Posted on 10/21/2005 5:37:01 AM PDT by sheltonmac
Great post, thanks.
Council of Trent-CANON IV.-If any one saith, that man's free will moved and excited by God, by assenting to God exciting and calling, nowise co-operates towards disposing and preparing itself for obtaining the grace of Justification; that it cannot refuse its consent, if it would, but that, as something inanimate, it does nothing whatever and is merely passive; let him be anathema.
CANON IX.-If any one saith, that by faith alone the impious is justified; in such wise as to mean, that nothing else is required to co-operate in order to the obtaining the grace of Justification, and that it is not in any way necessary, that he be prepared and disposed by the movement of his own will; let him be anathema.
Catholic Website Newadvent-"If we take the attitude of free will as the dividing principle of actual grace, we must first have a grace which precedes the free determination of the will and another which follows this determination and co-operates with the will. This is the first pair of graces, preventing and co-operating grace (gratia praeveniens et cooperans).
HELLO?!? Wake up Catholics. Don't you see a difference in theology between Augustine and the current position of the Catholic Church that happened at Trent?
Please re-read what I posted about Augustine's ideas about our cooperation with Grace and then tell me how that differs from Trent.
Your picture of the Renaissance represents the assesssment given about 100 years ago by Jacob Burckhardt. Tons of research over the last 100 years has shown that while some Renaissance humanists were somewhat secular and challenged some aspects of Church authority, these were the clear exceptions. The leading Renaissance humanists were devoutly Christian and sought to recovery the Patristic heritage as well as the ancient classical heritage. Your view of the Renaissance is actually a secularized one accenting the recovery of pagan antiquity, which was one part but only part of and integated with a recovery of Christian humanism. Among dozens of books, I would recommend Charles Trinkaus, In His (the?) Image and Likeness (1972?) which examines in great detail the Christian (and Augustinian) centrality of the leading Italian Renaissance figures.
It is simply incorrect to say that the Renaissance perverted Catholicism and to blame it for most of what went wrong. The fallacy lies in thinking that all "humanism" or man-centered thinking is wrong. That is actually a Calvinist position. Christian humanism glorifies man but rightly does so because man is God's greatest creature. A false kind of humanism glorifies man in the absence of God. The late medieval Renaissance humanism was almost exclusively of the first type, not the second. It was in the interest of Enlightenment enemies of Christianity to make it out to have been an example of the second type. You (and many other Catholics) unwittingly buy into that. So did the Evangelical Protestant Francis Schaeffer, who blamed Renaissance humanism for everything going wrong. Schaeffer did a lot of good at L'Abri etc. but he was not a very good historian. (He was much closer to being right about the two-story universe of Kant than he was about the Renaissance.) The Enlightenment “secularized” view of the Renaissance is deeply embedded in standard textbooks and has seeped into some Catholic writing.
Erasmus was not really "pals" with Luther. THey had an intense fight over the freedom of the will in 1525. I don't particularly like Erasmus--I think his Catholicism had unhelpful accents and emphases. He stayed within the boundaries of orthodoxy, yes, but his view of monasticism and his recommendations for reform were not among the best, in my view. Thomas More represents a much healthier Catholic humanism.
Scholars over the last 50 years (Paul O. Kristeller etc.) have emphasized the many ways that Renaissance humanism actually grew out of medieval scholasticism. I could go on at length, but the main point remains: the Renaissance, whether in Italy or in Northern Europe was anything but a revolt of man-centered idolatry against Christian faith.
The movement that did corrupt everything, in my view, was, as I mentioned, the development of the all-powerful nation-state in which the king claimed authority to control everything, including the Church. To the degree, for instance, that Machiavelli or Bodin or Hobbes represent "humanism" or "Renaissance" then the Renaissance contributed to this development. But I would argue that a much larger trend was at work here, one with roots going way back but which was stalled off, prevented from triumphing in the high Middle Ages by papal resistance under Gregory VII and Innocent III etc., namely, the movement to put things in terms of raw power and dominance of the state rather than seeing the temporal ruler (the state) as under God's governance. This movement was pushed by medieval rulers (Frederick II, for instance) but did not triumph until the Protestant Reformation. The theoretical justification for it is found in writers from the 1500s and 1600s (Hobbes, Bodin) but practice preceded theory--kings were pushing for it in fact before intellectuals justified it, though one might see elemetns of it in Machiavelli or Lorenzo Valla or Marsilius of Padua in or even perhaps Dante in the 1200s, 1300s, 1400s.
