Posted on 03/07/2007 9:10:18 AM PST by Salvation
If Catholics go down for the tortillas and our "imaginary friends," the Protestants and "Reformed" Christians go down for the "holy rollers" and the snake handlers.
That is perfectly obvious.
And you are well within your rights to disagree about their validity. Doesn't mean that you are correct. But you ARE within your rights to do so.
No. Has NOTHING TO DO WITH TRADITIONS BUILT UPON TRADITIONS BUILT UPON TRADITIONS; BUILT UPON FOSSILIZED, CALCIFIED, EXTRAPOLATED TRADITIONS and applauced, by all the flying buttresses of the magicsterical throughout the ages. Nothing at all to do with all that traditions of men stuff.
It has to do with what THE TEXT SAYS. The TEXT says Christ had siblings. The accurate HISTORICAL RECORD says Christ had siblings. That's just a fact. All the traditions in the world will not obliterate that fact.
First of all, I would challenge you to show me in scripture where it says that tradition, in of itself, is to be ignored and that (how does it go...) the Bible is to be the only rule for faith and practice (isn't that what you all say?)
I will fully agree with you that there are numerous places that the concept of the traditions of men are villified in scripture. One of the more famous passages follows:
Mar 7:1 Now when the Pharisees gathered together to him, with some of the scribes, who had come from Jerusalem,Mar 7:2 they saw that some of his disciples ate with hands defiled, that is, unwashed.
Mar 7:3 (For the Pharisees, and all the Jews, do not eat unless they wash their hands, observing the tradition of the elders;
Mar 7:4 and when they come from the market place, they do not eat unless they purify themselves; and there are many other traditions which they observe, the washing of cups and pots and vessels of bronze.)
Mar 7:5 And the Pharisees and the scribes asked him, "Why do your disciples not live according to the tradition of the elders, but eat with hands defiled?"
Mar 7:6 And he said to them, "Well did Isaiah prophesy of you hypocrites, as it is written, 'This people honors me with their lips, but their heart is far from me;
Mar 7:7 in vain do they worship me, teaching as doctrines the precepts of men.'
Mar 7:8 You leave the commandment of God, and hold fast the tradition of men."
Mar 7:9 And he said to them, "You have a fine way of rejecting the commandment of God, in order to keep your tradition!
Mar 7:10 For Moses said, 'Honor your father and your mother'; and, 'He who speaks evil of father or mother, let him surely die';
Mar 7:11 but you say, 'If a man tells his father or his mother, What you would have gained from me is Corban' (that is, given to God)--
Mar 7:12 then you no longer permit him to do anything for his father or mother,
Mar 7:13 thus making void the word of God through your tradition which you hand on. And many such things you do."
Of course, you see from the example here where the tradition practiced by the Pharisees was, in fact, the opposite of what God had commanded. By encouraging people to give to the temple vice taking care of their parents, the pharisees were steering people toward violating the commandments. (Note: this same example is used in Matthew 15:1-20)
Then we have the example in Galatians:
Gal 1:13 For you have heard of my former life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God violently and tried to destroy it;Gal 1:14 and I advanced in Judaism beyond many of my own age among my people, so extremely zealous was I for the traditions of my fathers.
Now I, in my little Catholic mind, can't see how that is a condemnation against 'tradition' or a commendation of 'tradition,' one way or the other...
Then, we have the example in Colossians:
Col 2:6 As therefore you received Christ Jesus the Lord, so live in him,Col 2:7 rooted and built up in him and established in the faith, just as you were taught, abounding in thanksgiving.
Col 2:8 See to it that no one makes a prey of you by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ.
Col 2:9 For in him the whole fulness of deity dwells bodily,
Col 2:10 and you have come to fulness of life in him, who is the head of all rule and authority.
Here is a very clear admonition not to learn the Faith and stay with Christ, not letting human tradition with its vanity draw you away.
As a Catholic, that tells me that I need to learn the Faith so as not to be vulnerable from attacks by various varieties of heretics (reminds me of 1 Pet 3:15)...like the Aryans, the Gnostics, etc.
So what can we learn from the above?
It is apparent that we must not place tradition above the commandment of God. Examples abound! The sale of indulgences was a classic example from centuries ago. The money raising techniques of a lot of televangelists is a more current example.
We can see that human traditions and worldy wisdom can draw one away from Christ. Again, there have been examples throughout history: Marcion could not resolve the Old Testament God and the New Testament God (with his human wisdom), Arius and his followers could not comprehend a Christ that was both God and man, even today, we have so-called Christians who believe that God condones homosexuality and abortion.
But nowhere in those verses is the concept of Tradition, in of itself, condemned. In fact, there are just as many places where "tradition" is lauded. Where the oral tradition and verbal teaching are, in fact, praised. Some of these verses include:
1 Cr 11:2 I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you.
2 Th 2:15 So then, brethren, stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter.
2 Th 3:6 Now we command you, brethren, in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that you keep away from any brother who is living in idleness and not in accord with the tradition that you received from us.
Rom 6:17 But thanks be to God, that you who were once slaves of sin have become obedient from the heart to the standard of teaching to which you were committed, (Note: committed is the Greek word paradidomi -- to give over unto -- it's the same word as 'delivered' in 1 Cr 11:2, above)
Jude 3 Beloved, being very eager to write to you of our common salvation, I found it necessary to write appealing to you to contend for the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints.
(Note, when this epistle -- Jude -- was written, the Bible was not yet compiled. The faith was delivered VERBALLY -- check verse 17 out, as well)
So, from those verses, we can see that the authors are commending the Christians to follow what they were taught...be it by word of mouth or in writing.
As St. John said, (Jhn 21:25) But there are also many other things which Jesus did; were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written.
In this post, I have discussed literally every verse in the New Testament where the word paradosis is used. I honestly don't see the basis for your accusations.
Now, do the Roman Catholics you know abide by this early admonition? I for one have not seen it in reality for about 35 years.
My daughter does. By her own decision, too.
What did our pride avail us?
What have wealth and its boast-
fulness afforded us?
All of them passed like a shadow
and like a fleeting rumor;
Like a ship traversing the heaving
water,
of which, when it has passed, no
trace can be found,
no path of its keel in the waves.
Yeah, that was very clever (sarcasm).
Don't let my cleverness get in the way of your holy bleeding fencepost or whatever.
I don't need that for my faith to be validated. It's sad that others, Catholics and otherwise, need it. Catholics aren't required to believe even in the approved apparitions.
One is read and one isn't?
Oh shoot. Somebody said it first.
When Jesus said search the Scriptures,,,there was only the new testament.
None of the rest had been recorded nor was it finished.
At my church, or overall?
Praise and glory be to men! How telling it is that for the Bible you give 14 levels of credit to men and ZERO to God. It does not appear to occur to you that it is God who directed the writing and assemblage of His own word. I suppose under your view God never would have stood a chance in this world without an Apostolic hierarchy. I'm sure God is very thankful.
Hardly anything cries tears of blood in our houses, either.
Our tortillas don't have images on them and our grilled cheese sandwiches don't have faces.
If they did, we'd be scared and toss 'em out, yo.
*sigh*
He is just NO HELP, y'know?
Diplomacy isn't exactly our humble's forte, is it?
;-)
He has numerous strengths, that not being among them.
He can kill off the other folks' characters in a story circle more creatively than anyone I know.
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