Posted on 03/29/2007 5:20:08 AM PDT by Gamecock
FoxNews reported today that while addressing a parish in a suburb of Rome, Pope Benedict XVI clarified his view of hell. The Pope said concerning hell, [it] “really exists and is eternal, even if nobody talks about it much any more,”
According to reports from the Vatican this “straightforward” language is in effort to eliminate confusion pending an upcoming release of the new Catholic catechism. One might wonder about confusion from a church that proposes that its doctrine does not change.
However, even the casual Catholic should remember the last Pontiff’s less literal view of hell. Speaking of hell, Pope John Paul II said that it is “the ultimate consequence of sin itself . . . Rather than a place, Hell indicates the state of those who freely and definitively separate themselves from God, the source of all life and joy”.
According to Catholic dogma the Pope is infallible and exists as the functional head of the body of Christ on earth. So how can we have such divergent views on the reality of hell?
Hell is not the only issue with which we seem to see some contemporary doctrinal progression from Rome. In October the Pope indicated that limbo, supposed since medieval times to be a “halfway house” between Heaven and Hell, inhabited by unbaptized infants and holy men and women who lived before Christ, was “only a theological hypothesis” and not a “definitive truth of the faith”.
It is a real shame that millions and millions of folks are walking lock step with the Pope as their authority rather than Scripture. In order to be a good Catholic your theology must progress with the evolution of Papal theology, even at the expense of former Pontiffs. How dangerous it is to be blown about by Papal winds. Not so for Christians who reject Rome’s magisterial view of authority and embrace the doctrine of Sola Scriptura where God’s unchanging, inerrant, infallible divine Word is the ultimate authority in the church.
78 posted on 03/30/2007 9:40:41 AM MDT by dangus
You mock people as a means of feeling superior. Yet you make no effort to be familiar with the language of Elohim. If you took just a moment to review my home page,
b'shem Yah'shua
you would discern that I am male not female.
"Read what I said: The RC's added to scripture as a result of Luther."
For all its faults, The Church is the Divinely inspired and Divinely established Bride of Christ.
If the books that had been in existence long before Luther appeared were added at Trent it is because the Church was Divinely inspired by the guidance of the Holy Spirit Himself to include them.
Luther served his purpose. He just did not serve it the way he was supposed to do; namely, work within the Church to change, not create a false doctrine and establish a heretical schism.
Again, good day to you.
I read it. I read it like four or five times. It wasn't any truer the last time than it was the first. How many times does it need to be read before it stops being a misstatement?
In related news, what is the purpose of this thread? Judging by the original article and photos I guess it was a nonsense thread. I suppose it could be kind of a Prot pep rally thread but since it starts by attacking the Pope and the Papacy it can't qualify for Caucus status. But since the article is way too biased to change anyone's mind, well, I just don't get it ...
Or how about this? It's a contest: who can give the most outrageously one-sided statement of a controversial point of view.
Not anywhere in Scripture....
Are you Jewish Messianic, or are you Gentile? Saw your homepage.
"Not anywhere in Scripture...."
Of course it is. What do you think the word "Bride" means in all the parables? Women? Dwarves? Rabbits?
BTW, maybe you can find Sola Scriptura for me. I can't find in the Talmud, the Mishna, the Gemara, The Torah, or the New Testament.
Where ARE these people? That's what I want to know.
If the books that had been in existence long before Luther appeared were added at Trent ...
One of the ninety-eleven things that a lot of Protestants don't get is that the Church doesm't sort of sit around making new rules of stuff people have to think and believe. "'Ey Luigi, what's on de menu for dis week?""I dunno boss, how 'bout we tell 'em dey have to believe, uh, oh, the hypostatic union or we break their legs?"
It seems to me that it's in response to some notable confusion that the ponderous magisterium rouses itself, delivers a dictum, and goes back to sleep. Up until Luther, while there may not have been consensus, the disagreement about the canonical OT wasn't big enough to matter. Once Nestorius says "Mary isn't EITHER theotokos, then somebody has to say, "Yes she was too." Once a bunch of people want to excuse Tobit, somebody has to say, "It's in." And so then the people who are looking for a beef will say we added something.
Wow, I must digest this one piece at a time.
The RC's added to scripture. The Church of Christ decided under the guidance of the Holy Spirit what the contents of the Holy Bible would be 1200 years before Martin Luther existed.
as a result of Luther The Church never changed one iota of content as a result of Luther. I would be fascinated to hear what your information source is and what their agenda is, as well.
It's like trying to instruct stones.
There is a willful disregard of everything from the beginning of the Church at Pentecost to the Protestant heresies.
