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So let's see, we have access to grace through Jesus to whom we can come without a mediator since He Himself is our mediator between the Father and us; and we can come to him boldly to find grace to help in time of need. Now it stands to reason if you can come to the boss directly with your problems why would you want to go through any lesser created being? And since there is no scriptural basis for Mary's having anything to do with our redemption except historically being the mother of Jesus, why make up this superstition? What does it add to what Jesus has already accomplished for our salvation?

I'll try to summarize how I understand the difference between the Catholic and Protestant conceptions of the "redemption." For Protestants G-d and man are "joined" only at the person of J*sus and no where else. With Catholics and Orthodox J*sus is like the corner of the paper towel placed in a spill of water . . . contact begins there and then spreads from the corner throughout the towel (the Eastern Orthodox are quite up front about the fact that chr*stianity is not so much about the "redemption" as it is the theosis ("defiication") of man. Put another way, to Protestants the "redemption" of J*sus is vicarious while to Catholics and Orthodox it is participatory. Every human being is a potential participant in the work of J*sus. This is why Catholics "offer up" their own sufferings. They join with those of J*sus. J*sus was the beginning and the point of initial contact but the work of the saints are also redemptive when they are "united" with those of J*sus. Protestantism regards J*sus death on the cross as absolutely and totally vicarious (the Eastern Orthodox, who of course are more "authentic" than the Catholics, don't even accept J*sus crucifixion as an atoning sacrifice for sin).

Similar distinctions apply to what it means to be "saved" in Catholic and Protestant parlance. For the latter an individual becomes "saved" when he "accepts J*sus as his savior" (ie, accepts the absolutely vicarious death of J*sus on the cross on his behalf). For Catholicism/Orthodoxy objective salvation refers to mankind as a while rather than individuals. The human race was redeemed corporately, but the fate of every single individual born into the world is still very much in doubt. This is why they call J*sus their "savior" even as they ask him to "save" them. He is their savior insomuch as they are part of the corporately redeemed human race. Individually, they walk a tightrope over the flames of Hell from the moment they are born until the day they die. Yet they don't understand the appeal of "once saved always saved" Protestantism. They can understand every religion on earth except that of the Bible Belt.

It is because the human race has been redeemed but no individual can be in life that they "preach Protestantism to the Jews but preach Judaism to the Protestants." The Jews are implicitly denying the "redemption of the human race as a unit" by continuing to observe the Torah (which was supposedly a mere "foreshadowing of the gospel), so towards Judaism Catholicism seems to adopt a "J*sus only," "all your works are in vain," "doctrines and commandments of men" attitude. They tell Jews that by observing Biblical commandments that ceased to be relevant at a certain point they are "missing the point." They tell them that observing Biblical commandments and performing Biblical rituals are vain and superfluous and "of none effect." Therefore Catholic preaching aimed at Jews (or, in our days, Catholic apologetics against Judaism) sounds very Protestant. J*sus alone saves and "the Law" is of none effect.

However from the Catholic perspective Protestants have fallen into the "opposite error." Protestants don't recognize that only the human race as a unit was objectively saved and that each human being faces a life of struggle to be individually saved (which will be certain only when life is over). So Catholic preaching or apologetics aimed at Protestantism sounds "Jewish." Protestants are "antinomians," they are "presumptive" in their belief that J*sus has already saved them without any effort on their own part. J*sus established a church and endowed it with the "means of salvation" and Protestants who insist on a direct pipeline from G-d that bypasses this are (as are the Jews who keep "the Old Law") "missing the point." Yes, J*sus has saved the human race. But he saves individuals via lives of fasting, prayer, repentance, good deeds, and chr*stian ritual and ceremonial. This is why Catholicism sounds so "Jewish" to Protestants and why Protestant arguments against Catholicism merely echo Paul's teachings against the Torah, though Catholics who continue to insist on the utter vanity of "the Old Law" never seem able to realize this. (By the way, Eastern Orthodoxy is quite upfront with the idea that J*sus alone does not save an individual, but that it is a cooperative effort of both J*sus and the individual. They call this synergeia).

