Ivory Coast [Catholic] Bishop Warns Against ‘Prosperity Gospel’

YAOUNDÉ, Cameroon - Catholic leaders in the Ivory Coast are warning against preachers spreading a so-called “prosperity Gospel” - which often includes giving large sums of money with a promise of a heavenly financial blessing in return.

Nigerian preacher Chris Oyakhilome is an example, promising that “your miracle is in your offering” and that if a person is in financial difficulty or suffering from disease, they must give generously to his ministry to receive their needed “miracle.”

“All giving is a demonstration of our faith in God and his word,” he said in a podcast widely distributed in western Africa. Oyakhilome also said believers should give generously, because it will become a pathway to wealth, health and good luck.

The phenomenon was discussed during the first congress of the Reflection and Production Cell of Ivory Coast Theologians (CEREPTI), which took place Sep. 11-14 in Yamoussoukro.

Bishop Ignace Bessi Dogbo of Katiola, the president of the bishops’ conference in the Ivory Coast, denounced the influence such preachers were having even in the Catholic Church, and called on Catholic theologians to effectively present the “true Gospel of Christ” in the face of “the excesses and deviations which constitute an affront to Catholic orthodoxy and orthopraxy.”

The bishop said Catholic theologians had a duty to face up to the “heresies” which threaten Catholic identity - heresies promoted by “communities which mushroom everywhere by road sides claiming to be Christian, but which deny the centrality of the Cross, and preach that prosperity could come like a magic wand.”

Dogbo called on the theologians to work with the country’s bishops to constitute a rampart against these excesses, and to be true promoters of Catholic doctrine.

“I’ve read thousands of pages of original source church history.”

1) Apparently not.

2) You seem completely incapable of posting any “original source church history” that proves your point.

3) And I knew that would be the case because I really did read “thousands of pages of original source church history” in LATIN from exactly the time period in question and did a PhD in Medieval History on the history of the Church in the Middle Ages. I know what I’m talking about. You not only don’t seem to know what you’re talking about but you can’t offer a single shred of evidence to prove your claim.

Which brings me to:

4) Put up or shut up.

“I know what history shows about Rome approving and getting a cut of traveling indulgence sales.”

The Church never once authorized sales. Put up or shut up.

“I know the perversion of Scripture and stilted logic that led to the justification of the sale of indulgences.”

No, actually I doubt you do, and, in any case, there was no authorization for any sale of indulgences by the Church.

One of three things will now happen:

1) You’ll keep posting without any evidence.
2) You’ll keep posting with non-evidence and claim it proves something it doesn’t.
3) You’ll embrace the second part of “Put up or shut up.”

The choice is yours.

Glad, you forgot #4!

“No matter what is presented to you, you will claim it is false.”

So I historically just post, “sure Vlad.”

.........

But for any one wanting to do their own research, start here:

1507 Pope Julius II declares a “Jubilee Indulgence”, to raise money to rebuild St Peter’s Basilica (renewed twice, in 1513 and 1515). Those who contribute toward the rebuilding fund get years shaved off their time in purgatory.

1514 Albrecht of Brandenburg becomes Archbishop of Mainz and Primate of the German Empire at age 24 - buying his offices (!), using a large loan.

To pay his loan back, Albrecht sought and received permission to sell the “jubilee indulgence” in his territory.

The deal was that Albrecht could keep a chunk for loan repayment, and the rest would go to the rebuilding of St. Peter’s.

Albrecht hired a traveling Roman Catholic barker, Johann Tetzel to extract maximum money from the faithful by hawking these indulgences.

Th fully displayed his papal authorization symbols on his caravan, as Tetzel collected money.

This was a major issue in the Reformation. Under assault by Luther, Rome refused to change.

Trent later addressed the financial abuses, but continued the perversity of the false teaching of a treasury of merit and other indulgences.

.........

And for you Vlad, sure.

Thanks for proving me right yet again.

As I said: “2) You’ll keep posting with non-evidence and claim it proves something it doesn’t.”

And then you did exactly that:

“1507 Pope Julius II declares a “Jubilee Indulgence”, to raise money to rebuild St Peter’s Basilica (renewed twice, in 1513 and 1515). Those who contribute toward the rebuilding fund get years shaved off their time in purgatory.”

Declaring an indulgence in no way authorizes a sale of indulgences. Thanks for proving my point.

“1514 Albrecht of Brandenburg becomes Archbishop of Mainz and Primate of the German Empire at age 24 - buying his offices (!), using a large loan.”

And he did not authorize the sale of indulgences. He, in fact, wrote an authorization letter where he not only showed donations should differ depending on one’s station in life - thereby showing there were to be no sales - but he also explicitly stipulated the poor were to receive the indulgence too. Hence, no sales whatsoever. Thanks again for proving my point.

Your points have been refuted time and time again in this forum: See post #177 here for instance: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/2648984/posts?page=177

Or here in post 355 where I go through Albrecht’s instruction letter showing no sales of indulgences were to take place: http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/religion/3466712/posts?q=1&;page=355

What it means is that due to the dire need for money by the infamous Leo X, then as even the Catholic Encyclopedia states , "jubilees and indulgences were degraded almost entirely into financial transactions," and Rome permitted Albert of Brandenburg to have preached in his territory the plenary indulgence promised all those who contributed to the new St. Peter's.