Now, if you want me to make further qualifications and clarifications I can do that. But I thought it not good to bore people with too much detail, which is why I made larger generalizations. Rest assured, I made my generalizations based on what I consider to be a careful reading of the details. And yes, I am aware of great change between the early and later Middle Ages. But seen as a whole, the entire period from say 600 to 1500 also has some broad continuities when compared to, say, the 1600s or 1800s on the one hand and the 100s or 400s on the other hand.
German or English or Italian were used for day-to-day life, for business. This means that no one learned in school to read things written in vernacular. You had to sound out the text as you read and as you did that, you heard the word take form and understood it then. Peasants and tradesmen could not read in German. Only someone who already had learned to read in Latin could have read something written in German out loud to the average person. All of this means that, in fact, printing a text in German before Luther meant it had a limited readership though it might have reached more people aurally.
Publishing in Latin meant more widespread reading than publishing in the vernacular. When the devotional writings of, say the Cloud of Unknowing, were composed in English rather than Latin or the writings of Johann von Ruusbroeck in old Dutch rather than Latin, they could be read only in the limited region of England. The best of them were actually then translated into Latin so that they could be read across Europe.
Now, Luther's genius was to select for his translation a dialect (his own) from the middle of the range of German dialects (running from south to north, Saxony was in the middle). Thus his German could be more readily understood by more German-speakers than it would have been had he published in Swiss or North (Low) German dialect. That his Bible did reach a lot of people (in many but not all cases aurally, because by his day, learning to read German writing was growing) is evident in that his Saxon dialect gradually became the basis for a standard, school-taught, German. But that took decades if not centuries. In his day, translations were also published in Low German and Swiss etc. because people in those regions found it easier to read them.
The situation in England was different. There two basic clusters of dialect dominated--north and south. The northern, alliterative style was still flourishing in the late 1300s but Chaucer wrote in the "Southern" style characteristic of London and probably as a result of the dominance of London (much like Paris) the London-southern dialect crowded out the northern entirely as far as literary purposes was concerned. Germany had dozens of major cities of equal importance in various regions rather than one huge dominating capital like France and England. For that reason, people continued to write and print in Swiss and Low German and Bavarian dialect well into the 19th century. Today there's a revival of dialect writing but for a time, school-German, derived from Luther's choice of Saxon dialect for his translation, crowded the dialect writing out, though dialect, of course, remained standard for oral communication.
In this sense, Luther did disseminate vernacular translations more widely but he could do so in large part because a growing public was becoming literate in German. Such a public did not yet exist in 1450--it was emerging but was not there yet. So Latin texts were actually a better marketing choice in 1450 than German texts. The situation had changed by 1525.
You'll find that Augustine's veiw changed over time which he freely admits in his writings; especially with the Pelagius heresy. Here is an excerpt from his works, "On Grace and Free Will".
As Augustine states, God turns the will as He so pleases and changes the will from bad to good. He has Lordship over our wills.
The Mentel Bible was printed at Strasburg in 1466. I assume, though I have not researched it, that it would have represented an upper-German dialect (Alemannic, related to Swiss) and thus would have been at least to some degree unintelligible to the extreme North Germans but quite comprehensible to Swiss and Alsatians.
In any case, it should not be called a Gutenberg Bible because its publisher, I assume, was named Mentel. All Gutenberg bibles are in Latin. The Mentel Bible is important because it does represent a Catholic attempt to make the Bible available to German-speakers. But it was a narrower-aimed publication than Gutenberg's Latin Bible, for reasons given in my earlier post.
BTW, Augustine can be quoted as seeming to appear to deny free will; but he doesn't.
I can find dozens of such examples from his works. Here he is in City of God (which I reread recently) Book 5, chap. 9 Now if there is for God a fixed order of all causes, it does not follow that nothing depends on our free choice. Our wills themselves are in the order of causes, which is, for God, fixed, and is contained in his foreknowledge, since human acts of will are the causes of human activities. therefore he who had prescience of the causes of all events certainly could not be ignorant of our decisions, which he foreknows as the causes of our actions.
*The more you read Augustine the better you will understand he does not deny free will or the necessity of our cooperating with Grace.
