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To: metmom

your comment: “And just now is 1 John 1:9 wrong?” I didn’t say that, but you ignored the rest of the story:

Christ told the apostles to follow his example: “As the Father has sent me, even so I send you” (John 20:21). Just as the apostles were to carry Christ’s message to the whole world, so they were to carry his forgiveness: “Truly, I say to you, whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven” (Matt. 18:18).

This power was understood as coming from God: “All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation” (2 Cor. 5:18).

Your comment: “There is no grace needed for those who have no sin.” The Blessed Mother is Full of Grace.

Your comment: “ They HAVE to in order to be free from sin.”
It was implied that one continues to be in mortal sin. If one repents and receives forgiveness through the Sacrament of Reconciliation, then graces are received.

You can obtain supernatural life by yielding to actual graces you receive. God keeps giving you these divine pushes, and all you have to do is go along.

For instance, he moves you to repentance, and if you take the hint you can find yourself in the
confessional, where the guilt for your sins is remitted (John 20:21–23). Through the sacrament of penance, through your reconciliation to God, you receive sanctifying grace. But you can lose it again by sinning mortally (1 John 5:16–17).

Keep that word in mind: mortal. It means death. Mortal sins are deadly sins because they kill off this supernatural life, this sanctifying grace. Mortal sins can’t coexist with the supernatural life, because by their nature such sins are saying “No” to God, while sanctifying grace would be saying “Yes.”

Your comment: “Purgatory doesn’t cleanse sin.”

All Christians agree that we won’t be sinning in heaven. Sin and final glorification are utterly incompatible. Therefore, between the sinfulness of this life and the glories of heaven, we must be made pure. Between death and glory there is a purification.

Thus, the Catechism of the Catholic Church states: “All who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven. The Church gives the name purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is entirely different from the punishment of the damned” (CCC 1030–1).

The concept of an after-death purification from sin and the consequences of sin is also stated in the New Testament in passages such as 1 Corinthians 3:11–15 and Matthew 5:25–26, 12:31–32.

The doctrine of purgatory, or the final purification, has been part of the true faith since before the time of Christ. The Jews already believed it before the coming of the Messiah, as revealed in the Old Testament (2 Macc. 12:41–45) as well as in other pre-Christian Jewish works, such as one which records that Adam will be in mourning “until the day of dispensing punishment in the last years, when I will turn his sorrow into joy” (The Life of Adam and Eve 46–7). Orthodox Jews to this day believe in the final purification, and for eleven months after the death of a loved one, they pray a prayer called the Mourner’s Kaddish for their loved one’s purification.

Jews, Catholics, and the Eastern Orthodox have always historically proclaimed the reality of the final purification. It was not until the Protestant Reformation in the sixteenth century that anyone denied this doctrine. As the quotes below from the early Church Fathers show, purgatory has been part of the Christian faith from the very beginning.

Some imagine that the Catholic Church has an elaborate doctrine of purgatory worked out, but there are only three essential components of the doctrine: (1) that a purification after death exists, (2) that it involves some kind of pain, and (3) that the purification can be assisted by the prayers and offerings by the living to God. Other ideas, such that purgatory is a particular “place” in the afterlife or that it takes time to accomplish, are speculations rather than doctrines.


10 posted on 02/19/2017 9:21:17 AM PST by ADSUM
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To: ADSUM
For instance, he moves you to repentance, and if you take the hint you can find yourself in the confessional, where the guilt for your sins is remitted (John 20:21–23). Through the sacrament of penance, through your reconciliation to God, you receive sanctifying grace. But you can lose it again by sinning mortally (1 John 5:16–17).

Agree that God does move us to repentance.

However, John 20:21-23 has nothing to do with the roman catholic confessional booth or having to confess your sins to a priest. That is not evidenced in the NT church.

The Greek in 1 John, and the NT for that matter, tells us that if we believe Jesus is the Son of God, we do indeed have eternal life.

This false doctrine of mortal sins is not supported by the NT nor is the concept of purgatory and penance.

If there is any "work" we can do to prove our worthiness before God, the cross is nullified.

This passage from Colossians addressings exactly what Christ did for us when He died on the cross.

