Posted on 12/10/2011 2:11:27 PM PST by NYer
Yes, Mary was the mother of Jesus, the Son of God. We don’t believe she was sinless or divine though.
Some of this gets into stuff that sort of boggles the human mind. I know there is the question of how Jesus could have escaped original sin while having a fully human, sinful mother. I know there are arguments/discussions about that and it’s still sort of a mystery to me. If original sin is passed along strictly in the DNA it would be baffling.
The way I think of it is that original sin is basically separation from God - the corruption that is within us because we are alienated from God, don’t have the fellowship with God that mankind originally had in Eden. But the human nature of Jesus was intimately connected with God the Father as could be, because the human and divine natures were together in one divine human being.
My daughter is feeling better now and she’s watching my husband’s screensaver of photos, chattering away. So my mind has done about all the thinking it’s gonna get done tonight, I think. lol
Some of the divisions between denoninations are because we’re humans of finite capacity trying to understand infinity and other mysteries. I’m glad we don’t have to understand all the mysteries before we can grasp the simple truths that save us: that Jesus has paid the punishment for our sins and because our debt is paid there is nothing left to keep us out of Heaven. There we will fully know, even as we are fully known. It’s gonna be great!
There’s sin in every “herd”. The associate pastor at our church had to resign after it was found that he had had multiple affairs. My sister-in-law’s husband (now ex-husband)resigned from a large LCMS congregation after she caught him using porn (and other things).
Sadly, it’s all over the place. And not one of us is able to throw the first stone either, because we’ve all fallen in so many ways.
Almost like we need a Savior, huh?
Good thing we’ve got One. =)
It’s an uneasy balance between scholasticism and emotion. Either one without the other, or without the proper balance, makes trouble. Pietism erred by rejecting scholasticism, as you say. And that’s where a LOT of denominations are right now, as well as the whole culture. The emotionalism has probably been a huge contributing factor to moral relativism, which has led to post-Christianity and now post-modernism.
Most people don’t care mush (oops. a typo too good to correct. lol) at all WHAT they believe - only that they believe it sincerely.
We can agree to disagree on Luther if you like. Are there hermeneutical principles you accept rather than those he espoused?
Yes, Mary was the mother of Jesus, the Son of God. We don’t believe she was sinless or divine though.
>>Catholics don’t believe in her divinity either.
But Luther did believe she was sinlesss like the father as well as in her Immaculate Conception.
All seed except Mary was vitiated [by original sin].”[18] When concentrating specifically on Mary herself as the Mother of God, Luther acknowledges God’s singular action in bringing her into the world, but in making general comments about the universality of human sinfulness, he includes her among all the rest of humanity.
“Mother Mary, like us, was born in sin of sinful parents, but the Holy Spirit covered her, sanctified and purified her so that this child was born of flesh and blood, but not with sinful flesh and blood. The Holy Spirit permitted the Virgin Mary to remain a true, natural human being of flesh and blood, just as we. However, he warded off sin from her flesh and blood so that she became the mother of a pure child, not poisoned by sin as we are. For in that moment when she conceived, she was a holy mother filled with the Holy Spirit and her fruit is a holy pure fruit, at once God and truly man, in one person.”[19]
17] Martin Luther, D. Martin Luthers Werke, Kritische Gesamtausgabe, 61 vols., (Weimar: Verlag Hermann Böhlaus Nochfolger, 1883-1983), 52:39 [hereinafter: WA]
[18] WA, 39, II:107.
[19] Sermons of Martin Luther, 291
The way I think of it is that original sin is basically separation from God - the corruption that is within us because we are alienated from God, don’t have the fellowship with God that mankind originally had in Eden. But the human nature of Jesus was intimately connected with God the Father as could be, because the human and divine natures were together in one divine human being.
>>That’s an orthodox Catholic way of looking at the issue. I think that Catholics at least of the Eastern persuasion would say she was filled with grace from the first moment of her existence.
But even if she was sinless, she wasn’t like Eve before the fall because she was mortal and died, and suffered just like everyone else.
