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

[Havoc]

This is important stuff that Jesus said. If He was to be taken metaphorically, wouldn't you think He would exhaust all possibility for further explanation in order to get to message right?

Some didn't get it and some did. This is in line with His teaching all along. And it doesn't say they left misunderstanding - Look at Jesus' words after the others left. "Does this offend you?"

Those that left understood it; but were offended at what he was saying. He wasn't saying his physical body and blood was to be eaten by anyone. Ya'll need to back up and reread the chapter. He started out with saying 'I'm the bread of life'. And he clarified himself to the point of slapping them in the face with it.

6:35 " I am the bread of life: he that cometh to me shall never hunger; and he that believeth on me shall never thirst."

6:40 " And this is the will of him that sent me, that every one which seeth the Son, and believeth on him, may have everlasting life: and I will raise him up at the last day."

6:47 " Verily Verily, I say unto you, He that believeth on me hath everlasting life. [48] I am that bread of life ."

Now with the statement in verse 48, the problem arises with the use of metaphor. The Jews didn't understand what he was saying. He expounded upon it starting in 53. But what he was saying was the same thing he'd been saying all along. Not that he is cannibal food; but, that he is the Bread of life - and that anyone who believes in him has eternal life. The eating is metaphor for believing. The invocation of the metaphor was the stumbling block to the Jews. And after repeating the metaphor and expanding it to a greater allusion to what would come, part of his disciples were offended at what he said and left. Jesus cared; but, the truth is the truth. If you get offended at it, you need to examine what you really want. Jesus doesn't need to beg - he was brutally beaten and killed for our sins, if that isn't enough - you want too much!

[biblewonk]

I was paged by Steven. :-)

[SoothingDave]

Congratulations! You've won Sentence of the Day for post 187

God is not the author of confusion

SD

[malakhi]

Gentle Angelo. You're insinuations are your own.

Let me repost what you said earlier:

No argument with you continuing your thread, but when you continue it to it's extreme (in real life), people like me end up dead.

I took this to mean that you believe that religion, and the discussion thereof, results in people being killed. Which is tantamount to saying that all people of religious faith are potential Taliban. It does get tiresome having to refute such ridiculous claims. Now, if I misunderstood what you meant to say here, I apologize. Perhaps you can clarify how, exactly, this sort of discussion ("when you [meaning 'we'] continue it to its extreme") results in people like you ending up dead?

Merely, that fools like you, get soldiers like me, killed, for your fervor. I'll be there for my Country, where will you be?

How are we fools, and what exactly have we done to get soldiers like you killed "for our fervor"? You are making sweeping and baseless generalizations about us.

We too, are here for our country. We support our President and our military. We pay our taxes, which pays your salary and provides you with the resources you need to do your job. We support candidates and politicians who favor a strong national defense. We pray for your safety and success. There are more ways of serving than being in the armed forces. I dare say that there are many strongly religious people who serve along side you. More so than in the general population, because those who are raised in strongly religious homes generally have a stronger love of country and willingness to serve as well. If you have hostility and resentment of religious people, perhaps you should go and talk with a chaplain. Religious people are on your side, not against you.

[SoothingDave]

Some didn't get it and some did. This is in line with His teaching all along. And it doesn't say they left misunderstanding - Look at Jesus' words after the others left. "Does this offend you?" Those that left understood it; but were offended at what he was saying.

Say what? Can we try this again? Those who heard Jesus say "you have to eat my flesh" who left Him because of this, understood him correctly? (That is, correctly to you, that they needed to believe on Him, that "eat me" means "believe in me.")

And they were offended at the idea of believeing in Jesus so they left. Is this what you are saying?

If you are, then why in the world did those leaving mumble to themselves "How can this man give us his flesh to eat?"? Why wouldn't they mumble "this guy wants us to believe in him?"?

SD

[malakhi]

Gentle Angelo, why do I get the impression that you may be shorter than the average female in your community?

col kurz, you are wrong, and you are showing yourself to be unpleasant and not very bright. Now be a good boy and run along before you embarrass yourself any further.

[JohnnyM]

Sorry I didn't respond earlier. I didnt have access to the internet :)

"Religion becomes identified in the popular mind with a series of moods, in which the worshipper, disposed therefore by all the arts of the revivalist, relished the flavors of spiritual peace. You needed neither a theology or a liturgy; you did not take the strain of intellectual inquiry, nor associate yourself whole-heartedly with any historic traditon of worship. You floated, safely enough, on the little raft of your own faith, eagerly throwing out lifelines to drowning neighbots as were able to catch it; meanwile the ship was foundering."

