Removing Jesus

White Horse Inn ^ | June 1, 2014 | Timothy F. Kauffman

[ealgeone]

I’ve read a lot of the CCC. From comments I’ve seen on FR I’ve read more than a lot of rccs.

[ealgeone]

It's promulgated by the RCC itself. This nonsense that Mary and Joseph didn't have kids of their own is what drives it in part.

The Word, as has been explained too many times, clearly shows Joseph and Mary had other kids of their own. There are too many passages that show they did have children when read in context. And please....none of this the word brethren can mean cousin, other believers, when we read the passages indicating they had children.

That catholics continue to perpetuate this ever virgin myth of Mary is just totally contrary to the Word.

Roman catholics have built up Mary to something that is not recognizable when viewed through the lense of Scripture.

It's why Christians reject roman catholic tradition on this issue and a host of others.

[metmom]

Here, a couple of links with references to some of the ECF’s who espoused that view, found with a google search.

http://www.godrules.net/articles/earlychurch-on-sex.htm

http://whychurchfatherswerenegativeaboutsex.blogspot.com/

There are other indicators as well. For one thing, the way celibacy is held up as the ideal, especially for the priesthood.

Not to mention that married couples who give up sex have been lauded. There was at least one thread that I recall recently about a married couple who agreed to be celibate and it drew mixed reactions, but there were those who supported it.

And the reactions of Catholics when it’s even suggested that Mary had sex with Joseph. Catholics are just aghast at the thought.

I’ve heard people state that Mary couldn’t have had sex with Joseph because she was sinless, or rather that she couldn’t have been sinless if she had had sex with Joseph.

[metmom]

Why do Catholics get someone banned as a hate site so Prots can’t reference him and yet at every turn throw same said banned person/site back in the faces of Prots as if he is representative of Protestantism?

Why do Catholics feel free to appeal to someone they don’t want anyone else to use?

The hypocrisy is staggering.

They are continually breaking the RF guidelines they demanded to be put in place.

Rules for thee but not for me, eh?

[WVKayaker]

They get really upset when a spade is called a spade.

It is interesting to hear the squeals of the wounded all the way over here in the Philippines. It seems most of the Roman Catholic cultists prefer to remain in their state of denial. They have been properly indoctrinated, and have no response except to complain.

There is no Salvation outside of Jesus Christ. There is no remission of sins outside Jesus Christ. There is no other intercessor under Heaven, only Jesus Christ.

The idea that the roman catholic mary was sinless, and all those others that have been proclaimed sinless by that cult, deny the very purpose for Jesus to come, to live, to be killed, and to be resurrected. This writer is square over the target.

They like their fables and fairy tales of apparitions and alleged "miracles". They prefer the smells and bells of their false religion, and miss the most important part of Scripture.

John 3: 3 Now there was a Pharisee, a man named Nicodemus who was a member of the Jewish ruling council. 2 He came to Jesus at night and said, “Rabbi, we know that you are a teacher who has come from God. For no one could perform the signs you are doing if God were not with him.”

3 Jesus replied, “Very truly I tell you, no one can see the kingdom of God unless they are born again.”

4 “How can someone be born when they are old?” Nicodemus asked. “Surely they cannot enter a second time into their mother’s womb to be born!”

5 Jesus answered, “Very truly I tell you, no one can enter the kingdom of God unless they are born of water and the Spirit. 6 Flesh gives birth to flesh, but the Spirit gives birth to spirit. 7 You should not be surprised at my saying, ‘You must be born again.’ 8 The wind blows wherever it pleases. You hear its sound, but you cannot tell where it comes from or where it is going. So it is with everyone born of the Spirit.”

9 “How can this be?” Nicodemus asked.

