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 ...
My friend, you are ALREADY being punished. You allow divorce up to four times - that's not anything the early Christians allowed, it is an absolute break with millenia of Christian doctrine and practice and it is a terrible wound on the Orthodox and the Protestants.
You permit the use of contraception. All hormonal contraceptives are abortifacients. Thus, you're schismatic theology is killing your children and turning your wives into objects to be used, turns your men into heartless fools.
Everyone who ignores the words of the Pope injures themselves grievously. The Pope is merciful and tries to heal your wounds by teaching you the Truth, but you will not listen.
It would help if you familiarized yourself with Catholic documents before you made such foolish assertions. The Church has always said - Vatican II repeats this, btw - that anyone who rejects the teachings of the Church while simultaneously acknowledging the Church is the true one condemns himself to hell. Few people are quite that stupid. That is the intended sense of the passage. You can make up all kinds of things by mis-reading the passage, but I can't help that.
Tha analogy still fails due to the fact that no other country in the world, and certainly not the USA, recognized the legitimacy of the CSA. However, nobody in their right mind would refuse to recognize the legitimacy of the Orthodox or Southern Baptist denominations as existing Christian denominations.
As for whether Orthodoxy split off from Roman Catholicism or vice versa, clearly the two sides disagree on that issue.
Your refusal to admit that the Pope is not the head of these other denominations is as nutty as if GWB refused to admit that Tony Blair is the Prime Minister of the UK.
None of the ancient sees established by the apostles survive unbroken to this day except for Rome, the ancient see of Peter. All the patriarchates are beneath Rome in terms of authority as any perusal of the first three hundred years of Church history easily shows.
The Orthodox Churches actually admit that, of the 5 patriarchs, Rome's is first among equals. However, the Orthodox Church simply does not admit that the Pope is the head of Christianity, and neither does any other Christian denomination.
Your claims fly in the face of reality.
You permit the use of contraception. All hormonal contraceptives are abortifacients. Thus, you're schismatic theology is killing your children and turning your wives into objects to be used, turns your men into heartless fools.
(Shrug) That is irrelevant to our discussion. Whatever theological differences you want to talk about have nothing to do with the fact that the Pope only has power over other Roman Catholics.
Everyone who ignores the words of the Pope injures themselves grievously. The Pope is merciful and tries to heal your wounds by teaching you the Truth, but you will not listen.
You just seem to miss the point that even though the Pope is certainly a moral authority for Christians of any denomination, his words have no more power to a non-Roman Catholic than the words of any other mortal.
xzins already pointed out your little historic miscue of overlooking the Orthodox Churches in this regard, but you also missed Marting Luther. Henry even wrote impassioned treatises arguing against Luther's "refromist heresies," defending the Catholic Church. I think he was currying favor with the Pope for one of his annulments.
The Pope has authority, not power.
You don't seem to understand. The presence or absence of another country recognizing the CSA presupposes that the country doing that is both really a country and really competent to make the judgment.
Now, there is only one Church. Jesus did not establish multiple churches, just one, all part of one body, His. So the analogy is not perfect because we live in a world with multiple countries, but only one True Church.
Any group which has valid apostolic succession (like the Orthodox) thereby has seven valid sacraments (like the Orthodox) and draws her power from the ONE Church headed by the Pope. If that group refuses to communicate with her head, she has rebelled, broken off, as Lee did against Lincoln, yet she remains fully Catholic in all but obedience.
Other groups which broke off without benefit of keeping valid apostolic succession (like the Lutherans and all their off-shoots, or the Anglicans) are simply ecclesial communities, a bunch of lay people who have only baptism and marriage as sacraments and are too at a loss for grace to fully recognize even those remnants of grace that come to them through the power of the Catholic Church.
Your claims fly in the face of reality
Your opinions are, fortunately, not reality. :)
You turn your wives into prostitutes and your children into corpses and that's not relevant to theological discussion? Ok. Whatever.
You just seem to miss the point that even though the Pope is certainly a moral authority for Christians of any denomination, his words have no more power to a non-Roman Catholic than the words of any other mortal.
And as long as you refuse the power of his words, your wives will be prostitutes and your children corpses. Your theology would have it so because you will not listen to the Vicar of Christ.
Absolutely. What's your point?
Now, there is only one Church. Jesus did not establish multiple churches, just one, all part of one body, His. So the analogy is not perfect because we live in a world with multiple countries, but only one True Church.
That's the argument, of course. And only about half the world's Christians agree with your view that the RCC is that True Church.
Any group which has valid apostolic succession (like the Orthodox) thereby has seven valid sacraments (like the Orthodox) and draws her power from the ONE Church headed by the Pope. If that group refuses to communicate with her head, she has rebelled, broken off, as Lee did against Lincoln, yet she remains fully Catholic in all but obedience.
That is a RCC interpretation of history. The Orthodox Church would disagree and there is nothing that the RCC can do to prove that their's is the correct version of history. So sorry.