Book 12, Chapter 9 "I likewise know that when an evil choice happens in any being, then what happens is dependent upon the will of that being; the failure is voluntary, not necessary, and the punishment that follows is just."
*Dozens of such examples abound.
I have read Augustine. It was through Augustine I became a Reformer.
It has been a while since I've read Thomas More. If memory service me correctly (and a few checks seems to confirm this) Thomas More advocated in Utopia that power be put into the hands of a few ruling politicians. In other words he was advocating what is now know as communism. This btw was the stance of the Catholic Church of the Renaissance who saw their political power of the middle ages slipping under the Reformation idea of giving power to the people.
The fallacy lies in thinking that all "humanism" or man-centered thinking is wrong....Christian humanism glorifies man but rightly does so because man is God's greatest creature.
And there you have it, the Renaissance thinking of glorifying man which encompasses EVERYTHING we do today. The ME generation. That's what it all comes down to. You will be hard press to find anywhere in scripture that we are to glorify man. This is a lie that goes back to the Garden itself when Eve was told, "...you will be like God".
"...but the main point remains: the Renaissance, whether in Italy or in Northern Europe was anything but a revolt of man-centered idolatry against Christian faith."
I never said it was a revolt. Church history shows documented evidence of the Augustinian/Pelagius-Council of Orange/Semi-Pelagius disputes. While Church councils formally declared semi-Pelagian with it's man centered beliefs as heresy, Popes sat on this dispute for hundreds of years. The Renaissance, with its humanistic beliefs found roots in the semi-Pelagian beliefs in parts of the Church and Augustine's beliefs, highlighted at the Council of Orange, were washed away by the Council of Trent.
As far as what you write about pelagianism and Augustine is concerned--this is based on hackneyed anti-Catholic presentations of what Catholics in the Middle Ages supposedly believed. Your claims have been refuted on dozens of FR threads. That you continue to trot them out does not speak well for you. I have read Augustine's writings in detail in Latin, I have read dozens of scholarly accounts of his teaching on grace and works by both evangelical Protestant (McGrath) and Catholic (Gerald Bonner, Mary T. Clark) and secular scholars. I have studied the decrees of the Council of Orange, studied under and taken issue with (regarding semipelagianism) the master of late medieval Augustinian theology, Heiko Oberman, taught this material for decades. I have read directly from manuscripts countless medieval monks' writings about grace and works. And nowhere do I find any evidence of semi-Pelagianism being taught during the Middle Ages. Moreover, this is not just my opinion but that of the highly respected Lutheran professor at Princeton Seminary for many years, Karlfried Froehlich. Medieval scholars knew what Pelagianism was and what semi-pelagianism was and they avoided it even though the actual decrees of Orange II became lost during much of the Middle Ages. They didn't need the actual decrees because the basis for condemning semi-pelagianism is found in the writings of Augustine THomas Aquinas reconstructed the content of II Orange based on a careful reading of Augustine and John Cassian and the other principals in the controversy. Read the sections of the Summa theologiae regarding grace and works and you will see that he utterly rejects any notion of pelagian or semipelagian works righteousness.
A little knowledge is a very dangerous thing and you are operating out of little knowledge. What you have retailed here is a bunch of hack neo-Calvinist propaganda that floats around the internet. No reputable scholar, Protestant or Catholic or secular who works at first hand with medieval or Reformation sources supports your view. Even Heiko Oberman, who claimed that Gabriel Biel taught a form of semi-pelagnism, did so only by implication because he knew the texts did not explicitly support any such claim.
This issue is which reading of Augustine is most accurate. And Calvin's reading (and Baius and Jansenius and Faustus's) is manifestly false. Augustine refers to "irresistible" grace in one place (in De correptione et gratia found in NPFN 1, vol. 5, ca. p. 470, if I recall correctly), a work from about 427. But in works written in 412 (On the Spirit and the Letter) and 426 and 427 (On Grace and Free Choice, as well as the cover letters for that treatise) he makes equally clear that no matter what he wrote about God's grace shaping us--and he was well aware that he had written strong language--he insisted in this letter and treatise to a group of monks who were arguing exactly as Cassian and Faustus did a few years later, exactly as Calvin and Jansenius and others disagreed over what Augustine "really" meant--in these letters and the treatise from 426/427, Augustine explicitly says that whatever you make of what I have written, you must never forget that God's grace never eliminates human cooperation with it and human cooperation can never be understood in such a way as to overcome or deny God's grace. Augustine himself was well aware that people were reading what he wrote in very different ways. He was well aware that he had written what seemed like contradictory things about grace and works. And in explicit response to that he, Augustine, himself gave the authoritative interpretation: never deny free will cooperating with grace but also never deny that God's grace is always already out in front of our cooperating free will. WIthout grace our wills are captive to sin but still free; God's grace does not force, does not rape, does not coerce; it can be resisted. WE have that clarification from Augustine himself. Calvin, Baius, Jansenius willfully chose to ignore it.