10 “You are Israel’s teacher,” said Jesus, “and do you not understand these things? 11 Very truly I tell you, we speak of what we know, and we testify to what we have seen, but still you people do not accept our testimony. 12 I have spoken to you of earthly things and you do not believe; how then will you believe if I speak of heavenly things? 13 No one has ever gone into heaven except the one who came from heaven—the Son of Man. 14 Just as Moses lifted up the snake in the wilderness, so the Son of Man must be lifted up, 15 that everyone who believes may have eternal life in him.”

16 For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life. 17 For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but to save the world through him. 18 Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe stands condemned already because they have not believed in the name of God’s one and only Son. 19 This is the verdict: Light has come into the world, but people loved darkness instead of light because their deeds were evil. 20 Everyone who does evil hates the light, and will not come into the light for fear that their deeds will be exposed. 21 But whoever lives by the truth comes into the light, so that it may be seen plainly that what they have done has been done in the sight of God. ...

[MarineBrat]

Wasn’t interested in wasting any time arguing. Just expressing an opinion.

[Resettozero]

Anyone who has ever changed a breast-fed child's diaper, knows that breast-fed baby poop does not stink. It's sweet-ish.

Perhaps YOUR breast-fed child's poop didn't stink...and had a nice sweet aromatic scent.

(Just, wow.)

Does the Mister agree with you on this?

[daniel1212]

It's staggering how I ....have never met one single, solitary Catholic who thought sex between a husband and wife is dirty and sinful.

Perhaps not, but while modern RCs have become more enlightened on the subject, RCs often assert one must go to the "fathers," and there we see no less than Jerome, Augustine and Tertullian imputing uncleanness to marriage or its relations.

this too we must observe, at least if we would faithfully follow the Hebrew, that while Scripture on the first, third, fourth, fifth, and sixth days relates that, having finished the works of each, “God saw that it was good,” on the second day it omitted this altogether, leaving us to understand that two is not a good number because it destroys unity, and prefigures the marriage compact. Hence it was that all the animals which Noah took into the ark by pairs were unclean. Odd numbers denote cleanness. St. Jerome, Against Jovinianus Book 1 http://www.ccel.org/ccel/schaff/npnf206.vi.vi.I.html

So much for 2 x 2 evangelism! And behold how the scholar resorts to this false dilemma, as on First Corinthians 7 he reasons:

It is good, he says, for a man not to touch a woman. If it is good not to touch a woman, it is bad to touch one: for there is no opposite to goodness but badness. But if it be bad and the evil is pardoned, the reason for the concession is to prevent worse evil. (Against Jovinianus (Book I, v. 7)

He furthermore stated,

It is not disparaging wedlock to prefer virginity. No one can make a comparison between two things if one is good and the other evil....Let them marry and be given in marriage who eat their bread in the sweat of their brow, whose land brings forth thorns and thistles, and whose crops are choked with brambles. My seed produces fruit a hundredfold.(''Letter'' 22; http://epistolae.ccnmtl.columbia.edu/letter/447.html).

In addition, Augustine held marital relations must involve sinful lust:

...the very embrace which is lawful and honourable cannot be effected without the ardour of lust, so as to be able to accomplish that which appertains to the use of reason and not of lust....This is the carnal concupiscence, which, while it is no longer accounted sin in the regenerate, yet in no case happens to nature except from sin. — On Marriage and Concupiscence (Book I, cp. 27); http://www.newadvent.org/fathers/15071.htm

Then we have Tertullian, who argued that second marriage, having been freed from the first by death, "will have to be termed no other than a species of fornication,'' partly based on the reasoning that such involves desiring to marry a women out of sexual ardor. ''An Exhortation to Chastity,'' Chapter IX.—Second Marriage a Species of Adultery, Marriage Itself Impugned, as Akin to Adultery, ANF, v. 4, p. 84.]

[metmom]

That last quote of Augustine’s was the one I remembered.

And again, the typical Catholic’s reaction at the thought of Mary having sex with her lawful husband reveals what people really think about sex within marriage.