Meaning that the indulgence Leo X granted by the the bull Sacrosancti Salvatoris et Redemptoris (March 31, 1513) became "an object of barter in a wholesale commercial transaction." What one could purchase was "a confession certificate, by virtue of which one could confess to any priest at any desired time in his later life sins reserved to the pope." (History of the Church: Reformation and Counter Reformation edited by Hubert Jedin, John Patrick Dolan, p. 45 )

Therefore, since confession requires penitence, then it is stated that indulgences were not sold and the Church never authorized the sale of indulgences.

Dogbo called on the theologians to work with the country’s bishops to constitute a rampart against these excesses, and to be true promoters of Catholic doctrine.

Oh HELL yes!!!!

Can't have anything cutting in on THEIR little scam; can we!!?

"One indeed is the universal Church of the faithful, outside which no one at all is saved, in which the priest himself is the sacrifice, Jesus Christ, whose body and blood are truly contained in the sacrament of the altar under the species of bread and wine; the bread (changed) into His body by the divine power of transubstantiation, and the wine into the blood, so that to accomplish the mystery of unity we ourselves receive from His (nature) what He Himself received from ours."

--Pope Innocent III and Lateran Council IV (A.D. 1215)

To further clarify, Leo X granted a plenary indulgence , the remission of all temporal punishment for all sins, such as would voluntarily contribute to the building of the church St. Peter (who at one time lived in a house of a tanner by the sea), but with half of the money being for Bishop Albrecht von Mainz, the authorized papal agent for the indulgence granted by the papal Bull Sacrosanctis salvatoris et redemptoris, to repay money loaned him from an Augsburg banker in order to illegally obtain pastoral office. As Jedin affirms , "the whole thing was a full-fledged scandal."

However, since what was actually given in response to a donation was a confession certificate, which required penitent confession to any priest at any desired time in his later life in order to receive the indulgence, then technically it is asserted that Rome never authorized the actual sale of indulgences. Meaning that Rome sold a conditional promise of remission of the temporal punishment due to sin.

Note that in support of indulgences 1 Peter 4:8 is invoked, “ … love covers a multitude of sins,” as well in the apocryphal fable, Tobit 12:9, that “almsgiving delivers from death, and it will purge away every sin.” However, while it is true that God can chastise us for sins in order to work repentance, (2 Samuel 7:14; 1 Corinthians 11:32; Hebrews 12:5-13; Revelation 3:19) including sins of ignorance (and God can have regard to the intercession of others for such: James 5:14,15), as well as for sins that are put away, but for which cause public scandal, (2 Samuel 12:13-14ff) or that we need to learn obedience from, as well as provide chastisement in order to keep us from sin and for character development , (Job 42:5; Ecclesiastes 7:3; 2 Corinthians 12:7-9) yet this all takes place in this life, (1 Peter 1:6,7) with its trials and temptations.

Thus while we often read of souls, from Job to Christ suffering by such (the latter as God, yet in being tempted in all points as well are, yet without sin), the only suffering for believers that is manifestly taught as after this life is that of the judgment seat of Christ, which does not begin at death, but awaits the Lord's return, (1 Corinthians 4:5; 2 Timothy. 4:1,8; Revelation 11:18; Matthew 25:31-46; 1 Peter 1:7; 5:4) and which judgment is the suffering of the loss of rewards (and the Lord's displeasure) due to the manner of material one built the church with, which one is saved despite the loss of such, not because of. (1 Corinthians 3:8ff)

Also, though warranting judgment, God will be merciful to those who are penitent, (1 Kings 21:27-29) and by Christ give mercy and grace to such as give the same, (Acts 10:31; 2 Timothy 1:16; 1 Peter 5:5) as well as have regard to the Godly intercession of others for those who are being chastened, (Mark 2:1-12; James 5:14,15) yet this is not restricted to clergy (though as a class it is expected they would be the most Godly, and who lead in judicial discipline), but extends to all those of holy faith and fervent prayer. And the only exhortation to confessing sins in the NT is to each other in general, who can engage in spiritual binding and loosing:

Confess your faults one to another, and pray one for another, that ye may be healed. The effectual fervent prayer of a righteous man availeth much. Elias was a man subject to like passions as we are, and he prayed earnestly that it might not rain: and it rained not on the earth by the space of three years and six months. And he prayed again, and the heaven gave rain, and the earth brought forth her fruit. Brethren, if any of you do err from the truth, and one convert him; Let him know, that he which converteth the sinner from the error of his way shall save a soul from death, and shall hide a multitude of sins. (James 5:16-20)

And who join with leadership in judicially binding in spiritual binding and loosing, with no less than the apostle Paul looking to the congregation to loose one whom they bound in chastisement under his leadership.

In the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, when ye are gathered together, and my spirit, with the power of our Lord Jesus Christ, To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus. (1 Corinthians 5:4-5)

To whom ye forgive any thing, I forgive also: for if I forgave any thing, to whom I forgave it, for your sakes forgave I it in the person of Christ; (2 Corinthians 2:10)

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