Posted on 07/26/2013 2:04:17 PM PDT by NYer
Sunday, June 21, marked the 90th anniversary of the Scopes Monkey Trial decision. The questions surrounding evolution—meaning, in particular, the origins of humans—still raise large and important questions for how we understand human nature and the doctrine of original sin. But Jason Stellman thinks that the obsession with our physical origins, though understandable, is perhaps theologically off-kilter. Where we've come from biologically is not as important as where we're heading. It's not the beginning of the journey, man—it's the destination. Stellman's The Destiny of the Species (Wipf and Stock, 2013) is a brief, rollicking, and readable apologetic, notable not just for turning the question of origins on its head, but also for pioneering a slightly different route from the path taken by many Catholic converts in their first books.
From Prosecutor to Papist Stellman's own personal story is compelling. Born and raised in Orange County, California, Stellman came to serious faith in the context of the Evangelicalism of the California preacher Chuck Smith's Calvary Chapel ministries. He served as a Protestant missionary in both Hungary and Uganda before turning to a more theologically rigorous form of Protestantism: Calvinism. Stellman attended Westminster Seminary in Escondido, California and began ministering in the Presbyterian Church in America, the largest conservative Presbyterian denomination in the U.S., planting Exile Presbyterian Church in Woodinville, WA in 2004. Stellman's name came into the limelight when he was chosen to serve as the chief prosecutor in the 2011 heresy trial of fellow Presbyterian minister Peter Leithart, a Calvinist writer and scholar known to readers of journals including First Things and Touchstone. Leithart's views were accused of being in line with a school of Presbyterian thought known as the “Federal Vision,” and he was tried for, among other charges, allegedly failing to distinguish justification and sanctification, divine law and divine grace, and teaching that baptism confers grace and divine adoption. In short, Leithart was on trial for being too Catholic.
Although Stellman's work as prosecutor was acknowledged as solid at the time, Leithart was acquitted by the Northwest Presbytery. In the time after this trial, however, Stellman himself began to question certain historic Protestant beliefs like sola scriptura and sola fide. Through a number of contacts, including the group of formerly Calvinist Catholic apologists centered around the “Called to Communion” (calledtocommunion.com) website, which was founded to foster dialogue with and provide apologetics precisely for Calvinists who suspected the Catholic Church of being right or at least having something to say, Stellman began the journey that ended with his own entrance into the Church on September 23, 2012. Over the last year Stellman has been doing catechesis in a Seattle-area parish, and he now works at Logos Bible Software, developing resource material that will provide an easy way to look at the Scriptures in the light of Patristic and Medieval sources as well as the teachings of the Magisterium.
Apologetics for Everyone Much of Catholic apologetics in English-speaking countries, and increasingly in Latin America, has focused on the differences between Catholics and Protestants. This is not surprising given that large swaths of Evangelical Protestants were baptized as Catholics and left the Church due to the catechetical and spiritual failures of post-conciliar American Catholicism. Sherry Wedell of the Catherine of Siena Institute has written extensively of this phenomenon, which continues to this day—many Catholics who hunger for solid biblical teaching and help in living a life of Christian discipleship seek out elsewhere what they should find in Catholic faith. They find it in the Protestant world where large parts of the Catholic faith have been conserved, especially devotion to Scripture, a serious search for divine intimacy, and the main outlines of Christian morality. Thus Catholic apologetics has been naturally geared toward showing lapsed Catholics and the Protestants they have joined that Catholic faith actually fulfills what they are looking for in a more coherent and comprehensive way. This is an important task—and the importance of it has born great fruit over the last thirty years, not only bringing many serious Protestant pastors, academics, and laity into full communion, but changing the dynamic of Catholic-Protestant relations. During the last two papal conclaves, I have been asked a number of times by Evangelical Protestants about the candidates and what they have to offer. In 2005 one Evangelical Presbyterian friend asked me, “Are we going to get a really good Pope?” I was tempted to answer after the fashion of Tonto when the Lone Ranger asked what chance there was of the duo escaping a wrathful Indian tribe: “Who is this 'we,' white man?” But I didn't, because such a recognition shows how much anti-Catholicism has been tamed in the age of John Paul II, Catholic Answers, Evangelicals and Catholics Together, and all the other efforts of apologetics and dialogue.
