Posted on 06/19/2009 10:03:34 PM PDT by dangus
Praise God, that we are saved by grace alone. Works without faith are utterly without merit. This is not merely a Protestant notion.
Such has been the persistent teaching of the saints throughout the ages. Yet a whitewashing of Martin Luther has led to many people, even Catholics, fundamentally misunderstanding the Catholic Church's criticism of him.
Please understand that what I write here is no ad-hominem attack on Luther for any purpose, including the slander of Protestantism. Attacking the moral character of Martin Luther is gainless, for no-one supposes Luther to be imbued with the gift of infallibility. But when the counter-reformation is known by most people only by what it opposes, it becomes necessary to clarify what it was that it opposes. Further, given the whitewashed history of Martin Luther, it is imperitive to remember the context of the Catholic Church's language and actions, which seem terribly strident, presented out of the context.
The Catholic Church does not believe that one could merit salvation by doing good works. Nor could one avoid sin by one's own strengths. In fact, the Catholic position is one held by most people who believe they follow Luther's principle of sola fides. We are saved by grace alone, by which we have faith, which necessarily leads us to righteous works, and the avoidance of sin.
This is not Luther's position. Luther held that it was impossible to avoid sin. “As long as we are here [in this world] we have to sin.” (Letter to Melanchthon, 1521) "They are fools who attempt to overcome temptations by fasting, prayer and chastisement. For such temptations and immoral attacks are easily overcome when there are plenty of maidens and women" (Luther's Works, Jena ed., 1558, 2, 116; cited in P. F. O'Hare, "The Facts About Luther", Rockford, 1987, 311).
As such, it was not necessary to avoid sin. “If grace is true, you must bear a true and not a fictitious sin. God does not save people who are only fictitious sinners. Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly, for he is victorious over sin, death, and the world.” In fact, the way to conquer sin, he taught was to indulge it: “The way to battle a tempting demon was to “in-dulge some sin in hatred of the evil spirit and to torment him.” Even the greatest sin was permissible, so long as one believed in Christ.: “Sin shall not drag us away from Him, even should we commit fornication or murder a thousand times a day. (all quotes from Letter to Melanchthon, 1521)
These quotes are often brushed aside as being hot-headed rhetoric. (Ironically, one passage to suggest that such intemperate statements were righteous is Jesus' warning that should one's eyes cause him to lust, he should cast the eye into Gehenna. How diametrically opposed to Jesus' teaching is Luther's!) But they were not said in a harmless context. Luther counseled Prince Phillip that it would be fine to take a mistress. And his comments that peasants were born to be cannon fodder is horrific in light of the deaths of 100,000 peasants in a rebellion of which he spoke, “I said they should be slain; all their blood is upon my head... My little book against the peasants is quite in the right and shall remain so, even if all the world were to be scandalized at it.” (Luther's Works, Erlangen ed., 24.299)
Such beliefs are not incidental to Luther; they are a major part of the reason for many princes siding with him against the Catholic church. Without such support, his movement would have no base. But he also appealed to their financial motives, arguing that they had no obligation to fight Muslims. In fact, Luther preached that Islamic domination was superior to Catholicism. His horrors at the excesses of Rome were pure fiction, aimed at weakening Rome's military strength. His lies are betrayed by his ignorance of Rome's geography. (He mistakenly thought that the Vatican was built on one of the seven hills of Rome, an assertion he'd make time and time again in asserting that the Papacy was Babylon.) Again, the context is horrifying: Belgrade fell in the very same year as the Council of Worms, 1521. By 1529, the Islamic horde had reached Vienna.
Luther even attacked the Holy Bible, itself. Nowhere does the bible say we are saved by “faith alone.” In fact, those words exist only in the Letter of James. So, Luther sought to have that book struck out of the bible. At the Council of Worms, he was shown how the 1st Letter of Peter refers to purgatory, how Revelations depicts the saints in Heaven praying for the souls below, how James explicitly states that “faith alone is dead, if it has not works.” Later Protestant apologists offered alternate explanations for these difficult passages, but Luther simply declared that they were false: “Many sweat to reconcile St. Paul and St. James, but in vain. 'Faith justifies' and 'faith does not justify' contradict each other flatly. If any one can harmonize them I will give him my doctor's hood and let him call me a fool “
His violence to the Word of God was worse still regarding the Old Testament. In condemning the Ten Commandments, he said Moses should be “damned and excommunicated; yea, worse than the Pope and the Devil.” Yet this man argued that the bible alone was authoritative?
