Posted on 10/26/2004 9:20:58 AM PDT by skellmeyer
A free brochure on purgatory and indulgences is available for download at
http://bridegroompress.com/catalog/product_info.php?cPath=22&products_id=28
This brochure may be freely downloaded, e-mailed, printed out and distributed in churches, small groups, or among friends and acquaintances, etc. in order to promote a correct understanding of the Catholic teaching on the subject.
(Excerpt) Read more at bridegroompress.com ...
Oh, please, don't trot out that Romans passage in order to insist I have to proclaim with my mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord and believe in my heart that He is risen from the dead or I won't be saved. After all, numerous demons in the Gospels proclaimed that Jesus was the Son of God and the demons certainly believe in their heart that He is risen from the dead, so your logic puts those demons in heaven.
Then you'll trot out the tripe about how the demons' faith is not a "saving faith", whatever that is, since New Testament Scripture never uses that phrase. And I'll have to point that out. If you want to know what you must do to be saved, check out the three modes of God's revelation, described at http://bridegroompress.com/catalog/article_info.php?articles_id=62
As the thief was dying on the cross next to Jesus, he accepted Christ as his Saviour, and Jesus replied: "Today you will be with Me in Paradise." Notice He said TODAY, not next year if enough prayers are said for you, or candles are lit for you - his faith in the Blood of Jesus was enough for that man's salvation.
Typical Protestant - reads literally what is meant to be read figuratively, and never thinks about the context.
Look, if had you finished reading the rest of the New Testament, you would see that immediately after His death, Jesus went down "to preach to the spirits in prison" during the three days His Body lay in the tomb, then He rose from the dead (and His resurrection is what justifies us, NOT His Cross, as Paul testifies in Romans: "He was put to death for our sins, but was raised for our justification."), then He spent 40 days teaching the disciples and only THEN did He ascend into heaven.
So, yes, the thief ended up in heaven TODAY, keeping in mind that a thousand years is as a day to the Lord and a day is as a thousand years. The thief died a baptism of blood, which is sufficient to enter heaven, since baptism saves you now, as Peter tells us, and we must both believe and be baptized to be saved, as Jesus tells us.
"By faith you have been saved, and not by works, lest anyone should boast......."
Yes, and you add the line of dots because you can't finish quoting the sentence or your whole point is destroyed. "for we are his handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for the good works that God has prepared in advance, that we should live in them" never mind verses like James 2:24 "See how a person is justified by works and not by faith alone."
And also never mind that the NT talks of faith in the past, the present and the future tenses, but you guys always grab onto only the one-third of Scripture you like and ignore the two-thirds that destroy your points. See my analysis on http://bridegroompress.com/sc/faithwrk.htm for more information on that, Scripture already included.
Have I covered all your lame points, or do you want to thrash like a fish on the end of a hook for awhile longer?
Yes, and then don't forget to change the subject.
Pathetic excuse for Christian belief.
I was just trying to find common ground, but you knew that.
"Pathetic excuse for Christian belief."
You are much too full of yourself, and I choose not to yoke myself in discussion with you.
If you accept Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour you will be saved - if not, then you will not be.
So simple even a dullard like me can understand it.
That's a nice unifying statement. You must be quite proud of yourself.
On the bright side, you know enough to run when you are beaten. That is a virtue.
Luther denied that reason was anything except the whore of the devil - faith alone, and all that. Protestant insistence on "sola scriptura" makes everyone their own Pope, rendering moral relativism an absolute necessity. Atheists responded by embracing the moral relativism. They simply argue that the Protestants got it backwards. Faith is the opiate of the masses - reason alone is the thing.
The conclusion is hard to avoid. After all, Scripture defines moral existence. If everyone creates their own "spirit-led" interpretation of reality, that is the very definition of relativism. Sola scriptura is nothing but a series of practical experiments in relativism. Atheism's insistence on reason alone is simply an attempt to systematize the experiments according to the only measure that sola scriptura allows: the human mind. Ironically, this sole standard is also denied by Protestants - reason is the whore of the devil, remember? So, oddly enough, the atheist version of moral relativism is a wild attempt to retain at least some absolute standard. Secular atheists recognize that you can't throw away Scripture and rationality simultaneously or all you have left is anarchy, aka, Luther's wars of the Reformation. Luther and the other reformers were too stupid to realize that.
Like I said, Protestantism is a pathetic excuse for Christianity, and it is the philosophy that spawned the modern Democratic party.
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