Stellman certainly has done his part in explaining his own move, writing an essay titled “I Fought the Church, and the Church Won” and giving an in-depth interview on “Called to Communion” as well as engaging in various interesting questions about the real differences between Catholics and Calvinists on his personal blog, “Creed Code Cult”. But refreshingly, Stellman's Destiny of the Species is actually not geared toward Protestants interested in or annoyed by Mary, the Pope, Purgatory, and Indulgences. It is an apologetic for Christianity as a whole after the fashion of Chesterton's Orthodoxy or Lewis's Mere Christianity, geared toward those who might be “spiritual but not religious,” “nones,” lapsed Catholics who have left Christian faith behind altogether or are already practicing some other sort of faith, and Christians of all sorts, whether Catholic or not. What he has produced is an old-fashioned apologetic for everyone.
Back to the Future Stellman's book, written around the time of the 150th anniversary of Darwin's Origin of the Species, arrived not only in time for the 90th anniversary of the Scopes Monkey Trial, but also Pope Francis's first encyclical, Lumen Fidei, with which it bears some striking similarities. Destiny of the Species begins with the premise that while our biological origins are of interest to us, Darwin ultimately “doesn't scratch where we truly itch.” We certainly eat, drink, defecate, breathe, and move in ways that remind us we are animals. But unlike other animals, whose existence is instinctual, man “is not pushed but pulled, not driven but drawn.” Your dog may appreciate a good nap, a beef, and a burgundy, but we have desires for glory, love, and life that has no end. We are, says Stellman, “hard-wired for heaven.” All of the frantic search for someplace else and something new that Tocqueville found in so pure a form in America (and that more recent writers like David Brooks and Wendell Berry have wryly observed or excoriated) is the sign not simply of biological urge, but spiritual need. Stellman uses Chesterton's fine phrase to describe it: divine discontent. We all hunger for a future that is more than we can experience now.
Like Lumen Fidei, Stellman is proposing that human discontent and restlessness should be answered not by quelling them, but by seeking answers to them. Francis answers Nietzsche's dictum that “if you want peace of soul and happiness, then believe, but if you want to be a follower of truth, then seek,” noting that “autonomous reason is not enough to illumine the future”. Stellman observes that for the vast bulk of people, the way to apparent peace and happiness is not belief, but “worldliness”—simply following our biological needs and various emotional passions for things, fame, revenge, and pharmacologically-induced good feelings. The way of belief, according to Stellman, is actually the path to truth and the only way to real peace and happiness. The rest of his book is dedicated to illuminating the truth that, as Pope Francis puts it, “the light of faith is unique, since it is capable of illuminating every aspect of human existence.” It is “a light coming from the future and opening before us vast horizons which guide us beyond our isolated selves towards the breadth of communion.”
The seeker with a pure heart will not choose between belief and truth, but between competing beliefs. Again, like Pope Francis, Stellman emphasizes that our choice is really between true belief and idolatry. Stellman's middle chapters survey the various false gods that humans encounter, offering treatments of the five vanities surveyed in the book of Ecclesiastes, the temptations of a technologically advanced and affluent society, and how the universal acknowledgment of sin's reality usually issues in our identification of it in someone else's life. We all love to confess others' sins while staying silent about our own. Stellman's treatment is generally good in this section, though it must be said that his treatment of the dangers of life in a consumer society tend toward a sort of stereotyped vision of business and markets that might have been better left out or at least balanced by a recognition of the dangers of modern do-gooderism present in non-profit and government work, too. Stellman, whose views are probably left-of-center, occasionally seems as if he's making a brief against politically conservative Christians and not a brief for Christianity. Jibes at those who watch FOX News or take different views on political issues detract from what is solid and permanent in his exposition. This leads to a second difficulty in the book. Stellman uses a variety of pop-culture references to make his points. Many of them, such as his use of The Matrix to illuminate the choice we have to make between simply distracting ourselves and offering ourselves to seek the truth, hit home. Not all of them do. Rock music fans, especially U2 fans, sometimes need to be reminded that song lyrics seldom stand well on their own.
