Posted on 05/16/2008 3:19:30 PM PDT by netmilsmom
Stemming from this comment
>>I think the RCC doctrines are a product of the enemy<<
Please tell us where we stand here. Examples welcome, but I'm not sure that actual names can be used when quoting another FReeper, so date and thread title may be better.
I wonder if it is possible to be more Calvinist than Calvin.
How do you define “deify?”
Exactly.
One good thing that (probably) came out of all this is: we'll probably all be very familiar with that portion of the catechism in the future! LOL
Let me see if I've got this straight, a couple hundred posts were devoted to one paragraph in the Catechism and it turns out that Calvin was in TOTAL AGREEMENT with it? Is that pretty much right?
I have no reason to believe that he was using the phrase in anything other than an orthodox fashion. Since we experience union with Christ, we participate, in some sense, in a deification. That is not to say we become capital-G God.
Again, I think it is important to understand the doctrine in its historical context within the orthodox Church.
If so, it sure isn't difficult to see how the LDS fell into this error.
I have no knowledge that the LDS heresy had its genesis in the statements of the church fathers.
The LDS doctrine is natural outgrowth of the heresy of tri-theism and that God the Father has a body of flesh and bone.
>>One good thing that (probably) came out of all this is: we’ll probably all be very familiar with that portion of the catechism in the future! <<
Amen!
Perhaps it’s not necessary simply to agree with Calvin, perhaps we must also agree with Machen, or whoever is running the latest splinter group in vogue.
Genesis 3:4
And the serpent said unto the woman, Ye shall not surely die:
3:5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.
We know what is good and what is evil, and if we don't, then we have to look to God's word to tell us, not to mankind.
We will be adopted sons of God, a world of difference.
Perhaps the reality is that the Reformers like Luther, Calvin and Zwengli were not nearly as anti-Catholic (they may have been more inclined toward violent response, but in fairness so was the Church during that era) as many present day Protestants.
It is probable that Calvin and certainly Luther would most likely be appalled for the institutions that try to pass themselves off as Protestant denominations today.
Additionally, it is worth noting that those who reject the Church in favor of YOPIOS seem to see nothing odd about consulting a de facto Catechism written by Calvin or other Reformers.
But as many as received him, to them gave he power to become the sons of God, even to them that believe on his name:
1:13 Which were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, nor of the will of man, but of God.
What we are discussing is Calvin's use of the word "deify" and Aquinas' statement that men become "gods."
The two statements are very different.
Calvin is not postulating some neo-Platonic mysticism that blurs the difference between men and God which Aquinas seems to be doing.
When Calvin says "the end of the gospel is, to render us eventually conformable to God, and, if we may so speak, to deify us," he is first laying down the fact that we "conform" to God; we do not "become" God.
Just as Christ justifies the ungodly by imputing HIS righteousness to fallen men, so too does God "deify" some fallen men by imputing to them the effective work of Christ on the cross.
Even Calvin, from the wording of his sentence above ("if we may so speak,") seems to understand the error that might come from taking that comment too literally.
Men do not become gods. Please show me the Scripture that says men becomes gods.
Then quickly inform the LDS that they've had it right all along.
Galatians 4
4:1 Now I say, That the heir, as long as he is a child, differeth nothing from a servant, though he be lord of all;
4:2 But is under tutors and governors until the time appointed of the father.
4:3 Even so we, when we were children, were in bondage under the elements of the world:
4:4 But when the fulness of the time was come, God sent forth his Son, made of a woman, made under the law,
4:5 To redeem them that were under the law, that we might receive the adoption of sons.
4:6 And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.
4:7 Wherefore thou art no more a servant, but a son; and if a son, then an heir of God through Christ.
"In some sense." And that makes all the difference in the world.
So we do not become capital-G God. Do we become "gods," as Aquinas wrote?
Because it is certainly understandable to see how the RCC's confusion regarding imputed righteousness (Scriptural) and infused righteousness (anti-Scriptural) is at the core of this disagreement.
Are we redeemed spirits or are we "gods?"
No, Calvin did not believe men become “gods.”
How do you define "Calvinist"?