The precise reference to De correptione et gratia (On Rebuke and Grace), par. 34, 38, in NPNF series 1, vol. V, is to pp. 485 and 487. The two letters giving his own clarification sent with On Grace and Free Choice are found in the same volume, pp. 437-440; the treatise follows.
"I'm sure I can speak for many Catholics in saying that there is nothing discernably "Catholic" in TBAA. It is not only touchy-feely "feel-goodism," as someone on this thread said, it is also syncretistic and univeralist in the bargain."
Only the fact that it promotes praying to angels and the universalistic tendencies. It does seem as if Catholics have been claiming for years that anyone who follows their religion in good conscience will be saved.
The show seems to me to be distinctly Catholic as most Catholics I know behave and believe. If that is wrong, then most Catholics I know don't act Catholic.
"No thinking Catholic would consider the show to be anything more than sentimentalist trash, at least as it pertains to expositions of authentic Christianity."
I guess I don't know too many of those.
Colin.
Yes, I know. I have little knowledge and that is dangerous. I would suggest going to a number of UNBIAS NON-CATHOLIC sites and they will verify what I'm saying. But, I already know, if it's not Catholic it's not official. Anything other than what the RCC states is "hackneyed anti-Catholic presentation". The Catholic Church states that Thomas More was a great guy and that's that. Forget about what other non-Catholic authors have to say. There are other religious groups whose churches tell them what to believe as well.
It has been my experience for Catholics to rant and rave about Protestants not knowing what they are talking about simply because we don't believe the Roman Catholic Church is necessarily the final authority in any manner, including history. However, it is surprising that I could study the history of the church, read Augustine's and other early writers, reread the scriptures from a Reformed perspective and arrived at the same conclusion Luther, Calvin and the rest of the Reformers arrived at-independent of their writings. What do you think the statistical odds are of that happening? As an statistical analysis I can report that the probability are significantly high to simply dismiss it as some "hack" who "stumbled" across a few misplaced, misread comments.
I would suggest your historical perceptions are tainted, colored by what the Church tells you and your preconceived notions. This is a mark of a good Catholic but not a good historian.
I meant to write all men are objectively saved - POTENTIALLY. The operative word "but" proves that subjectively, men are NOT all saved. Christ died for the sins of all men, not just the elect. This is what the Church means by "objective". However, there is also what we call "subjective redemption" - which means applying Christ's Work to our own selves. This sounds like we do it by ourselves, but we have written back and forth, and I think you know where I, as well as Trent, stand on this. We can do nothing ALONE. But with God, I can do anything (says Paul).
With all due respect, you do not understand Luther because Luther never blamed God for the sinful actions of man.
Unfortunately, that is where his teachings inevitably leads to, whether he meant it or not. If we cannot choose right from wrong, how do we reconcile all of those numerous verses that place on us squarely the responsibility for obeying the commandments, for repentance, and for believing in Christ? If I cannot do this because I am "totally depraved", how can I be held responsible? Does God command me to do something that I cannot do, even with His help? This is the problem with Luther's anthropology - thus the idea of imputed righteousness.
While I applaud the Catholic Church’s stance on abortion, I don’t see writings on using condoms or diaphragms within the context of marriage in Augustine’s or Jerome’s writings.
Both contraception and sterilization has always been considered against the natural law - a sin against God.
