Posted on 05/17/2007 10:08:04 AM PDT by Gamecock
Reading Francis Beckwith's interview with David Neff in Christianity Today, reminded me of how idyllic the Roman church can seem in the minds of those who embrace it (Click here: Q&A: Francis Beckwith | Christianity Today | A Magazine of Evangelical Conviction).
But then this news report appeared today which gives a much different picture of the supposed glories of Romanism (Click here: Pope to canonize first Brazilian saint - Yahoo! News).
All discussion of justification, the authority of Scripture, and reciting the Creed aside, the Pope is heading to Brazil to canonize Antonio de Sant'Anna Galvao, a Franciscan monk who is credited with 5000 miraculous healings. Over 1 million people are expected to be in attendance. The healings supposedly come as a result of swallowing rice paper pills prepared by the monk over two hundred years ago. According to the AP news report . . .
"The Vatican has officially certified the medical cases of two Brazilian women as divinely inspired miracles that justify the sainthood of Galvao. Both of these women spoke of their faith with The Associated Press, claiming that their children would not be alive today were it not for the tiny rice-paper pills that Friar Galvao handed out two centuries ago.
Although the friar died in 1822, the tradition is carried on by Brazilian nuns who toil in the Sao Paulo monastery where Galvao is buried, preparing thousands of the Tic Tac-sized pills distributed free each day to people seeking cures for all manner of ailments. Each one is inscribed with a prayer in Latin: `After birth, the Virgin remained intact. Mother of God, intercede on our behalf.'
Sandra Grossi de Almeida, 37, is one such believer. She had a uterine malformation that should have made it impossible for her to carry a child for more than four months. But in 1999, after taking the pills, she gave birth to Enzo, now 7. `I have faith," Grossi said, pointing to her son. I believe in God, and the proof is right here.'
Nearly 10 years before that, Daniela Cristina da Silva, then 4 years old, entered a coma and suffered a heart attack after liver and kidney complications from hepatitis A. `The doctors told me to pray because only a miracle could save her,' Daniela's mother Jacyra said recently. `My sister sneaked into the intensive care unit and forced my daughter to swallow Friar Galvao's pills.'"
So, if you "return home" to Rome, you get the whole ball of wax, including the beatification of saints who give out Tic-Tac size rice-paper pills which supposedly heal. And Pope Benedict XVI will be there to bless it all.
By the way, confessional Protestants affirm the historical evangelical doctrine of justification by grace alone, through faith alone, on account of Christ alone, and the full authority of Scripture. And yes, we even recite the Creed every Lord's Day and we use a biblical-text based liturgy which is quite similar to that described by Justin Martyr in the second century.
Too bad Dr. Beckwith didn't consider a confessional Protestant church before embracing Romanism. Now he's stuck with Antonio de Sant'Anna Galvao and his rice-paper healing pills.
Hey! Kindly leave us out of this discussion. Being neither Catholic nor Protestants, we have no dog in this fight.
That said, the article struck me as mean-spirited. I can just imagine that the author wrote it with a sneer.
What an honour for you to take time out of your busy schedule which appears to be (if Drudge’s headlines count for anything), the legalization of millions of illegal aliens, collusion with the most liberal of House and Senate Democrats, and the further degradation of this country, in order to address the Wikipedia-generated anti Catholic diatribe that you have so finely contributed.
I further thank you for your information on Archdeacon Philpott which comes from a site promoting the spiritual hero Judas Iscariot in the Gnostic Gospels - new on DVD doncha know?
Millions of simple believers dead at the hands of the bishops? Oh, dear. We want more believers, not fewer. And the simpler the better, right?
But we thank you for your contribution, and will consider its worth in the light of the spirit in which it was offered.
We used to sign random people up for that.
Or people that we wanted to bug.
“The devil can NOT perform a miracle”
I understand your fascination with the fathers and your antipathy with sola scriptura, but sometimes scripture does get it right.
Rev 13:14 And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by [the means of] those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast; saying to them that dwell on the earth, that they should make an image to the beast, which had the wound by a sword, and did live.
Rev 16:14 For they are the spirits of devils, working miracles, [which] go forth unto the kings of the earth and of the whole world, to gather them to the battle of that great day of God Almighty.
Rev 19:20 And the beast was taken, and with him the false prophet that wrought miracles before him, with which he deceived them that had received the mark of the beast, and them that worshipped his image. These both were cast alive into a lake of fire burning with brimstone.
As Harnack and many other historians have noted, popes Zephyrinus and Callixtus I, who were Monarchian Modalist heretics were the first Roman bishops to apply Matthew 16:18 to the themselves, and thus the Roman episcopacy, which drew fire from Hippolytus who then became an alternate pope of Rome, Tertullian, Origen and others for their arrogance in trying to subvert the faith. But then the cat was out of the bag and later popes seized upon Matthew 16:18 even though being soundly opposed in their twisting of the passage by 98% of the church fathers.
It should remind you, that is where it came from.(grin)
Wekk, since I was being recruited by the CIA senior year in college and my academic advisor was a Cuban refugee and former CIA operative in Stockholm, near the Cuban embassy, maybe y’all did slip a bug in. Not that if would have done any good, unless you liked listening to a bunch of smart alex poli sci students drinking beer and cracking jokes. hehehe
A sound post on the history of the unscriptural papacy and how it has twisted scripture to support itself in grand style and introduce unscriptural doctrine.
Rev 13:14
Rev 16:14
Rev 19:20
We don,t interpret this the way you do.
These are not are not literal miracles.
They are illusions that mislead people
I am particularly fond of the warning label --
CAUTION: THESE PLASTIC BOBBLEHEADS ARE NOT "RELICS" OR TALISMEN OF ANY SORT, AND MAKE NO CLAIM OF ANY INHERENT GRACE. THEY WILL NOT PERFORM NOR FACILITATE "MIRACLES" FOR WHICH THEIR PRESCRIBED USAGE IS NOT INTENDED. IF IT'S MIRACLES YOU'RE AFTER, TRY OUR OTHER FINE PRODUCTS FOUND HERE...
Thank you, just trying to keep it real. I’m down widdat, ya know bro.
You, too? 8~)
Although I can usually be found dancing on my husband's toes.
“We don,t interpret this the way you do.”
Of course you don’t.
What wasn’t?
Oh really? So where does Irenaeus get off saying that it is a matter of necessity...necessity...that all churches everywhere agree with the Church of Rome. Irenaeus who was never a Roman pontiff but just a lowly bishop of Gaul in around A.D. 170.
A dupe of Zephyrinus and Callixtus, was he? A Monarchian modalist was he?
“What wasn’t?”
Depends on the time the pub closed.
LOL. I remember when that changed. Rome can be fast on its feet when it wants to be.
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