Posted on 05/03/2008 4:38:34 PM PDT by NYer
Scripture, our Evangelical friends tell us, is the inerrant Word of God. Quite right, the Catholic replies; but how do you know this to be true?
It's not an easy question for Protestants, because, having jettisoned Tradition and the Church, they have no objective authority for the claims they make for Scripture. There is no list of canonical books anywhere in the Bible, nor does any book (with the exception of St. John's Apocalypse) claim to be inspired. So, how does a "Bible Christian" know the Bible is the Word of God?
If he wants to avoid a train of thought that will lead him into the Catholic Church, he has just one way of responding: With circular arguments pointing to himself (or Luther or the Jimmy Swaggart Ministries or some other party not mentioned in the Bible) as an infallible authority telling him that it is so. Such arguments would have perplexed a first or second century Christian, most of whom never saw a Bible.
Christ founded a teaching Church. So far as we know, he himself never wrote a word (except on sand). Nor did he commission the Apostles to write anything. In due course, some Apostles (and non-Apostles) composed the twenty-seven books which comprise the New Testament. Most of these documents are ad hoc; they are addressed to specific problems that arose in the early Church, and none claim to present the whole of Christian revelation. It's doubtful that St. Paul even suspected that his short letter to Philemon begging pardon for a renegade slave would some day be read as Holy Scripture.
Who, then, decided that it was Scripture? The Catholic Church. And it took several centuries to do so. It was not until the Council of Carthage (397) and a subsequent decree by Pope Innocent I that Christendom had a fixed New Testament canon. Prior to that date, scores of spurious gospels and "apostolic" writings were floating around the Mediterranean basin: the Gospel of Thomas, the "Shepherd" of Hermas, St. Paul's Letter to the Laodiceans, and so forth. Moreover, some texts later judged to be inspired, such as the Letter to the Hebrews, were controverted. It was the Magisterium, guided by the Holy Spirit, which separated the wheat from the chaff.
But, according to Protestants, the Catholic Church was corrupt and idolatrous by the fourth century and so had lost whatever authority it originally had. On what basis, then, do they accept the canon of the New Testament? Luther and Calvin were both fuzzy on the subject. Luther dropped seven books from the Old Testament, the so-called Apocrypha in the Protestant Bible; his pretext for doing so was that orthodox Jews had done it at the synod of Jamnia around 100 A. D.; but that synod was explicitly anti-Christian, and so its decisions about Scripture make an odd benchmark for Christians.
Luther's real motive was to get rid of Second Maccabees, which teaches the doctrine of Purgatory. He also wanted to drop the Letter of James, which he called "an epistle of straw," because it flatly contradicts the idea of salvation by "faith alone" apart from good works. He was restrained by more cautious Reformers. Instead, he mistranslated numerous New Testament passages, most notoriously Romans 3:28, to buttress his polemical position.
The Protestant teaching that the Bible is the sole spiritual authority--sola scriptura --is nowhere to be found in the Bible. St. Paul wrote to Timothy that Scripture is "useful" (which is an understatemtn), but neither he nor anyone else in the early Church taught sola scriptura. And, in fact, nobody believed it until the Reformation. Newman called the idea that God would let fifteen hundred years pass before revealing that the bible was the sole teaching authority for Christians an "intolerable paradox."
Newman also wrote: "It is antecedently unreasonable to Bsuppose that a book so complex, so unsystematic, in parts so obscure, the outcome of so many minds, times, and places, should be given us from above without the safeguard of some authority; as if it could possibly, from the nature of the case, interpret itself...." And, indeed, once they had set aside the teaching authority of the Church, the Reformers began to argue about key Scriptural passages. Luther and Zwingli, for example, disagreed vehemently about what Christ meant by the words, "This is my Body."
St. Augustine, usually Luther's guide and mentor, ought to have the last word about sola scriptura: "But for the authority of the Church, I would not believe the Gospel."
What are the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven???
I agree completely and that is a definition of UNITED. When a man and woman are UNITED in marriage, their MARRIAGE is a union, it DOES NOT mean that they are the same person.
Perhaps if you had not concatenated the verse you would understand better.
Do either of those verses involve an instruction from Christ to an individual?