"Because of its divine institition for the propagation of man, the seed is not to be vainly ejaculated, nor is it to be damaged, nor is it to be wasted" (Clement of Alexandria, The Instructor of Children, AD 191)
They {certain Egyptian heretics} exercise genital acts yet prevent conceiving of children. Not in order to produce offspring, but to satisy lust, are they eager for corruption" (Epiphanius of Salamis, Medicine Chest against Heresies, AD 375)
You {Manicheans} make your auditors adulterers of their wives when they take care lest the women with whom they copulate conceive. They take wives according to the laws of matrimony by tablets announcing that the marriage is contracted to procreate children, and then, fearing because of your law {against child bearing}...they copulate in a shameful union only to satisfy lust for their wives. They are unwilling to have children, on whose account alone marriages are made. How is it, then, that you are not those prohibiting marriage, as the apostle predicted of you so long ago {1 Tim 4:1-4}, when you try to take from marriage what marriage is? When this is taken away, husbands are shameful lovers, wives are harlots, bridal chambers are brothels, fathers-in-law are pimps (Augustine, Against Faustus, AD 400)
I have found 3 other such writings by Augustine who derides the sexual union that avoids the possibility of having children. Contraception has always been a problem of ancient societies - and the Church has spoken out against it. Unfortunately, the Protestants at the Lambeth Conference felt the pressure to succumb to culture. The Catholic Church has received its dictates from a Divine Person, and will not change such teachings.
The whole point of this all is not to bring up contraception per sec, but the FACT that the Spirit does not give knowledge of Himself to everyone. That is a verifiable FACT - all one has to do is look to the current state of Protestantism. The Spirit has been given to the CHURCH! The Community as a whole. Paul talks about receiving the Spirit in a plural sense, not that He endows knowledge on each of us individually to know His doctrines and teachings. Why do you think it was necessary to define WHO God was, or WHO Jesus was, or WHAT is Scripture at various Councils? Because individuals will disagree.
St. Thomas Aquinas himself said that ignorance is one of the results of original sin that remains with human kind. Our intellect is clouded. Even HE was found to be wrong on at least one occasion - the Immaculate Conception of Mary (although some may debate that). Augustine, also, was not infallible. His theory of babies being condemned to hell for not being baptized was never accepted by the Church. What is odd about Augustine here is that he had forgotten his very own teaching against the Donatists - that God is not bound by the sacraments. Thus, a way is available for theologians to see that God's mercy would overcome the "necessity" of being baptized. The Church realizes that the Spirit does not communicate normally with individual men. Thus, the NECESSITY for the Church to explore its traditions and teachings, its interpretations of Scriptures over the years - to come to a conclusion of a particular issue. And while guided by the Spirit (as we first see in Acts 15:28), the Church can make a defined dogma - even if it "SEEMS" to go against past Scriptural teachings (circumcision in this case).
The whole point of this was that Augustine is not the Church, nor the final arbitrator of what Catholics are to believe. Though instrumental in a number of different theologies, every word that issued from his mouth was not infallible - the Councils in union with the Bishop of Rome were considered infallible, not individual Fathers. The CHURCH'S teachings are infallible, when so identified.
"When, therefore, we have such proofs, it is not necessary to seek among others the truth which is easily obtained from the Church. For the Apostles, like a rich man in a bank, deposited with her most copiously everything which pertains to the truth; and everyone whosoever wishes draws from her the drink of life. For she is the entrance to life, while all the rest are thieves and robbers. That is why it is surely necessary to avoid them, while cherishing with the utmost diligence the things pertaining to the Church, and to lay hold of the tradition of truth. What then? If there should be a dispute over some kind of question, ought we not have recourse to the most ancient Churches in which the Apostles were familiar, and draw from them what is clear and certain in regard to that question?" (Irenaeus, Against Heresies, 3, 4, 1 180-190 AD)
"For the word of the Lord which came through the Ecumenical Council at Nicea remains forever" (Athanasius, Synodal letter to the Bishops of Africa, 368/372 AD). Note there is a reference to this going to 1 Peter 1:25.
It would be senseless to cite how all of the Church Fathers felt about the Church as a whole as the deposit of truth - NOT individuals themselves. ONLY HERETICS (like the Montanists) claimed that the Spirit came to them individually as prophets. Of COURSE we are to think for ourselves! But not in opposition to the Church! This is the way of the heretic - which comes from the Greek word meaning "choice". What sort of faith is required to pick and choose what you are going to believe, Harley? Faith is trusting in GOD'S WAYS, not our own ways!
I'll skip the Filioque for now. I have been reading about it thoroughly just this week. I am confident that it is a misunderstanding of terms - just as after Nicea, the Greek word for "essence" or "substance" was misunderstood and had to be re-defined later. Even we have different meanings for the same terms - Salvation or justification, for example.
