Posted on 06/10/2007 3:02:20 PM PDT by NYer
Many modern people have the notion that the principal mission of the Catholic Church is to impose belief on unbelievers. The reality is that most of its time is spent trying to restrain belief in everything from spoon-bending to the aliens who allegedly speak to us through a cat in Poughkeepsie.
The riptides and cross-currents of religious enthusiasm in American culture are kaleidoscopic and dizzying. Cradle Catholics can be forgiven for just ignoring the whole thing and many of them do. But it’s still worth taking into account because some religious trends can have decided real-world effects.
Some of the effects of unrestrained belief can be amusing.
For instance, after five centuries of being told by Protestant polemicists that we “Romanists” do not trust the saving grace of Jesus Christ and ignorantly seek salvation by the works of the law, it is a weird thing for a Catholic to see the spectacle of kooky apocalyptic Protestants eagerly excited about the birth of red heifers because this will (they hope) be the prelude to rebuilding the Temple of Solomon and the re-institution of the Mosaic sacrificial system. Just how that Temple will be rebuilt when the Dome of the Rock is situated on the site of the Temple is not quite as clearly worked out.
Which brings me to something just as kooky, but less amusing.
Recently, James Dobson, a leading Evangelical and a usually sensible man, hosted on his show one Joel Rosenberg, author of something called Epicenter: Why Current Rumblings in the Middle East Will Change Your Future. Rosenberg claims to know “what the Bible says” about what is happening in the Mideast and is not shy about making “predictions regarding the fate of the Middle East regarding issues such as Iran’s nuclear threats against Israel, the arms race and ultimately ... Armageddon.” Here’s a snippet:
Dobson: “Well, Joel, let’s explain to everybody how Ezekiel 38 turns out, because Israel is about to be attacked, and a huge number of troops from Russia and Iran are coming toward Israel to destroy it, and what happens?”
Rosenberg: “Well, God is going to move. You won’t find in the Scriptures that the United States is coming to rescue Israel or the European Union, but God says he is going to supernaturally intervene — we’re talking about fire from heaven, a massive earthquake, diseases spreading through the enemy forces. It is going to be such a clear judgment against the enemies of Israel that Ezekiel 39 says that it will take seven months to bury all the bodies of the slain enemies of Israel. “
Such standard-issue Evangelical prophetic cocksureness is an excellent example of why a magisterium is so useful and necessary.
Not only does the magisterium help us know what is essential to the faith, it also helps us remain free of what is unessential. For the various species of Protestantism, in addition to denying real biblical truths such as the Real Presence or infant baptism, also have a tendency to invent “biblical truths” that do not exist and impose them by means of a sort of cultural pressure via charismatic preachers with pet theories who, in their own sphere, are granted an infallibility the Pope could never dream of.
Now, a Catholic is quite free to have a kooky private reading of Ezekiel 38-39 as a prophecy of the “coming resurgent Soviet Union” and its alliance with Muslims, communist Chinese or whoever, all in a vast Cecil B. DeMille battle against Israel. The Church has all sorts of room for eccentrics, and everybody needs a hobby.
But a Catholic is not free to go around telling everybody that “this is the clear teaching of the Bible” and demand it be believed. For the fact is, this kooky theory is emphatically not the clear teaching of the Bible, nor does it have any sanction whatsoever from the Church, the tradition, the Fathers, the councils or the popes. It is a pure novelty we can and should ignore.
What we should not ignore is Rosenberg’s claim that, “Given the events going on in our world today, people at the Pentagon, people at the CIA, people at the White House are asking to sit down and talk about these issues, to understand the Biblical perspective, because it is uncanny what is happening out there and it deserves some study.”
I suspect that Rosenberg is exaggerating his clout with the big cheeses in DC. I doubt that the Pentagon’s intel meetings are dominated by exegeses of Ezekiel 38.
But I do think it matters if a significant portion of the American polity drinks in such bizarre theories as if they were God’s revealed Truth.
Ideas have consequences, especially crazy ones. Most crazy ideas do no harm.
Crazy ideas about the Middle East, backed by the force of arms, stand a better than average chance of killing millions.
That said, I agree that many, if not most, Unitarian Churches are populated by liberal kooks. Not my cup of tea.
Put down the coffee mug....
All right my friend. As I understand it the idea is that apostolic succession has passed on through tradition truths from Christ and the apostles themselves, plus truths coming later through action of the Holy Spirit and Mary to the Catholic Church that are not contained in scripture itself. Thus the Protestant has the truth, but not the whole truth.
I asked about salvation because Luther’s 95 Theses did address a salvation issue, it seems to me; whether the purchase of indulgences could assure forgiveness and salvation. So the critique of tradition, in practical application, at the time of Luther seemed to raise a salvation issue, while in modern times, given current practices it may not.
In Acts 17:11 the Bereans are praised for using scripture to test the truth of Paul’s teachings. So that is certainly a valid use of scripture, regardless of who the leader is, Paul, Pope, minister or priest.
Protestants refer outside of scripture constantly in exposition on scripture, from personal experience, to history, to what they learned in seminary and the like. So sola scriptura doesn’t seem to mean, in application, that only scripture can guide the Christian’s understanding. It does seem to mean, in practice, that only scripture can definitively be invoked.
