Posted on 12/14/2011 10:41:59 AM PST by Alex Murphy
Amid the hubbub surrounding the Gingrich surge, this is one question that has perplexed commentators of all religious and political persuasions. There’s no consensus about where to find the Catholic in Newt.
At this point, the question is not where it is exactly, but where to begin looking.
So, let’s review speculation about the Catholicity of Newt Gingrich. I’ll also advance my own hypothesis and give it a professorial flourish by using a suitably big word.
Hypothesis number one: The new Catholic Newt is simply being American.
Playfully characterizing Gingrich as a “religious flip-flopper” draws attention to how Gingrich, like many other Americans, has seemingly changed his religion to suit prevailing fashion. Perhaps there’s also an ironic part to this interpretation in that Gingrich has supposedly made use of the religious market place to embrace a religion that would take umbrage if treated as a “commodity.”
It might be reasonable enough to see Gingrich’s Catholicity as a kind of epiphenomenon reflecting American cultural propensities--after all, Newt is indeed American. But conversion as “flip-flop” seems to preclude understanding conversion as a turn toward something; it’s not just a lurching back and forth from one view to another. It also makes the Catholic in Newt hard to locate.
Hypothesis number two: Professor Newton Leroy Gingrich has recognized Catholicism’s intellectual appeal.
Reading oneself into Catholicism has a long and venerable history. For some generations, it was Karl Adam’s The Spirit of Catholicism or Ronald Knox’s The Belief of Catholics that opened up a new intellectual vista. For later generations, it was Thomas Merton’s The Seven Storey Mountain or Malcolm Muggeridge’s Something Beautiful for God that made Catholic spirituality accessible and real.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
Whatever. I think anyone who reads this can make up their own mind about what is meant.
True, no doubt. Some people WILL see what they want to see. That can’t be helped.
But I’m not going to let a misrepresentation of anyone’s position stand unchallenged.
Look at their accomplishments. Newt allied himself with Ronald Reagan to build the Reagan Coalition, the Religious Right, and the Republican majority (together the Reagan Revolution) which directly led the downfall of the Soviet Union, the Contract with America, government reforms, less government, tax cuts, a balanced budget, and the great, long-standing Reagan economy.
Romney, on the other hand, vehemently denied Ronald Reagan and aligned himself with Ted Kennedy and the left. Romney accomplished installing liberal big government programs, defended and promoted Roe v Wade and legalized abortion as settled law, advocated and implemented RomneyCare with its liberty killing government mandates against formerly free citizens and its taxpayer funded or subsidized and mandated abortion procedures. He ran and governed to the left of Ted Kennedy on the gay agenda resulting in gay marriage in Massachusetts. He appointed liberal judges and liberal appointees throughout his government. Under his leadership conservatism and the Republican party was all but destroyed in Massachusetts.
Romney is one evil liberal progressive. No way in hell will MittBots be allowed to support this abortionist, big government, socialist scumbag on FR!
Guess my message isnt clear enough. I have to keep repeating it and zotting would be MittBots.
79 posted on Sat Dec 03 2011 19:59:37 GMT-0800 (Pacific Standard Time) by Jim Robinson
Please show me what caused you to believe the Orthodox Presbyterian Church is moving toward rejecting the Trinity. I can't imagine where you got that from.
You'd be hard pressed to prove that the OPC teaches presumptive regeneration, either. While there are a few Calvinists who teach that, it certainly isn't the mainstream Reformed position or one that is mandated by the Westminster Confession.
If you want to know what the OPC believes, go to the confessions of the church and the decisions of the General Assembly.
A Roman Catholic can very correctly require me to do the same with regard to Catholicism, since some Roman Catholics say all sorts of things for which you would not want to be held accountable.
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