Conversely, does Christmas contradict the Bible? You might quibble (justifiably) about teaching kids about Santa Claus, but I think the answer is no.
So the issue for us Protestant types is not demanding that everything have a verse of Scripture to back it up, but rather that no doctrine of Christianity contradict either the word or the spirit of Scripture.
So with that in mind, let's look at a few of the issues that divide us. Just for a starting glance, let's look at the enforced celibacy of priests. The RCC says that all priests must remain unmarried and celibate all their lives, citing 1 Cor. 7:25-26, in which Paul says that it is "good" for virgins to remain so. However, in this same passage, Paul says that he has "no command from the Lord"--in other words, he's giving advice, not laying down a doctrine of perpetual virginity for all believers.
There is a passage in which Paul speaks directly to the marital status (among other things) of bishops and deacons, 1 Timothy chapter 3. In it, he assumes that many bishops will be married and have children, and insists only that they have but one wife (v. 2), and that their children be obediant and respectful (vv. 4-5). Now, if the Apostle, taught not by men but directly by God (Gal. 1:1 and 12) applauds marraige and children in the bishops of the Church, by what right does Rome demand celibacy? Rome has not simply added a tradition to the Holy Scriptures, she has declared herself to be greater than the original Apostles and able to ignore what they taught!
The standard Catholic answer to this (indeed, to any point of contention between the RCC and the protestant members of the Church) is not to deal with the issue, or to admit that Paul did indeed allow bishops and deacons to be married, but to attack a strawman, accusing people like myself of "wanting to be our own popes" and trying to rip apart a false idea of what sola scriptura is.
Indeed, we can see this imbalance of placing the RCC's teachings above Scripture in even so important and central a doctrine as the very doctrine of salvation itself. The Catholic often "bashes" the Protestant for believing that faith in Christ alone will get a person into Heaven. "The only time 'faith alone' appears in the Bible," he or she will say, "is when James (2:24) says that it is 'not by faith alone.'"
Well, if this is truly what James meant, then we truly do, as some outside the faith hold, have a battle of wills between Paul and James in the early Church. For Paul wrote, "Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ, even we have believed in Jesus Christ, that we might be justified by the faith of Christ, and not by the works of the law: for by the works of the law shall no flesh be justified" (Gal. 2:16).
Indeed, Christ Himself stated that it is the centrality of belief in Him that saves, not deeds: "For God so loved the world that He gave His one and only Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life" (John 3:16). Indeed, Christ gave that gift to a dying thief that had no chance to do any good deed in his life, no chance to take the Eucharist, to receive baptism, to atone for his many sins. "I tell you the truth, this day you will be with Me in paradise" (Luke 23:43, which also disproves Purgatory, by the way).
No wonder, then, that Paul wrote, "[This is] the word of faith we are proclaiming: That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved" (Rom. 10:8-9).
Indeed, Paul spent a great part of his ministry (and several letters) fighting against a similiar false teaching to that of modern-day Rome's. But where Rome says, "Yes, you need to believe in Jesus, but you also need to go to Mass, take the Eucharist, go to confession, etc.," the early Judaizers, with far more Scriptural justification, said, "Unless you are circumcized, according to the tradition taught by Moses, you cannot be saved," (Acts 15:1).
The Council of Jerusalem rejected this belief. The Apostle Peter argued:
And God, which knoweth the hearts, bare them witness, giving them the Holy Ghost, even as he did unto us; and put no difference between us and them, purifying their hearts by faith. Now therefore why tempt ye God, to put a yoke upon the neck of the disciples, which neither our fathers nor we were able to bear? But we believe that through the grace of the Lord Jesus Christ we shall be saved, even as they.James agreed, and a letter was sent out releasing Gentile believers from the Jewish Law. Indeed, Paul later wrote, "You who are trying to be justified by law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace" (Gal. 5:4).
Does this mean that we who are saved by faith need never do any good? "What shall we say, then? Shall we go on sinning so that grace may increase? By no means!" (Rom. 6:1-2). In fact, Paul explained perfectly the proper position of faith and deeds when he wrote, "The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love" (Gal. 5:6).
Let's put it another way. If you are using your deeds, whether charity or love or the Eucharist or confession or whatever, in any way as the cause of your salvation, you are not saved. But if your faith in Christ alone is the cause of your salvation, then good works will be the natural effect of that faith. This is precisely what James meant when he wrote, "In the same way, faith by itself, if it is not accompanied by action, is dead. . . Show me your faith without deeds, and I will show you my faith by what I do" (2:17, 18).
