized? really, you know the jailer had no cildren how?

the problem those who hold your position have is 2,000 years of Christian history says you are wrong.

the Church the Apostles left behind BAPTIZED INFANTS.

the very men you rely on to set the canon of the NT BAPTIZED INFANTS.

this wasn’t an issue until the 16th century.

what arrogance to think no one understood baptism until the 16th century.