Posted on 05/12/2004 11:23:37 PM PDT by AskStPhilomena
It is said that the Devil hates preachers even more than he hates exorcists. A preacher, after all, ministers to multitudes, driving away error and encouraging conversion of heart by the exposition of Catholic doctrine. Common opinion suggests that today’s homiletic standards should give the Evil One little cause for concern. Everyone, or so it seems, has a pulpit horror story of banality, heresy or simple incoherence, even from traditional priests. Having accounted for exaggerations, clerical bad hair days and the posturings of the professional sermon critics among us, it does seem that much, perhaps most, preaching, is substandard.
It’s harder to establish the reasons for this lack of eloquence. Laying the blame on a lack of proximate preparation seems the most popular course - Father is too busy or lazy to prepare properly. Many priests don’t seem to read much more than the daily newspapers, and become preachers of The Weekend Australian rather than the Gospel. The television and the internet have established themselves as the sacerdotal diversions of choice. It’s not that the means of social communication, as the Vatican coyly dubs them, are unimportant, just that as a promoter of homiletic skills they are intrinsically limited. Gone are the days of the presbytery library brimming not just with texts of the Fathers, theology and lives of the saints but also with classics of literature in several languages.
Loud, long and severe
The Curé of Ars as a young priest is said to have slaved over the preparation of his sermons, writing them out in full on the sacristy bench and going to the high altar to pray when he needed inspiration. Having completed them he would commit them to memory. His sources were limited to the standard manuals of the time and his sermons reflect his chief preoccupations - the evils of dancing, drinking and impurity. You have to wonder whether the laity who complain about the irrelevance and tedium of contemporary preaching would deal well with the words of a saint like St John Vianney. His extensive denunciations of all kinds of vice and every spiritual malaise would drain the blood from any face. Nothing he said was for the sake of consolation but rather for destroying the calm of those content with laxity and sin. It was noted that his listeners didn’t even have the luxury of sleeping through his often very loud sermons.
He was not thought of as a good or learned preacher. Both long winded (his average was about an hour and forty minutes) and severe (he was accused of having a Jansenist temperament), he often forgot his place, resuming, if at all, after a long pause. One of his brother priests absentmindedly mislaid the text of about twenty of the saint’s homilies because he didn’t think them very interesting or important. It was only when he began to preach ex tempore, abandoning his youthful rigorism, that the Curé’s words hit home. As a toothless old man mumbling in the pulpit about the love of God he would reduce the whole church to tears of penitence - his sermon was his life. Anything that involves the action of the Holy Spirit is a lot more complicated than any of us imagine.
We can compare the preaching of this saint to that of another holy man, Henry Cardinal Newman, his contemporary. He coaxed and cajoled his listeners, pointing to the beauty of the Church and its teaching, secure in the conviction that the Truth, once announced, attracted the mind. His was a soul that rested peacefully in that Truth, inviting others into its tranquil harbour. You couldn’t imagine Newman shouting at a congregation in the way that Vianney did, yet both were holy, both influenced the people of their time, neither had truck with error or vice.
Congregation hostile
Much has changed in the course of two centuries and those who lament that their clergy don’t preach like Henry Newman or John Vianney should bear in mind that, by and large, a modern congregation won’t sit still for more than twenty minutes or consent to listen to anything more challenging or complicated than a joke about the football. St John would be viewed as an arrogant bore gratuitously insulting his respectable parish, Bd Henry as an uncaring elitist preaching “over the heads” of simple folk. You can be more or less certain that both would be reported to the diocesan authorities or their religious superiors as troublemakers and “unpastoral”. A.N.Wilson wrote a novel which begins with a dense Jesuit who didn’t know how to preach. He coped with the challenge by reading other people’s sermons. As long as he chose the words of those who pandered to the current fashions he was considered a celebrity preacher, given honour and advancement. His fall occurred when, running short of time, he selected a book at random on the way to the pulpit - a collection of Cardinal Newman’s homilies. Unfortunately for him it contained an oblique reference to the glories of High Mass in Latin. His career as a preacher ended ignominously.
