Posted on 04/14/2005 12:00:51 PM PDT by Dean Baker
Baptist church 'fake pope' sign attracting attention, criticism By JEANNINE F. HUNTER, hunter@knews.com April 13, 2005
NEWPORT, Tenn. - Two days after being posted, a church marquee message that questions the purpose of the papacy is still attracting attention in this small community.
"What I am trying to do is to let people know there's only one way to heaven through Jesus Christ," said the Rev. Cline Franklin, pastor of Hilltop Baptist Church. "There's no need for help. God sent his son, Jesus Christ. We're all priests if we're saved. I don't need to go to anybody else to pray."
The sign's side facing Broadway, the main thoroughfare in Newport, reads, "No truth, No hope Following a hell-bound pope!" On the other side, facing the church parking lot, it reads: "False hope in a fake pope."
The message appeared days after Pope John Paul II's funeral last week.
"It is unfortunate when it comes from within the Christian church. It's really sad," said the Rev. Dan Whitman, 54, pastor of Newport's Good Shepherd Catholic parish and Holy Trinity parish in Jefferson City. "You learn how to deal with it and pray not to be that way yourself."
It does not reflect mainstream Baptist thought, said Dr. Merrill "Mel" Hawkins, associate professor of religion and director of the Center for Baptist Studies at Carson-Newman College in Jefferson City.
"When you see signs like that, they are almost like relics or artifacts of a bygone era," Hawkins said.
He spoke about animus between Protestants and Catholics persisting after the Protestant Reformation and for centuries, during which "harsh things were said, couched within misperceptions, misunderstandings."
Among the major misperceptions is that Catholics "venerate the pope on the same level as Jesus," Hawkins said, and that "the pope is connected to their salvation in place of Jesus Christ."
Catholics make up about 12 percent of the population in the South.
"Catholics are a minority faith in the South, and there's often bias toward minority religious communities because people don't understand," he said.
James Gaddis, a lay speaker who also chairs the board at First United Methodist Church, said he had not seen the sign but had heard about it.
"I understand that it's very degrading," he said. "I think it's tragic that any church group would stoop to this posture."
Following Tuesday night's council meeting, Newport Mayor Roland Dykes Jr. said he was a little saddened by the message.
"It doesn't behoove any of us to determine who is going to heaven or hell. I think the pope is a highly, highly respected person," he said.
Franklin's church is a five-year-old independent Baptist church. When asked what the message meant, he said: "What does 'pope' mean? It means father. We have a heavenly father, and the Bible says we shall call no man a father. "
He said people have been driving by or taking pictures or calling to share their views. He said the intent was not to offend Catholics and people are misunderstanding the sign.
Copyright 2005, Knoxville News-Sentinel Co.
Well... they ARE!!
(And EACH has Scripture to back it up!)
Why is there no connection between them?
-A8
If Scripture is so perspicuous, then why are there 30,000 denominations?
-A8
"Therefore, it is probably more pleasing to God not to have faith."
That is a totally "logical" line of reasoning. Problem is that God's "logical" is totally different than the way the world thinks. And with that, God says "it is impossible to please Him without faith".
The Church is the Mystical Body of Christ, when we are baptized into the Church we are baptized into His death.
Not actually, believing in God doesn't get one into Heaven. For as scripture says, even the devils belive in God, and tremble. (James 2:19)
"It is only about accepting God's FREE gift. If you don't want His free gift, you will someday get exactly what you desired - eternity without God, which is hell."
How refreshing those words are. The whole concept of an eternal hell fire and brimstone just doesn't line up with the Scriptures. Yet way too many Christians seem to use it from a "if you don't believe as I do you're going to hell!"
And how many times has "hell" been tried to scare someone into believing in God or His Son Jesus Christ? It just doesn't work that way.
Hell is "sheol" in Hebrew which simply is the place of the dead; 6 feet under.
I suppose you know that this distinction was unheard of before the Reformation. So in your view, for 1500 years Christians remained ignorant of this distinction.
At the root of this distinction is Gnosticism, the heretical notion that matter is irrelevant, and that the elements of salvation are entirely spiritual. Gnosticism was one of the very the first heresies the Church had to deal with, and it is still around. When Christ gave the keys to Peter in Matt 16, He did not give them to an invisible Church, but to a visible, living breathing man. It would make no sense to give authority "to bind and to loose" to an invisible Church. When in Matt 18 Christ talked about resolving disputes in the Church, He definitely wasn't talking about taking the dispute to an invisible intangible body. An invisible Church could not have codified a canon of books that belong to the Bible. So, your use of the Bible (and dependence upon the Bible as an authority) presumes a visible authority. But an invisible Church can have no visible authority. So, your use of the Bible contradicts your claim that Christ did not found a visible Church. The fact that there are some bad eggs in the Church does not mean that Christ did not found a visible Church. Nor does the fact that there are people who believe in Christ and yet are not members of the Catholic Church mean that Christ did not found a visible Church. The notion that Christ founded only an invisible Church and not one visible Church is not found in Scripture. And so it contradicts your doctrine of "sola scriptura".
Newman has a helpful essay on this distinction here,
See what St. Cyril (d. 386) says:
"But since the word Ecclesia is applied to different things (as also it is written of the multitude in the theater of the Ephesians, And when he had thus spoken, he dismissed the Assembly), and since one might properly and truly say that there is a Church of evil doers, I mean the meetings of the heretics, the Marcionists and Manichees, and the rest, for this cause the Faith has securely delivered to you now the Article, "And in one Holy Catholic Church;" that you may avoid their wretched meetings, and ever abide with the Holy Church Catholic in which you were regenerated. And if ever you are sojourning in cities, inquire not simply where the Lord's House is (for the other sects of the profane also attempt to call their own dens houses of the Lord), nor merely where the church is, but where is the Catholic Church. For this is the peculiar name of this Holy Church, the mother of us all, which is the spouse of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Only-begotten Son of God (for it is written, As Christ also loved the Church and gave Himself for it, and all the rest,) and is a figure and copy of Jerusalem which is above, which is free, and the mother of us all; which before was barren, but now has many children."