Could you clarify how my posts reflect this? It seems from reading various posts that the Catholic Church ignores the Holy Spirit, who only seems to be mentioned when talking about the Trinity. The Holy Spirit is not present in forming the Bible. The Holy Spirit does not interpret Scripture. The Holy Spirit needs help in maintaining THE church. The Holy Spirit needs help in guiding the sheep. Or so the Catholic Church would have you believe. It seems the Catholics are more dependent on man than on God.

JM

[SoothingDave]

The danger of reading Greek dictionary entries is that we can find things that support our interpretation which have absolutely nothing to do with the context.

Thank you. Like, for example, classical uses of certain words meaning "little rock" and "rock"?

SD

[al_c]

Good morning, everyone. I wish JimRob hadn't taken away the option to send a message to "ALL" or "everyone." So, IMRight ... since this next sentence concerns you, I'll just address it to you. How 'bout them Cowboys?! < /sarcasm >. Well ... someone had to win.

Tuesday, October 16, 2001
Saint Hedwig, religious - Optional Memorial

First Reading: Responsorial Psalm: Gospel:

Romans 1:16-25 Psalms 19:2-5 Luke 11:37-41 You must ask God to give you power to fight against the sin of pride which is your greatest enemy - the root of all that is evil, and the failure of all that is good. For God resists the proud.   -- St. Vincent de Paul

--------------------

From wau.org ...
On one level, this Pharisee seems to have been a decent person. By inviting Jesus to lunch, he showed that he was interested in getting to know the latest "popular" rabbinical teacher. By ceremonially cleansing his hands before eating, he also showed that he was careful about fulfilling his religious obligations. Finally, by refraining from criticizing his guest, he showed some sense of good manners. Yet Jesus gave this man a very sharp rebuke, calling him greedy and a fool. Why? It couldn't be that Jesus didn't love him. He looked upon everyone with kindness and compassion. What was Jesus doing?

The man had a problem that he either did not see or did not want to see. Despite his religious behavior, his heart was filled with very non-religious motivations. He was basically a selfish person, intent on getting more for himself rather than on giving to others. His religious behavior was a screen that prevented him from seeing his need for a change of heart. The kindest thing that Jesus could do for him was to remove the screen and show him what lay behind it.

What about us? How often do we avoid facing up to the selfishness in our hearts? We may think that changing would be hard, or even impossible. But Jesus wants to wake us up to our need for repentance because he wants to heal us. He wants to cleanse our hearts--and not just in a general way: He wants to heal my selfish thoughts, my lusts, my envy. Are we willing to let Jesus probe us and put his finger on those thoughts and patterns of behavior in us that need to be changed? We have no cause to be afraid. He already knows our sins, and loves us anyway.

Jesus didn't just criticize the Pharisee. He showed him the way out of his bondage: "Give for alms those things that are within; and see, everything will be clean for you" (Luke 11:41). Jesus promises that as we step outside our self-concern and begin to demonstrate concrete, practical care for other people, we will experience his grace at work in us, changing our hearts.

"Lord Jesus, you're right. I need a change of heart, but I can't do it myself. Heal me, so that I may love as you love."

--------------------

Have a great day, everyone.

[SoothingDave]

Hi ya' Dave!

Hi yourself. :-)

OK, back to the metaphors. I had written: If one takes this statement ("This is My body") literally, other OBVIOUS metaphors could also be taken literally, such as "I am the Vine; you are the branches."

You replied: This amended statement of yours hinges on the word "obvious." To you, Jesus at the Last Supper is obviously speaking metaphorically. Not so to me.

Oh, but it IS obviously a figure of speech! For one thing, interpreting His words ("This is My body") as being figurative is the logical way to interpret it.

To you. If we look at the simple semantics of the statement "this is x," I guess it all depends on what "is" means. Seriously. One would normally read this type of sentence to equate "this" and "x."

This becomes as "obvious" metaphor to you when we let "this" equal a hunk of bread and "x" equal "Jesus' body." This is not dictated by the language itself, but only by the seeming impossibility of the statement to be true.

So, conceiving no manner of making the statement literally true, you read it as an "obvious" metaphor. I know how the statement is true and take it that way.

Besides, there is NO precedence anywhere in Scripture for equating an inanimate object, such as bread, with a living being.

John 6 is a precedent. And even if it weren't, are we bound to only believe things that occur in the Bible twice? Jesus only rose from the dead once, there is no precedent for that, yet you take it literally.

Do this "in remembrance" of Me. (Even if the bread and wine COULD become His actual flesh and His actual blood, the partaking of it would be redundant, because His sacrificial and propitiatory work on the cross is a FINISHED work!!)