Low regard
Humbert of Romans, a medieval theorist of preaching, suggests that the Holy Spirit inspires the preacher in direct proportion to the devotion of the people. It is worth considering that bad preaching is not just a clerical problem, but a function of the low regard in which this ministry is held by everyone in the Church, despite protestations to the contrary. In the same way that the merest glimpse of even a completely cold thurible provokes Pavlovian coughing fits, the accession of the priest to the pulpit often reduces the congregation to a state of evident catatonia before he says a single word. A culturally ingrained habit of thought, of both clergy and laity, considers the preaching of the Church not so much an action of Christ the Teacher but an address whose principle function is to deliver the congregation from boredom. The recent tendency to employ nonclerical preachers at the liturgy - their proper functions lie elsewhere - has not helped this perception.
The French chronicler of manners, Anthelme Brillat-Savarin, records the custom of one famous old canon who would periodically pause during his longer instructions to consume a pickled walnut, while he allowed the congregation leave briefly to clear their throats and nasal passages. He also records an ecclesiastical difference of opinion over the propriety of allowing ladies to have their servants bring them cups of hot chocolate during extended preaching. However quaint these historical portraits they reveal a period in which preaching was taken seriously. It was an event of Divine Mercy at which you might to find edification, grace or conversion of heart.
In an age when the preacher competes not just with the cabarets and soirees of Ars but with increasingly expert and technologically advanced electronic media and cinema proper training of the clergy in sacred eloquence is only part of the solution. We have to have good listeners as well as good preachers.
Is a fish a dog? No, but it’s a hell of a lot closer to a dog than a mushroom is. Likewise, Islam is a lot closer to Christianity than wiccanism or atheism is. To deny this is to deny reality and eschew credibility.
I'll probably catch hell for this, but I will point out that out side the Church is outside the Church.
I was unaware that there was more than one God.
Is that why infant baptism wasn't started until the late 200s, Mariolotry in the 400s, Indulgences in the 500s, Purgratory in the 600s, Saint and image worship in the 700s, transubstantiation in the 1000s, celibacy for priests in 1125, auricular confession in 1215, bible forbidden in 1229...
Sounds like a consistent story to me - NOT!!
And HUMAN TRADITIONS ADOPTED and PERPETUATED by the ROMAN CATHOLIC CHURCH in the COURSE OF 1600 YEARS.
(Compiled by Rev. Stephen L. Testa).
"And ye shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free" Jesus in John 8:32
Notice:- These dates are in many cases approximate. Many of these heresies had been current in the church years before, but only when they were officially adopted by a church council and proclaimed by the pope as dogma of faith, did they become binding on Catholics.
And doctrine to be true must conform to the Word of God. "To the law and to the testimony; if they speak not according to this word, it become there is no light in them." ( Isaiah 8:20 ).
At the Reformation in the 16th Century these heresies were repudiated as having no part in the Religion of Jesus as taught in the New Testament.
1. OF ALL THE HUMAN TRADITIONS taught and practiced by the Roman Catholic Church, which are contrary to the Bible, the most ancient are the prayers for the dead and the sign of the Cross. Both began 300 years after Christ................................................................................310
2. Wax Candles introduced in church about...........................................................................320
3. Veneration of angels and dead saints about...................................................................375
4. The Mass, as a daily celebration, adopted.........................................................................394
5. The worship of Mary, the mother of Jesus, and the use of the term, "Mother of God", as applied to her, originated in the Council of Ephesus in..............................................................431
6. Priests began to dress differently from the laity in.................................................................500
7. The doctrine of Purgatory was first established by Gregory the Great about the year.......593
8. The Latin language, as the language of prayer and worship in churches, was also imposed by Pope Gregory I. 600 years after Christ...............................................................................600
The Word of God forbids praying and teaching in an unknown tongue ( I Cor.14:9).
9. The Bible teaches that we pray to God alone. In the primitive church never were there prayers directed to Mary, or to dead saints. This practice began in the Roman Church about......................................................................................................................................600
(Matt.11:28; Luke 1:46; Acts 10:25-26; 14:14-18)
10. The Papacy is of pagan origin. The title of pope or universal bishop, was first given to the bishop of Rome by the wicked emperor Phocas, in the year.....................................................610
This he did to spite Bishop Ciriacus of Constantinople, who had justly excommunicated him for having caused the assassination of his predecessor emperor Mauritius. Gregory I, then bishop of Rome, refused the title, but his successor, Boniface III, first assumed title "pope".
