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Posted on 11/02/2001 5:42:58 AM PST by Brian Kopp DPM
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Yes, but the Calvinist unaided reason tells us that God is omnipotent and omniscient, therefore if X is eternally damned, then God made him. Charles Henrickson's point (really, the Lutheran Synod's position as I understood it) was that these two views that humans have of God,-- God of love and God of power, are not reconcilable under pure reason.
This may not be a proper thread to discuss this at length.
Pastor, why do you think the Muslims persist in their faith?
The question is, do we support the Vatican now or harken back to past teachings of the church?Ahhh, the words that nearly all schismatics utter sooner or later. But we must return to the true faith! I hope that you are not one of these who would leave the Church and the Pope to follow your private interpretation of the “past teachings of the Church.” I do not know you or where you are at, so please understand I make no judgments about you, but those words have such strong historical context to them.
As doctrine has developed through the last (nearly) 2000 years of Christianity various schismatics have reacted to various developments by demanding a return to the past teachings as they understood them. Just to cite a couple of the major examples that everyone is familiar with, the Orthodox and the filoque, and the Protestants nearly always claim they are a return to the ancient Church that was corrupted by the Catholic hierarchy. There are an infinite number of lesser examples, the Jansenists, etc. We could go on and on. History has clearly demonstrated that the only way to stay on the side of truth is to cling to the Holy See. Heresy after heresy after heresy arises, and no land has stayed safe from them, except those who remain aligned with the Pope.
I do not cling to Cardinal Kasper and what he states. I do cling to what the Pope teaches, and what the Church formally states. From the catechism:
816 "The sole Church of Christ [is that] which our Savior, after his Resurrection, entrusted to Peter's pastoral care, commissioning him and the other apostles to extend and rule it.... This Church, constituted and organized as a society in the present world, subsists in (subsistit in) in) the Catholic Church, which is governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him." 267Dominus VobiscumThe Second Vatican Council's Decree on Ecumenism explains: "For it is through Christ's Catholic Church alone, which is the universal help toward salvation, that the fullness of the means of salvation can be obtained. It was to the apostolic college alone, of which Peter is the head, that we believe that our Lord entrusted all the blessings of the New Covenant, in order to establish on earth the one Body of Christ into which all those should be fully incorporated who belong in any way to the People of God." 268
patent +AMDG
Messages from Heaven - the Apparitions of the Virgin Mary - Zeitun, Egypt
" Official investigations have been carried out with the result that it has been considered an undeniable fact that the Blessed Virgin Mary has been appearing on Zeitun Church in a clear and bright luminous body seen by all present in front of the church, whether Christian or Moslem"
While all in America were watching the the Chicago riots at the Democratic Convention, or viewing live war zone broadcasts from Vietnam or were being mesmerized by the Watergate hearings on television, the Mother of God was appearing for tens of thousands to see in the land of the pyramids at a Coptic church constructed to commemorate the area in Egypt where she had come with Joseph and Jesus when they all fled from Herod. Starting in April, 1968, her apparitions of light changed the lives of thousands. Her appearances at Zeitun were astounding. She was seen by more than a million people. The apparitions were broadcast by Egyptian TV, photographed by hundreds of professional photographers and personally witnessed by Egyptian President Abdul Nasser, an avowed Marxist. The apparitions lasted for three years with numerous unaccountable healings recorded by various medical professionals. The local police, who initially thought the apparitions were an elaborate hoax, searched a 15-mile radius surrounding the site to uncover any type of device that could be used to project such images. They were completely unsuccessful.
Moslems who saw the apparitions chanted from the Koran, "Mary, God has chosen thee. And purified thee; He has chosen thee. Above all women." She was seen accompanied by doves of light in apparitions that lasted from a few minutes to as long as nine hours. Kyrillos VI, the Orthodox patriarch, formed a commission to investigate the apparitions. A number of the commissioners observed plumes of fragrant purple smoke rising from the church at the time of the apparitions and the figure of a woman surrounded by a very bright globe of light accompanied by doves of light. A digitally-enhanced, negative image of one television frame is shown at the top of this page to enable you a see an outline of what was seen by hundreds of thousands in Egypt.