If you read the Church Fathers on this subject, it is as obvious as day that they did not think Christ founded an invisible Church, but rather that Christ founded a visible Church. Here is a site with a list of great quotations from the Fathers.
-A8
Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me. (Jesus, John 14:6)
And exactly why do you [apparently] think that these two claims are incompatible?
-A8
"That authority was given to the Apostles, and they gave it to the bishops. In other words, the authority to interpret Scripture belongs to the authorities of the Church. And you are not one of them."
I assume here the "Church" is the Roman Catholic church? More on that after I know your answer.
1Ti 2:4 Who will have all men to be saved, and to come unto the knowledge of the truth.
2Ti 3:16 All scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
2Ti 3:17 That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.
Joh 16:13 Howbeit when he, the Spirit of truth, is come, he will guide you into all truth: for he shall not speak of himself; but whatsoever he shall hear, [that] shall he speak: and he will shew you things to come.
God lays upon no man or denomination to teach the all truth to Christians, this is the job of the holy spirit that has been received by Christians upon receiving Christ as their savior. And God wants all of His people to know the all truth as these Scriptures say. But how that process works is not explained because the spirit works in all manner of ways to bring us unto the all truth if we ever reach that point.
Will you bow your knee to Christ?
"that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth" (Phil 2:10)
If you do indeed reject the deity of Christ, then you are not a Christian. Why do you read the Bible, and refer to it as an authority, if Christ was not God? How are you saved from your sins, if Christ was not God? Do you think Christ was a mere prophet, as the Muslisms claim? Merely a good teacher? Merely a miracle-worker? When Jesus says, "I tell you the truth, before Abraham was born, I am!", was He lying, or messed up in the head, or was He reincarnated? Who was Christ?
You say you used to be "an ordained minister". And you say that the claim that Jesus is God is one of the "doctrines of devils". Even the devils knew who Jesus was, and they trembled, as we see throughout the Gospels.
-A8
Yes, though it would also include the Orthodox bishops as well, who belong to the Catholic Church, but are not as yet in full communion with the bishop of Rome.
The highest authority in the Church, under Christ, is the successor of Peter, since Peter was commissioned by Christ to be the chief of the Apostles.
-A8
"King David was called Lord also but that did not make him God."
The Trinity; the greatest self inflicted wound by Christianity. Why take something so simple as God, who had a Son, Jesus Christ, and God who is holy and spirit, which He gives (holy spirit) to people who believe in His Son, and replace it with something even the so called greatest scholars of the Trinity cannot explain themselves?!
I understand what you are saying, but I think it goes beyond just the grave. While I agree with your thoughts about "the grave", hell is a place without the presence of God and for that reason, a place of torment.
While it is a fact that no one wants to suffer, it is the love of God that reached out to us so that none of us would have to spend eternity without God. Christ died for ALL. He offers salvation to "whoever will come". Motivated by love, He sacrificed while we were in rebellion against Him so that we could enter a loving relationship with him. This is the most inclusive belief I know of.
Even rats leave a sinking ship - they say. Those rats are not changed from the inside out. They don't become anything but wet rats.
In contrast, we have the opportunity to be born into God's family - not just stow away to escape a bad fate.
Anyone who wants nothing to do with God will someday get their wish. That will indeed be hell. It will be freely chosen by them, but they won't like their choice.
People can debate about the scriptural imagery of hell and whether the flames are real or symbolic - and we'd miss the point. It is the absolute lack of the presence of God - of all that's ultimately good. The isolation, despair, loneliness and misery that makes it a place of torment and suffering. Any real flames would pale in comparison to that suffering. So I agree, they shouldn't be the message.
It is the love of God. The sacrifice of God to reconcile us to Him that is the most important thing.
I wish all that love. For all need it desperately. All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God. From the average guy on the street, to the Pope. And there is nothing we can do through works to go to heaven. It is all grace. The unearned grace of God. A free gift to us that was the most costly ever given. And all we have to do is receive it by faith.
best, ampu
You're not saying that the Apostle Peter appointed by Jesus Christ was the first Pope are you? Peter's ministry was strictly to the Jewish Christians. Only Paul's ministry was to the Gentiles. Now Peter did minister to some Gentiles in Israel once but that is the only exception I know of. Besides, didn't the first Pope come about in the 2nd century? If that's the case, the Apostle Peter was long gone by then.
"It is all grace. The unearned grace of God. A free gift to us that was the most costly ever given. And all we have to do is receive it by faith."
So beautiful. Sometimes when I know I have sinned the words "stand firmly in the grace we have been given" come to mind. I didn't earn nor could I have, it was a gift that I am supposed to stand in and enjoy. Such is our God who loves to give so we can praise and adore Him with all our hearts.
Beautiful post.
the Church
****
Is NOT a system, its people!!! I weep for the poor souls that sit within your system doomed for judgement if they don't come out and all the while being deceived in thinking they have chosen the correct path.
"There is a way that SEEMS right unto man that leads to destruction."
"Wide is the path that leads to destruction."
Oh I can say with assurance the RCC is going to add millions to her members book in the upcoming time. Millions.....But...you won't get ALL the world, there will still be a remnant, the true Bride.
Work quickly....Satan's time is short and he knows it.
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