Jesus did not appoint Peter to the leadership of the apostles and forbade such notion. (Luke 22:24-26; Eph.1:22-3;Col.1:18; I Cor.3:11 ).
Note:- Nor is there any mention in Scripture, nor in history, that Peter ever was in Rome, much less that he was pope there for 25 years; Clement, 3rd. bishop of Rome, remarks that "there is no real 1st century evidence that Peter ever was in Rome."
11. The kissing of the Pope's feet began in.........................................................................709
It had been a pagan custom to kiss the feet of emperors. The Word of God forbids such practices. (Read Acts 10:25-26; Rev.19:10; 22:9).
12. The Temporal power of the Popes began .....................................................................750
When Pepin, the usurper of the throne of France, descended into Italy, called by Pope Stephen II, to war against the Italian Lombards, he defeated them and gave the city of Rome and surrounding territory to the pope. Jesus expressly forbade such a thing, and He Himself refused worldly kingship (Read Matt.4:8-9; 20:25-26; John 18:38).
13. Worship of the cross, of images and relics was authorized in........................................788
This was by order of Dowager Empress Irene of Constantinople, who first caused to pluck the the eyes of her own son, Constantine VI, and then called a church council at the request of Hadrian I, pope of Rome at that time.
Such practice is called simply IDOLATRY in the Bible, and is severly condemned (Read Ex.20:4; 3:17; Deut.27:15; Psalm 115).
14. Holy Water, mixed with a pinch of salt and blessed by the priest, was authorized in .........850
15. The veneration of St.Joseph began in............................................................................890
16. The baptism of bells was instituted by Pope John XIV, in the year...................................965
17. Canonization of dead saints, first by Pope John XV in...................................................995
Every believer and follower of Christ is called saint in the Bible (Read Rom.1:7; I Cor.1:2).
18. Fasting on Fridays and during Lent were imposed in the year.........................................998
Imposed by popes said to be interested in the commerce of fish. (Bull, or permit to eat meat), some authorities say, began in the year 700. This is against the plain teaching of the Bible (Read Matt.15:10; I Cor.10:25; I Tim.4:1-3).
19. The Mass was developed gradually as a sacrifice; attendance made obligatory in the 11th century.
The Bible teaches that the sacrifice of Christ was offered once and for all, and is not to be repeated, but only commemorated in the Lord's Supper (Read Heb.7:27; 9:26-28; 10:10-14).
20. The celibacy of the priesthood was decreed by Pope Hildebrand, Boniface VIII, in ......1079
Jesus imposed no such rule, nor did any of the apostles. On the contrary, St.Peter was a married man, and St.Paul says that bishops were to have wife and children (Read I Tim.3:2,5 and 12; Matt.8:14-15).
21. The Rosary, or prayer beads was introduced by Peter the Hermit, in the year 1090. Copied from Hindus and Mohammedans.
The counting of prayers is a pagan practice and is expressly condemned by Christ (Matt.6:5-13).
22. The Inquisition of heretics was instituted by the Council of Verona in the year 1184. Jesus never taught the use of force to spread His religion.................................................................1184
23. The sale of Indulgences, commonly regarded as a purchase of forgiveness and a permit to indulge in sin, began in the year..............................................................................................1190
Christianity, as taught in the Bible, condemns such a traffic, and it was the protest against this traffic that brought on the Protestant Reformation in the 16th century.
24. The dogma of Transubstantiation was decreed by Pope Innocent III, in the year...........1215
By this doctrine the priest pretends to perform a daily miracle by changing a wafer into the body of Christ, and then he pretends to eat Him alive in the presence of his people during Mass. The Bible condemns such absurdities; for the Lord's Supper is simply a memorial of sacrifice of Christ. The spiritual presence of Christ is implied in the Lord's Supper. (Read Luke 22:19-20; John 6:35; I Cor.11:26).
25. Confession of sins to the priest at least once a year was instituted by Pope Innocent III, in the Lateran Council, in the year.............................................................................................1215
The Bible commands us to confess our sins direct to God. (Read Psa.51:1-10; Luke 7:48; 15:21; I John 1:8-9).
