Posted on 11/06/2015 11:42:49 AM PST by NYer
There are many brands of bread on the market; most are actually bread, otherwise consumers would reject them or complain. The many types may contain a variety of recipes, additives or packaging, and some are closer to “just flour, yeast, a pinch of sugar and some water” than others; but most can be recognized as bread.
Same thing with types of churches. there are many brands and packagings that are still church, even though one may be a “top seller.”
The Church that God intended is not a brand; it is the worldwide communion of believers. Some have different additives, like sesame seeds, potato or egg. That doesn’t make them any less “bread.”
I searched long and studied much to determine which “brand” of Christian church I would embrace as an adult. I’m very blessed that I did not take any institution’s veracity for granted — it made me study the scriptures closely and make an adult decision. I chose a church that is pretty much just flour, yeast, a pinch of sugar and some water; nevertheless, I recognize the “everything” bagels, rosemary garlic whole wheat crackers and sesame loaves of this world as also being Christians. A brand of church is not an occasion for snobbery.
“Wow....this is news to many of us Christians on the board.”
No, it is not.
“We’ve often been told how hard it is to be a catholic.”
It seems that you do not know the difference between being obedient and “works righteousness”. So you’re essentially admitting you confuse obedience of faith (as St. Paul puts it) that we believe in and “works righteousness” which we do not believe in?
“You have to do this, do that, be here, be there, etc, or else you’re not a good catholic.”
Again, the confusion is all yours.
“You illustrate my point with the remainder of your comments.”
No, the rest of the comments were from an article at Catholic Answers. That’s why there’s a link at the bottom. Apparently you’re just as confused by something that simple as you are by everything else.
This, for instance, is from Catholic Answers:
Sometimes the Church is accused of teaching “salvation by works,” but this is an empty accusation. This idea has been consistently condemned by the Church. Good works are required by God because he requires obedience to his commands (Mt 6:1-21, 1 Cor 3:8, 13-15) and promises to reward us with eternal life if we obey (Mt 25:34-40, Rom 2:6-7, Gal 6:6-10, Jas 1:12). But even our obedience is impossible without God’s grace; even our good works are God’s gift (Rom 5:5, Phil 2:13). This is the real biblical plan of salvation.
This is a link to where it came from: http://www.catholic.com/quickquestions/what-is-the-catholic-understanding-of-the-biblical-plan-of-salvation
If you can understand that paragraph from Catholic Answers you can correct your misunderstanding. Will that happen?
Since others here might be just as confused as eagleone so clearly is, I suggest you look at this 8 minute video about salvation:
http://www.catholic.com/video/what-do-catholics-believe-about-salvation
Christians are those who follow Christ. It's not that complicated.
I follow Christ....do you?
9Nicodemus said to Him, “How can these things be?â€
10Jesus answered and said to him, “Are you the teacher of Israel and do not understand these things?
11“Truly, truly, I say to you, we speak of what we know and testify of what we have seen, and you do not accept our testimony.
12“If I told you earthly things and you do not believe, how will you believe if I tell you heavenly things?
13“No one has ascended into heaven, but He who descended from heaven: the Son of Man.
14“As Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, even so must the Son of Man be lifted up;
15so that whoever believes will in Him have eternal life.
16“For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.
17“For God did not send the Son into the world to judge the world, but that the world might be saved through Him.
18“He who believes in Him is not judged; he who does not believe has been judged already, because he has not believed in the name of the only begotten Son of God.
19“This is the judgment, that the Light has come into the world, and men loved the darkness rather than the Light, for their deeds were evil.
20“For everyone who does evil hates the Light, and does not come to the Light for fear that his deeds will be exposed.
21“But he who practices the truth comes to the Light, so that his deeds may be manifested as having been wrought in God.â€
(John 3:9-21 NASB)
Comparing God’s Word to making selections about “brands of bread” would mean we can all have “our” own interpretation of God’s Word. This would be absurd as it is preposterous. What it entails is that there are many” paths to salvation. If that were the case, the early Church Fathers should not have laboriously spent 300 years sorting out the true Word of Christ and authentically attributing to Him, His written word based on what they collectively (the Church) believed is the true Word of Gd. This authority did not vanish into thin air, The authority was to last until the end of time proclaiming ONE truth.
True, there was dissent prior to the Reformation but this is precisely why we have ONE Church that settles the truth for all time. That authority is not given any more to Luther than it is to Billy Graham, to Joel Osteen or David Koresh, Jim Jones, or Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
The truth is not what some corner street pastor says what “he”/”she” or some gay married pastor thinks what the Bible is all about. Without the Eucharist, Easter is nothing more than a vapid Kumbaya song and dance on the beach with the rising sun in the foreground.
The work of great theologians, Catholic and non-Catholic, the vast constellation of converts, saints, and martyrs and stigmatists, make the Catholic Church the ONE true authentic Church that proclaims a central Credo at every celebration of the Mass, that at some place, somewhere, at some time in the world is recited by millions in just about every three seconds. This is the tree of the mustard seed that has spread its branches across time and space.
