The Neverending Story (The New Christian Chronicles)

Southern Baptists ending talks with Catholic Church ^ | 3/24/01 | AP

[malakhi]

The Neverending Story
An ongoing debate on Scripture, Tradition, History and Interpretation.

Statesmen may plan and speculate for liberty, but it is religion and morality alone which can establish the principles upon which freedom can securely stand. The only foundation of a free constitution is pure virtue. - John Adams

Thread 162
TNS Archives

[RobbyS]

Hey, thanks. I learned a new word and that a chiliad is a thousand years." Chiliarch" is a commander of a thousand men.This is fun! Anyway, I alsways stay a Kilometer away from millenialist discussion, since I never think of the Bible as a code. To me it is all futile anyway. Didn't the Lord say, "Stand ready!"

[OLD REGGIE]

How exactly is it all of those things to ask you to back up with the official thoughts of your denomination, whilst picking over mine with a fine toothed comb, looking for loopholes?

Show me just one place where I claimed Unitarianism, or any other denomination, as my denomination.

You can't because I haven't. Why I even agree with many of the official thoughts of the RCC, with Judaism, with IFBB's, with humanists, etc. Does that make me any one of these groups?

Only conceited "know it alls" such as you have the temerity to place a person in the bucket of "your" choosing and then "require" them to defend this bucket.

[newberger]

You have FreepMail.

[Invincibly Ignorant]

Just curious angelo. Is this a form of some kind of Judaism Monica Lewinsky is dabbling in or is it something else?

From her interview last night:

Lewinsky said that right now, she's still designing handbags, something she's been doing for the past couple of years. And she's also concentrating on her faith, studying at the Kabballah Center in Los Angeles. The Kabballah are ancient books of Jewish mystical thought, according to the center's Web site.

[Invincibly Ignorant]

oops #31284 was for angelo. Sorry Newburger.

[newberger]

oops #31284 was for angelo. Sorry Newburger.

LOL! I guess it's OK, II. Please, though, don't spell
my moniker that way (...burger) after our Lent starts.

Torture, don'tcha know :-).

Paul

[Joyful Wisdom]

Men don't fly, airplanes do.

Really, I haven't seen too many airplanes take off down the runway to go find a bird to excersize with in my entire life. Please explain this feat. I'm sure the military in this country would love to be briefed on such an amazing discovery as an airplane that flys autonomously..

Now you are just being silly

[Wordsmith]

Thanks, back at you.

[ksen]

If I may intrude, though I confess to not reading the entire exchange you and Colleen have been having.

Go right ahead, feel free to join in anytime.

You make this an either/or question, where we see it as both. God wants to keep my place in Heaven secure.

That’s because it is an either/or question. Either God keeps you secure by Himself, or He doesn’t. It is my contention that the Scriptures teach that God keeps our place in Heaven secure all by Himself.

But I can choose every day, every minute, to work with Him or against Him. He does not force me to do His Will.

All of that is true, but it has no bearing in this discussion. The decisions we make after believing in Christ for our Salvation will affect the level of reward we receive when we get to Heaven. Our Post-Salvation decisions also affect our life here on Earth. I have said before that God has never promised to protect us from the earthly consequences of our sin.

Together we ensure my salvation. God doesn't force me. I can't do it alone. But together we can do it.

See, I think your thinking is wrong on this. Let’s say for a moment that Salvation is a you and God thing, He does His part and you do yours. Will God fail in upholding His end of the bargain? No, He won’t. Will you fail in upholding your end of the bargain? Probably, I would even make that a definite yes.

So, if God will not fail, but you most likely will, then who is your Salvation really dependent upon? You. There’s an old saying about a chain being only as strong as its weakest link. If your Salvation is dependent upon you and God then it is only as strong as the weakest partner. Again, you.

This is the message of the Incarnation. God took on humanity to join with us, to partner with us, so that we could come to join with Him, partner with Him.

The message of the Incarnation is that God loved us so much that He was willing to set aside everything that He is entitled to, in order to made sin for us.

-ksen

[trad_anglican]

I think the Roman point is that it matters not what a person says during the liturgy if he was not ordained for the purpose of sacrificing.

I agree with this, but the whole supposed basis for rejecting Anglican orders was "missing words" in the ordinal. Our ordinal says you're being ordained to be a priest in the Church of God, to do what priests have always done in the Church of God, chiefly administration of the sacraments. Our sacrament of the eucharist is sacrificial. So what is the importance of the missing words in the ordinal?

[The_Reader_David]

Of course, but the Latins have ignored the sixth Nicean canon for centuries. It does, like the twenty-eighth canon of Chalcedon, point out that the Church never actually accepted their later idea of the Pope of Rome as the "Head of the Church", "Vicar of Christ", etc.