I wish Catholics would put themselves in the shoes of their Fundamentalist Protestant oppnents for just a moment and try to understand that to them Catholicism seems like utter hypocrisy, insisting on the "fulfillment" and non-necessity of Biblical law and ritual while insisting on the necessity of post-Biblical law and ritual, derived largely from paganism. If Paul (Protestants reason) inveighed against the laws and rituals which were commanded from the very Mouth of G-d to Moses, then how much the more so (`al 'achat kammah vekhammah) must his words apply to post-Biblical laws and rituals which were not spoken by the Mouth of G-d but which were adopted little by little from the pagan cultures being converted?

I realize that my beliefs and my experiences have made me very "anti-Catholic," but Catholics never seem to have the slightest bit of compassion for people who simply cannot understand the cults of Mary and the saints. This is foreign to them; do you understand that? They've been praying to G-d all their lives and have never felt the slightest need to pray to another heavenly being. Is it any wonder they don't understand you? It is considerably harder convincing a person who has been praying to lesser beings that he may also pray to G-d than it is to convince someone who is accustomed to pray to G-d that he may also pray to lesser heavenly beings!

It is very hard for me not to notice that just as Catholicism prefers post-Biblical rituals to Biblical ones, so it also seems to prefer post-Biblical stories to Biblical ones. Have you not the slightest sympathy with someone who is being told that Adam and Noah are "unimportant" or "symbols whose actual existence has been disproved by science) when your own religion is full of illiterate bumpkins (not in America, but elsewhere) who may believe that St. George slew a dragon, St. Patrick drove the snakes from Ireland, Mary appeared to an Aztec peasant, and made the sun dance in Portugal? Can't you see the utter and flaming hypocrisy of such a stand, real or perceived?

I do not intend to advocate for sola scriptura, since I do not subscribe to it myself. But I notice that when Protestants quote Biblical texts to justify beliefs you Catholics and Orthodox seldom if ever quote verses back to justify your positions. Bible quotes are met invariably by such things as "well, it's our Bible!" or "we had it first!" or "you're just a stupid fundie, what do you know?" I have read a zillion times about how your monks preserved the "Protestant" Bible by copying it. Yet the fact remains that you, the co-religionists and spiritual descendants of those monks, are much more likely to doubt the events described by the text and to attack belief in them. Can you imagine what this looks like to sincere Fundamentalists? They get the idea that the minute an Oral Tradition is admitted the Documentary Hypothesis comes loping right in. And who can blame them? The Catholic world is full of apologeticists who see Biblical inerrancy as identical to sola scriptura and who invoke the "errors of the Bible" and its alleged origin in ancient Mesopotamian and Canaanite paganism (allegedly edited and redacted by St. J. St. E, St. P, and St. D) in order to refute sola scriptura and "soul competency." Orthodox Judaism has always had an Oral Tradition, but it has never had to stoop to such arguments! But the fact is that "orthodox" Roman Catholics seem to have adopted the Biblical theories of liberal Protestants in order to justify the existence of the "magisterium" (never mind that liberal Protestants are no friendlier to an authoritative oral tradition than are literalist ones!).

Good grief, people! This time I'm not engaging in name-calling! I'm trying to get you to look at a few things from someone else's perspective! You can do that, right? You can understand "lesbian and gay persons," moslems, and everyone else in the world. Can't you do that with "simple-minded Protestant literalists" or are they less human than everyone else?

One thing Catholicism does seem to have in common with islam and all other ancient (and therefore "respectable") religions is that they seem to be plugged into a pre-factual, pre-literal, pre-rational Jungian/Freudian subsconscious full of archtypes and symbols. Fundamentalist Protestants deal with facts. When anyone other than a Fundamentalist Protestant invokes the sin of Adam, Noah's Ark, or even J*sus on the cross one can never be entirely certain if he is talking about these as facts or as (to quote Frank Sheed, who was an evolutionist and higher critic himself) "events all the truer for never having happened." You seem to gravitate to universal symbols rather than Biblical "facts" (other than on the "real presence," which I know for a fact many Catholics poke fun at when there are no "literalist Protestants" around to infuriate with hypocritical inconsistency). Fundamentalist Protestants mean what they say. Everyone else says "G-d is too big" and make religion so profoundly symbolic that it turns into one big Uncle Remus story.