Martin Luther, who every Catholic would be good to read before they vilify and make fun of him, said in the introduction to his commentary on Romans:
Faith is a work of God in us, which changes us and brings us to birth anew from God (cf. John 1). It kills the old Adam, makes us completely different people in heart, mind, senses, and all our powers, and brings the Holy Spirit with it. What a living, creative, active powerful thing is faith! It is impossible that faith ever stop doing good. Faith doesn't ask whether good works are to be done, but, before it is asked, it has done them. It is always active. Whoever doesn't do such works is without faith; he gropes and searches about him for faith and good works but doesn't know what faith or good works are. Even so, he chatters on with a great many words about faith and good works.The Bible then, clearly states that it is faith and grace alone which save us, without any works of the law. It does teach that good works are the natural effect of a living faith, and that the faith of a man who claims Christ without showing it in his outward deeds is dead and useless, a vine without fruit. Therefore, the Protestant, working from sola scriptura states, "I believe in Christ, and therefore I am saved, and will be with Christ the very day I die. My good deeds come from the gratitude of this assured salvation, to glorify God."
The RCC, on the other hand says, "Well, you might, but we're the best way to make sure. Even then, you can't know, and you'll probably spend time in Purgatory. So you need this and that deed and indulgence to reduce your time in Purgatory, assuming that you don't lose your salvation by committing the wrong sin . . ."
Regarding Purgatory, the RCC, according to the entry in the Catholic Encyclopedia on the subject, teaches, "The Catholic doctrine of purgatory supposes the fact that some die with smaller faults for which there was no true repentance, and also the fact that the temporal penalty due to sin is it times not wholly paid in this life."
Yet Jesus said on the Cross, "Tetelestai." This Greek word was stamped on the papers of prisoners released from prison, and meant literally, "Paid in full." That is, their debt for their crimes was paid in full. Thus Paul wrote:
And you, that were sometime alienated and enemies in your mind by wicked works, yet now hath he reconciled in the body of his flesh through death, to present you holy and unblameable and unreproveable in his sight: If ye continue in the faith grounded and settled, and be not moved away from the hope of the gospel, which ye have heard, and which was preached to every creature which is under heaven; whereof I Paul am made a minister.There is no room for Purgatory in the faith taught by the Apostles. Even 1 Cor. 3:13-15 talks of the testing of the believer's works, burning up the straw and dross so that that which is truly gold in God's sight might be revealed, not the "purging" of the believer himself. And again, to the theif beside Him, who certainly died without having time to confess all his sins and do pennance for them, did Christ say, "You will be purged for many centuries in fire, but then will be allowed into My Kingdom"? Or did He instead say, "I tell you the truth, this very day you will be with me in Paradise"?
--Col. 1:21-23
And lest one claim that the Church "has always taught about Purgatory," I have of late been reading the ante-Nicean Early Church Fathers, and I have yet to find one that so taught. That's not to say that an obscure reference could not be found, but the ECF of the first three centuries don't seem to be aware of Purgatory, which suggests that it was a later invention, not the original teaching of the Apostles.
I know that I've waxed a bit long here, but I figured that the "Protestant bashers" here deserved a reasoned answer. I believe in the Scriptures above all else because they have perfectly preserved the teachings of the prophets, of Christ, and of the Apostles after Him for two millennia. Conversely, in Catholic tradition I see changing doctrines and direct contradictions to the Word which we both know and agree to be true. Since we know the Bible to be true, it would seem to me only right and logical to be as the Bereans, and put all else to the test of the Scriptures to see if what we are taught in our churches is true (Acts 18:11).
Yours in Truth,
The approximate date varies, with 100AD for Jehovah Witnesses and 312AD for Calvinists and Mormons.
The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints (Mormons is a nick name and we would rather it not be used) belives that the apostacy was a gradual process and do not attach any specific date to when the original church went apostate. You might want to read 'The Great Apostacy' (check a local LDS bookstore) for a detailed arguemnt that an apostacy took place.
Two: If the Spirit indeed does confirm that the NT cannon is correct, then one has to admit that the either an apostate Church produced an infallible NT cannon (a contradiction) OR, that in fact, the Church wasn't apostate after all.
Those are not the only possible conclusions. You could also consider the possibility that the apostate church composed an tainted NT that is mostly as it was originaly, but not completely like what the apostles wrote, so it still contains much of God's word, but is not perfect (leading to much contention and disagrement among Christians for 2000 years).
God used Pharoah's hardened heart to His own ends, does that venerate Pharoah?
Many schools of theology contend that the Church had a falling away, or went apostate, not too long after the death of the last Apostle.
Be careful here. "The Church" can never be apostate or else it wouldn't be "The Church." Nor is "The Church" dependent upon human organization -- it is plainly from God, not man.