I have already responded to the criticisms by our Protestant-Calvinist friend’s way back in post 498. As I stated in another post, (708 I think), Catholic Doctrine, all of it, connects the Doctrine of Incarnation with the Doctrine of the Cross. Sacraments are tied to both Incarnation and the Paschal Mystery (Passion, Death, Resurrection, etc). Again, Pope Benedict’s great quote from his book Jesus of Nazareth where the Pope links Incarnation and Cross Together will suffice here once again:
Pope Benedict states “ In this Chapter the theology of Incarnation and the Theology of the Cross come together; the two cannot be separated. There are thus no grounds for setting up and opposition between Easter theology of the Synoptics and St. Paul, on one hand, and St. John’s supposedly purely incarnational theology, on the other. For the goal of the Word’s becoming-flesh spoken of by the prologue is precisely the offering of his body on the Cross, which the sacrament makes accessible to us”
So again, the Doctrine referred to in CCC 460 is rooted in “participation of the Divine Nature” or what the Eastern Tradition refers to as “Theosis”, which is a beautiful Doctrine that states that Human beings can have communion with God, and thus become like God to such a degree that humans can “partake in the Divine Nature” (c.f. 2 Peter 2:4). We become united with God by his Grace, through his son Christ Jesus and the Holy Spirit. The process of “Theosis” starts at Baptism where the CCC states the Baptized person has become a New Creature, (see CCC para. 1265)
http://www.usccb.org/catechism/text/pt2sect2.htm#art1
So the Catholic Church sees that through the Incarnation and Cross/Resurrection/Ascension, God has given us access to his Mercy and Love and by his Grace, which God gives us through the Sacraments, the inner person becomes renewed and transformed by Grace and through that Grace we become United to God and thus like God. So by Grace we become like what God is by nature. In other words, Christ trough his Grace allows us to “partake in the Divine Nature” (c.f. 2 Peter 2:4). So through the incarnation of Christ, God is now really accessible to us and wants us to be in “communion with him”.
St. Paul in Acts 17-28-29 (he quotes some pagan poets here) states “For in him we live and move and have our being, as even some of your poets have said, for we too are his offspring. Since we therefore are the offspring of God, we ought to not think that the divinity is like an image fashioned from gold, silver or stone by human imagination.” Later on St. Paul talks about “a man who has been appointed, and he provided confirmation by raising him from the dead” (c.f. Acts 17:30). So, St. Paul speaks of living and moving with God and links it to Christ, who became incarnate.
St. Paul in Ephesians alludes to the concept of “Theosis” again where he states “who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, ‘to be holy and without blemish before him’” (c.f. Eph: 1:3-5). He writes “and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the Fullness of God” (c.f. Eph 3:19), and coming to “mature manhood, to the extent of the full stature of Christ” (c.f. Eph 4:13).
St. Paul in Chapter 6 of Romans takes up this theme here as well. In verses 1 to 4, he mentions Baptism then he states “For if we have grown into union with him through a death like his, we shall also be united with him in the resurrection” (c.f. Rom 6:5). Later St. Paul writes about being “conformed to the image of his Son” (c.f. Rom 8:29), which Catholics and Orthodox believe happens at Baptism (going back to Romans 6) and restores what was loss before the fall when Man and Woman was created in the Image of God (c.f. Gen 1:26-27).
So Catholic Theology, and The Eastern Orthodox Theology, has much more Theological depth than just being saved by God covering us with Grace, while still seeing us as filthy and Depraved (One of Calvin’s 5 Points of TULIP). While we distorted our Image (Divine Image, as we were originally created in God’s Image) as a result of Adam and Eve’s Sin (The Fall), through Christ, God is going to not only restore our True Image, but through his Grace, bring us into communion with the Holy Trinity, which is Love itself, and thus partake in the Divine Nature.
St Paul further writes “that you should put away the old self of your former way of life, corrupted through deceitful desires, and be renewed in the spirit of your minds, and put on the new self, created in God’s way in righteousness and holiness of truth” (c.f. Eph 4:22-23). St Paul writes “to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God…Do not conform yourself to this age but be transformed by the renewal of your mind, that you may discern what is the will of God, what is good and pleasing and perfect” (c.f. Rom 12-1-2). St Paul speaks of May the God of peace himself make our perfectly holy an may you entirely, spirit, soul and body, be preserved blameless for the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ” (c.f. 1 Thes. 5:23) and why we are called which was “for obtaining the glory of our Lord Jesus Christ” (c.f. 2 Thes 2:14). St. John states whoever remains in God’s Love remains in God and God in Him. In this love brought to perfection among us we have confidence on the day of judgment because as he is, so are we in this world” (c.f. 1 John 4:16-17). Finally, two verses I already mentioned describe “partaking of the Divine nature/Theosis” are 1 John 3:2: “We know that when He is revealed, we shall be like Him, for we shall see Him as He is” and St. Paul’s letter to the Philippians where he states: Christ will “transform our lowly body that it may be conformed to His glorious body.” (c.f. Phil 3:21).
So, through Christ’s Incarnation, he joined our humanity and glorified it Himself and by the Paschal mystery, we are to be united with God in a communion of Love, and to live for all eternity. In this context, to partake in the Divine nature is in fact to become like God, which is not to say we become God. We will be in eternity and thus being like God, but we will be praising God with all the Angels and Saints as Revelation tells us.
I look up how Calvinists define “Calvinist” and go with that.
Are you now rejecting Aquinas or do you simply not understand him?
No one here is.
Men do not become “gods.”
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