Wideawake, can I get a witness???

NYer, you constantly invoke the "wisdom of the Eastern churches." Do you think I'm going to ask you if you believe Adam was a real person? I know what you'd say. Easterners are even more plugged into a primal, non-factual Jungian subconscious than "rationalistic" Westerners.

Orthodox Judaism cannot exist without the Oral Torah for reasons even the most literalistic "redneck" can understand. The Written Torah has no vowels or punctuation and the Oral Torah supplies these. The Written Torah could not be copied and kept in existence without the voluminous laws which have existed since Moses but which are written down nowhere in the Torah itself. And I don't know of anyone who claims that he could take a King James Bible and build a Tabernacle and conduct a Biblical sacrifice. (What are the details? What is the incense composed of?) But Catholics and Orthodox chr*stians can't say any of this. Instead they seem to respond to the concerns of Protestants with smgness, superiority, and utter hogwash ("We wrote it, so you should trust us when we tell you not to belive it!")!

DANGIT, y'all! Can you see none of this???

I read all of your post, but not all of what lead up to your response. You lost me at a couple of spots, but I want to rebut a couple of your points with my admitted lacking knowledge of my own catechism (I'm a student, and I only engage in FReeping at work, so I don't have a lot of free time).

And since there is no scriptural basis for Mary's having anything to do with our redemption except historically being the mother of Jesus, why make up this superstition? What does it add to what Jesus has already accomplished for our salvation?

We ask Mary to pray for our salvation to Christ, thus God, and to intercede with him directly on our behalf. Mary was very important in the earliest days of the Church, and helped bring others to Christ her son. It may not explicitly outline Mary's place in Scripture, but that is where Church tradition comes into play. The Church was around before the New Testament was written down. They followed the Torah, and what Christ instructed them to do after his ascension. Many Catholic practices and "rituals" came about during this transitional time period. They would not have written in the practices of their Christian faith at that time, as it is not the Word of God, but rather works that the Lord wants them to do.

In regards to the vicarious and participatory natures/views of Catholicism and Protestantism, I think that derives from Jesus saying, "go and sin no more". I believe here, Jesus forgave Mary of Magdalene of all her past transgressions, but wants her do avoid doing more sin. Yes, Christ's crucification has redeemed us all, but as a matter of punishment, some will burn in hell far longer than others if they don't actively live up to what Christ wants of them. That is where the participatory aspects comes into play, to confess our sins, and join them to our lords for reconciliation, and for punishment, and thus forgiveness. I believe being strictly vicarious is what has led so many Protestant denominations into liberalism and apostasy.

Yet they don't understand the appeal of "once saved always saved" Protestantism. They can understand every religion on earth except that of the Bible Belt.

That whole paragraph is a matter of faith. I believe that everyone will end up being saved, but because of their sins (especially those committed with intentional malice) will go to hell to pay for what they have done, and for nor repenting. Christ saved us, but we have to earn it, or keep up our end of the bargain so to speak. It is dangerous to go around thinking that one can do what they want, because they are already saved. To me, that is a slap in the face of the Lord, and is very hypocritical. Too many Christians have succumb to that, and that is why Catholics have the outlook that they do.

Your synergia argument swings both ways, and it seems we look at each other as being "like the Jews", or being the new pharisees. Again, it's a matter of an outlook of faith. As a Catholic, I believe that through the power of the keys that Christ gave to Peter (thus the power to bind and loose), the Church is the vessel to my salvation in Christ, through him, with him, and in him, with the unity of the Holy Spirit, one God, forever and ever.

Like you, I don't like the name calling. I wish people would avoid making inflammatory comments to people of other denominations. I leave other denominational threads alone, but I am a reactionary when my Church is unfairly attacked, and I try to defend her in my limited capacity. I don't mind theological debates at all, but the trolling and deliberate ignorance of many of the posters angers me. We all have more in common than we think, we believe in the same Lord, but have different ways of doing so. Live and let live is what we should be doing, and in fact, we should be allying ourselves against Islam.

If I am not on later to respond, have a happy 4th of July.