[SoothingDave]

See, I think your thinking is wrong on this. Let’s say for a moment that Salvation is a you and God thing, He does His part and you do yours. Will God fail in upholding His end of the bargain? No, He won’t. Will you fail in upholding your end of the bargain? Probably, I would even make that a definite yes.

Insert repentence and forgiveness here. We fail, but repent and are forgiven.

So, if God will not fail, but you most likely will, then who is your Salvation really dependent upon? You. There’s an old saying about a chain being only as strong as its weakest link. If your Salvation is dependent upon you and God then it is only as strong as the weakest partner. Again, you.

Scary, isn't it? I can see the appeal of your way of thinking as it removes from us any responsibility for our salvation. Sure our rewards will be different, but so what? We get to live forever in the Presence of God. Even the guy selling hot dogs gets to be at the Super Bowl.

I repeat, I can choose to work with God, or to work against Him. He will not force me to behave the way He wishes, and He will not remove my ability to bear the consequences of my choices.

This is the message of the Incarnation. God took on humanity to join with us, to partner with us, so that we could come to join with Him, partner with Him.

The message of the Incarnation is that God loved us so much that He was willing to set aside everything that He is entitled to, in order to (be) made sin for us.

Was it necessary for God to redeem us in the manner He did? Was it necessary for God to lay out the plan of salvation to include a Fall and an Incarnation to effect Redemption? Could He have chosen another way to accomplish the goal that did not require Him to become man?

SD

[saradippity]

It seems clear that no matter what R.C's say or present it will be held up to scorn by the N.C.'s with a few exceptions. On several occasions I have conveyed my thoughts on the precarious state of Christianity in this country and in the world and emphasized some of the machinations that were going on as the Roman Catholic Church is brutalized from without and from within. I have asked for ideas that might serve to strengthen the defenses of the Roman Catholic Church. I along with every other R.C.poster on this thread have recognized the horrible travesty of pedophilia in the ranks of the priests.

I thought perhaps one Christian might have offered to write to the Catholic bishop in their city and express how damaging their protection of homosexuality and pedophilia is to the entire body of Christian believers. The silence was deafening with the exception of those several who chose to ignore my post and launch an all out attack against Rome,the Roman Catholic Church ,priests and blah-blah and yadda-yadda. In fact the attacks have been so vicious and error ridden that I think many of you must be closet Unitarians. At least Old Reggie owns up to it and for that I say thanks.

I say this because I read this wonderful letter in Chronicles,A MAGAZINE OF THE AMERICAN CULTURE,March 2002.The writer was responding to a previous letter. I will copy it here and see if some of you don't recognize yourselves. As always,if the shoe fits wear it,if not,know that it doesn't pertain to you.

Unitarianism is a movement aimed at destroying the traditional culture and religious order.One hundred and fifty years ago,a sound man might be deceived,but today,who but leftists would swallow such an elixir of decrepitude without gagging?

I have no objection to people being Unitarians,Vegetarians or No-Cafeterians.What I do object to is their dishonest pretense of being Christian.Like feminists and other leftists,Unitarians are not content to form their own Islam without tears,but they must prowl about the world under false colors seeking, if not the ruin of souls then at least the destruction of that zest for life which characterizes real Christianity. I have read passionate pagans and met passionate Muslims,but among the Unitarians I have found nothing more impassioned than a self-righteous determination to be smarter than other people.

So as I said before I think there are quite a few closet Unitarians on this thread.

[ksen]

I would like to answer these two comments in the same response if you don’t mind.

D-fendr:
If you wish, I'd appreciate your response - in your own words please - to what "believed on Christ" means as used in your last post.
I.e., what is meant by this, in terms of what one does, experiences, thinks, knows, experiences, etc. when one "believes on Christ."

To believe on Christ means to realize who Jesus Christ is, the Son of God, or another way, God the Son. The person also needs to understand what Jesus did, He died on the cross for MY sins, was buried, and rose again, physically, from the grave. If a person believes those things and puts their trust in what Jesus did for them, then they will be saved.

Is that the kind of thing you were looking for? I admit it is hard explaining it without using the Scriptures, but I tried to abide by the parameters you set forth. If you have any further questions I would love to hear them and have the chance to answer them.

Ok, allend, your turn.

allend:
ksen: Once we have believed on Christ, our eternal destination is secure, kept by the power of God.
allend: Yes, if you deny that we have free will after that.

Please see my post to SD above (#31289). It may provide a response to what you have said. If it does not adequately do so, please post back with whatever you would like clarified.