While there is no doubt that sex outside of marriage is wrong, the way celibacy and virginity are held up as standards to attain over marriage, strips off the fluff and shows what Catholic teaching really is stating.

[MHGinTN]

In the ruins of Pompeii were discovered water drained toilets. That did not use traps as modern toilets do, but they had running water under the ‘stools’ to drain away the effluent. The Romans has sewers and pipes, albeit their pipes were made of lead, with the resulting lead poinsoning which accompanies ingesting lead.

[Mark17]

Wasn’t interested in wasting any time arguing. Just expressing an opinion.

It's kind of understood, that if you post something on FR, others might respond to you, whether you like it or not. What a novel concept, but hey, wasn't interested in wasting any time arguing. Just expressing an opinion. 😎

[RnMomof7]

It's staggering how I could be 63 years old, have known or personally corresponded with many hundreds of Catholics, have read Himalayan stacks of Catholic books and periodicals, have visit Catholic websites, English and Spanish language, from far-right-to-far-left,the ones I consider doctrinally sound and even the ones I, personally, think are like Kellogg's, full of flakes and nuts --- and have never met one single, solitary Catholic who thought sex between a husband and wife is dirty and sinful.

But Mary never had sex with her husband Joseph... When priests were married they were not to have sex with their wived the day prior to saying mass ....and on this site I have read posters say that sex without the intent of getting pregnant (using birth control ) is "mutual masterbation"

[MHGinTN]

It makes no difference in the case of many sacrilkege apologist, for they can’t even see when someone agrees with them they are so blind to anything except the dogma of mother church.

[Mrs. Don-o]

The links you provided manifest a certain ignorance about the way the Church regards the early Church fathers. They are not regarded as infallible teachers nor as sources of doctrine per se. They are most authoritative when what they say shows a broad a consensus, which is evidence of the "mind of the Church" at that time.

The authors at "godrules" are so ignorant as to refer to "Saint Tertullian". It may seem like a mere detail, but it's a telling error which shows a real unfamiliarity with the subject, like a sportscaster who persists in talking about home-runs in football. Tertullian write a huge amount of valuable stuff, for instance refuting the Gnostics, and also he originated the term "Trinity" --- that's a biggie! --- but he was never honored as a saint because a number of his later writings directly contradicted the teachings of the Church.

Even St. Augustine, who IS a canonized saint, and a very great one, is not accepted uncritically or in toto. For instance, some of his writings can be interpreted as denying free will as well as asserting total depravity: this the Catholic and Orthodox churches reject.

People who try to conflate "early Church Fathers" totally with Catholic doctrine, as if they were one and the same, never quote St. John Chrysostom, who wrote in a beautiful and positive way about the embrace of marital love. They also manage to miss the entirety of Catholic Sacramental theology, which holds Holy Matrimony to be a sacred sign, a "Mysterium Tremendum" imaging the union of Christ and the Church, and sexual intercourse to be a constitutive element of that Sacrament.

So it is not only not considered a sinful, dirty or depraved act, it is considered an outward sign of the inward life of grace.

Catholics know this.

Propagandists who comb the ECF's for obsolete "gotcha" texts do not.

Please be wary of such distorted misuses of early Christian writers.

As for Mary, what do you think --- that God just used her as a Hagar, a reproductive concubine, and then passed her off to Joseph: "Here, I got what I wanted, now you can have her"?

We know from Scripture that God the Most High chose May as his dwelling, a marvel foreshadowed by the Ark of the Covenant.

The Ark carried manna; Mary carried Jesus, the Divine Bread of Life. The Ark carried the Tablets of the Law; Mary carried the Divine Giver of the Law. The Ark carried the staff of Aaron, which symbolized God's life-giving power; Mary, in a way far excelling this, carried the Living God Himself. Thus Mary is untouchable and inviolate for even stronger reasons than the Ark of the Covenant or the Holy of Holies would be untouchable.