26. The adoration of the wafer (Host), was decreed by Pope Honorius in the year..............1220
So the Roman Church worships a god made human hands. This is plain idolatry and absolutely contrary to the spirit of the gospel. (Read John 4:24).
27. The Bible forbidden to layman and placed in the Index of forbidden books by the Council of Valencia in...........................................................................................................1229
Jesus commanded that the Scriptures should be read by all (John 5:39; I Tim.3:15-17).
28. The Scapular was invented by Simon Stock, an English monk, in the year.......................1287
It is a piece of brown cloth, with the picture of the Virgin and supposed to contain supernatural virtue to protect from all dangers those who wear it on naked skin. This is fetishism.
29. The Roman Church forbade the cup to the laity, by instituting the communion of one kind in the Council of Constance in 1414
The Bible commands us to celebrate the Lord's Supper with unleavened bread and the fruit of the vine (Read Matt.26:27; I Cor. 11:26-29).
30. The doctrine of Purgatory was proclaimed as a dogma of faith by the Council of Florence in...........................................................................................................1439
There is not one word in the Bible that would teach the purgatory of priests. The blood of Jesus Christ cleanseth us from all sins. (Read I John 1:7-9; 2:1-2; John 5:24; Rom.8:1).
31. The doctrine of 7 Sacraments affirmed in ......................................................................1439
The Bible says that Christ instituted only two ordinances, Baptism and the Lord's Supper. (Read Mt.28:19-20; 26:26-28).
32. The Ave Maria, part of the last half in ..........................................................................1508
It was completed 50 years afterward and finally approved by Pope Sixtus V., at the end of the 16th century.
33. The Council of Trent, held in the year 1545, declared that Tradition is of equal authority with the Bible........................................................................................................................1545
By tradition is meant human teachings. The Pharisees believed the same way, and Jesus bitterly condemned them, for by teaching human tradition, they nullify the commandments of God (Read Mark 7:7-13; Col.2:8; Rev.22:18).
34. The apocryphal books were added to the Bible also by the Council of Trent in...............1546
These books were not recognized as canonical by the Jewish Church (See Rev.22:8-9).
35. The Creed of Pope Pius IV was imposed as the official creed 1528 years after Christ and the apostles, in ....................................................................................................1560
True Christians retain the Holy Scriptures as their creed. Hence their creed is more than 1528 older than the creed of Roman Catholics (Read Gal.1:8).
36. The Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary was proclaimed by Pope Pius IX in .....1854
The Bible states that all men, with the sole exception of Christ, are sinners. Mary herself had need of a Saviour (Read Rom.3:23; 5:12; Psa.51:5; Luke 1:30, 46, 47).
37. In the year 1870 after Christ, Pope Pius IX proclaimed the dogma of Papal Infallibility..1870
This is a blasphemy and a sign of the apostasy and of the anti-christ predicted by St.Paul (Read II Th. 2:2-12; Rev. 17:1-9; 13:5-8,18).
Many Bible students see the number of the beast (Rev.13:18), 666 in the Roman letters of the Pope's title:"VICARIVS FILII DEI". - V-5, I-1, C-100, I-1, V-5, I-1, L-50, I-1; D-500, I-1 - Total, 666.
38. Pope Pius X, in the year 1907, condemned together with "Modernism", all the discoveries of modern science which are not approved by the Church................................................... .1907
Pius IX had done the same thing in the Syllabus of 1864.
39. In the year 1930 Pius XI, condemned the Public Schools.............................................1930
40. In the year 1931 the same pope Pius XI, reaffirmed the doctrine that Mary is "the Mother of God".........................................................................................................1931
This doctrine was first invented by the Council of Ephesus in the year 431. This heresy contrary by Mary's own words (Read Lk. 1:46-49; Jn. 2:1-5).
41. In the year 1950 the last dogma was proclaimed by Pope Pius XII, the Assumption of the Virgin Mary.........................................................................................1950
CONCLUSION
What will be the next invention? The Roman Church says it never changes; yet, it has done nothing else but invent new doctrines which are contrary to the Bible, and has practiced rites and ceremonies taken bodily from paganism. Some scholar has found that 75% of the rites and ceremonies of the Roman Church are of pagan origin.
