Posted on 07/10/2007 8:57:47 AM PDT by f150sound
LORENZAGO DI CADORE, Italy - Pope Benedict XVI has reasserted the universal primacy of the Roman Catholic Church, approving a document released Tuesday that says Orthodox churches were defective and that other Christian denominations were not true churches.
In the latest document — formulated as five questions and answers — the Vatican seeks to set the record straight on Vatican II's ecumenical intent, saying some contemporary theological interpretation had been "erroneous or ambiguous" and had prompted confusion and doubt.
It restates key sections of a 2000 document the pope wrote when he was prefect of the congregation, "Dominus Iesus," which set off a firestorm of criticism among Protestant and other Christian denominations because it said they were not true churches but merely ecclesial communities and therefore did not have the "means of salvation."
"Christ 'established here on earth' only one church," the document said. The other communities "cannot be called 'churches' in the proper sense" because they do not have apostolic succession — the ability to trace their bishops back to Christ's original apostles.
please, please don’t take this the wrong way! and besides, any Freeper should not trust an AP article to be honest.
It is something totally reasonable for any christian church, or any religion for that matter to proclaim their superiority. If you had any doubts, well then why bother following your church? Also, the catholic church does not say non-catholics are excluded from salvation! Read what St Paul has to say about those who do not know the law and those who build altars to the unknown God - these are good examples of what our doctrine is; We believe for those who do not know the full truth (or law), they are judged on their conscience. This statement in no way theologically excludes non-catholics from heaven.
As far as I understand it, that is mistaken on two counts:
First, because the Mormons believe that the Church apostasized after the death of the apostles and became the “Church of the Devil.” Mormonism then claims that the true church was restored through the Prophet Joseph Smith in the 1820s. Their belief that the Church was utterly lost in damnable error for some 1500 years would make a claim of unbroken apostolic succession impossible (some Mormon correct me here if I've got that wrong);
Second, the Catholic church argues that the Catholic and Orthodox churches --- which together would account for approx. 70% of the world's Christians--- have unbroken lines of apostolic succession.
Hence, it follows that most Christian churches have an unbroken line of succession..
No, its only your interpretation of that bit of scripture that gets ignored.
If that is so, then those priests were either snake-mean or turkey-stupid.
So I guess you are here not to discuss but to taunt. Whatever floats your boat.
To people who are troubled by this report but not inclined to grant infallibility to AP or Reuters, may I suggest that a thoughtful educated Catholic is probably a better source of information on the teaching of the RC Church than people who despise us, among whom I recommend including the Lame-Stream Media.
I am sorry for your loss, but I was completely without knowledge of any information regarding your personal life. May the Lord bless you during this difficult time.
But you haven’t read it, you just trusted the MSM for it. That tells me a lot.
Me too. Thanks for the reminder.
Thanks you all. I owe it all to Boca Java, Lexapro, and, today, incipient heat-stroke. It kinda releases the sub-conscious ....
No, "nuance" means you have to be able to separate ideas into more than two categories. The world of belief is not clean cut into two categories.
There is more than the extremes of "everyone else is going to hell" and "all denominations are basically the same."
We'll all find out who's right when we're dead. ;-)
Again, from the Catechism,
"Since Christ died for all, and since all men are in fact called to one and the same destiny, which is divine, we must hold that the Holy Spirit offers to all the possibility of being made partakers, in a way known to God, of the Paschal mystery."
Every man who is ignorant of the Gospel of Christ and of his Church, but seeks the truth and does the will of God in accordance with his understanding of it, can be saved. It may be supposed that such persons would have desired Baptism explicitly if they had known its necessity.
I sincerely urge you to follow that link to read the statement in context.
Searchable Catechism. A wonderful thing.
The Catholic Church is neither, as Golda Meir and Pinchas Lapide attested.
Unless they were anti-Semites and anti-Zionists too.
Says the infallible you.
I have provided you quotes from the previous Pope's pronouncements. I have provided you quotes from the Church's official Catechism.
What have you provided? Paraphrases by the drive-by media?
Do you really think that is intellectually honest?
Other than that, you win the prize for the best idea of the day. I just invented, pirated a recipe for white wine Sangria that will cure ALL your ills while reconciling Catholics and Protestants -- even the Protestants who don't drink will be mellowed out by the smiles on the face of those working on their second glass, I promise ...
No wonder my timing has been off today. I had Maxwell House.
Clearly you are more interested in insults than analysis.
Your loss, not mine.
AP screwed up. Who’d a thunk it.
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