Posted on 04/05/2015 4:56:11 PM PDT by Arthur McGowan
In an article entitled Saint Patrick the Baptist?, Stephen R. Button tries to claim St. Patrick for Evangelical Protestantism... or at least disassociate him from Roman Catholicism. Button is hardly alone: you can find similar attempts by Don Boys and others, some of them dating back several decades.
The argument tends to work like this. From Patrick, we have (in Button's words) only the “84 short paragraphs that make up both his Confession and his 'Letter to Coroticus.'” Baptist authors then mine these texts for any doctrines that Patrick doesn't mention explicitly, and then claim that he must have held the Baptist view.
(Excerpt) Read more at catholicdefense.blogspot.it ...
2) No worship of Mary or praying to departed believers
3) No office of cardinal, primate, archbishop
4) No indulgences or penance
5 Salvation comes about through faith....not works
6) No special clergy...that is no priest
7) Bishops and elders could be married
8) Salvation is secure
With Mormons or Catholics the problem is the lack of faith in the bible. Instead they say that the real truths were kept out of the bible and revealed by other means, whether it was Joseph Smith or some Pope or DeMontfort. Eventually the bible becomes a list of negative doctrines like the constitution is to Obama.
But Jesus said it a bit different. Matthew 18:20 For where two or three are gathered together in my name, there am I in the midst of them.
I don't disagree with either. In the LCMS, each church is independent. Every head pastor of a church is a bishop (overseer). All bishops are equal and have no authority over other bishops. You'll notice that in the qualifications for bishop, you'll never see subservience to Rome, the seat of Peter, or an unbroken line of succession back to the apostles.
And the original quote does not use capital "C" Catholic, but lower case "c" catholic, which means universal. I love how Romanists take old quotes and capitalize a descriptive word to make them feel superior and justified.
Wrong:
There is absolutely no mention of any liturgical calendars in the life of the NT church, a conspicuous absence, while censuring the binding liturgical calendars of their past faith.
"Ye observe days, and months, and times, and years." "I am afraid of you, lest I have bestowed upon you labour in vain." (Galatians 4:10-11)
"Let no man therefore judge you in meat, or in drink, or in respect of an holyday, or of the new moon, or of the sabbath days: " "Which are a shadow of things to come; but the body is of Christ." (Colossians 2:16-17)
The later accretions of extraScriptural traditions by men does not establish what is right, as wholly inspired Scripture does. Why follow men, however pious, with their varied opinions, who were yet developing their theology, as if they were apostles when they progressively supported extraScriptural and unScriptural traditions of men ?
In addition, the Easter Dating Controversy actually testifies to the fact that the pope was not looked to and followed as the supreme head who was to be obeyed even in such a relatively inconsequential thing as the date if Easter.
Around 195, Pope Victor I, attempted to excommunicate the Quartodecimans, turning the divergence of practice into a full-blown ecclesiastical controversy. According to Eusebius, synods were convened and letters were exchanged, but in the end, having overstepped his mark, Victor, the Bishop of Rome, was rebuked and had to back down.
Eusebius of Caesarea (Church History, V, xxiv) notes:
Words of theirs are extant, sharply rebuking Victor. Among them was Irenæus, who, sending letters in the name of the brethren in Gaul over whom he presided, maintained that the mystery of the resurrection of the Lord should be observed only on the Lord’s day. He fittingly admonishes Victor that he should not cut off whole churches of God which observed the tradition of an ancient custom." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Easter_controversy
Lactantius recounts: “At this the demons were chased away, and the holy rites interrupted.” What we don't hear: Christians siding with the pagans in denouncing Catholics for using the Sign of the Cross, or claiming that it's a pagan ritual dating to the time of Constantine
Lactantius may passing on a fable, but you are almost right: I hardly hear that and do not teach that. By itself as an option it is not unBiblical except as being a requirement which Catholicism makes it, which is wrong. As it IDs one as a Cath, then Prots would naturally avoid it.
What we don't hear: Either side rejecting fasting, the Eucharist, or the sacrificial nature of the Mass.
They have eyes but they see not. Bringing up competition btwn two groups holding to a common error does not establish what the NT church taught. But Scripture does, and why we do not see is the Cath Eucharist as being the Lord's Supper.
For while this “sacrament” is taught as being "the source and summit of the Christian life" (CCC 1324) “the medicine of immortality, the antidote for death, and the food that makes us live for ever in Jesus Christ," (CCC 1415) through which “the work of our redemption is carried out,” (CCC 1364) and around which all else in Catholicism essentially revolves, with the offering of which being the primary function of her clergy;
Yet rather than the practice of this principal and prevalent practice being manifest as such in the life and epistles of the NT church, it is only manifestly described in one epistle (outside of Jude 1:12 referring to a “feast of charity”), in 1Co. 10 and 11.
And which do not teach transubstantiation, though RCs extrapolated it from that, but in context refers to the body showing that they are His body, which proclaims His death by unselfishly taking part in that caring communal meal done in remembrance of His death, not by eating His flesh.