If only the High Priest could enter the Holy of Holies, certainly no man could enter Mary: the idea here is inviolability.

In the NT, Mary herself bears witness to her commitment to virginity. When the Archangel Gabriel tells Mary she will conceive and bear a son, she seems astonished --- revealing that she was not only a virgin, but committed to virginity.

Imagine this: You are at a bridal shower for a friend and somebody remarks to the bride, “You are going to have such adorable kids!” Everybody laughs, but the bride draws back in astonishment and says, “But...but...how shall this be? I know not man.” **Huh?** For a woman who is engaged to be married, there are only two possible explanations for such a reaction: either she has no idea where babies come from—--or she has every intention of remaining a virgin after marriage.

Why else would Mary be astonished? She’s a woman betrothed to Joseph, she knows about the birds and the bees. Yet she reacts with amazement at the news that she, a woman betrothed, will bear a son.

Notice that the angel does not say “You are pregnant.” He says “You will conceive in your womb and bear a son” (Luke 1:31). This is a promise that has been made to other women in Jewish history such as Sarah and Hannah. All of them understand the promise to mean, “You and your husband will conceive a child.” So why should the same promise astonish Mary, a young woman who also plans to marry—--unless she had already decided to remain a virgin throughout her life?

Lastly, the “ever-virgin” argument boils down to, “The Church believes this because the Church has always believed this.” All the ancient churches –Coptic, Chaldean, Assyrian, Arabic-speaking, Greek-speaking, as well as Latin --- which existed from Apostolic times --- refer to Christ’s mother as "Our most holy, pure, blessed, and glorious Lady, the Theotokos and Ever Virgin Mary," Aeiparthenos in Greek, or the equivalent in Syrian or Coptic or whatever. Our martyrs who were killed by Nero and Diocletian believed this. You can find an inscription in the Catacomb of Priscilla in Rome: “Beata Maria Semper Virgine”, "Blessed Mary Ever Virgin.”

This same truth was firmly held by Luther, Zwingli, and other Christians until well into the Reformation --- even Calvin rejected arguments against Mary's perpetual virginity based on the mention in Scripture of “brothers of Jesus,” whom Calvin understood to be other close kin, e.g. half-brothers and cousins. The Anglicans in the 16th, 17th, even the 18th century, (John Wesley) hailed Mary as ever-virgin.

This idea that Mary was NOT ever-virgin, is a Renaissance-era innovation. So you can either think that the ancient churches and the devout and learned Christians for 15 centuries were right; or you can think they were all wrong. I, myself, would think it rash to presume that most Christians in most places have been wrong about most things, most of the time, but that a handful of breakaway Renaissance-era Europeans all-of-a-sudden and for the first time grasped the meaning of the ancient texts.

[ifinnegan]

“How is this much different than “If you ain’t Catholic, you ain’t Christian” threads out there.”

Exactly.

[MarineBrat]

>>It’s kind of understood, that if you post something on FR, others might respond to you, whether you like it or not.

Agreed. And when I opened the thread and saw that its intent was to put a stick in the eye of (ostensibly fellow) Christians, and to foment argument, I responded and moved along. No argument here.

Yadda yadda Catholics! Yadda yadda Protestants. It just doesn’t interest me.

[Tennessee Nana]

and breastfed babies don’t poop as much..

:)

[WVKayaker]

What a perverted view that roman catholics display about things that are clear in Scripture. Evidently, black is white and green is red in the understanding of that cult's followers. The view of God's Word and the inspired history they claim to have authored, is opposed in their teaching from their traditions.

i have no doubts about their sincerity, but I do wonder at the adherence to the indoctrination! They seem to blindly follow and accept the lies the cult displays. This mary thing is born from a need for tangible feelings, and not giving over to the Spirit calling us out! Cults need blind followers, but every now and then, God can speak through an ass. That seems to be the impression from the roman cult toward non-rccers...