13When you were dead in your transgressions and the uncircumcision of your flesh, He made you alive together with Him, having forgiven us all our transgressions, 14having canceled out the certificate of debt consisting of decrees against us, which was hostile to us; and He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross. Col 2:13-14 NASB

As the certificate of debt is cancelled out the roman catholic concept of purgatory where we go to "get cleaned up" is voided.

but if we walk in the Light as He Himself is in the Light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus His Son cleanses us from all sin. 1 John 1:7 NASB

The blood of Christ either cleanses us from all of our sins or it doesn't.

The secure position of the believer is further made clear by Paul in Ephesians where he writes:

7In Him we have redemption through His blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of His grace 8which He lavished on us. In all wisdom and insight 9He made known to us the mystery of His will, according to His kind intention which He purposed in Him 10with a view to an administration suitable to the fullness of the times, that is, the summing up of all things in Christ, things in the heavens and things on the earth. In Him 11also we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to His purpose who works all things after the counsel of His will, 12to the end that we who were the first to hope in Christ would be to the praise of His glory. 13In Him, you also, after listening to the message of truth, the gospel of your salvation—having also believed, you were sealed in Him with the Holy Spirit of promise, 14who is given as a pledge of our inheritance, with a view to the redemption of God’s own possession, to the praise of His glory. Ephesians 1:7-14 NASB

The astute reader will note our redemption is through His blood, we have forgiveness of our trespasses, we have an inheritance, after believing in Him, we are sealed by the Spirit, who is given as a pledge of our inheritance.

There is no good deed or work we can do to earn our salvation much as the roman catholic wants there to be.

Keep that word in mind: mortal. It means death. Mortal sins are deadly sins because they kill off this supernatural life, this sanctifying grace. Mortal sins can’t coexist with the supernatural life, because by their nature such sins are saying “No” to God, while sanctifying grace would be saying “Yes.”

This is yet another falsehood by the roman catholic church. Paul wrote "23for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God, 24being justified as a gift by His grace through the redemption which is in Christ Jesus; 25whom God displayed publicly as a propitiation in His blood through faith. This was to demonstrate His righteousness, because in the forbearance of God He passed over the sins previously committed; 26for the demonstration, I say, of His righteousness at the present time, so that He would be just and the justifier of the one who has faith in Jesus. Rms 3:23-26 NASB

Paul notes everyone...including Mary, has sinned. There are no exceptions save Christ of course.

Later in Romans 6:23 Paul wrote "the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord."

Paul did not say, the wages of mortal sin, is death. He indicates all sin leads to death.

The catholic belief you can have the "little sins" or venial sins which don't have to be confessed to remain in fellowship with God, and still be right with God, shows a lack of understanding of sin. It goes back to a works based mentality which is rejected by the NT.

All sin separates us from God apart from faith in Christ.

The doctrine of purgatory, or the final purification, has been part of the true faith since before the time of Christ. The Jews already believed it before the coming of the Messiah, as revealed in the Old Testament (2 Macc. 12:41–45) as well as in other pre-Christian Jewish works, such as one which records that Adam will be in mourning “until the day of dispensing punishment in the last years, when I will turn his sorrow into joy” (The Life of Adam and Eve 46–7). Orthodox Jews to this day believe in the final purification, and for eleven months after the death of a loved one, they pray a prayer called the Mourner’s Kaddish for their loved one’s purification.

The appeal to Orthodox Jews again shows a works based mentality on the part of the roman catholic as the Orthodox do not believe Jesus is the Messiah.

But you may be on to something as it does not appear that many roman catholics have complete faith in the forgiveness of Christ through His shed blood which may also explain the roman catholic appeal to Mary for so much.

Peter, however, captures what Christ did for us on the cross and what belief in Him actually does for the believer.

24and He Himself bore our sins in His body on the cross, so that we might die to sin and live to righteousness; for by His wounds you were healed. 25For you were continually straying like sheep, but now you have returned to the Shepherd and Guardian of your souls. 1 Peter 2:24-25 NASB

15 posted on 02/19/2017 11:01:48 AM PST by ealgeone
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