“And for those who want to know what salvation is I offer this from the Word of God which has been the clear message for almost 2000 years now.”
Except I already posted this:
Good works are required by God because he requires obedience to his commands (Mt 6:1-21, 1 Cor 3:8, 13-15)
and promises to reward us with eternal life if we obey (Mt 25:34-40, Rom 2:6-7, Gal 6:6-10, Jas 1:12).
But even our obedience is impossible without God’s grace; even our good works are God’s gift (Rom 5:5, Phil 2:13). This is the real biblical plan of salvation.
He received his call straight from Christ.
Are you saying God doesn't still call men to be His servants?
As regarding Osteen and the others you always love to cite (excepting Graham), you will know them by their fruits.
By your qualifications the rcc has a great number of priests who would not pass your lofty qualifications and a number of popes either...current one included.
The Bible is clear that we come to Christ through faith/belief in Him.
The fruit we produce, often confused with good works, is a natural outgrowth of the faith that is in us.
However, these good works do not save us. Apart from faith in Christ one can do all the "good" things they want, but that will not save them.
When a person believes Christ that person is sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise (Eph 1:13-14; Ephesians 4:30; 2 Corinthians 1:22). The Holy Spirit is given as a downpayment on our future inheritance. No where in the NT does it ever say this is taken away from us.
And roman catholicism has veered greatly off the road by emphasizing the participation and reliance upon mary for salvation, the re-sacrifice of Christ, indulgences, works to keep salvation, etc.
There is but one way of salvation. Belief in Christ. John 14:6. "I am the way, the truth, the life. No one comes to the Father but through Me."
Jesus is emphatic in this statement that it is through Him and Him alone that one gains salvation.
If that were the case, the early Church Fathers should not have laboriously spent 300 years sorting out the true Word of Christ and authentically attributing to Him, His written word based on what they collectively (the Church) believed is the true Word of Gd. This authority did not vanish into thin air, The authority was to last until the end of time proclaiming ONE truth.
Yes, the early church, the ekklesia, the body of Christian believers, did sort out the contents of the Word as moved by the Holy Spirit.
Do you include Paul in this list of "authority" as he received his calling apart from the other disciples/apostles?
You keep making the same mistake. You have taken upon yourself to interpret “your” thinking about God’s Word. Isn’t this risible, that you try interpreting God’s Word contrary to the very Church by whose Divine authority the books in the Bible were assembled some 300 years ago! For the 100th time, the books in the Bible did not fall from the skies and arrange themselves in the chapters and verses in which you find them.
Either you believe in the Church and its power of sole intepretation of God’s word or should you doubt it, you need to toss out your Bible. You can’t have it both ways.
Strange, isn’t it that you would try contradicting the Word as interpreted by a Church for 2000 years by theologians, scholars, historians, saints, and martyrs.
Here’s a humble suggestion. Instead of wallowing in this shallow nonsense that is Bible Christianity and all its contradictory variants, go get a book on Edith Stein, for example, the Jewish philosopher about her interior struggles of this extraordinary woman as well as the great conflicts she resolves before becoming a Catholic convert, Carmelite, and finally a martyrs of the Holocaust. Or if you want to be truly informed, try getting yourself the 10-part series on Catholicism by the scholar and now Bishop Robert Barron.
Unless you have been exposed to the towering intellectual tradition of the Catholic faith, you will find yourself like the proverbial frog in the well accustomed to a shallow depth and crabbed view of Catholicism as we see from the Grahams, Osteens, Schullers, and Jim Jones’s and David Koresh’s of this world. Each trying to convince their low-IQ Oprah-type congregants that their “interpretation of the God’s Word is authentic.
The Bible isn't as complicated as you would like to make.
As John noted, these things have been written so you can know.
“Context and sound hermeneutics are key in understanding the verses you cite else you are practicing eisegesis instead of exegesis.”
All Protestants must by necessity practice eisegesis. Again, the Bible is clear about the necessity of obedience to God.
“The Bible is clear that we come to Christ through faith/belief in Him.”
And no one is denying that here.
“The fruit we produce, often confused with good works, is a natural outgrowth of the faith that is in us.”
The fruit we produce - is started by God in us - and we cooperate with His grace. And those good works - and it is deniable that’s what they are since they are started by God - is one way God chooses to share His grace with us.
“However, these good works do not save us.”
No one here is claiming they do. But God’s grace does save us. And cooperating with God’s graceful actions within us allows God another avenue - for lack of better way of putting it off the top of my head - for giving us grace.
“Apart from faith in Christ one can do all the “good” things they want, but that will not save them.”
You keep attacking something that no one here is promoting. Again, we see that the most common tendency among anti-Catholics is to revile and attack what they apparently do not know and do not understand.