My point is a soft one. If this is not a salvation issue, then we are one body in Christ. I believe that much of the history of the church has been lost to the Protestant lay people, such as wonderful and inspiring stories of great saints. The flip side of this is that the Catholic church’s lay people never developed the passion for scripture that infuses and enriches so many Protestant’s lives. I personally view it as one body divided, to the detriment of both. I don’t mean to insult the Protestants that study the history of the church or the Catholics that spend time with the Bible, but to point to the overall tendencies of both groups.
...Romanism, in addition to denying real biblical truths such as . . . oh, say . . . JUSTIFICATION BY FAITH ALONE, also have had a tendency over the centuries to invent “biblical truths” that did not exist and do not exist [for political, vain glory or whatever other reasons] and impose them by means of a sort of cultural pressure via all manner of traditions, rituals, IN-GROUP VS OUT-GROUP pressures; family & genocidal murdering INQUISITIONS; with pet theories, pet rituals, pet Saints who, in their own sphere, are granted an infallibility the average healthy Proty pastor would never dream of.
Understandable.
Forget to take our medication, did we?
There are some mostly technical areas of ah, unclarity.
Wiser heads will correct me but I think the following is RC teaching:
The Apostolic succession involves a real conferral of the Holy Spirit. It’s not just “tradition” in terms of teaching. It is also Apostolic responsibility and authority. Secularly an “apostle” is like an agent in law for whose actions the principal is responsible.
When considering the use of Scripture to test what someone says, I think it’s important to look at how our Lord and the NT writers used Scripture. It is NOT how it is currently used. Jesus’ use of “The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob” in his controversy with the Sadducees is, well, unusual. At least I think so.
Anyway, the fathers are pretty wonderful not to say exotic in the things they do with Scripture. I love it, but it’s not what I learned in seminary.
I think your last paragraph is very near the money. It is wonderful to see Bible classes in RC Churches these days. I taught one at the last parish I attended, but I am mostly learning at my current parish.
I think you might start toying with the idea of reading some of Cardinal Newman’s stuff.
I would not say “truths coming later through action of the Holy Spirit and Mary”. Mary intercedes. Truth comes through Jesus in the Spirit, as it is written,”.. grace and truth came through IHS XP.”
AS I said privately, indulgences are not about salvation. If you’re in purgatory, you’re saved. They are about time in purgatory. And, yeah, they were abused, as I said privately.
A remarkable statement from John Paul II regarding the fall of the Soviet Union, in "Crossing the Threshold of Hope":
"My Father is at work until now, so I am at work" (Jn 5:17). The fall of Communism opens before us a retrospective panorama of modern civilization's typical way of thinking and acting, especially in Europe, where Communism originated. Modern civilization, despite undisputed successes in many fields, has also made many mistakes and given rise to many abuses with regard to man, exploiting him in various ways. It is a civilization that constantly equips itself with power structures and structures of oppression, both political and cultural (especially through the media), in order to impose similar mistakes and abuses on all humanity.How else can we explain the increasing gap between the rich North and the ever poorer South? Who is responsible for this? Man is responsible-man, ideologies, and philosophical systems. I would say that responsibility lies with the struggle against God, the systematic elimination of all that is Christian. This struggle has to a large degree dominated thought and life in the West for three centuries. Marxist collectivism is nothing more than a "cheap version" of this plan. Today a similar plan is revealing itself in all its danger and, at the same time, in all its faultiness."
Think what you will of the Magisterium being discussed in this thread (I attend a Presbyterian church) but I take John Paul II seriously and think this is a remarkable and disturbing statement made by a man with a great deal of information we do not have access to.
It's tragic, really.
And I've read the Bible.
I threw in Mary as a source of knowledge because of the Fatima visions and prophecies of assassintation attempts on the Pope and the like.
There are very many fine lines in theology where if you cross them you are in a totally different place than if you don’t . . . Mary or the Holy Spirit as the active force for example. The rationalization of indulgences is another . . .
I will pay attention to how Christ and the Apostles used scripture and compare it to my own use. That’s an interesting project!
I threw in Mary as a source of knowledge because of the Fatima visions and prophecies of assassintation attempts on the Pope and the like.
There are very many fine lines in theology where if you cross them you are in a totally different place than if you don’t . . . Mary or the Holy Spirit as the active force for example. The rationalization of indulgences is another . . .
I will pay attention to how Christ and the Apostles used scripture and compare it to my own use. That’s an interesting project!
Excellent book. Very wonderful author. All his books I’ve read are wonderfully factual and balanced.
????
Am disappointed. Saddened. My tone was quite charitable.
I much agree. I think the Pope is being very astute and accurate here.
And if a Proty said such a thing about an RC, the wailing and abuse buttons would be flashing liberally.
Interesting.
The hateful attacks on Roman Catholics’ faith continue here night and day.
There’s not a shred of hate in any of my posts—neither toward an individual nor any part of the RC edifice.
Thankfully, God knows my heart even if it’s unknown to you.
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