Fine, but please don’t refer to Christ as an “itinerant preacher.” It conjures images of anyone with white robe, bare feet, long hair and beard, like Indian shamans going about preaching their “own” interpretations of Scripture adding to Biblical anarchy.
The “Second Great Awakening” was an American version of this. We have a disparate assortment of individuals with no common credo at the forefront of a movement that mixed a Protestant reformation ideal with political issues like seeking temperance reforms and abolitionists who strived for the downfall of slavery.
Groups like Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses all had this “itinerant” moment such as Brigham Young’s wagon trail. These are all heretical beliefs that led the great English essayist Hillaire Belloc to write in his book “The Great Heresies” that unlike other heresies, Protestantism “spawned a cluster of heresies.”
Petrine authority is not given to anyone and everyone to go teach anything and everything. Christ singled out one person Peter upon whom He founded His One Church, and solemnly bestows on Peter and His successors One authority to instruct in One truth. For those of us who believe in Petrine authority based on reason and faith, on oral and written traditions, on ritual and practice, and on divine revelation, (all such factors that went into the early Church fathers who sorted the books we call the Bible), apart from Catholicism, the rest is all apostasy.
Honestly, "itinerant preacher" brings up wonderful images in my mind. Could you possibly be projecting a bit? You understand that itinerant just mean they had an itinerary, a list of places to go. And they did preach. So there's no factual flaw to the designation.
The “Second Great Awakening” was an American version of this. We have a disparate assortment of individuals with no common credo at the forefront of a movement that mixed a Protestant reformation ideal with political issues like seeking temperance reforms and abolitionists who strived for the downfall of slavery.
Wheats and tares, to be sure. But God knows His own, and many were gathered into the family of Jesus Christ in those days. Only God can give a proper accounting.
As for the so-called political issues, when men and women repent of sin in large numbers, God can heal their land of great evils. Is that a bad thing? It was good to abolish slavery. Just as now we seek to extend those victories into the saving of unborn children. The principle is the same. We valued the slave then and value the unborn child now because they and we are all made in the image of God, and have an intrinsic right to live and be free and to be valued by each other as God values each of us. Would you distain the aid of Baptists in the fight to stop abortion, simply because we do not agree with you on every point? If not, then why complain of the good that was done by repentant men and women of that long past generation?
As for Petrine authority, there is no Scriptural case for it surviving into the Roman See, or even being defined as Rome now defines it. Indeed, there is no credible record of any chain of monarchical control for the first 160 or so years of the Christian church. What was distinctively Catholic didn't manifest itself until many years after the beginning of the Christian era, and when it did, it was schismatic, and is to this day, as this forum demonstrates day in and day out.
Peace,
SR
Good thing you don't get to dictate what phrases are used. Calling Jesus or John the Baptist, or Paul, Peter, etc. an "itinerant preacher" is merely speaking accurately. That IS what they were regardless of the negative definition you imagine.
”Protestantism “spawned a cluster of heresies.”
If Protestantism spawned heresy, then you will have to admit that Roman Catholicism spawned a cluster of heresies long before there WAS a Protestantism. Mr. Belloc, I'm sure mentioned that, right? Even the Apostles, in the first century had to contend with them. And how did they do that? By appealing to the Scriptures. It's no different today and even having a magesterium in Rome handing down decrees and dogmas is no guarantee heresy won't continue to pop up. Your church's record on always keeping the orthodox faith is somewhat lacking, not to mention, it readily admits that many doctrines HAVE no ancient witness or Scriptural backing. The battle against heresy IS, after all, a spiritual war and the weapons we use are not carnal.
Our spiritual OFFENSIVE weapon is the Sword of the Spirit, which is the word of God (Eph. 6:17). Since the devil is always going to attack the truth, it's no wonder that his emissaries will continue to invent new heresies and try to draw away people from Christ and the truth of the gospel. That will not cease until Christ returns. I question why you spend so much effort to condemn true servants of Jesus Christ by lumping depraved cult leaders together with them. Do you seriously think there is no difference between Billy Graham and Jim Jones or Joseph Smith? I hope you know NOBODY thinks that.
That's the way Jesus shows up in Catholic paintings...That's the way Jesus shows up in the bible...I'll stick with the bible...
Petrine authority is not given to anyone and everyone to go teach anything and everything. Christ singled out one person Peter upon whom He founded His One Church, and solemnly bestows on Peter and His successors One authority to instruct in One truth.
Peter didn't teach much about the church as compared to Paul...And it was Paul who taught us to call no man father, condemned those who insist that Christians eat no meat on Friday, condemned those who insisted that clergy are forbidden to marry, and on and on...
But you would have us believe that while Peter didn't teach so much on the church, there was a succession of (unbiblical) priests who would follow Peter who taught you to ignore what Paul wrote...These followers would create a 'Church' unknown to the apostle Paul...And THAT Church would develop over the Centuries...
But we can see with the actual words of Gad that Paul never acquiesced to Peter but put him in his place a couple of times...
Peter never said anything about apostolic succession...It was some shyster down the road a ways who said, hey, I'm going to claim I'm the head of this religion and my authority goes back to Peter...Trouble is, up popped a few more of these shysters and the had to kill each other off...The last one standing was the leader of your religion... Again, I'll stick with the bible...
And just how do you think Jesus looked in those days?
White robe? Maybe not white, but a robe.
Long hair? Check.
Bread? Check.
Bare feet? Very possibly.
Going about preaching HIS own interpretation of Scripture. Yup. because what He was preaching was not what the religious leaders of the day were preaching.
He corrected them all the time.
The “Second Great Awakening” was an American version of this. We have a disparate assortment of individuals with no common credo at the forefront of a movement that mixed a Protestant reformation ideal with political issues like seeking temperance reforms and abolitionists who strived for the downfall of slavery.
And the problems with that were what exactly?
Do you have problems with people overcoming alcoholism and abolishing slavery? You're really criticizing them for it?
Groups like Mormons, Jehovah’s Witnesses all had this “itinerant” moment such as Brigham Young’s wagon trail.
So what? Whenever there's a move of God, Satan will ALWAYS some in and try to capitalize on it, often mimicking it to try to deceive people.
That doesn't invalidate the original move of God and the work He's done in the lives of people in it.
Petrine authority is not given to anyone and everyone to go teach anything and everything.
And we don't need Rome's permission to fulfill the command that Jesus gave us to go into all the world and preach the gospel.
Christ singled out one person Peter upon whom He founded His One Church, and solemnly bestows on Peter and His successors One authority to instruct in One truth. For those of us who believe in Petrine authority based on reason and faith, on oral and written traditions, on ritual and practice, and on divine revelation, (all such factors that went into the early Church fathers who sorted the books we call the Bible), apart from Catholicism, the rest is all apostasy.
No He didn't because Peter *petros* is not the rock *petra* on which Christ's church is built.
For the rest of us, we take Jesus' command to share the gospel seriously and do it ourselves and we don't need anyone's permission to do it, nor do we abdicate our responsibility and foist it off onto someone else.