When confronted by the Catholic church over his statements, Luther never disavowed these statements, or claimed they were exaggerations, or apologize for putting his foot in his mouth. Instead, he boasted, “Not for a thousand years has God bestowed such great gifts on any bishop as He has on me.”
Thus, the Catholic church was in the position of defending Western Civilization militarily against the Islamic horde, when an outrageous heretic preached all manner of hatred against it, instigating insurrection, and leading political forces to align against it. In doing so, he attacked not only the Church, but the historical and biblical under-pinnings of the bible. Could there be any wonder that the church responded harshly? Luther is dead, and he has never been held to be infallible or sinless. This is not an attack on him, but a defense on the Catholic Church, which he assailed.
It's 1529. The Muslims are in Bavaria. There's a madman boasting that he's responsible for 100,000 dead peasants, and he sides with the Turks. Can you really say that the Church treated him too harshly?
This is true, but the problem you're facing with the KJV is they were MISSING some the ORIGINAL text,thus you're starting from something watered down in the first place.
Modern Bible's such as the NIV have been washed down so many times they resemble nothing like the Septuagint
You would be far better off with the Douay-Rheims,Dear friend.Than understand it seen through the eyes of the Catholic Church founded by Christ Himself who gave you Bible Canon
Your linked sources are not very good.I suggest you start here with UPENN and Robert Kraft
TREATMENT OF THE GREEK TEXTUAL VARIANTS
I want to know how a YEARLY reminder of God's saving power (Passover) managed to morph into COMMUNION: something that occurs every time the church doors are open.
Sounds like a TEACHING to ME!!
Actions DO speak louder than words!
You WILL know them by their fruits.
Golly!
Sounds like Joseph Smith was a Catholic!
You wrote:
“I want to know how a YEARLY reminder of God’s saving power (Passover) managed to morph into COMMUNION: something that occurs every time the church doors are open.”
Ever read the Book of Acts?
Acts 2:41-47
41Those who accepted his message were baptized, and about three thousand were added to their number that day. 42****They devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching and to the fellowship, to the breaking of bread and to prayer.**** 43Everyone was filled with awe, and many wonders and miraculous signs were done by the apostles. 44All the believers were together and had everything in common. 45Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. ****46Every day they continued to meet together in the temple courts. They broke bread in their homes and ate together with glad and sincere hearts,**** 47praising God and enjoying the favor of all the people. And the Lord added to their number daily those who were being saved.
Apparently, FROM THE BEGINNING, early Christians were receiving the Eucharist often. They DEVOTED THEMSELVES TO IT.
You wrote:
“Sounds like a TEACHING to ME!!”
But it isn’t. Actions are actions. They are not teachings of the Church. Peter committed an improper act.
“Actions DO speak louder than words!”
They do in many ways. But Peter had already taught very differently. He was not teaching there. http://www.catholic.com/thisrock/1998/9805chap.asp
“You WILL know them by their fruits.”
You do.
You wrote:
“C’mon we’re talking about priest becoming another Christ,
surely you can back that up with something !”
If you actually read the New Testament you would see that Christ gives authority to the Apostles to extend what was exclusively His mission: John 20:19-23.
Jesus had already told them they could do nothing without Him in John 15:5. And continuing on that same line of John 20 about the forgiveness of sins look at 2 Cor. 2:10. Look especially at an older translation like the Confraternity, Douay-Rheims or even the KJV. Look at what St. Paul said:
10To whom ye forgive any thing, I forgive also: for if I forgave any thing, to whom I forgave it, for your sakes forgave I it in the person of Christ;
Notice how St. Paul says he forgave in the PERSON OF CHRIST? Catholics usually use the Latin when we refer to that principle: in persona Christi. Ever hear of it? It has everything to do with this topic. As Aquinas wrote:
But this cannot be said of Christ; for the Apostle says (Heb. vii. 25): Coming of Himself to God, always living to make intercession for us…And therefore it is not fitting for Christ to be the recipient of the effect of His priesthood, but rather to communicate it to others. For the influence of the first agent in every genus is such that it receives nothing in that genus: thus the sun gives but does not receive light…Now Christ is the fountain-head of the entire priesthood: for the priest of the Old Law was a figure of Him; while the priest of the New Law works in his person, according to 2 Cor. ii. 10: For what I have pardoned, if I have pardoned anything, for your sakes have I done in the person of Christ.