On all the posts and threads that we have discussed this issue I have made it abundantly clear that we come to the knowledge of God by God Himself ALONE through His Holy Spirit. God doesn’t “aid” us. God does the work.
So how do you explain that there are hundreds of Protestant theologies that differ, in some cases DRASTICALLY, and yet claim that very same Holy Spirit as their source of "knowledge"? As I said before, the Holy Spirit does not instill individuals like you and me with such knowledge. This is reserved for the great mystics, the contemplatives, of the Church, as well as Councils united to define doctrines.
God gives us to our Lord Jesus. God seals us with His Holy Spirit. God works through us and gives us our good works. Our Lord Jesus keeps us and sees us home
Agree.
We never make a decision.
This again contradicts Christian belief for 2000 years. With such remarks, how am I to understand that man has free will? Perhaps a few quotes will show you are incorrect?
"When you are desirous to do well, God is also ready to assist you." (Ignatius 107 AD)
"The man who has the Lord in his heart can also be lord of all, and of every one of these commandments. However, as to those who have the Lord only on their lips, whose hearts are hardened, and who are far from the Lord - the commandments are difficult" (Hermas 150 AD)
"There is, therefore, nothing to hinder you from changing your evil manner of life, because you are a free man" (Melito, 170 AD)
"God ministers eternal salvation to those who cooperate for the attainment of knowledge and good conduct. Since what the commandments direct are in our own power, along with the performance of them, the promise is accomplished" (Clement of Alexandria, 195 AD)
There are numerous quotes by Clement and his pupil Origen along these lines - dozens and dozens...
But how about the West?
We define the soul as having sprung from the Breath of God. It is immortal...and free in its determinations (Tertullian, 210AD)
God, who created {the world}, did not, nor does not make evil...Now, man {who was brought into existence} was a creature endowee with a capacity of self-determination, yet he did not possess a sovereing intellect...Man, from the fact of his possessing a capacity of self-determination, brings forth what is evil...since man has free will, a law has been given him by God, for a good purpose" (Hippolytus 225AD)
"Man was made with a free will... on account of his capacity of obeying or disobeying God. For this was the meaning of the gift of free will." (Methodious 290 AD)
Rational creatures have been entrusted with free will. Because of this, they are capable of converting {i.e. from bad to good, with God's graces} (Disputation of Archelaus and Manes 320 AD)
And finally AUGUSTINE! "If faith pertains only to free choice and is not given by God, why, in regard to those who do not want to believe, do we pray that they may come to believe? It would be utterly useless for us to do this if we were not entirely correct in our belief that even wills that are perverse and hostile to the faith can be converted to belief by God Almighty. (Grace and Free Choice, 426 AD)
It is certain that we do keep the commandments, if we will to do so; but because the will is prepared by the Lord, we must ask Him to give our wills such strength as will suffice for putting our will into action. It is certain that in willing anything, it is we that do the willing; but it is He that enables us to will what is good...It is certain that in doing anything, it is we that act; but it is He that enables us to act, by His bestowing efficacious powers upon our will. (Grace and Free Choice)
"But if someone already regenerate and justified should, of his own will, relapse into his evil life, certainly that man cannot say: ..."I have not received"; because he lost the grace he received from God and by his own free choice went to evil" (Admonition and Grace 426AD)
Synergism has always been the doctrine of the Church. God's grace is not irrestible - man has the free will to refuse it. Man also has a responsibility to accept God's Commandments. God does not command us to do something that we cannot do. In some way, thus, we are united with God when our wills are moved to do the good and pleasing things for Him. Trent and Orange are clear - man can never come to God alone. But nor does God drag man into heaven alone. It is important that one looks to the entire Church Tradition and teachings, not just part of the Augustine corpus to determine our own beliefs. One can only wonder why someone would base their theology around PART of one particular saint of the Church...One needs not prove that Augustine believed in the Sacraments of the Church and the role of the Church in salvation of mankind. He clearly bowed to the authority of the Church. If Augustine is so highly regarded by Calvinists, why do they choose not to look at these teachings of Augustine on Mary, the Eucharist, Confession, the Saints, and so forth?
