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."
Once again you said it so well—and so efficiently (not some long, puffed-up diatribe).
You have described my own parish experience. We have a variety there that fits your description, but I also know a “chunk of them” who take their life of faith as top priority. We have Scripture studies, young adult groups, neighborhood helping hands groups (we help to provide food for the needy); we have young mothers groups and and we have groups of people who are planning to be baptized into the Church. We have groups who meet for prayer and we also have groups who meet in the church to pray the Liturgy of the Hours together.
And these kind of people—as you have said—provide the sparks for those who may—for a time—seem less than “on fire”.
Nothing is so contagious as good will, good attitudes and good humor.
“The glory of manhood is never seen in this world-—men do not blossom on earth in their higher attributes. You injure a man here because he is of little value to society and he passes from your sight and you think no more of him, but when you see him again he may be a prince before God.”
When I said "your turn," that was your invitation to provide documentation for your "little suzie" post.
I denied that was the position of the RCC. Now it's your turn to show me I'm wrong.
Mary’s the one in the center bathed in light???
You seem to be suffering from the illusion that you don't need to abide by Scripture:
Irrelevant. If a white person said exactly the same thing, they would be accused of racism.
It's still bigotry by definition
Yes, although she's quite larger in person than the picture shows. She's also got her feet on a globe of the earth which you can't really see, and apparently according to another poster 12 stars around her head. I couldn't remember that detail, I just remembered the huge statue dead center with the feet on the globe.
That's it??? The 'keys' were given to show Peter had authority???
If the early Christians had been as enthusiastic over Peter's "sheet revelation" as your "praise," Christianity would be nothing more than a haughty Jewish sect.
Naw. Wrong again.
You have no idea how much I apply that Scripture in the Biblical way.
St Paul in one situation insisted that the officials come and escort him out of jail in broad daylight.
One best applies Scriptures under guidance of Holy Spirit.
So what is the clinical name for that pathology, Dawg?
Hey MD, I've read numerous times on these threads where the priests as well as the congregation face EAST...That is, with the priests back to the congregation...
So which is it???
As somebody already pointed out, it is a biblical seen. It is not a globe of the earth.
I revisited your question on original source documents for the Bible. That is a good question. I don't have the answer but perhaps you can find it here. Consider that we do not have the two tablets on which God wrote the Ten Commandments yet no one questions their validity. Just a thought ;-)
Excuse me, I was there. I was not only there, we were right below that statue as my husband was photographing a wedding and I was positioning the wedding party directly beneath it. Its a GLOBE with a scene painted BEHIND THE GLOBE.
I know of more than one person who set out to cause pain and provoke anger
= = =
Sounds like another False allegation, accusation—false witness
BTW, I haven’t seen any RC classes in that scheduled.
Might be good to start at the kindergarten level.
I don't doubt it's a globe. Just not one of the earth. Referring to the picture in #1401, where is the painted scene?
I cannot shake the suspicion that if a Catholic had said "She", you would say, See there? They DO think it's Mary and they are praying to that statue!"
Maybe it would be useful to consider why you said "she" and what you meant by doing so.
FYI: As CG describes it, it sounds like a statue of one of the visions of St. Catherine Laboure. BUt it couls also be a depiction of the lady of Revelation.
You're a little too old for kindergarten, aren't you?
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