“The priest is indeed another Christ, or in some way he is himself a continuation of Christ.” (Pope Pius XI, Encyclical on the Priesthood).
“The priest on earth (is) another Christ.” (The New Saint Joseph Baltimore Catechism.)
“In this moment, the priest quite literally becomes Christ Himself.” (This is the Mass, Bishop Fulton J. Sheen, Page 100)
“The priest is not just the cross, he is Christ Himself.” (The Lone Star Catholic, March 1, 1959)
“To the carnal eye, the priest looks like other men, but to the eye of faith he is exalted above angels.” (Faith of our Fathers, Gibbons, Page 422)
“Another grace of the synod [Synod of Bishops, October, 1990] was a new maturity in the way of looking at priestly service in the Church; and thus also of the personal life of each and every priest, that is to say, of each priest’s participation in the saving mystery of Christ: ‘Sacerdos Alter Christus.’” (Pope John Paul II, Letter to Catholic priests on the occasion of Holy Thursday, 1991).
“The priest is given transcendent power to forgive sins, to administer the sacraments, but most of all to offer the Eucharistic Sacrifice, the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, in which he becomes an ‘Alter Christus’” (Pastoral Reflections on the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass, Cardinal John J. O’Conner.)
“In the sacrifice of Jesus Christ the priest is a substitute of Christ Himself. As a result of his ordination, he is a true alter Christus.” (The Latin Mass: Chronicle of a Catholic Reform, Summer 1995 Issue. )
“Thus the priest, as is said with good reason, is indeed another Christ;” (Papal Encyclical ‘Ad Catholici Sacerdotii’ on the priesthood, Pope Pius XI, December 20, 1935)
What about these claims ?
Yes Christ IS!
Jesus told his disciples to spread the word of the Gospel, and somewhere your church made the claim that they and they alone should be followed. Notice how Paul doesn’t even mention Peter at the end of Romans, and you can guess why !
“Add to that, these “priests” allegedly have the power to bring Jesus down from Heaven to become a peice of bread ??”
“No, and no Catholic claims they do”
I have news for you... The Rev John O’Brien does. with the approval of the catholic church.
“The faith of millions” is approved by your church.
“When the priest pronounces the tremendous words of consecration, he reaches up into the heavens, BRINGS CHRIST DOWN FROM HIS THRONE, and places Him upon our altar to be OFFERED UP AGAIN AS THE VICTIM for the sins of man.
: the priest brings Christ down from heaven, and renders Him present on our altar AS THE ETERNAL VICTIM for the sins of man - NOT ONCE BUT A THOUSAND TIMES! The priest speaks and lo Christ, the eternal and omnipotent God, bows his head in humble obedience to the priest’s commands.”
“The Nihil Obstat and Imprimatur are official Roman Catholic declarations that a book or pamphlet is free of doctrinal or moral error.”
the priest brings Christ down from heaven, and renders Him present on our altar AS THE ETERNAL VICTIM for the sins of man - NOT ONCE BUT A THOUSAND TIMES! “
So one of your alter Christos persons gives orders to the Almighty ? It’s official doctrine!
Jesus Disciples ARE the Catholic Church. The Church founded by Christ is the point of departure for protestants.
The Septuagint is not the end all of biblical texts. Since I’m using a translation anyways, I’ll stick with the ESV and let folks who have devoted their lives to studying texts and languages do what they do best. An aging electronic warfare officer isn’t likely to do it better - and the Douay-Rheims sure wouldn’t!
The ESV is based on the Masoretic text of the Hebrew Bible as found in Biblia Hebraica Stuttgartensia (2nd ed., 1983), and on the Greek text in the 1993 editions of the Greek New Testament (4th corrected ed.), published by the United Bible Societies (UBS), and Novum Testamentum Graece (27th ed.), edited by Nestle and Aland.