Stellman really excels when he is bringing out the great riches present in Scripture. Again, mirroring Lumen Fidei, Stellman shows how the Decalogue is meant not simply as a veto on naughty human actions, but as a liberation of humans from the passions and idolatries he's been describing and toward a life of spiritual abundance. (I would complain that he describes the Commandments using the Protestant rather than the Catholic numbering, but my own contribution to ecumenical outreach is to say let's do it the way Protestants and Jews do.) Using Job, Stellman shows how the real objection to God's existence, the problem of evil, is met by God's presence, ultimately in the form of Jesus Christ, whose Resurrection and Ascension show us, in a limited way, what we will be. Stellman's final pop-culture flourish is to use the movie Memento, which tells its story alternating between scenes starting in the beginning and moving forward and the end moving backward, as an analogy to the way in which the light of faith works. We know the destiny of the species is assured, but the light of faith, while illuminating all of life, doesn't usually show us more than we need for our own personal immediate steps ahead. “One step enough for me,” in Newman's famous words. Stellman's vision of Christianity answers exactly to the two primary aspects of Chesterton's personal philosophy in Orthodoxy. In the light of the future prepared for us, life is both familiar and unfamiliar, marvelous and unsatisfactory. It is not merely a biological process, but a high adventure. The Destiny of the Species: Man and the Future that Pulls Him
by Jason J. Stellman
Wipf & Stock, 2013
128 pages
Which again further testifies that PTDS is not based upon Scripture exampling it or teaching it, though RC attempt to extrapolate support for what is really a tradition.
We have no war with Acts 17, it is part of scripture and hence true. We disagree with your interpretation of it.
That is your opinion, but it clearly supports testing by the Scriptures what is taught in order to determine its veracity, unlike RC are to do.
Concerning Acts 17, I see neither an affirmation or rejection of Tradition.
Tradition itself is not contrary to SS, but it being the word of God when Rome decrees it and equal with Scripture is wrong. Meanwhile, your opinion is contrary to what other RCs claim they see.
However, if one believes Tradition, one should examine it to see if it is sound and to see where it stops.
When Rome teaches traditions such as PTDS, distinctively titling calling pastors"priests ," etc., then RCs are to submit to it. They will not find it in Scripture, and for hundreds of years Rome restricted access to personal reading of Scripture, and while now she encourages it, her approved notes can lead you astray, including by their liberalism.
Beyond a handful, to do so [provide an infallible lists of what level every teaching belongs to] would be intellectually lazy. It would discourage individuals from studying Scripture, from studying the writings of various doctors of the Church, from studying the Catechism....
But RCs disagree even about how many infallible papal decrees there are, and without knowing for sure which ones preclude dissent - and RCs disagree on what class allows that - and having each RC seeking to determine doctrine by studying evidence, then this leads to disagreements. And there is much they can disagree on.
However, the typical RC argument is that while the evangelical means of determining truth by studying results in disagreements, the RCs have the magisterium of Rome which authoritatively settles the matter, thus Rome requires assent to her teaching on less than infallible levels.
Code of Canon Law: "Can. 752 Although not an assent of faith, a religious submission of the intellect and will must be given to a doctrine which the Supreme Pontiff OR the college of bishops declares concerning faith or morals when they exercise the authentic magisterium, even if they do not intend to proclaim it by definitive act; therefore, the Christian faithful are to take care to avoid those things which do not agree with it.