Nor is the Lord's Supper anywhere shown or said to be a sacrifice for sins, nor are any NT pastors ever shown offering it in the life of the church or even dispensing bread. or even being called "priests" versus presbuteros, as instead instead the primary work of NT pastors is that of prayer and preaching. (Act 6:3,4) "Preach the word; be instant in season, out of season; reprove, rebuke, exhort with all longsuffering and doctrine." (2 Timothy 4:2)
And which is what is said to "nourish" the souls of believers, and believing it is how the lost obtain life in themselves. (1 Timothy 4:6; Psalms 19:7;Acts 15:7-9) More : The Lord's Supper: solemn symbolism or real flesh and blood?
(Note: allow scripts for pop up Bible verses
Donatism on the Sacraments...What we don't hear: that the Sacraments are just symbols, or that the Sacraments are unnecessary for salvation.
Bringing up competition btwn two aberrant groups does not establish what the NT church taught.
Dealing with this requires defining what a sacrament is. If understood as an action which brings a blessing, then evangelicals can affirm sacraments, as in, "To him give all the prophets witness, that through his name whosoever believeth in him shall receive remission of sins." (Acts 10:43) "Blessed is he that readeth, and they that hear the words of this prophecy, and keep those things which are written therein: for the time is at hand." (Revelation 1:3)
If meant that God must act because a ritual is performed, ex opere operato, by the act itself, so that even an atheist baptizing a properly disposed soul effects regeneration if he "intends to do what they church does," then that is false, though God will bless any obedience, and apart from Rome's false gospel, it would count as a valid baptism if the person was a true convert.
Peter said God purified the hearts of souls by faith, before baptism, that being part of salvation by grace, (Acts 10:43-47; 15:7-10) and in telling souls to be baptized and they would receive forgiveness and the Spirit, (Acts 2:38) then he was telling them to believe, as baptism requires and expresses faith, confessing Christ via moving one's body just as one confesses the Lord with the mouth.
What we don't see: Christians siding with the Catholics on the Incarnation, and with the Gnostics against the Eucharist.
Again, bringing up competition btwn two aberrant groups does not establish what the NT church taught. But Scripture does, and again, what we don't see is the Cath interpretation of the gospel accounts of the Lord's supper in the life of the church, which interprets the gospels.
All of this points strongly to the Catholic claim. Unlike Baptists or other Evangelical Protestants, we see Catholics in every age. And that's exactly what we should expect to see from orthodox Christianity. Wrong: Actually the RCC is
http://peacebyjesus.witnesstoday.org/deformation_of_new_testament_church.html#The in the NT church;
For the NT church manifestly did not teach perpetual ensured magisterial infallibility, which is unseen and unnecessary in the life of the church, as is her separate class of believers distinctively titled "priests ," offering up "real" human flesh and blood as a sacrifice for sin, and literally consuming this to obtain spiritual life, around which act all else revolves, and looking to Peter as the first of a line of exalted infallible popes reigning over the church from Rome (which even Catholic scholarship provides testimony against), and a separate class of believers distinctively titled "saints," and praying to created beings in Heaven, and being formally justified by ones own sanctification/holiness, and thus enduring postmortem purifying torments in order to become good enough to enter Heaven, and saying rote prayers to obtain early release from it, and requiring clerical celibacy as the norm, among other things.
Sacred tradition ...
This is one of the most ridiculous threads ever started by a FRoman Catholic. The premise is full of so many fallacies that I don’t even know where to start.
In the year 110 A.D., not even fifteen years after the book of Revelation was written, while on his way to execution St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote: “Where the bishop is present, there let the congregation gather, just as where Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church”. The Church believes that when the bishops speak as teachers, Christ speaks; for he said to them: “He who hears you, hears me; and he who rejects you, rejects me” (Lk 10, 16).
Mat 7:15 “Beware of false prophets who come disguised as harmless sheep but are really vicious wolves.
Act_20:29 I know that false teachers, like vicious wolves, will come in among you after I leave, not sparing the flock.
So now what do you do? How do you test the truth if we are warned there are false prophets and leaders?
The number one being that non-inspired different men who could differ with each other, and on Cath. teaching, somehow are invoked as if determinative of doctrine, when in fact Rome judges them more than they judge her, while Scripture was the supreme transcendent material authority for the early church.
Major fail on your part, Petrosius. I didn't say Jesus wrote any single Word of the Bible. In your haste to slam me, you failed to read and comprehend. Go have your priest read my post to you and explain I wrote.
Why in the Hell would a church annul a wedding if they had kids?
In a word, money. For a generous donation these things can somehow just happen. One of those traditions they don't like to talk about too much.
The inability to explain away a lie sufficiently is not always the fault of the listener.
The Church avoided allowing divorces by annulling marriages even though it is the exact same thing. It’s a little like declaring yourself celibate because you don’t have sex with women.
“Given the 30, 000 different varieties its hard to tell.”
I can help you.
Eliminate any that do not consider the Word of God authoritative.
Include those that teach the Gospel of Grace through which alone Christ saves.
If you need help winnowing it down in your area, pm me.
I’m very excited to hear how your spiritual journey goes!
Best!
It’s not my fault that you don’t have the needed faculties to understand concepts that you don’t agree with. That’s your problem not mine. Reminds me of Muslims, frankly.
Pretty much what it appears to be although we aren’t smart enough to understand the advanced logic
I think he has a pretty good handle on it. But thanks anyway.
No, you see, the Church declared them married for life at one point but they were never married at all because now the Church says it never happened.
Given that the Roman Catholic Church doesn’t claim Luke to have been a Pope, this passage would seem to refer to the teaching of the original Apostles.
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