I’m glad we don’t have to understand all the mysteries before we can grasp the simple truths that save us: that Jesus has paid the punishment for our sins and because our debt is paid there is nothing left to keep us out of Heaven.
>>Luther’s mistake was confusing justification with sanctification. Jesus repaired what Adam did in the garden when he paid the price on the cross.
The Eastern Church likes to say that in the beginning we were created in the image and likeness of God, but we lost that through Adam’s sin. By Jesus’s death on the Cross, he reopens Eden to us and makes it possible for us to receive his grace.
We have to co-operate with it though for it to be efficacious in our lives. If we are hard-hearted and resist it, then it won’t have any merit in our lives sort of like if we put up a shade to keep the sunlight out.
You can’t have works without faith, nor faith without works. God isn’t a puppet master like the Calvinists think, he gave us free-will to choose whether to listen to the proddings of grace or not.
The only thing that will keep us out of heaven is our own obstinacy.
It’s an uneasy balance between scholasticism and emotion. Either one without the other, or without the proper balance, makes trouble. Pietism erred by rejecting scholasticism, as you say.
>>I think not. Just look at the Eastern Churches. Their theology is non-scholastic and does not distinguish between theology and mysticism.
Luther’s disdain for scholasticism stayed with me post-conversion to Catholicism and influenced by decision to join an Eastern Catholic parish. We are Catholic, but we are closer to Eastern Orthodoxy in our theology, thinking, and spirituality.
No legalism, no indulgences, etc.
Of all of the Christian churches, they have held together about the best theologically amid the morass of modernism and postmodernism.
Are there hermeneutical principles you accept rather than those he espoused?
>>I was turned off by Luther’s lack of personal sanctity that I saw evident in his writings. He impressed me as vain and prideful unlike earlier Catholic reformers like St. Catherine of Sienna who challenged the Pope during the Great Western Schism.
When I was at Valparaiso University, the theology professor read a rather vulgar letter that Luther wrote to Melancthon, and it sickened me. This along with his his sanctioning of the Elector of Saxony’s bigamy made me question whether he was sent by God.
You gave this quote from Luther: “Mother Mary, like us, was born in sin of sinful parents, but the Holy Spirit covered her, sanctified and purified her so that this child was born of flesh and blood, but not with sinful flesh and blood.”
When it says “so that THIS CHILD”, is “this child” referring to Mary, or to Jesus?
I’m not sure what you mean about Luther confusing justification with sanctification.
Here’s what I would say about justification and sanctification (in a nutshell) - so you can see whether we’re agreeing or disagreeing. lol.
Jesus’ death paid the price for sin so that we can be reconciled to God, but if we disbelieve or reject that reconciliation we will remain apart from God. (Sort of like if we put up a shade to keep out the light.) So faith is necessary in order for Jesus’ sacrifice to make a difference for us.
Because of our original sin we can’t believe in God on our own. That’s why we need the Holy Spirit to empower us - who gives us faith through the means of grace (Word and Sacrament). We have the ability to reject that gift of faith, and as you say, it is only that obstinacy that would keep us from receiving the gift of faith and being saved. But unless we resist that gift, we will receive it much like a little child receives a gift.
The fruit of the Spirit comes along with the faith that we’re given. The haughtiness and self-defensiveness gives way to humility, the selfishness to love, the fear to faith and love, the sorrow to joy, etc. The rest of our life will be spent with the old, sinful nature battling with the newly-created sanctified nature in us, with the Holy Spirit continuously working to sanctify us through repentance and forgiveness.
That sounds a lot like what you said, as far as I can tell, but I might have misunderstood what you said so I’m interested to hear what you think.
Are you Eastern Orthodox, then?
I’ve got a big tub of compost in my kitchen thawing out so I can plant some bulbs that I didn’t get to before the ground froze. My husband has the world’s worst olfactory senses and even he is saying that it stinks. lol. We’ve been trying for the last 2 months to get the heater in our house fixed and it’s still not fixed so it’s cold in the house but if the compost is stinking it’s probably sufficiently thawed out so I can plant the bulbs and then drag the tub back outside.
I’m sure there’s some kind of illustration hidden in that, too, but I’m too tired to figure it out right now. lol. For the sake of my household I’d better go take care of this now. Back later.