First Vatican Council, Session 4 (18 July 1870): Wherefore we teach and declare that, by divine ordinance, the Roman Church possesses a pre-eminence of ordinary power over every other Church, and that this jurisdictional power of the Roman Pontiff is both episcopal and immediate. Both clergy and faithful, of whatever rite and dignity, both singly and collectively, are bound to submit to this power by the duty of hierarchical subordination and true obedience, and this not only in matters concerning faith and morals, but also in those which regard the discipline and government of the Church throughout the world. - http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm
And any dissent allowed even by theologians is supposed to be quite limited in scope and manner.
I have never heard the opinions stated by Henry Graham or John Stapleton before. I suppose there is a question when disagreeing with Tradition.
No, both are saying that there is to be no more seeking to determine the truth of anything Rome officially teaches:
“All that we do [as must be patent enough now] is to submit our judgment and conform our beliefs to the authority Almighty God has set up on earth to teach us; this, and nothing else.” “...outside the pale of Rome there is not a scrap of additional truth of Revelation to be found.” “He willingly submits his judgment on questions the most momentous that can occupy the mind of man-----questions of religion-----to an authority located in Rome.” “Absolute, immediate, and unfaltering submission to the teaching of God's Church on matters of faith and morals-----this is what all must give..” - “Henry G. Graham, "What Faith Really Means", (Nihil Obstat:C. SCHUT, S. T.D., Censor Deputatus, Imprimatur: EDM. CANONICUS SURMONT, D.D.,Vicarius Generalis. WESTMONASTERII, Die 30 Septembris, 1914 ); http://www.catholictradition.org/Tradition/faith2-10.htm] “
The reason of this stand of his is that, for him, there can be no two sides to a question which for him is settled; for him, there is no seeking after the truth: he possesses it in its fulness, as far as God and religion are concerned. His Church gives him all there is to be had; all else is counterfeit...
Holding to Catholic principles how can he do otherwise? How can he consistently seek after truth when he is convinced that he holds it? Who else can teach him religious truth when he believes that an infallible Church gives him God's word and interprets it in the true and only sense? — (John H. Stapleton, Explanation of Catholic Morals, Chapters XIX, XXIII. the consistent believer (1904); Nihil Obstat. Remy Lafort, Censor Librorum. Imprimatur, John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York; http://www.gutenberg.org/files/18438/18438-h/18438-h.htm )
Some Catholic Doctrine is based on previous Doctrine which is were it can become difficult to see the Scriptural basis of the Tradition. For example we believe that Mary is Mother of God. This belief is derived from the belief that Mary is the Mother of the human nature of Jesus. However, the Person of Jesus cannot be seperated from his human nature. As a consequence, Mary is the mother of Jesus. But Jesus is also God, so Mary is the Mother of God.
This kind of logic would also make Mary's parents the grandparents of God, and Israel His progenitor as well, yet the words which your retired pope said regarding the title “Co-redemptrix” (base upon similar logic) are fitting here:
the formula “Co-redemptrix” departs to too great an extent from the language of Scripture and of the Fathers and therefore gives rise to misunderstandings...” “Everything comes from Him [Christ], as their Latter to the Ephesians and the Letter to the Colossians, in particular, tell us; Mary, too, is everything she is through Him. The word “Co-redemptrix” would obscure this origin. A correct intention being expressed in the wrong way. “For matters of faith, continuity of terminology with the language of Scripture and that of the Fathers is itself an essential element; it is improper simply to manipulate language” - ( God and the world: believing and living in our time, by Pope Benedict XVI, Peter Seewald, Ignatius Press, San Francisco, 2000, p. 306
Whether he was consistent with this logic is another thing, for the Holy Spirit does not use titles carelessly, and when even stating that the Christ came of Israel He clarifies, "Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed for ever. Amen." (Romans 9:5)
That God has a mother is demonic mormonic doctrine, and in what manner Israel is a progenitor of Christ is made clear, and His deity is proclaimed. And while in a very limited technical sense Mary might be called the mother of God in that she provided the body God prepared for Him, and was a mother to Him as He grew, yet all Mary had came from God, and just as "the Son of God" denotes ontological oneness, so Mary being the mother of God most naturally denotes that she is ontologically the mother of God, providing His divine nature. And indeed the appellation Theotokos is part of the supererogatory adulation of the Mary of Rome that almost makes her a 4th person of the Trinity!