The Greek word used for "in remembrance" has some ramifications. It speaks to making present the effects of a past event. Doesn't sound like strictly a "remembrance"s ervice to me.

SD

[Invincibly Ignorant]

I have seen some praise for Havoc, I never thought I would. He wrests Scripter to his own destruction. You, therfore, brethren, knowing these things befor, take heed, lest being led aside by the error of the unwise, you fall from your own steadfastness.

Did somebody say something?

[malakhi]

What was that last night? I thought the XFL had ceased operations.

[Invincibly Ignorant]

Steven get your head together. I was In Danang in 1965 as an E-5,USMC, and not in the "rear with the gear". Want to post opposing DD-214 on this thread?

Colonel, if that's what you really are, you do yourself and those you have (or used to have) authority over disgrace by coming in here and insinuating there's no need for God in a military situation. However, I believe all things happen for a reason and perhaps you've been drawn to these threads by the Spirit of God unawares. You are certainly welcome to stick around and participate because I know Jesus Christ can use this discussion to change your life as he has mine and countless others in here. Good day.

[SoothingDave]

No, I do quite well 'get it.'

Indeed.

The people of the colonies didn't feel they needed to pay for everything twice - once for themselves and once for another group that didn't get the idea that this is america.

Yeah, what are those damn Catholics doing here in America anyway?

If it wasn't so blindingly bigoted it would be hilarious how you equate America with Protestantism.

Catholics were not the majority, they were the minority. Catholics didn't like the program and went to do their own thing. The people of this country owed nothing to Catholicism in way of special treatment.

Damn lucky we let them have jobs. Stupid ingrate Catholics.

In your mind the majority is allowed to cast its ideolgical shadow on the education of all minorities.

America provided schools and Catholicism decided not to take part in them. That doesn't mean it's owed to Catholicism to build a system for them, then a system for muslims, then one for Jews, etc. This is the melting pot.

Yeah. If those damn Catholics would just melt into good little Protestants and start being real Americans.

Why on earth should their tax dollars go to a school which is goiing to poision their childrens' minds?

Why, I thought we were all Christians together.. that we all agreed on the core essentials... But, I guess readings from the Bible and teaching children who Jesus was is just a bit much for a Catholic to be poisoned with, eh?

It figures that a folk who can't see his own philosophy permeating his every reading of Scripture would fail to see the Protestant philosophical bias present in Protestant schools.

What to you is "the dirt basics" is indoctrination 101 to us. Understand?

Oh, I see. So teaching that Jesus died for our sins, was raised up on the third day and lives in each of us as Christians - teaching that and required obedience to him is indoctrination. Glad to hear that from you. Cause those are the dirt basics.

Then you'd gladly let your kid learn these basics from a Catholic-biased school? Speak up!

(I guess I should belabor the point, given the audience here, an do the old "role reversal." What if America were mainly founded by Catholics and Orthodox. And they developed public schools which taught about the authority of the Church and had statues of Mary and said the "Abbreviated" version of the Our Father every day. Would you feel like you had to have your kids in a different kind of environment, lest they pick up some irrational Romanism?)

Your problem is that that sort of crap was not being taught on the other side of things. ...Ya'll weren't persecuted out of the schools, the RCC made it's choice not to be a part of the educational system. If similar things were being taught, you'd have a point.

What? No bias here. Just us Protestants without philosphy teaching the basics.

SD

[Invincibly Ignorant]

I'm sorry, I thought you said the catholic church was perfect?

Not perfect, however, the Church does not teach error in matters of faith and morals.

See I knew you'd fess up. As for the church not teaching error I still can't get over the disingenuous way it teaches about Matthew 1;25. I do believe there are those within the catholic churh that belong to Christ's church just as there are those who belong from other denominations as well. Christ hasn't separated the wheat from the tares yet.

Oh sorry again. I assume right after the last apostle died all my christian brothers and sisters continued to meet daily. Been goin on for a couple thousand years now.

I was asking for documentation regarding post Apostolic Church Councils. The Catholic Church had one in Nicea in 325 A.D. When did your church have one? My guess is the conference in Philadelphia, PA in 1919.

Sorry the Bible doesn't require documentation for post apostolic church councils, you see the church can go ahead and meet anytime, anywhere and no one has to take minutes. Its really a beautiful thing.

[al_c]

What was that last night? I thought the XFL had ceased operations.

I was beginning to think it was XFL, too. All they wanted to show last night was the cheerleaders.

Can't say I blame them, though ... the game wasn't interesting. It might have been slightly better if Dennis Miller would've kept his trap shut.