Marriage is not a right - it is a privilege. Saying “marriage is a right” is like saying “having a job is a right” - no. You certainly have the right to *pursue* and attain 1, but you are not guaranteed. Both are contracts (unless you make your own work) and require multiple consenting parties. It’s not just an “individual” right, per se. Several people much agree to it.
Marriage is not a right - it is a privilege. Saying “marriage is a right” is like saying “having a job is a right” - no. You certainly have the right to *pursue* and attain 1, but you are not guaranteed. Both are contracts (unless you make your own work) and require multiple consenting parties. It’s not just an “individual” right, per se. Several people must agree to it.
Surely these deviants and their apologists must be enraged at the unfair and discriminatory treatment of cousins who want to marry.
Chilstrom has proven, over and over, that neither critical thinking, nor biblical discernment are skills in his possession.
I think I must be confused about what you mean by “scholasticism”. When I talk about scholasticism, I mean scholarly exegesis, systematic theology, etc. The mental part of faith. I’ve done enough word studies and exegetical studies in my day to know there is value in that, but I doubt that Luther would be disdainful of that - nor, come to think of it, you, based on what I’ve heard you say so far - so I think we must mean different things when we use the term.
My husband and I are both very cognitive about our faith, although I tend to also wear my heart on my sleeve, as anybody who knows me would agree. I cry easily when I speak or sing about the Lord because He means so much to me. But we had somebody at our church anonymously mail us a tract about the 12 inches, between the head and the heart, that determine whether we go to Heaven or Hell. They were saying that all we have is head knowledge rather than heart knowledge and are thus not even saved. We’ve been through the death of our stillborn daughter and a host of other things including several times that I was suicidal; if I didn’t have the Lord with me I would literally be dead. I would be nothing without Him. He is everything to me. Everything I live and die for.
But because I usually speak fairly rationally about my faith I was assumed to have only “head knowledge”.
That’s what I was talking about with the “scholasticism” versus emotion. Scholasticism represents the solidness of WHAT we believe, and emotion represents the fact that we DO believe it with all our heart. Both are necessary.
If “scholasticism” means putting yourself above Scripture, then the only place for that would be in examining the genuineness and reliability of Scripture to see whether you believe it to be trustworthy. If you claim to trust it, then there’s no place for being a critic of Scripture.
There’s some of Luther’s stuff that I’ve had a hard time stomaching as well. He talked about the sinner-saint dichotomy and I think it was alive and well in his life. But Jesus Himself got pretty dicey at times too. “Whitewashed tombs” is not exactly mild language. And Jesus didn’t castigate the religious leaders of His day for allowing divorce for any reason - although He very clearly did not agree with it. Not trying to compare Luther with Jesus because Jesus is the Son of God and Luther isn’t, but I think that sometimes the form of a person’s love or passion depends on the situation.
Lately I’ve been dealing with a lot of political and corruption issues. Unbelievable levels of corruption. I’m usually a very mild-mannered, soft-spoken person who tries hard to be patient. But some of what I’ve been dealing with requires something much firmer. Sometimes I get impatient and that’s just sin, but sometimes I’ve been very, very pointed because I honestly believed that it was what the other person needed.
I believe Jesus also was very, very pointed with people when He knew it was what they needed. Rather than choosing to appear “nice”, He chose to serve the needs of others, even if it was an uncomfortable role to play and would get him criticized by people who were “holier” than He (cough). Jesus had to be the most humble man on earth, and yet somebody watching Him throw out the money-changers would have called Him a hot-headed lunatic.
And I think that has to be factored in when we look at the morality or sanctification of a person. I’ve spoken with atheists who reject Christianity altogether because they say they could never believe in a God who uses some of the harsh language of the Old Testament. They see no place for righteous anger at all. And at the same time they say they couldn’t believe in the God of the Bible because (they say)He is not just. So their code of “morality” for a God is that He has to be just but can’t be harsh. IOW, they can only believe in a God if the world is perfect so that justice never requires harshness. They couldn’t live up to that standard either but they excused that by saying they’re not God so they don’t have to live up to the standards of being a holy, good, and just God. IOW, they were very happy to be the couch potatoes criticizing the ones in the race, even though they couldn’t even come up with a conceptual idea of how someone COULD meet their requirements.