Note:- Cardinal Newman, in his book, "The Development of the Christian Religion", admits that..."Temples, incense, oil lamps, votive offerings, holy water, holidays and season of devotions, processions, blessing of fields, sacerdotal vestments, the tonsure (of priests and monks and nuns), images....are all of pagan origin..." (page 359).
HERESIES are those doctrines and practices which are contrary to the Bible. They are also called "human traditions" or "doctrines of men". Both Peter and Paul predicted and warned that in the later times "false teachers" would rise within the Church and bring in "damnable heresies" and "doctrines of devils". (Read II Peter 2:1-3, and I Tim.3:2-5). Jesus rebuked the Pharisees, for they transgressed the commandments of God by keeping their traditions, "In vain", He said, "they worship me by keeping for doctrines the commandments of men" (Matt.15:3,9).
The real heretics therefore , are the Roman Catholics and the true orthodox are the Evangelical Christians.
BRETHREN! The Word of God commands us to get out of Babylon, saying: "Come out of her, my people, that ye be not partakers of her sins, and that ye receive not of her plagues."(Rev.18:4). All true Christians will remain faithful to the religion of Christ as taught in the Bible, and heed the warning of the Apostle Paul, who said: "But thought we, or an angel from heaven, preach any other Gospel unto you than that which we have preached unto you, let him be accursed."(Gal.1:8).
http://www.baptistpillar.com/bd0172.htm
http://www.baptistpillar.com/bd0172.htm
Thank you posting this list and fleshing out my post #25. That is a great compilation and I'll definitely be keeping a copy of it for study. Thanks.
Thanks RM. I was going to compile a list of these someday so I've bookmarked it.
The Catholics will, of course, say these are traditions which the church has the authority to impose. They get this idea from the Council of Trent (correctly pointed out in your list) when the council declared Tradition to be equal with the scripture. Thus it becomes a circular argument. (e.g. We follow tradition and we know this is right because our traditions say so.) The Pope infalibility declared in 1870 makes this so.
I don't know if I would equate them with "the beast of Babylon". In studying their theology I can only conclude the TRUE believers are my Christian brothers and sisters. I understand this is not reciprical (they believe those outside the RCC are-at best-heretics) and generally I make allowances for their beliefs.
Ironically, Catholics will look at other people in the Catholic church who are true apostates as fellow believers just because they belong to the church. It has been my experience they will defend these Catholic apostates or Catholics who are in grievious error over solid Protestants believers every time. No matter how wrong the Catholic and how right the Protestant. Something which I find offensive and un-Biblical.
I do think they have strayed from sound teaching and feel I would be remiss if I failed to point it out from time to time.
Just last year the Pope asked all Catholics to pray the rosary for the conversion of Islam. Isn't that what you would pray for too? I have not heard any idea from any Catholic or nonCatholic that strikes me as more intelligent,more holy or more likely to be effective than prayer,have you?
Man, Harley, you really haven't been listening, or you just pick and choose what you want to hear. I really don't know where to start in identifying the errors in that last post of yours, there are so many.
BTW, have you ever bothered to read Keating's book? I ask because I've read Boettner's (though it was work to keep from laughing at some points).
Read the Keating book I refer to in post #34, unless you're afraid to hear the other side of the story.
Maybe if you would just pray to the Holy Spirit to conform your thinking with the mind of His Church you might find yourself very surprised.
"...and pray on my behalf, that utterance may be given to me in the opening of my mouth, to make known with boldness the mystery of the gospel,..." Ephesians 6:19
We don't need to pray for people conversions. We should be praying that we may be faithful in opening our mouths to share the gospel.
Seriously,I could not do that,perhaps because I would be afraid I'd be killed before anyone even unerstood what I was talking about. So I will pray the rosary for the conversion of Islam and trust that God gives men like you the courage to go out into the heart of Muslim nations and proclaim the Gospel. Clearly lies and violence only begets more lies and more violence. The world will only change if we proclaim the Truth and pray unceasingly to our Triune God.
Even if the circumstance presented themselves to me, I could only hope that I would be as faithful as our fellow saints. But right now there are brave souls in these Muslim countries who are preaching the word. We should be praying for their boldness and safety.
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