Is it invincible ignorance or willful disobedience?
Is it simple blindness or sheer arrogance?
Or is it simply the fact that too close an examination of the period from the beginning, especially the early fathers and martyrs until the schism, would result in the heresy being exposed?
See you later. I gotta run...
Your notion that Hebrew is some sort of native language of Elohim is uproarious. All human langauges are just that: human. Biblical Passages regarding the gift of tongues make clear that the true gift of tongues is in angelic langauge, and guess what: it ain't Hebrew.
The gospels were written in Greek, telling of a man who spoke Aramaic.
Incidentally...
Now that I know you're not a woman, I won't refer to you as such, but St. Xenia is a woman. The name "Xenia" is a woman's name, in general. 99% of Freepers don't have a home page, and many of those don't indicate whether they are male or female. If you give yourself a woman's name, don't complain to me that I presume you to be a woman.
No, no, no, no!
When people really love each other, they make babies. Unless they're Democrats. Democrats don't believe in guns, so the stork keeps dropping by, uninvited. And because they have low self esteem, the babydad gives the babymom the bird.
I also thought XeniaSt was going to be a female, but I guess it's a street, huh?
Acts 26:14, St/ Paul says he had a vision (audition?) in the Hebrew Dialect. When I was in seminary they said that meant Aramaic. But I know there are many whose attitude toward HEbrew is similar to that which Muslims have to the Arbaic written by Mohamed. It's interesting.
XeniaSt, two questions: Have there been threads put up about your approach to the Gospel? And do you show up on threads attacking Protestant beliefs or do you argue mostly against Catholics?
I ask because I was on a train once in California and the conductor was a self-described messianic Jew and he had a particular hatred for the RC Church -- enough so that he tangled with me, though I was on vacation and had paid for my seat. To me it was another example of how normal social constraints are not operative when Catholicism is the issue. I was more fascinated than bothered.
Now wait a minute here. Wouldn't shooting the stork count as Artificial Birth Control?
Xenia Street is where I used to live
I ask because I was on a train once in California and the conductor was a self-described messianic Jew and he had a particular hatred for the RC Church -- enough so that he tangled with me, though I was on vacation and had paid for my seat. To me it was another example of how normal social constraints are not operative when Catholicism is the issue. I was more fascinated than bothered.
112 posted on 03/30/2007 1:04:35 PM MDT by Mad Dawg
He does not communicate to us through some man-made corporation. Second : If you understand the language of Elohim, it is very clear that: YH in Hebrew is the Name of Elohim. I will debate with anyone First : Elohim YHvH has communicated with us through His Word.
b'shem Yah'shua
He has communicated to us from outside our time-space continuum.
He said he would send another like himself ( Ru'ach HaKodesh )
to assist us in understanding His Holy Word.
"Yah has become my salvation" is the Name that most refer to as Jesus.
The name Yah'shua means "Yah has become my salvation".
vav is man in Hebrew; Yah became man for our salvation.
The letter Hey is the breath of Elohim.
who holds man-made tradition
above the Holy Word of Elohim.
Yes. Though, "If I knew God I'd be Him."
For example: I quite agree with you that God "does not communicate to us through some man-made corporation", and that's why I'm a Catholic, or part of why. But I get that your view of the RC church is that it IS man-made (or worse). So how far are we likely to get? Not far enough to be worth the perspiration, as far as I can tell.
I wish you had addressed some of my questions. But thanks for responding to my post, if not to its contents.
Did I miss one of your questions?
My questions were:
At first I thought that this was a legitimate article but I should have known that anyone who runs a blog called "Irish Calivinist" would be an anti-Catholic bigot. I'm not going to bother to show you that this pope is not refuting or correcting anything said by previous popes.
You chide Catholics because the popes supposedly contradict each other. Well, you Protestants contradict each other all the time. You blather on about "sola Scriptura," about how only the Bible has any authority but you can't agree among yourselves about what the Bible means or even says. Some Protestants believe in hell but many do not. Who's right? How do you decide who's right? How is this better for the average believer?
When Christ ascended into Heaven, He did not leave us with a New Testament that had already been written down. He did not leave us with just a body of beliefs that he had spoken to His Apostles. If He had, that would not have been enough since our human nature, unaided by grace is not capable of living out what He commanded us to do. Rather, He left us with His mystical Body, the Church and her sacraments, which allow us to participate in His divine life and which are a continual source of grace. Moreover, the Holy Spirit infallibly guides the Church, protecting her from error. This is the advantage that Catholics have over Protestants. We are not guided by our own private interpretations of Scripture, which would only be our own opinions, but by the Holy Spirit.
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