So I guess what I’m saying is that even though I may be uncomfortable with the attitude presented by Luther or even other teachers/pastors, I don’t know whether it is sin, or whether there are other factors that call for that behavior. Sometimes extreme conditions call for an extreme response.
Ultimately the obedience God wants is for us to believe in the One He has sent. I don’t believe what Luther says because Luther said it but because as far as I can tell, it seems to be true to Scripture. Somebody had asked how many Lutherans study the Lutheran confessions; you had said your family doesn’t. My kids haven’t studied them either, although both my husband and I have because of our professional training. (And I confess that I’ve forgotten a lot of it!) Mostly what we study is Scripture, because that is what we know we can trust. The better we know Scripture, the less likely we are to take any one passage out of context, use our own definitions, etc.
Sorry this is so long.
As I have said before, they left us. We did not leave the Word. I hate having to explain to everyone now that I am Lutheran, but....... you know the rest.
“Lutheranism is dead, or at least soon will be and it wants to take the Catholic Church with it.”
Broad brush, retarded, rotton fruit producing statement.
This article just plain pisses me off!
No, the problem comes in when people open the Bible and start reading it, and then someone has to step in and decide what it means when they disagree about what they read.
Consider such a simple question as the baptism of infants. If it were just a matter of "not having an authority higher than the Bible" there would be no disagreement, because both conservative Lutherans and fundamental Baptists agree that there is no such authority.
Luther’s premise was that Scripture itself has authority above any mortal man.
He's right insofar as the Scriptures are God's own word, and no Christian -- including the Pope, BTW -- has the right to teach against them. But he's wrong to conclude that the correct understanding of Scripture is somehow automatically accessible to believers apart from the church founded by Christ. (cf 2 Tim 2:2) He even departed from that understanding himself later in life. When Zwingli denied the Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist, Luther wrote:
Who, but the devil, has granted such license of wresting the words of the holy Scripture? Who ever read in the Scriptures, that my body is the same as the sign of my body? or, that is is the same as it signifies? What language in the world ever spoke so? It is only then the devil, that imposes upon us by these fanatical men. Not one of the Fathers of the Church, though so numerous, ever spoke as the Sacramentarians: not one of them ever said, It is only bread and wine; or, the body and blood of Christ is not there present.
No offense, but I beg to differ. When I read everything Luther wrote, including collections of his letters, I left the Lutheran Church after thirty plus years and am now Catholic. If you had said 'Melanchton' rather than Luther, I think I could see your point, but it was Melanchton, not Luther, who actually laid the foundation of what remained named for Luther. Even Melanchton, though, in the end relies on the same self-assurance which is in reality, just a personal assertion, to decide what Scriptures mean. Please, don't misunderstand me, I can completely understand someone who is strongly Lutheran and how they look at the ELCA as the problem rather than the fundamentals that were so long the basic tenants of the Lutheran faith, I just think the problem goes a lot deeper than that.
Regards & God Bless
There are doctrinal differences that are because the texts are unclear or the Bible is silent on specifics, or because they involve mysteries that are incomprehensible to us. I don’t consider those to be problems, but just a fact of life. The same holds true for judges who interpret laws differently, etc.
The issue of infant baptism involves whether infants can believe, and it is human logic which calls that into question - not Scripture, which says that the baby in Elizabeth’s womb leaped for joy when Mary and the fetal Jesus came near. It also says that unless one receives the Kingdom like a “little child” - brephos, IIRC, which is the term for fetus - they shall never enter it. It also refers to a time when a child is old enough to “choose the good”. Because some believe that faith is a human choice, they equate the age that a child can “choose the good” with the age that the child can have faith. So the issue really involves how cerebral “faith” is, and how much it depends on the person rather than God. What clouds the issue is human logic which doubts that infants can believe.
