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10-Point Biblical Refutation of Sola ScripturaThe Bible teaches that a “three-legged stool” (Bible, Church and Tradition) is necessary to arrive at the truth.1. It's Not Taught in the BibleScripture certainly is a “standard of truth”, but not in a sense that rules out the binding authority of authentic apostolic tradition and the Church. Catholics agree with Protestants that Scripture is materially sufficient: i.e., every true doctrine can be found in the Bible, if only implicitly and indirectly by deduction. But no biblical passage teaches that Scripture is the sole rule of faith for the Christian (formal sufficiency). Nor can sola...

The Fatal Flaw of Sola Scriptura“Sola Scriptura” (Scripture Alone) is the foundational doctrine of Protestantism. But the doctrine itself is based on certain false presuppositions, which makes the whole doctrinal house of cards fall apart.TranscriptEric Sammons:Sola scriptura or scripture alone is the foundational doctrine of Protestantism, but the doctrine itself is based on certain false presuppositions, which makes the whole doctrinal house of cards fall apart. That’s what we’re going to talk about today on Crisis Point. Hello, I’m Eric Salmons, your host and inner chief of Crisis Magazine. Before we get started, I just want to encourage people to...

Sola Scriptura Needs Sola Fide, and How to Refute Both At the suggestion of Father Dave Nix, I recently read the short work by Joel Peters entitled “Scripture Alone? 21 Reasons to Reject Sola Scriptura.” It is a fast read and probably the most crushing blow to Protestantism I have ever read. You simply cannot argue with Peters’s logic and the historical facts he presents (it is well sourced), not to mention all of the Scripture he cites. Having been a Protestant before converting to the Catholic Church, I was not shocked by anything I read, but I was delighted...

The authority of Scripture holds supreme importance in a Christian worldview, especially for Protestant evangelicals who believe that their faith and the way they live depend upon Scripture. Other branches of Christendom and skeptics, such as the convert to Roman Catholicism Peter Kreeft, sometimes raise objections to this crucial distinction. (1) They suggest that this principle is incoherent or unworkable. Responses to seven common objections explain how sola scriptura impacts Christian theology. Objection #1: Scripture itself does not teach the principle of sola scriptura; therefore, this principle is self-defeating. Response: The doctrine of sola scriptura need not be taught formally...

“Has the Roman Catholic Church infallibly defined a single word of Jesus or an apostle, that is not found in Scripture?” Dr. James White to Mitch Pacwa “I cannot think of any.” Mitch Pacwa This shows that everything the church needed for ministry was written down in the Scriptures. That is the clear implication of the verses below; and combined with the early church’s understanding of the rule of faith / apostolic tradition, when it is specifically spelled out, it indicates that everything needed was written down in the NT. Jude 3 – the faith was once for all delivered...

Definition of Sola Scriptura Sola Scriptura: the reformed Protestant belief that the Scriptures alone are the final and only infallible authority for the Christian. This does not mean that Scriptures are the only authority (nuda or solo Scriptura), as Protestants believe in the authority of tradition, reason, experience, and emotions to varying degrees (after all, “sola scriptura” itself is an authoritative tradition in Protestantism). It does mean that Scripture trumps all other authorities (it is the norma normans sed non normata Lat. “norm that norms which is not normed”). Scripture is the norma normans sed non normata “norm that norms which is...

APOLOGIA WHY I'M CATHOLIC: SOLA SCRIPTURA ISN'T LOGICAL, PART III 6/28/2015 3 Comments Even though I've been writing for thirteen weeks now about an obscure Latin phrase (sola scriptura) and using some terms that are so out of vogue in our modern "what I feel is all that's real" world (for instance, "logical") I can't stress enough that I'm talking about something I experienced to the depths of my being. Something existential. It was like the Northridge Earthquake. But this time it wasn't the foundation of my house moving and shifting and beginning to crumble; it was the foundation of...

If the doctrine of Sola Scriptura is true, then, as a system of theology, Roman Catholicism ought to be wholeheartedly rejected. This quick inference is not as simplistic as it may first appear. Sola Scriptura not only negates any form of authoritative tradition in Roman Catholicism, it also eviscerates any Roman Catholic doctrine or practice explicitly drawn from Scripture, since the truth of such doctrines is, according to the Council of Trent, only guaranteed by the "holy mother Church" who has the sole authority to "judge of their [the Scriptures'] true sense and interpretation."[1] Therefore, if Sola Scriptura precludes such...

In 897 AD, Pope Stephen VII had Pope Formosus’ body exhumed and put on trial at the infamous Cadaver Synod, during which the corpse was found guilty, and stripped of his papal vestments. Pope Theodore II later convened a synod and overturned Pope Stephen’s findings, as did Pope John IX after him. But later, Pope Sergius III overturned the rulings of Theodore II and John IX, and reaffirmed the conviction of Formosus. Perhaps Formosus’ corpse will find some little comfort in the knowledge that it is still—at least for now—listed on Rome’s “unbroken line of popes” currently on display at the...