-ksen

[Invincibly Ignorant]

So as I said before I think there are quite a few closet Unitarians on this thread.

Oooh. This accusation will surely make us think twice before we type what we actually believe to be the truth. Thanx for the enlightenment.

[Wordsmith]

The decisions we make after believing in Christ for our Salvation will affect the level of reward we receive when we get to Heaven.

Will God fail in upholding His end of the bargain? No, He won’t. Will you fail in upholding your end of the bargain? Probably, I would even make that a definite yes.

Hello ksen! Trying to use your terminology, why are our “Post-Salvation” acts less reliable than our “Pre-Salvation” act of "believing in Christ"? As I understand your argument, you propose that we need to, of our own free will, believe in Christ. Obviously, you believe we are capable of doing this. However, after doing so, you seem to propose that we are incapable of additional acts of will ("upholding our end of the bargain") that are also consistent with God's desire.

In other words, if it is possible for to freely choose to believe in God, why is not possible for us to freely choose to continue following God?

Would you say that it is impossible for a human to experience "believing in Christ" as a process rather than a point-in-time event?

And lastly, how do you understand this issue in light of Jesus’s teaching, “Whoever desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow me” (Mk. 8:34). I would say that this passage is one of the stronger ones in support of the understanding that Christ does not compel us to follow Him, and that following Him is an ongoing process.

Christ Bless.

[SoothingDave]

but the whole supposed basis for rejecting Anglican orders was "missing words" in the ordinal. Our ordinal says you're being ordained to be a priest in the Church of God, to do what priests have always done in the Church of God, chiefly administration of the sacraments. Our sacrament of the eucharist is sacrificial. So what is the importance of the missing words in the ordinal?

I think it depends on why the words were removed. If, as you say, it is because they are superfluous, because "Administering the sacraments" includes the Eucharist, which is a Sacrifice, then you are correct.

If the words were removed specifically to deny the sacrificial nature of the priesthood, then the Catholics are correct.

I don't deny that many Anglicans still regard the Mass as sacrifical, but that was not the determination of the leaders of the Anglican Church who removed the words. Or so is the finding of the Catholic Church.

We have our own experience with this phenomenon in our own time. The vandals at ICEL seem to have a huge problem translating the words for sacrifice into English properly for the prayers of the Mass. (They also have a problem with "Grace" and other concepts.) This is deliberate to get people to think differently. I think this is what the Catholics thought the Anglicans were doing in removing this language.

SD

[ksen]

Did I ever mention the Colorado Avalanche are the defending Stanley Cup Champions?

Only because of the stellar play of ex-Bruins #77 Ray Bourque. ;^)

Seriously though, I was glad to see them win last year so Ray could get his turn skating the Cup around the ice.

-ksen

[trad_anglican]

I think it depends on why the words were removed. If, as you say, it is because they are superfluous, because "Administering the sacraments" includes the Eucharist, which is a Sacrifice, then you are correct. If the words were removed specifically to deny the sacrificial nature of the priesthood, then the Catholics are correct.

We both know that the language was changed specifically to deny the sacrificial nature of the priesthood. My whole point to eastsider was the irony that Rome did not officially make a determination on Anglican orders until after the sacrificial language was reinstated because of the influence of the Oxford Movement. So by the time the offical determination was made, the basis for that determination was no longer applicable.

[Joyful Wisdom]

I66 Post 30896: Did I say the entire papist church is evil? Nope, sure didn't. Did I say there is a pattern of evil conduct by the heirarchy of the papist church throughout a large part of history since the 6th century---yep, sure did! Does that make the entire church, evil---of course not, only those who use emotionally charged, hysterical rhetoric reach that conclusion.

I66 Post 31227: Yes, I do believe the Roman Catholic church as a whole to be a corrupted institution, by and large, as I have stated numberous times(didn't you see them?), the Roman Catholic church is corrupted by a corrupted gospel, that is in essence another gospel from the Gospel defined in Scripture and taught by the Apostles. The Roman Catholic church is also corrupted by it's many false doctrines, most notably, Mariology, praying to saints, praying to angels, Mary as coredemptrix, coadvocate, comediatrix, queen of heaven, etc, etc. BTW, those who have believed a false gospel are also numbered among the "wicked".

Isaiah: How can not all Catholics be evil, If you belive that those that follow a false Gospel are wicked and be definition Catholics follow the Catholc church. It fdoes not appear that only the emotially charged could reach that conclusion

You rhetoric seems made to inflame passion.

Also someone asked you not to use the word papist since it is disrespectful and was started as a slur. I do not know what you mean when you use the term but the impression I get is "tool of satan"