And tied in with that is the pietistic distrust of rituals of any kind, which is really amazing when you look at the culture that God set up in the Old Testament - which is full of rituals that logic would say would be ineffective. The Urim and Thummin, for instance. Rolling the dice, and yet YHWH said that is how He would give answers to His people. If the rituals are taken too far, which Luther said the Roman Church did, a person could hate God but as long as he did the right rituals he’d make it to Heaven. The pietists responded by saying that rituals are only ever symbolic and that God never really does anything effective through rituals. Sort of like Naaman thought that washing in the Jordan seven times was stupid. But God told him to do it because He had planned to be effective through that “ritual”. So part of what is going on is also the human logical and/or emotional response to an over-extension of a Biblical truth.
Logic and emotion are not the same thing as Scripture, but they factor into how people sometimes interpret Scripture. That’s a fact of life, but if people recognize the fallibility of human logic and emotion it will help them to trust only the Word and not necessarily what their emotions want the Word to say. The question can never be what we want it to say. This ELCA pastor really wants the Bible to say that whatever a person desires is great. It doesn’t say that. The person’s emotional desire trumped his faithfulness to see what’s actually in Scripture. We all need to guard against that, regardless of what denomination we’re in or what our particular emotional temptation is.
What IS a problem is when it is clear what the Bible is saying, but so-called “theologians” throw it away because they judge that part to not be the Word of God - which is the wholesale cut-and-paste, do-it-yourself God-making that the ELCA is doing that enables them to come up with stuff like this in spite of so many passages in Scripture that speak against homosexual behavior.
I’m not saying that there shouldn’t be tradition or a long-held stance on Biblical issues, or that there shouldn’t be experts who have studied the issues in-depth. Of course we need those, and only a fool would ignore the help that we have for understanding what the Bible actually says. I’m just saying that the experts can get it wrong - especially when they consider it their job to decide what the texts SHOULD HAVE said, or to manipulate the doctrines so they can get more money to build their cathedrals.
It’s very much like the judicial system today. There are some murky issues from the Constitution; those are rightly decided by the judiciary. But that doesn’t mean that everything the judiciary decides even makes sense, much less is actually true to the Constitution. Think of Kelo and Roe v Wade. Those are activist decisions made by courts that stepped WAY beyond what the Constitution actually says. And when you look in-depth at Roe v Wade, for instance, you see that the claims about what the 14th Amendment intended to say CANNOT be true. The country abides by whatever SCOTUS decides, but that doesn’t mean that SCOTUS is infallible. They can be demonstrably wrong because they violate the clear intent of the Constitution as it was ratified.
You said that the Pope has no right to teach against the Scriptures. I agree, and anybody who holds that belief will test the words of the Pope (or any other “expert”) to see if they are faithful to Scripture. That’s all Luther wanted, and it’s all I’m trying to say in this regard.
The truths of the Bible aren’t AUTOMATICALLY accessible to individuals just by reading the Bible, nor are they AUTOMATICALLY accessible simply by following traditions and experts. That’s why Scripture itself says that we are to diligently search the Word, to hold fast to the faith taught by the apostles, and to test the spirits.
No LCMS Lutherans were harmed in the posting of this thread.
Just to make sure we’re talking about the same thing, the hermeneutical principles I’m talking about are things like letting Scripture interpret Scripture, concentrating on clear texts rather than obscure texts, always considering the full context, studying the context and usage of the particular Greek and Hebrew words used, etc
Are you saying that those principles would not have kept the ELCA from ignoring all the passages of Scripture that condemn homosexual behavior? The overlying reason for letting Scripture interpret Scripture is a recognition that human wisdom is fallible and we can’t insert our own teachings in the place of Scripture.
Which branch of the Lutheran Church did you leave, and what doctrines did you believe to be in error? (Don’t answer if you don’t want to.)
Indeed. But we live in an era where everything anyone wants is seen as a “right”. The Occupy Wall Street protesters are a perfect example of this as are the ELCA and other liberal protestants and all other homosexualist agenda enablers. They seem to forget the constitution guarantees us the right to pursue happiness, not the right to happiness itself. Once the government has forced marriage redefinition on all 50 states, I wonder who the homosexualists are going to blame then when they’re still unhappy.
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