The currently renewed respect among Old Testament scholars for the Masoretic text is reflected in the ESV’s attempt, wherever possible, to translate difficult Hebrew passages as they stand in the Masoretic text rather than resorting to emendations or to finding an alternative reading in the ancient versions.
In exceptional, difficult cases, the Dead Sea Scrolls, the Septuagint, the Samaritan Pentateuch, the Syriac Peshitta, the Latin Vulgate, and other sources were consulted to shed possible light on the text, or, if necessary, to support a divergence from the Masoretic text. Similarly, in a few difficult cases in the New Testament, the ESV has followed a Greek text different from the text given preference in the UBS/Nestle-Aland 27th edition.
The footnotes that accompany the ESV text inform the reader of textual variations and difficulties and show how these have been resolved by the ESV Translation Team. In addition to this, the footnotes indicate significant alternative readings and occasionally provide an explanation for technical terms or for a difficult reading in the text.
Throughout, the Translation Team has benefited greatly from the massive textual resources that have become readily available recently, from new insights into biblical laws and culture, and from current advances in Hebrew and Greek lexicography and grammatical understanding.
http://www.esv.org/translation/philosophy
“I said to Peter in front of them all, “You are a Jew, yet you live like a Gentile and not like a Jew. How is it, then, that you force Gentiles to follow Jewish customs?”
You are correct. It wasn’t just an action, but he was ‘forcing’ the Gentiles to follow Jewish customs. He wasn’t just acting wrong, he was teaching wrong.
But since the Catholic Church teaches he was the First Pope, and since Popes are infallible speaking ex cathedra, we must assume that he wasn’t teaching ex cathedra at this time.
Otherwise the whole idea of Papal infallibility becomes...well, fallible.
More accurate source
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rs/rak/temp/toronto3/report-frame.html
Jewish Greek Fragments With the Greek materials from Qumran and other “Dead Sea” sites, we are in a better position than ever before to explore various aspects of Greek Jewish scribal practices. The following examples of almost certainly “Jewish” Greek fragmentary scroll MSS, about half of which are from the Qumran caves 4 and 7, and most of which are on leather, are examined in greater detail on my website at http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rs/rak/earlylxx/jewishpap.html (see especially the chronological listing — all these examples are dated paleographically to between 2nd century bce and early 2nd century ce).
Some are merely isolated scraps containing a few letters
Here is more accuracies for you to read
The Significance of Greek for Jews in the Roman Empire
http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/rs/rak/temp/toronto3/report-frame.html
Enjoy the reading.
I wish you a Blessed Evening!
You wrote:
“What about these claims ?”
What about them? 1) Can you first prove they are even genuine? I ask that because they appear to cited only on anti-Catholic websites as far as I can see. Imagine that. and 2) What about them specifically?
“Jesus told his disciples to spread the word of the Gospel, and somewhere your church made the claim that they and they alone should be followed. Notice how Paul doesn’t even mention Peter at the end of Romans, and you can guess why !”
Oh, I think he refers to Peter, just not by name and yes, I can guess why. Peter was a hunted man in Rome. Paul wasn’t stupid.
In Romans 15:20, St. Paul said he would not build on “another man’s foundation.” Yet in the same letter to the Romans he writes to a Church already founded “whose faith was spoken of throughout the whole world.” Romans 1: 8. Many Protestants used to recognize this as a veiled reference to Peter. The Protestant, BJ Kidd, for instance, wrote: “Rome, in short, was ‘another man’s foundation.’ No allusion to the ‘other man’ by name is wanted. The Romans knew well enough whom he meant. Who, then, was the ‘other man’? The evidence is early and threefold in favor of St. Peter.” History of the Church p. 52.
Another Protestant, George Edmundson, wrote: “There had been a founder of this great Church with whom St. Paul was well acquainted. Who was he? All tradition answers with one voice the name of St. Peter.” Church in Rome in the First Century, page 28: http://books.google.com/books?id=UHJCAAAAIAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=Edmundson,+in+his+%22Church+in+Rome+in+the+First+Century,%22
Also, St. Peter ended his first letter this way, “The Church which is in Babylon salutes you, and so does my son Mark.” Early Christians called pagan Rome Babylon.
Ceiling. Watch.
“I have news for you... The Rev John O’Brien does. with the approval of the catholic church.