Brother in Christ
It has been my experience for Catholics to rant and rave about Protestants not knowing what they are talking about simply because we don't believe the Roman Catholic Church is necessarily the final authority in any manner, including history. However, it is surprising that I could study the history of the church, read Augustine's and other early writers, reread the scriptures from a Reformed perspective and arrived at the same conclusion Luther, Calvin and the rest of the Reformers arrived at-independent of their writings. What do you think the statistical odds are of that happening? As an statistical analysis I can report that the probability are significantly high to simply dismiss it as some "hack" who "stumbled" across a few misplaced, misread comments.
I would suggest your historical perceptions are tainted, colored by what the Church tells you and your preconceived notions. This is a mark of a good Catholic but not a good historian.
Sir, Your reply consists entirely of ad hominem reasoning. In all that I wrote, only one sentence had to do with Protestant versus Catholic presuppositions influencing how one reads Augustine. The rest of what I wrote cited specific information, original sources, scholarship (including scholarship by Protestants that agrees with the interpretation of Augustine that I am defending).
For the record, I arrived at the assessment I am offering you as a Protestant. I studied in Germany as a convinced Protestant with one of the leading Protestant church historians on this topic. I studied the manuscript record of medieval monks as a convinced Protestant. My studies, however, brought me to the conviction that the Protestant version of medieval Catholics as teaching "works righteousness" and the Calvinist reading of Augustine were inaccurate and indefensible readings of Augustine.
I reached these conclusions as a Protestant student of history, teaching in a Protestant seminary. Only after nearly 20 years of study of and teaching of medieval and Reformation history did I draw a second conclusion from the first conclusion: if in fact the Protestant retelling of what happened with regard to works righteousness in the Middle Ages, if the Calvinst reading of Augustine, do not match what I find in Augustine's writings themselves, then the Protestant version of this history is not credible. Only then did I become a Catholic.
To explain my views as merely the baleful influence of Catholic bias in my reading of history is insulting. Your reading of Augustine made you a Protestant reformer. Fine. I do not know whether you approached Augustine with a Catholic mindset, found it undermined by your own direct reading of Augustine and thus became a Protestant or whether, you approached your reading of Augustine having already been taught a Protestant view of him. What do know is that I came to my reading of Augustine and the Middle Ages as a radical Protestant, an Anabaptist, and went away from it a Catholic. The one thing that was not involved was a preexisting Catholic bias.
Your observation about the astuteness of many American Catholics these days will go largely unchallenged by me. Two generations of poor or non-existent catechesis, in an ill-advised and misguided attempt to be "all things to all men" (in a watered-down way) has seen to that. Hence, I qualified my remark with the idea that "no thinking Catholic" would consider the show to be religiously beneficial. There are many ignorant Catholics AND ignorant Protestants in this country who, hungering for *something* spiritual but not recognizing true spirituality if it bit them in the rump, jump at this show and its ilk in a vain attempt to feel warm and fuzzy about themselves. Such people doubtless are responsible for the long run of the show. I do not speak for Catholics involved in this manner. I imagine you don't wish to speak for the many Protestants similarly encumbered by their share of 2Timothy 3:5-7.
As for your claim that Catholics believe that anyone following, in good conscience, their (erroneous) religious sensibilities will be saved: well, there are a few additional qualifiers to that!
First, we don't simply say that "anything goes" as you imply. One must be not only acting with a good conscience, that conscience also has to be "invincibly ignorant" of the truth. One cannot refuse to embrace the fulness of Christian truth because it is inconvenient, will bother the relatives, will get one fired, etc., ONCE ONE KNOWS the truth for what it is. God demands that we approach His truth on His terms. The early Church certainly had familiarity with this lesson! He demands no less today. Most people, Protestant and Catholic alike, are too lazy or too preoccupied with the affairs of day-to-day living in this life to ponder the importance of these matters. Will God thereby excuse them? I have no idea.
Second, Catholics still maintain that, for ANYONE to attain Heaven, being in a state of grace at the time of death is necessary. In our view, being in a sacramental system (Catholics and Orthodox alone share this outlook) is the surest means of availing oneself of the treasury of grace gained for us by Christ on the cross. Sanctifying grace is primarily dispensed by God through the Sacraments. A return to the state of grace after serious sin is achieved through the honest exercise of the Sacrament of Penance (confession). The life of grace is strengthened through worthy reception of the other Sacraments, as applicable to life's circumstances. Protestants do not avail themselves of these things. Neither do ALL of the non-Christians of the world. It is therefore difficult for us Catholics to understand how non-Catholics/Orthodox can be in a state of grace at the time of death, but we suppose that there may, indeed, be some in that very state.