While the appearances at Zietum were silent, the silence spoke volumes to those who came to see and strengthen their faith. The local Coptic Patriarch, Kyrillos VI, publicly announced a year after the apparitions started that he had no doubt that the Mother of God was appearing above the roof of St. Mary's Coptic Church.
For those who, like Thomas, needed to see for themselves, Mary offered an unequivocal televised demonstration at Zeitun. Yet, because of an unresponsive media and an indifferent world, very few outside of Egypt learned of her astonishing appearances there until well after they had ended.
More recently, the appearance of a woman clothed in light has been observed above the roof of the Church of St. Damian in Shoubra, Egypt, a suburb of Cairo. Starting in 1983 and seen with increasing frequency in the mid-1980's, the woman was seen by thousands walking above the church bathed in light in apparitions lasting up to five hours. Shenouda III, the head of the Coptic Church at the time, established a commission to investigate the beautiful lady of light. In 1987, the commission concluded:
"Let us thank the Lord for this blessing on the people of Egypt and for the repetition of this phenomenon. We should also like to thank the police and the Department of the Interior for their untiring efforts at maintaining safety and good order among the thousands of people who have spent day and night at prayer. We ask all the people to remain calm. Thus they may worthily receive the blessing of the Virgin, of St. Damian and of all the saints. May God save our country. We pray that he may guide Egypt and all her children to every success. May this phenomenon be a pledge of well-being for them and for all nations."
As in Zeitun, the silent witness of the Mother of God renewed the faith of tens of thousands and brought both Moslem and Christian to a place of peace where all could pray to the God who loved them enough to remind them of his love by sending His Mother.
Interesting. Has anyone pinned down or verified the latest story about Sr. Lucia? Is is true that she has commented on the current terrorism, relating it to the prophetic message?I can’t say I’ve pinned it down, but the most reliable indications indicate that she asked people to pray the rosary for peace, but did not comment otherwise. The letter that was sent out conforms to that. This is just MHO, not authoritative or anything.
I'm pinging FE since I think he knows more about this then I do.
patent +AMDG
and in Mozambique the Moslems who were unconverted, began to be Christian as soon as the statue of Our Lady of Fatima was erected.
A Missionary Strategy
Missionaries in the future will, more and more, see that their apostolate among the Moslems will be successful in the measure that they preach Our Lady of Fatima. Mary is the advent of Christ, bringing Christ to the people before Christ Himself is born. In an apologetic endeavor, it is always best to start with that which people already accept. Because the Moslems have a devotion to Mary, our missionaries should be satisfied merely to expand and to develop that devotion, with the full realization that Our Blessed Lady will carry the Moslems the rest of the way to her divine Son.
She is forever a traitor, in the sense that she will not accept any devotion for herself, but will always bring anyone who is devoted to her to her divine Son. As those who lose devotion to her lose belief in the divinity of Christ,so those who intensify devotion to her gradually acquire that belief.
At the time when they were finally driven out, the last Moslem chief had a beautiful daughter by the name of Fatima. A Catholic boy fell in love with her, and for him she not only stayed behind when the Moslems left, but even embraced the Faith. The young husband was so much in love with her that he changed the name of the town where he live to Fatima. Thus, the very place where our Lady apeared in 1917 bears a historical connection to Fatima, the daughter of Mohammed.
Russian People Hear More About John Paul II's Connection to Fatima.
I don't know what the point of accusing me of schism was. Perhaps you should be a little more careful before you start throwing such loaded terms around. It is an act lacking very much in the virtue of charity.
The shenanigans with all this weaselling around with what the Third Secret refers to is troubling. Has any credible Catholic authority compiled all of the various statements about the meaning of the Third Secret? Presumably, if one says the "dogma of the faith" will be preserved in Portugal, by implication that seems to suggest elsewhere it won't be. And then some sort of violent chastizements following as with the original Fatima prophecy of the Russian Revolution and World War II. Why did or why would factions in the Vatican try to dismiss and poopoo the Third Secret? Wasn't it supposed to have been made public in 1960 when part of it allegedly would already be in the process of coming true according to Sr. Lucia? What was it that was coming true in the early 1960s? The great falling away, the great apostasy? You know, you sort of wonder why John XXIII didn't want to make it public.
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