Michele Bachmann Should Not 'Get a Pass' on Past Membership in Anti-Catholic Church

Catholic Online ^ | 7/15/11 | Keith A Fournier

[tcg]

....some of my colleagues in the world of Catholic media, journalism and the Press have attributed the positions of this Church and Bachmanns past membership to just "being a Protestant." As someone who has worked ecumenically for decades I reject that dismissal. The Wisconsin Evangelical Lutheran Synod does not represent many Protestants. It is an Anti-Catholic body.

....I have worked with, prayed with and collaborated with MANY Protestant Christians, for over three decades, who would NEVER call the successor of Peter the Antichrist. The colleagues to which I refer go further, they seemingly accept the notion that if Protestant Christians felt otherwise they would no longer be Protestant. That is not only overly simplistic, it fails to recognize the substantial issues which divide the broken Body of Christ.

....Some of the other articles I have read ...attempt to dismiss it by pointing to the authors purported political leanings. So, let me speak to that for a moment. I have political leanings. I like Michele Bachmann's positions on the issues which matter most to this Catholic voter. She is pro-Life and defends marriage and the family and society founded upon it.

I appreciate her pledge to reign in the ever expanding size of the Federal government, which I fear threatens the principle of subsidiarity. Finally, I had been impressed with her intelligence, her oratorical skills, her background and her presence. All of this made her my second favorite possible candidate, until now. My first choice is obvious to anyone who reads my ongoing political commentary.

However, her political and policy positions were not the point of Joshua Green's article and focusing upon them may be a form of deflection. Green raised the issue of Michele Bachmann's long standing identification with a Church body which is clearly Anti-Catholic....

[The Iceman Cometh]

“the Catholic church’s official teaching is that anyone not a Catholic will also be going to hell” “Where did you get that from?”

My in-laws are as devout Catholic as it gets and yes, this is what they believe as well.

[starlifter]

“I posted it ...”

Really? Where?

[papertyger]

Question:

Have you ever googled any Catholic responses to these citations?

[Claud]

Thanks for your inside viewpoint on this.

So I guess the media is going to push this issue to, as people have already said here, divide Catholics and Lutherans on this issue and torpedo her candidacy.

I wear my traditional Catholicism on my sleeve as most people on the Religion forum know. But I think this is a ridiculous issue.

Even *if* she personally believes the Pope is the Antichrist, how will that affect the way she governs? Can anyone give me 3-4 policy/administrative decisions that will flow from it?

[Cronos]

As I said, that's a topic for a religious discussion. It has no relevance whatsoever to Michele's political campaign. I doubt the WELS church ever preached this from this pulpit and Michele said she disagreed with it.

the main thing is that this is an attempt by the left to get Catholics and Lutherans to fight and they (the left) hope that this will kill Michele's chances.

Their ploy is obvious and even more obvious is the fact that this is working -- thanks Dr. Thorne, Ib - you've played into the left's hands.

Like fools we take this bait and start fighting when we should remember who is trying to get us to fight -- folks who want us to sit it out while Obambi gets re-elected

[the invisib1e hand]

As someone who was beat up by Catholic kids for walking past their church and school to get to my Lutheran Church, back in the 50s, and then told that their priest said it was justified, I find your comments pathetic.

I've never recommended therapy to anyone, but in your case...

The truth is, what you say about Pelosi (and might I add Sebelius, Biden, Kennedy, et al) is true. There are few things more detrimental to the well being of mankind than reprobates. Not even protestants, because, ultimately, they're just powerless poses.

[cripplecreek]

My aunt was a devout Baptist who married a devout Catholic and it worked for them. Sometimes they went to his church and sometimes they went to hers. Other times they went to their own churches by themselves. They always went to Christmas mass at his church.

I don’t know how common it is but the Methodist church of my youth always had a midnight Christmas mass.

[LottieDah]

I have never heard such a thing. I have been a practicing Roman Catholic all my life and I never heard that. It is sad. I was taught those free from sin are welcomed into Heaven.

[Godwin1]

On the grave moral and social issues that America faces today—the “normalization” of homosexual behavior and the unjust mass killing of the innocent unborn—Bachman and the Catholic Church are on the same page. This is far more important than the fact that someone in Bachman’s church may or may not have called the Pope names. This is just the latest effort to destroy Bachman, who liberals clearly fear.

[HiTech RedNeck]

This has to be a debate larger than a single Western priest who wasn’t even a pope.