Nevertheless, it is more probable that God can save people who are "sincerely trying" to follow Him on imperfect roads, despite the fact that they cannot avail themselves of the "ordinary" means of grace. As the saying goes: "God is the Author of the Sacraments, but He is not bound by them." Doubtless, He can infuse grace through extraordinary means, but we do not know what those means consist of, and we cannot know, in individual cases, the eternal destinies of anyone in these circumstances. In short, from our perspective, IF non-Catholics are saved, it is IN SPITE OF, not BECAUSE OF, their denominational confession in life. Given all of this, it is hard to imagine that "Catholicism" is guilty of universalism as you state.
I understand that you will chafe at all of this, but you wanted truth, not poetry, I imagine. You don't have to agree with it, but this is the state for things from our perspective. You asked for specifics here, and I gave them to you. In this vein, TBAA is *relentlessly* un-Catholic.
Simply not true. All men who are appointed and predestined to heaven shall be saved. It rest with God; not man.
Unfortunately, that is where his teachings inevitably leads to, whether he meant it or not.
Then I would suggest you don’t understand his teachings. When studying Luther, Calvin or Augustine I never drew that conclusion. I still don’t. God predestines but man is responsible. The scriptures clearly teaches this.
Both contraception and sterilization has always been considered against the natural law - a sin against God.
That’s all well and good but you never used one piece of scripture to support your case.
The Spirit has been given to the CHURCH! The Community as a whole. Paul talks about receiving the Spirit in a plural sense
The Spirit is given to each believer. God states that He will remove our hearts of stones and give us a new Spirit. Paul does not talk about receiving the Spirit in a plural sense.
But not in opposition to the Church! This is the way of the heretic - which comes from the Greek word meaning "choice". What sort of faith is required to pick and choose what you are going to believe, Harley?
Your discussion on contraceptives is a good example. You state that people can’t make decisions in opposition to the Church. Protestants would say you can’t make decisions in opposition to scripture.
So how do you explain that there are hundreds of Protestant theologies that differ
The short answer on this is many have the wrong soteriology. They don’t understand the scriptures. You will find different (true) Reform churches but the differences are minor, usually limited to modes of baptism or something similar. This is simply because the Reformed soteriology is solid.
The synergistic soteriology OTOH runs the gambit of Eastern Orthodox, RCC and many Protestant churches. You will find in the not to distance future (it’s happening now) many Protestant churches, the EO and the RCC joining ecumenical hands. The hundreds of Protestant theologies are simply shades of misguided theology. I wouldn’t be so quick to say the RCC is different. The move is on for the RCC to join with the EO, the (yes) Lutheran, Presbyterians, and a number of other denominations. (Please understand many of the Lutheran and Presbyterians church have also lost their monergistic understanding.)
”With such remarks, how am I to understand that man has free will?”
Man’s will is in bondage until God sets it free. Once God sets it free then we naturally run to Him.
Synergism has always been the doctrine of the Church.
It was the doctrine of the eastern church; never the western church. If you truly believe this then you will have to articulate what the difference was between the Semi-Pelagian and the Council of Orange that they fought against.
I wasn’t approaching Augustine with either a Catholic or Protestant mindset. I was investigating what it means to have an omnipotent, omniscience, all sovereign God. If anything I approached Augustine and other church fathers from a synergistic mindset. It is my conclusion and now my contention, through Jewish and Church history and the scripture the western church was never synergistic. It changed over time through various historical and doctrinal situations. (The Eastern Orthodox appears to have always been synergistic and consistent.)
There are only two, and have been only two Christian religions; the synergistic and the monergistic view. The Catholics, and many Protestants shortly after the Reformation, have long ago abandoned the monergistic view in favor of the more humanistic, synergistic view. People bounce around these various groups with Protestants feeling comfortable becoming Catholics, Catholics feeling comfortable becoming EO, etc. It doesn’t matter. They all hold the same synergistic view but this was never the view of the western church.
The people who all these groups ACTUALLY disagree with are the Reformers who holds a monergistic view. Francis Schaffer was one of these, along with MacArthur, Piper, Sproul who, if memory serves me correctly you also have disagreements with. This is entirely understandable because you are not coming from same perspective as these gentlemen are.
I look at history with this mindset.
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