Some of the problem in this regard is that a large number of Catholics only get any Catechesis on Sundays. I do think dioceses need to spend more time/money on the parish libraries.
That would require a carefully selected list of books and which would likely reflect each priest's views, but an educated laity is to be discouraged overall by Rome, as the more objectively they read then the more than may see the lack of clothes on the emperor - as my library evidences. Thus the basic ethos of Rome is not that a RC determines truth or gains assurance of truth from objective study, as that is what they criticize evangelicals for, but Rome is the only trustworthy authority on truth, and assurance is by submission to her. RCAs appeal to what they see as evidentiary l sources in seeking to persuade souls in order to bring therm to forsake that evangelical means of assurance of truth.
For as i likely said, the only interpretation of Scripture or history that has authority is that which is from Rome. Thus, in response to the problem of arguments based on evidence seen as contrary to Rome, no less than an authority than Cardinal Manning:
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
My statement is that I find no explicit support. This does not mean there is no implied support that can be arrived at...
Rather, as said, it is derived by extrapolating support for PTDS from earthly relations, but which ignores the restrictions btwn realms manifest in Scripture, and has zero support in any examples or instructions on who to pray to, or warrant due to any lack in Christ as a spiritual intercessor btwn earth and heaven. Only God is shown as the object of mental prayer, and only pagans prayed to someone else in the heavens besides God.
even with the Our Father, which is in Scripture...,
And "after this manner pray ye," which says "Our Father who art in Heaven, hallowed be thy name," not "our mother."
So you affirm that an infallible magisterium is necessary to determine what is Scripture, and that being the instrument and steward of Divine revelation, and inheritor of promises of preservation, all of which Rome claims to be, makes her that magisterium?
I affirm that an infallible magisterium is necessary and that the RC Church is the infallible magisterium.
That is your belief, but i was responding to the logic behind the argument for it, which still requires an answer.
I think what confuses people is the belief that all Catholics sit in Mass and hear what the priest preaches and just believe it and that this teaching was handed down explicitly by Rome;
Perhaps not explicitly, and much of RC teaching is lacking in clarity, but such submission as your impugn is what is encouraged, rather than disagreeing based on interpretations of what Rome teaches, which clarification is what the priest is supposed to provide.
The people rejected are to be loved as children of God; it is Jesus that consigns people to Hell, not us.
That also is not an answer to my question, which was not whether Rome sends them to Hell but whether they are to be rejected (by the people), books or men? Meanwhile, the Rome does not send souls to Hell is misleading, as Roman teaching has been that Jesus will send those to Hell if they die apart from her:
• Pope Boniface VIII, Unam Sanctam: “We declare, say, define, and pronounce [ex cathedra] that it is absolutely necessary for the salvation of every human creature to be subject to the Roman Pontiff.” — Pope Boniface VIII, Unam Sanctam (Promulgated November 18, 1302) http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/b8-unam.html
• Pope Eugene IV and the Council of Florence: "The sacrosanct Roman Church...firmly believes, professes, and proclaims that..not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics cannot become participants in eternal life but will depart `into everlasting fire...unless before the end of life the same have been added to the flock; and that..no one, whatever almsgiving he has practiced, even if he has shed blood for the name of Christ, can be saved, unless he has remained in the bosom and unity of the Catholic Church.” — Pope Eugene IV and the Council of Florence (Seventeenth Ecumenical Council), Cantate Domino, Bull promulgated on February 4, 1441 (Florentine style), [considered infallible by some]
“With regard to the mystic body of Christ, that is, all the faithful, the priest has the power of the keys, or the power of delivering sinners from hell, of making them worthy of paradise, and of changing them from the slaves of Satan into the children of God. And God himself is obliged to abide by the judgment of his priests, and either not to pardon or to pardon... The sentence of the priest precedes, and God subscribes to it.” – – Dignity and Duties of the Priest, St. Alphonsus Ligouri, Vol. 12, p. 2. http://www.archive.org/stream/alphonsusworks12liguuoft/alphonsusworks12liguuoft_djvu.txt
You can provide teaching which disagrees with this, under the guise of clarification, but that is part of the variation in RC teaching or interpretation.