The debate is not whether "The Church" went into apostacy, but whether Catholicism constitutes "The Church." To do so, Catholicism's first test is adherence to scripture, a test that it fails as plainly as the nose on your face.
"Calvinists" do not believe the Church had a "falling away" in A.D. 312, along with "Mormons". This is argumentum ad ignoratiam and straw man.
Perhaps this fellow is thinking of anabaptists?
The Reformers, such as John Calvin, did not believe the Church had a "falling away" in A.D. 312--not even close. Indeed, the Reformers argued vigorously for a Reformation based upon historic catholic (i.e., *universal*) orthodoxy as based upon the Holy Scripture. The Reformers correctly observed that the institution known as the Roman Catholic church had denied certain issues of catholic Christianity and had substituted a false system of authority that obfuscated core tenents of the Gospel.
The Reformers, while holding to Sola Scriptura as the final authority in matters of faith and doctrine, held the historic, universal creeds of the Christian faith in the highest esteem (i.e., Nicene, Chalcedon, Athanasian), and held the writings of the ante-nicene fathers in high regard and instructive, though not determinative.
Moreover, the Roman Catholic church did not "produce" the Bible as [a] the Old Testament was in common use for millennia before the Roman Catholic church was founded and [b] the New Testament was also in common use and recognition long before the Roman Catholic church came into existence.
Dr. Eric Svendsen addresses this straw man of Romanism if anyone is interested HERE
What a pile of crap! Is crap a profanity? not sure. But I'm sure that your all about unsupported premises.
I think about one per paragraph. Starting with "Many schools of theology contend that..." What schools of theology??? Contended what??? Everything after that is based on very bad or non existant premises.
A waste of bandwidth.
Want to find credibility????
Document, document, document, footnote, footnote, footnote. Pretend your writing your thesis. Not trying to convert your sister-in-law.
Regards,
Lurking'
Firstly, God does not deceive nor does the Mystical Body of God his Church. Secondly, the 'thousand year' reign of Christ - meaning forever because he shall reign over the House of Jacob and his kingdom shall have no end - this everlasting Kingdom of God began with his resurrection. Moreover, he promised he would be with us all days even until the end of time.
The Church has always applied the wisdom which the Holy Spirit gave it, being "guided into all truth" (John 16:31) such that "the Church of the living God" (not the Bible) is "the pillar and ground of the Truth" (1 Timothy 3:15) and "he who rejects you (ie the leaders of the Church) rejects me" (Luke 10:16).
The Church leaders (in the Greek: 'episcopi' - or area over-seers - which became the word 'bishop') did in fact decide which among the hundreds of texts reporting the life of Jesus would become the Gospels plus the rest of the written part of the Christian tradition.
All this is documented and on record, for those who have eyes to see, and the brains to pick up on. Then again, it is not a matter of intellect but will. The last thing most human beings want to do is bow. Hey Adam? Right Lucifer?
The real Church has a documented history that traces back without a single break to its birth on Pentecost Sunday. Every other counterfeit is from, well, you know whom...
The history of the authoritative and indisputable decision-making process that created the Bible as we know it is given in Henry Graham's Where We Got The Bible available from http://www.tanbooks.com/framesets/titles.htm.
It would even be more accurate to say Baptist thought especially looks to AD 312 as the time the RC Church started to be corrupted(note I didn't digitally, black and white, say "it was apostate") due to its allegiance with the government--baptists have always been suspicious of a state church.
The classic Protestant view is yes the Church started to grow towards being apostate from about Emporer Constantine on, but that it never fully became that way. The name "REFORMATION" after all comes from the Reformers view that things needed reform--they never called themselves "New Founders" or something else, indicating that they thought the RC Church was hoplessly in error--Mormon's I believe said that about all Christians, which is why they founded an entirely new religion. The formation of the Cannon occurred before Constantine, and can easily be seen (as the scholars did then) as a mere recognition of what was already regarded as inspired and authoritative, rather than the creation of that... The creation of the New Testament after all was done from the pen of the Apostles... (and the breath of the Holy Spirit).
Another thing, you state the early church had no Cannon, which is incorrect--they had the Old Testament, the cannonicity which had been recognized by the Jews already (minus the appocrypha I might add), so yes they did have the largest part of the Cannon in that.
The logic that the New Testament is a creation of the Church--thereby proving the authority of the (Roman) Church over it, is flawed. The New Testament, created by eyewitnesses to the Ressurection--the Apostles--was RECOGNIZED by the Roman Church; there's a big difference between recognition and creation. And orthodox Protestants of all stripes, Calvinist, or not, have never taught the Roman Church was (fully) appostate, only that the encrustation of centuries of extra-biblical practice, teachings and tradition, had distorted the good news of salvation by grace alone through simple faith in Christ.