“The faith of millions” is approved by your church.“When the priest pronounces the tremendous words of consecration, he reaches up into the heavens, BRINGS CHRIST DOWN FROM HIS THRONE, and places Him upon our altar to be OFFERED UP AGAIN AS THE VICTIM for the sins of man. : the priest brings Christ down from heaven, and renders Him present on our altar AS THE ETERNAL VICTIM for the sins of man - NOT ONCE BUT A THOUSAND TIMES! The priest speaks and lo Christ, the eternal and omnipotent God, bows his head in humble obedience to the priest’s commands.’”
And as usual, you’re wrong. Let me show you how. 1) This is what you ACTUALLY wrote: “Add to that, these “priests” allegedly have the power to bring Jesus down from Heaven to become a peice of bread ??”
Notice what you said? You said the priest makes Jesus become “a peice of bread”.
This is what I said in return (please not how LONG MY RESPONSE IS):
No, and no Catholic claims they do. Christ does not become a piece of bread - nor does any Catholic claim He does. When I see something like that from an anti-Catholic like yourself I am struck by how intensely erroneous anti-Catholics are in their understanding of something yet it never seems to stop them from posting examples of it. Christ does not become a piece of bread. The bread becomes Christ’s flesh. You apparently think that means the same thing - and that says quite a bit.
It’s clear that you were in error about Jesus becoming “a peice of bread”. No Catholic priest believes that or teaches that. You, however, cut 81 words, EIGHTY-ONE WORDS, from my answer and actually defended what I didn’t deny!!!
What does that say about your approach?
“No one ?”
Yes, no one. No one is trying to sacrifice the living God-man Jesus again. How could anyone even try?
“the priest brings Christ down from heaven, and renders Him present on our altar AS THE ETERNAL VICTIM for the sins of man - NOT ONCE BUT A THOUSAND TIMES!”
Yep. And that in no way supports what you claimed. Remember, this was your original claim from post 194:
“Add to that, these “priests” allegedly have the power to bring Jesus down from Heaven to become a peice of bread ??”
I clearly denied that anyone was trying to make Jesus into bread. Now, you’re trying to say two different things. 1) Your emphasizing the idea of Jesus coming down to the altar - as if I ever disputed God’s power to do such a thing or the priest’s power in that regard. 2) You’re also making the completely RIDICULOUS claim that this means Jesus was being sacrificed over and over again, which is not only impossible, but, naturally is not what we teach or believe.
Ceiling. Watch.
“So one of your alter Christos persons gives orders to the Almighty ? It’s official doctrine!”
No. No orders given. God acts as He wills. It is His promise to His people to always be with them in the breaking of the Bread.
Ceiling. Watch.
WHAT!!!! You expect me to read all that...don’t you know?
Michael Jackson died! And you want me to think eternally?
Sorry. I don’t even have a TV, and I’m still in MJ overload...
I’ll try to read your links a little later in the evening. Thanks for the posts.
You wrote:
“...I’ll stick with the ESV...”
I have the ESV Study Bible. It is a beautiful Bible. I am most impressed with the translation and the notes. I just wish it wasn’t filled with so many Protestant assumptions, presumptions, and outright errors.
44All the believers were together and had everything in common. 45Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need. *
You wrote:
“Then I guess you PRACTICE this that was TAUGHT?
44All the believers were together and had everything in common. 45Selling their possessions and goods, they gave to anyone as he had need.”
No, because that is not mandatory. St. Paul, for example, kept the money he earned as a tent maker to support himself. I am sure he was still generous with what he had, but he clearly was not living communally with his income. As Acts 5:4 makes plain, we are free to own private property and use it for own support. What we cannot do is be greedy or, if we decide to give up our property, deceitfully hold some of it back. In Acts 11:29 we see that the early Christians still - and this is during the reign of Claudius so it was in the forties or fifties of the first century - were in control of their own property.
Thus, Acts 2:44 is completely voluntary and there is no blame on a man who chooses not to follow suit. I choose not to and the Church - and scripture - would find no fault with me on that score.
It’s always amazing how poorly Protestants understand the Bible while at the same time pushing, ironically, sola scriptura.
How does the selection of what's MANDATORY work?
And I suppose that TITHEing is MANDATORY?
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