If the Church were to imprison/kill someone or burn a book, this is a matter of discipline on which Rome is fallible. The statement that the doctrine taught by such books is wrong is infallible. How to treat those who teach the doctrine is a disciplinary matter. The Church is fallible on disciplinary matters.
Even if not, yet again,
Both clergy and faithful, of whatever rite and dignity, both singly and collectively, are bound to submit to this power by the duty of hierarchical subordination and true obedience, and this not only in matters concerning faith and morals, but also in those which regard the discipline and government of the Church throughout the world. - http://www.ewtn.com/faith/teachings/papae1.htm
However, what Rome officially says and what she does are two different things, and what she effectually conveys is that as long as even proabortion and prohomosexual politicians die in her arms, without evident Biblical repentance, then they are members who receive church funerals and have hope of eternal life due to her intercession.
It doesn’t. We trust that God ensured we get His word and used what was available at the time to get it to us just as He used Judas betrayal, and Balaam’s donkey stopped Balaam from disobeying God. You see, God said He would preserve HIS word for us. It matters not how. It matters that it is HE who did. If the Holy Spirit wanted us to have the book of Matthew HE made sure we have it today. The infallibility has been proven in that there has never been any errors found in it and it agrees with all the other scriptures. So you see, scripture alone says we should view Matthew is infallible scripture.
Matthew 17:3 And, behold, there appeared unto them Moses and Elias talking with him.
They’re probably still floatin around here writtin letters don’t ya think?
“So you see, scripture alone says we should view Matthew is infallible scripture.”
Post the verse that says that about Matthew’s gospel. When you fail, and you will, we will know how valid your claim is.
Did God promise to preserve His word for all time?
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
Please ping me to note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of general interest.
Just as I expected, you can’t post a verse.
And about your question: “Did God promise to preserve His word for all time?”
I’ll answer that just as soon as you post a verse proving Matthew’s gospel is scripture. Otherwise, things will stay as they are and you will continue to be unable to answer.
Psalm 12:6 The words of the Lord are pure words: as silver tried in a furnace of earth, purified seven times. 7 Thou shalt keep them, O Lord, thou shalt preserve them from this generation for ever.
Now you go run down some rabbit trail into the weeds if you want to but don't expect me to follow.
“God said He would preserve His word and He did.”
Show me from the Bible ALONE that God inspired Matthew to write a gospel book. When you fail, and you will, won’t that mean you have no biblical evidence that Matthew did so? Won’t that mean you are relying on non-biblical evidence?
After all the Ethiopian Coptics have 15 books in their Bibles that you don’t. How do you know they’re wrong and you’re right?
Did I not tell you to go down that rabbit trail into the weeds by yourself?
The rabbit trail of sola scriptura is all yours.
Yes, by an RC, by far outnumbering those promoting Prots and attacking Rome.
Good!
Ring kissers tend to wander off the path.
Show me, from ANY source, that Mary did NOT die and she now helps Jesus in Heaven.
“Show me, from ANY source, that Mary did NOT die and she now helps Jesus in Heaven.”
Show me first that the dogma is that she did not die. If you’re going to attack a belief, I suggest you actually know what the belief is first.
I think you have the cart before the horse.
If you’re going to HAVE a belief, I suggest you actually know WHERE the belief is coming from.
All Catholic beliefs come to us from Christ, Sacred Scripture and Sacred Tradition.
I can't disagree here; but I will ask that 'Sacred Tradition's SOURCES be identified.
“I can’t disagree here; but I will ask that ‘Sacred Tradition’s SOURCES be identified.”
Ask all you like. I am under no obligation to do basic research for you. Protestant anti-Catholics won’t even post a verse that specifically says Matthew wrote an inspired book! That belief is based entirely on Tradition.
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