As Catholic Answers says - in yet another article filled with scripture and perfectly sound interpretation which you probably will ignore:
The truth is, it is the grace of Christ alone that saves us by our cooperating with that grace in fulfilling the “law of Christ.†This is precisely what St. Paul teaches in Galatians 3:2-3, 5:2-6. And take note how he writes concerning these same “Judaizers:â€
Let me ask you only this: Did you receive the Spirit by works of the law, or by hearing with faith? Are you so foolish? Having begun with the Spirit, are you now ending with the flesh… (5:2) Now I Paul say to you that if you receive circumcision, Christ will be of no advantage to you. I testify again to every man who receives circumcision that he is bound to keep the whole law. You are severed from Christ, you who would be justified by the law; you have fallen away from grace. For through the Spirit, by faith, we wait for the hope of righteousness (Gr. dikaiosune—justification). For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is of any avail, but faith working through love.
Notice St. Paul’s emphasis on our being in grace and our working through the Spirit and in Christ in order to remain in Christ. Back in Romans, St. Paul said very similarly.
Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand and we rejoice in our hope of sharing the glory of God. (Romans 5:1-2)
In Romans 6:16, St. Paul goes on to tell us that after baptism (cf. Romans 6:3-4) obedience to Christ (that means good works!) leads us to justification while sin (that means bad works!) will lead us to death:
Do you not know that if you yield yourselves to any one as obedient slaves, you are slaves of the one whom you obey, either of sin, which leads to death (Gr.—eis thanaton, “unto deathâ€), or of obedience, which leads to righteousness (Gr.—eis dikaiosunen—unto justification).
Notice: St. Paul makes it very clear. Obedience leads to justification and eternal life while sin leads to eternal death (see also Romans 6:23). Thus, St. Paul’s emphasis is not just on works, but works done in and through the power of Christ. In Romans 8:1-14, St. Paul tells us in no uncertain terms that we must be in Christ and continuing to live our lives in Christ in order to do works that please God.
There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus… who walk not according to the flesh but according to the Spirit… and those who are in the flesh cannot please God… So, then, brethren, we are debtors, not to the flesh, to live according to the flesh – for if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live. For all who are led by the Spirit of God are the sons of God.
The key, again, is to remember St. Paul is emphasizing our continuing in Christ, or, in his grace or “kindness.†In Romans 11:22, he says it this way:
Note then the kindness and severity of God: severity toward those who have fallen, but God’s kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness; otherwise you too will be cut off.
Just so no one would get the wrong idea of what St. Paul was saying, it seems, he put it plain and simple in Galatians 5:19-21 and 6:7-9. There is no way we can get “justification by faith alone†that excludes works as necessary for justification in any and every sense if we read these texts carefully. St. Paul makes clear that if Christians allow themselves to be dominated by their “flesh,†or lower nature, they will not make it to heaven.
Now the works of the flesh are plain: immorality, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissension, party spirit, envy, drunkenness, carousing and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God... (6:7) Do not be deceived; God is not mocked, for whatever a man sows, that he will also reap. For he who sows to his own flesh will from the flesh reap corruption (eternal death); but he who sows to the Spirit will from the Spirit reap eternal life. And let us not grow weary in well-doing, for in due season we shall reap, if we do not lose heart.
Here St. Paul teaches that through good works, or continuing to “sow to the Spirit,†we will be rewarded with eternal life, but only if we persevere.
When a person believes Christ that person is sealed by the Holy Spirit of promise (Eph 1:13-14; Ephesians 4:30; 2 Corinthians 1:22). The Holy Spirit is given as a downpayment on our future inheritance. No where in the NT does it ever say this is taken away from us.
The whole article is written by a former Protestant. You might want to read it. You probably won’t. http://www.catholic.com/blog/tim-staples/are-good-works-necessary-for-salvation
what is this? …
It's like the suffering that purifies us here on earth. You don't resent it. It can make you bitter, or make you better. When you accept what the Father has sent or permitted to you, it makes you better.
Suffering is not incompatible with grace. Jesus suffered on the Cross for all of us, and thus paid the price for our salvation.. Was He not full of grace? All the time?
The Bereans were limited to the Old Testament.
Great Plan. /SARC
And no one is denying that here.
Except the claim by Pope Leo XIII that no one can come to Christ except through Mary.
Except what St Louis Marie de Montfort said, To reach the Eternal Father, we must go to Jesus, our Mediator of Redemption . . . To go to Jesus, we must go to Mary: she is our Mediatrix of Intercession.
Except when....The way of salvation is open to no one except through Mary. St. Alphonsus Maria Liguori
>>“However, these good works do not save us.â€<<
No one here is claiming they do.
Except when indulgences are brought up.
Except when penance is brought up.
Except when the rcc teaches one can lose salvation in contradiction to Ephesians and Corinthians as previously noted unless penance and indulgences have been properly executed.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.