As you may recall, when we left Martin Luther last week, he was bewailing and bemoaning the theological chaos that came about early on in the Reformation. There are as many sects and beliefs as there are heads. This fellow will have nothing to do with baptism; another denies the Sacrament; a third believes that there is another world between this and the Last Day. Some teach that Christ is not God; some say this, some say that. There is no rustic so rude but that, if he dreams or fancies anything, it must be the whisper of the Holy...

In September of 1996 I resigned my ministry as a Protestant pastor to enter the Catholic Church. It was a decision that was easy for me to make in that I was convinced that Catholicism was true and that the Catholic Church was my spiritual home. It was a decision that was nearly impossible to make in that I understood the implications of that decision. I knew what it would entail in practical terms. This was beautifully manifest, shall we say, when three months after leaving the ministry I was waiting tables at a restaurant in Encino. I was standing...

The sincere Roman Catholic will no doubt bristle at our summary of Tradition in our previous post: The pattern for Rome is this: “we already know this to be true, so there is no error in creating evidence to support it.” This is why I call ‘Tradition’ the historical revisionism that it clearly is. It is nonetheless a true, and verifiable statement. John Henry Cardinal Newman, one of the most famous converts to Rome from the Church of England, was a prolific writer and, after his conversion, a staunch apologist for Rome. He provides one of the best examples in...

St. Paul still holds out the written Word of God to His people. The Roman Catholic Church believes that the Word of God is transmitted to the Church by Tradition, the Scriptures and the Magisterium (i.e., popes, councils, etc…). According to the Catechism of the Catholic Church (81), Tradition transmits in its entirety the Word of God which has been entrusted to the apostles by Christ the Lord and the Holy Spirit. It transmits it to the successors of the apostles so that, enlightened by the Spirit of truth, they may faithfully preserve, expound and spread it abroad by their...

The Bible, the Word of the one true and living God, is the truth and the only source of truth that convicts of sin, warns of judgment, saves the sinner, purifies, cleanses, matures the believer and gives the hope of eternal glory. And because it is the revelation of God by which God does His work to His own ever-lasting glory, it is the priority for the church and for every believer. It is also always under attack, always under assault by Satan and his demons and the people in the kingdom of darkness. Attacks on the Bible have never...

No, and yes. The Bible does not have specific text that suggests that the Bible alone is our final authority in all matters of faith and practice. Those who delight to point this out, however, typically Roman Catholics and the eastern Orthodox, typically miss the point. First, their energies more often than not are aimed at the Anabaptist error that we call solo Scriptura. Here the person affirms that all he needs is himself and his Bible. The wisdom of the church in history, the community of believers, are all deemed irrelevant to understanding the things of God. Solo scriptura...

Faith is not alone, Scripture is not alone, Grace is not alone. We ought not separate what God has joined. By: Msgr. Charles PopeThere are a lot of “solos” sung by our Protestant brethren: Sola Fide (saved by faith alone), Sola Scriptura (Scripture alone is the rule of faith), and sola gratia (grace alone). (See the Protestant logo to the right.) Generally, one ought to be suspicious and careful of claims that things work “alone.” It is our usual experience that many things work together in harmony, that things are interrelated. Very seldom is anyone or anything “alone.”The problem of...

According to ancient Greek legend, the great warrior, Achilles, was invulnerable against attack, except for one area of weakness—his heel. That weakness would be exploited near the end of the Trojan War by Paris. As the story goes, he shot Achilles in the heel with an arrow, killing his seemingly undefeatable foe. Okay, so referring to Sola Scriptura as the Protestant Achilles's Heel is not a perfect analogy. There are many weak spots in Protestant theology. But the use of the image of "Achilles's Heel" in prose today is employed not only to accentuate a singular weakness in an otherwise...

In June of this year, the largest Presbyterian denomination in America voted to allow their clergy to perform same-sex “marriages” within the church, thus joining the ranks of other Protestant denominations, such as the Evangelical Lutheran Church, Episcopalian Church, and United Church of Christ.This “evolution” of theology and “modernizing” of church doctrine is a trend that I predict we’ll continue to see in non-Catholic Christian circles for years to come, and not just with marriage. Today, nearly all Protestant denominations support and even advocate the use of artificial birth control, and many allow at least some level of support for...

(Original title: "Well Done Phil" “It seems odd, that certain men who talk so much of what the Holy Spirit reveals to themselves, should think so little of what he has revealed to others.” – C. H. Spurgeon, Commenting and Commentaries (London: Passmore & Alabaster, 1876), 1. “Tradition is the fruit of the Spirit’s teaching activity from the ages as God’s people have sought understanding of Scripture. It is not infallible, but neither is it negligible, and we impoverish ourselves if we disregard it.” – J.I. Packer, “Upholding the Unity of Scripture Today,” JETS 25 (1982): 414 “Although tradition does...

"If a teaching isn’t explicit in the Bible, then we don’t accept it as doctrine!" That belief, commonly known as sola scriptura, was a central component of all I believed as a Protestant. This bedrock Protestant teaching claims that Scripture alone is the sole rule of faith and morals for Christians. Diving deeper into its meaning to defend my Protestant faith against Catholicism about twenty years ago, I found that there was no uniform understanding of this teaching among Protestant pastors and no book I could read to get a better understanding of it. What role does tradition play? How...