Why don’t you believe what the Catholic Church says about it being the “confession” rather than Peter himself? Do you not know that you must submit “intellect and will” to the magisterium?
While Cynicalbear inquires whether we Catholics must submit intellect and will” to the magisterium, springfieldreformer thinks that authority should not be used as a “mindless club to beat” folks into submission.
Springfielder, please the Catholic Church beats no one into submission. Indeed, it is Benedict and theologians like Aquinas who belief that reason and faith must be braided together. Faith without reason like Buddhism and Hinduism is mythological, and reason without faith consigns us to the limits of our human intellect. No one can deny that the Catholic intellectual tradition is second to none.
Cynicalbear misunderstands. It is precisely because the teaching of the Church is the true word of God grounded in faith (scripture, the sacred oral tradition, liturgy, ritual, and revelation) and reason that we have such a constellation of brilliant minds including leading Protestant theologians who converted to Catholicism. Indeed, the leading Lutheran scholar and teacher and certainly the pre-eminent American Lutheran theologian of his time, Rev. Richard Neuhaus upon his conversion to Catholicism said boldly he found “the fullest expression of Christ in the Catholic Church.”
Nor is there any mindless club to beat up on people. The opposite is true. The Catholic Church through the ages has been nourished by the blood of its martyrs, not unlike nearly all of the Apostles of Christ. All you have to do is check a short-list of independent minds that after serious study, and contemplation converted to Catholicism.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_converts_to_Catholicism
As before, ealgeone speaks to the sins and pronouncements of individual popes and their remarks. None of this has anything to do with official Catholic doctrine as recited in the Apostles Creed at each Catholic Mass or the Catechism of the Church. This kind of deflection does not serve any purpose except for the cheap thrill of casting stones.
Likewise, metmom goes off tangent and off over the cliff to think that Catholic doctrine is not inspired by the Holy Spirit. The Church itself was born of the Holy Spirit on the day of Pentecost. It is quite a stretch to think that its long litany of saints, martyrs, and stigmatists who believed and practiced the Catholic faith were errant in their belief of God’s word. Her rebuttal, like so many Bible Christians, is to rain down disparate scriptural quotations just like Jim Jones, Joel Osteen, and Billy Graham do in offering “their” own definitive and often contradictory interpretations of these scriptural passages. Sadly, this explains the unfortunate and often unmerited sobriquet Bible Christians have earned for themselves as “bible-thumpers.”
Deprogramliberalism does one worse. He inquired about the biblical proof for Catholic beliefs. Thus, he is supplied not with a torrent of the the large treasure of Catholic thinking enough to stock the theology libraries of colleges and universities, but instead with a book written by a convert to Catholicism- Dave Armstrong- a former Protestant campus missionary who offers to meet his request.
http://www.amazon.com/Biblical-Defense-Catholicism-Dave-Armstrong/dp/1928832954
Deprogrammerliberalism’s response to this is precious: He says: “I have nine books so far in the MetaChristianity series.” It is from this from this he gets his profound insights such as Why would Jesus say, “For God so loved the world” - past tense? Why would He not have said, “For God so loves the world” - present tense?
If he really is interested in something that is in-depth may we Catholics sugges?
http://www.amazon.com/Catholicism-DVD-Box-Robert-Barron/dp/B005J6U77Q
We can surely all believe that Christ taught ONE truth for all nations through all times. He commissioned, Peter (“feed my lambs, feed my sheep”) and his successors for this task. He founded one Church, empowered it with a “binding” authority and assured that the gates of hell shall never prevail against it.
For the first three hundred years, BEFORE the Church fathers sorted through hundreds of fragments of written texts and crosschecked these with the oral traditions and assembled the canonical texts including some writings while dispensing with others, we had the Catholic Church born of the Holy Spirit. That same Church grounded on Petrine authority exists today.
To iscool, this is a “fantasy.” Sprinfieldreformer labels “intellectual prowess as meaningless in God’s economy” as if literal Bible reading is all it takes.
In each of the towns we live in, we have several Protestant churches variously called First Calvary; Redeemer Lutheran, First Baptist; First Methodist, etc., and of course some mainline denominational churches with married gay and lesbian pastors as ministers. Thus the “Protestant” traveler has the option of hopscotching from one denomination to another until he/she finds “a” truth that he/she finds confortable with. This is the rotten heresy bequeathed us by Protestantism that allows for a menu of “truths” for grandma to choose from.
It is no insult but rather an evident truth to say that there are shoals of fish that swim in these shallow waters who are ready bait for just about any of these self-ordained pastors and preachers. Hence the swarm of Joel Osteens, “Bishop” TD Jakes and pastors of first AME Churches. This is now a lucrative vocation for all of them.