Posted on 02/07/2005 9:05:30 AM PST by skellmeyer
Roughly half of America dislike everything George Bush says, but that doesn’t mean he isn’t the President of the United States. This is a point too few people keep in mind. Take, for instance, the example of Stas, a very nice Orthodox man, who read my recent piece on concerning the Muslim reporter who implicitly threatened to kill me and nuke America. He thought the piece excellent except for my statement that the Pope was the head of Christianity: “As for the Pope, 1 billion various protestants and 300 million Orthodox don't follow his words and that's half of Christianity.” To keep things honest, a Mormon and a Protestant also voiced essentially this disagreement.
I could have pointed out, as I do here, that his statement proves nothing about either the Pope or the President, but I demurred. Instead, I merely pointed out that there are no major theological differences between Orthodoxy and Catholicism, apart from a minor theological point concerning the generation of the Holy Spirit and his aforementioned quibble concerning the Pope. He insisted I was wrong, and in attempting to demonstrate his case, he inadvertently made a connection between Orthodoxy and Islam that I had read about, but never really seen in action before.
(Excerpt) Read more at bridegroompress.com ...
bttt
You said: "The Hadiths are legal rulings based on the Koran."
Sorry, that is wrong. They are simply what Mohammed has stated and done and have nothing to do with the Koran itself. Let me quote the Muslims directly:
"These reports are known as Hadiths (meaning “statements”, but often called Traditions in English). They have been handed down to us from the Companions, the Muslims who lived at the time of the Prophet."
"Actually, a Hadith might be a report of what the Prophet (peace and blessings be upon him) said, did, or what he approved or disapproved of. The collection of the deeds, practices, and words of the Prophet—known from the Hadiths—is known as the Sunnah, and it forms the second source of Islamic Law after the Qur’an."
http://www.islam-online.net/English/introducingislam/Prophet/Said/article01.shtml
What I meant by Protestants deemphasize the Trinity is that some Protestants just talk about the Old Testament all the time - hardly mentioning Jesus or reading from the New Testament.
See my link @ #202.
There are Protestant sects that actually deny Trinity.
You don't need to defend yourself.
You need to repent.
Those too.
By definition, you're wrong.
If not, I can call Eastern Christianity the cradle of every Christological or Trinitarian heresy ever.
I've seen other EOs criticizing the West for having paid too much attention to Augustine ever since his own lifetime. This is probably too slippery a distinction to be worth arguing over.
The first heresies did arise in the East, but no time was wasted for the Church to treat such as heresies.
I wonder what Athanasius would have made of that during his many apparent defeats.
Compare that to the way Protestants reject the Jehovah's Witnesses and similars without any need for protracted struggles or deliberations. I'm not criticizing the early theologians of course; merely being early meant they had to fight to initial outbreaks of heresy, rather than revivals of already-defeated heresies, and had to work out the precise formulations instead of having them already written. But do be accurate about what happened.
As far as St. Augustine is concerned, his works did not reach the East until the 16th century. Those dealing with the "original sin" were unknown to the Eastern Church and were rejected. But he is a venerated Saint in the East as well as in the West.
If there is one thing that all three major devisions of Christianity share in common, and that neither Luther nor Calvin questioned is the Trinity. That is about the only thing that binds all of us into one disunited ekklesia. Those sects that reject Trinity are simply not any more "Christian" then all the different flavors of Gnostics.
In any case I took issue with this article's position that Orthodox Christians some how share a similar view of what the essence of God is.
My point was that on a superficial level I could find more similarities with Islam and SOME Protestant sects as well.
I was not comparing on a one to one basis and saying they were the same.
If Protestantism is a division of Christianity and if anti-Trinitarian aren't Christian, than by definition an anti-Trinitarian can't be Protestant. No more than something which isn't a bird can be a parakeet.
Which is what I meant in my reply to #207.
I couldn't agree more. You mean to tell me that Protestants actually call anti-triniterian non-Christians?
Yes.
So far, the poll of 3 honest Catholics on this thread has resulted in a "conclusion" that 2 out of 3 Catholics believe if one doesn't worship the Pope, his wife is a "prostitute" and his children are "corpses".
If this is true... well, it doesn't reflect very well on Catholics.
If this is not true... I wonder why more Catholics, such as those you pinged earlier, aren't voicing disagreement?
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.