Catholics who are of the bent “well, if you get saved by Christ it means you get incorporated into our church whether or not you know it at the time” — I can respect that, with the counter statement that it’s Catholic Christians who will find themselves together with us part of a larger congregation that however much presence it had in Rome, never had a central anchor in Rome — because its central anchor was outside this world.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

I don't think so: " Extraordinary Magisterium ---EX CATHEDRA “There is but one universal Church of the faithful, outside which no one at all is saved.” (Pope Innocent III, Fourth Lateran Council, 1215.) “With Faith urging us we are forced to believe and to hold the one, holy, Catholic Church and that, apostolic, and we firmly believe and simply confess this Church outside of which there is no salvation nor remission of sin… Furthermore, we declare, say, define, and proclaim to every human creature that they by absolute necessity for salvation are entirely subject to the Roman Pontiff.” (Pope Boniface VIII, Unam Sanctam, Nov. 18, 1302) “The most Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes and preaches that none of those existing outside the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, can have a share in life eternal; but that they will go into the eternal fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, unless before death they are joined with Her; and that so important is the unity of this ecclesiastical body that only those remaining within this unity can profit by the sacraments of the Church unto salvation, and they alone can receive an eternal recompense for their fasts, their almsgivings, their other works of Christian piety and the duties of a Christian soldier. No one, let his almsgiving be as great as it may, no one, even if he pour out his blood for the Name of Christ, can be saved, unless he remain within the bosom and the unity of the Catholic Church.” (Council of Florence--Pope Eugene IV, the Bull Cantate Domino, 1441.)"

We are united in what we want in our government. Almost everyone here agrees we are all pro-life and anti-big government. The rest is up to the individual and God. __________________

[italianquaker]

More than the writer of that article

[the invisib1e hand]

they're just powerless poses.

powerless poseurs, that is.

And as regards Michelle Bachmann, she is a sideshow.

[pburgh01]

Ughh, see that pic, disgusting. Could you see Peter, Paul, John or any of the Apostles kissing any cultic scroll from the Temple of Mars or Jupiter in ancient Rome.

[The Iceman Cometh]

As a long time WELS member, being categorized as "anti-catholic" is a bit of a stretch. WELS believes that they are not the only 'saving' church shedding the belief that if you don't belong to THIS church, you are doomed.

That being said, the belief of Peter being the anti-christ was a belief of Martin Luther if I recall correctly.

Accordingly, there are supposedly 3 clues in the bible as to the anti-christ and supposedly, the pope is the only thing that fulfills the three clues.

Anyways, in a WELS church, scant time is spent worrying about other churches as it should be.

[SharpRightTurn]

“Michele Bachmann Should Not ‘Get a Pass’ on Past Membership in Anti-Catholic Church”

If your church disagrees with my church, then my take on that may be that your church is exhibiting anti-my church bias.

If this is all that any anti-Bachmann agitators have to complain about, then they are grasping at straws.

[Houghton M.]

Yeah, trot out the proof text from Unam Sanctam. It’s talking about those who knowingly continue in schism. Most Protestants today do not knowingly choose against the Catholic Church.

Even you don’t knowingly—until now—choose against the Catholic Church. You were fed the lie that Unam Sanctam says all non-Catholics go to hell.

Now I’ve pointed out what it actually means. You can, of course, decide that I don’t know what I’m talking about and go your merry way. That would be irresponsible but common.

Or you can actually investigate the Church’s teaching in its context. Unam Sanctam has a context. At the time of the Protestant schism, those who knowingly abandonbed their Catholic faith were condemned by the Church (though only God knows their heart at their deathbed). After centuries passed and few, if any, Protestants were knowingly choosing against Catholicism (all they knew was Protestantism, they were fed falsehoods about it, they could not make a knowing choice), the Church explicitly addressed this in doctrinal statements in the 1800s and following. Vatican II repeated this—one has to knowingly choose against what one knows to be the true Church.

But you might want to think twice about getting into arguments over this. The more you get into it, the more resopnsibility you incur to find out the real story.

And I’m telling you you that you’ve been sold a bill of goods on this. You can trot out your prooftexts all you want, but who’s right about the interpretation of them? How are you going to know who’s right?

Look at Dominus Iesus, the most recent statement on this issue, if you truly seek to know what the Catholic Church teaches.

[Conservativegreatgrandma]

Extraordinary Magisterium ---EX CATHEDRA

“There is but one universal Church of the faithful, outside which no one at all is saved.” (Pope Innocent III, Fourth Lateran Council, 1215.)

“With Faith urging us we are forced to believe and to hold the one, holy, Catholic Church and that, apostolic, and we firmly believe and simply confess this Church outside of which there is no salvation nor remission of sin… Furthermore, we declare, say, define, and proclaim to every human creature that they by absolute necessity for salvation are entirely subject to the Roman Pontiff.” (Pope Boniface VIII, Unam Sanctam, Nov. 18, 1302) “The most Holy Roman Church firmly believes, professes and preaches that none of those existing outside the Catholic Church, not only pagans, but also Jews and heretics and schismatics, can have a share in life eternal; but that they will go into the eternal fire which was prepared for the devil and his angels, unless before death they are joined with Her; and that so important is the unity of this ecclesiastical body that only those remaining within this unity can profit by the sacraments of the Church unto salvation, and they alone can receive an eternal recompense for their fasts, their almsgivings, their other works of Christian piety and the duties of a Christian soldier. No one, let his almsgiving be as great as it may, no one, even if he pour out his blood for the Name of Christ, can be saved, unless he remain within the bosom and the unity of the Catholic Church.” (Council of Florence--Pope Eugene IV, the Bull Cantate Domino, 1441.)

There is no ambiguity here. Let's call the whole thing off and get to defeating Obama. __________________

[MortMan]

She went to Rev. Wright’s services, too?