Or are they both general instructions from apostles?
Do you want to be alone?
I don't see the need for others here when you are setting yourself up as the representative for both sides of the debate.
The Cathechism does not teach that "united" means one becomes a god, or a co-savior, or any of the garbage you say.
Please respect the right of Catholics to define their faith.
Never said that. Its the CATHOLIC view of this verse that is non-biblical and mythical. There is nothing in the Keys of the Kingdom that apply to Popes or the Catholic Church. It was applied to Peter and Peter ALONE.
"....nothing in the exegesis, leads one to conclude that the office was meant for anyone other than the apostle Peter. The findings have indicated no real basis to assume that the text is outlining the basis for a succession of supreme pontiffs who claim their authority from Peter."
"This is important because the Catholic Church maintains that the institution of the papacy is of divine, not human, origin. Matt 16:18 is used to substantiate this. If this claim is true, then one would certainly expect to find the “doctors of the church” referring to the institution of the papacy and linking it to this verse. For the most part, though, (with the exception of Jerome and the bishops of Rome), such references are not present in the writings of the fathers. Yes, it is true that Rome possessed a position of pre-eminence in the early Church; no historian or theologian would dispute this. However, the question is whether the primacy promised to Peter in Matt 16:17-19 and actually exercised by him is to be transferred to bishops of the Roman Church." "Upon This Rock: An Exegetical and Patristic Examination of Matthew 16:18
Yep, we don't complain about their crackers, grape juice and rattle snakes.
That is *not* true. Children learn the basics at a very early age.
You are saying that if a toddler knocks the gear shift out of place and the family car runs over his mother, that the toddler sinned, but it won't be held against him. That's just wrong.
A rather unfortunate example, as there is no intent in the action. It would not be a murder in that case, but a mere accident.
A better example would be one of covetousness:
A child purposefully takes a toy from the home of a playmate because he wants it for his own. That is sin, and he knows it to be so, as when he is caught at it he exhibits guilt.
Toddlers don't understand and their actions are not sinful. Sin is about the will, not the actions.
The example above proves my case, and it is from within my own house. The child I speak of was only 2 1/2 years old when he took my child's toy. When his parents forced it's return, he was fully guilt ridden and apologetic for his actions.
That instance holds all the prerequisites of sin. Children hold all the willfulness of their parents, but without the good sense of experience.
Then you don't get to determine that sola scriptura is not biblical.
A child is born and one minute later dies. Has this child "learned" right from wrong? Has this child committed any sin?
Let’s see: I can go with 1900 years of scholarship in the Church founded by Christ—the Catholic Church—and the plain words of Christ as laid out in the New Testament written and assembled by that Church, or I can go with Paster Brittany.
Hmmmm. What to do what to do.
Nonetheless, you recycle someone else's doubletalk:
Yes, it is true that Rome possessed a position of pre-eminence in the early Church; no historian or theologian would dispute this. However, the question is whether the primacy promised to Peter in Matt 16:17-19 and actually exercised by him is to be transferred to bishops of the Roman Church."
In other words, yes Rome was in charge and yes Peter was promised the keys, but we don't see how they relate.
It's willful blindness.
Apparently so. It is our choice to give in to the inner desires in a selfish way. A capacity that children lack.
I heartedly disagree. Children, especially newborns, have a great capacity for selfishness.
Mat 19:5 And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh
This may have escaped your pope, being single and all, but there is a spiritual truth in two being united becoming one...
I did not say you're not free to go on believing such error. Go right ahead. Sin boldly.
But if you insist I believe it, I will tell you how wrong you are.
Yes, but they retain separate personhoods.
Oh my.
If he knows it to be so (truly knows it and not just knows that Mom and Dad will be mad) then he is not the child we are talking about.
It is for this reason that I used the word (I try t carefully pick words) "infant."
If infants have no capacity for knowing and choosing and understanding the remifications, then they do not sin.
And the "all have sinned" Bible verse must allow exceptions and can not be used as a bludgedon to deny Mary her role.
That was the point.
A child is born, draws a single breath and dies. Where have the exhibited selfishness?
Ooooohhh...One of them there ten dollar words...
But what verse are you referring to??? I've posted a few...
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