Other groups which broke off without benefit of keeping valid apostolic succession (like the Lutherans and all their off-shoots, or the Anglicans) are simply ecclesial communities, a bunch of lay people who have only baptism and marriage as sacraments and are too at a loss for grace to fully recognize even those remnants of grace that come to them through the power of the Catholic Church.
That is a RCC interpretation of history. The Protestant Christians would disagree and there is nothing that the RCC can do to prove that their's is the correct version of history. So sorry.
I can do this all day, of course, since you have nothing but your Church's opinions to back your arguments and I have nothing but mine to back mine.
Oh, and BTW, I was married in an RCC church and have full respect for your denomination. I see your way to be no more valid than mine, or that of Anglicans, Baptists, Lutherans etc.
Further, all those things are to be believed with divine and Catholic faith which are contained in the Word of God, written or handed down, and which the Church, either by a solemn judgment, or by her ordinary and universal magisterium, proposes for belief as having been divinely revealed. And since, without faith, it is impossible to please God, and to attain to the fellowship of his children, therefore without faith no one has ever attained justification, nor will any one obtain eternal life unless he shall have persevered in faith unto the end...The first condition of salvation is to keep the rule of the true faith.
If any one, therefore, shall say that blessed Peter the Apostle was not appointed the Prince of all the Apostles and the visible Head of the whole Church militant; or that the same directly and immediately received from the same our Lord Jesus Christ a primacy of honor only, and not of true and proper jurisdiction: let him be anathema.
If, then, any should deny that it is by institution of Christ the Lord, or by divine right, that blessed Peter should have a perpetual line of successors in the Primacy over the universal Church, or that the Roman Pontiff is the successor of blessed Peter in this primacy: let him be anathema.
We teach and define that it is a dogma divinely revealed: that the Roman Pontiff, when he speaks ex cathedra, that is, when in discharge of the office of pastor and doctor of all Christians, by virtue of his supreme Apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine regarding faith and morals to be held by the universal Church, by the divine assistance promised to him in blessed Peter, is possessed of that infallibility with which the divine redeemer willed that his Church should be endowed for defining doctrine regarding faith or morals; and that therefore such definitions of the Roman Pontiff are irreformable of themselves, and not from the consent of the Church. But if any one—which may God avert—presume to contradict this our definition: let him be anathema.
This is the teaching of Catholic truth, from which no one can deviate without loss of faith and salvation (Philip Schaff, The Creeds of Christendom (New York: Harper, 1877), Dogmatic Decrees of the Vatican Council, On Faith, Chapter III; Chp. 4, pp. 266-71).
Vatican II
This sacred Synod turns its attention first to the Catholic faithful. Basing itself upon sacred Scripture and tradition, it teaches that the Church, now sojourning on earth as an exile, is necessary for salvation. For Christ, made present to us in His body, which is the Church, is the one Mediator and the unique Way of salvation. In explicit terms He Himself affirmed the necessity of faith and baptism (cf. Mk 16:16; Jn. 3:5) and thereby affirmed also the necessity of the Church, for through baptism as through a door men enter the Church. Whosoever, therefore, knowing that the Catholic Church was made necessary by God through Jesus Christ, would refuse to enter her or to remain in her could not be saved. (Your point)
When the Vatican rescinds Vatican I please post the declaration.
You're a brave man, calling my wife a prostitute from behind a computer monitor. I would not reccomend doing that to my face.
Okay, you want to throw insults around? At least Orthodoxy has not spent the last several decades being taken over by pedophiles and homosexuals. What does it say about you that you belong to a church that has condoned the victimization of children?
And as long as you refuse the power of his words, your wives will be prostitutes and your children corpses. Your theology would have it so because you will not listen to the Vicar of Christ.
Perhaps you should clean your own house before you critisize others. Unless, of course, child molestation is part of what the Vicar of Christ teaches.
If the Pope is so great and wise, why has he allowed such crimes to go on for so long?
The Pope has no authority over anyone other than members of the RCC.
I'd like some input from other Catholics. Is this really how you view the rest of us?
It could be argued he is not the head of the RCC either.. only part of it.. course you can get into the discussion of what IS a Roman Catholic.?. with what is a "Christian".. to follow..
People the world over think they have some poor old "God(s)" locked into an iron clad contract with "them" as his lawyer....
Any real God would be laughing at the arrogance of it all..
BUT, what if he(God) isn't laughing at all, but is really pissed off.?.
HUMANS.?.. (Eddie Murphy laugh).. [YEAH mee too]
Your thoughts please.
I'm not interested in getting in a lengthy discussion, but even the Pope would not make the claim that he has power over all Christians--a claim that is demonstrably false. There is a difference between power and authority, although I realize that non-Catholics often have a problem understanding that.
Thank you. Are you a Catholic? If so, what say you?
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