And thank you; I enjoy explaining the basics of Catholic theology to non-Catholic Christians.
I can only use the inspired writings of God. As a Catholic, you stated some of your truths are inspired, some are uninspired and some are based on tradition
More precisely, the inspired truth taught by the Church are more than the canonical Scripture alone. Nowhere in the argument with you on this thread have I used anything but the Holy Canonical Scripture, for that reason: that you, being Protestant (that what you seem to be however you describe your beliefs), would not be convinced by anything else and my job as a Catholic is to evangelize you.
One of the greatest victories the god of this world has accomplished is by dividing the disciples of Christ into two groups, for the most part, Catholic/Orthodox and Protestants. Even worse, we allow ourselves to be diescribed as such. I am a Christian, a disciple of Christ.
You use inspired verse with a Catholic commentary that may or may not be inspired as I will show later.
In your posts you keep returning to John 20:19-23 and declare those 5 lines of scripture are so special that a priesthood was developed. You also state instances where these Priest’s carry out special functions.
Correct; I state these scriptures sufficient to conclude that a special group of believers had what can be described as priestly functions in the Early Church and could propagate as a group down in history to this day. The Scripture would not be sufficient to know every detail, -- we know virtually nothing of the ritualistic component of these functions, for example, but I did not attempt to argue those. I showed where the scripture gives specifically Catholic understandings of the Sacrament of Confession as absolution or retention of sins against God, and of the holy Eucharist as a real presence of Christ and His redemptive Sacrifice among the celebrants. Earlier I also showed where the scripture describes a process of purification that precedes entry into Heaven of a believer who ends up saved.
Scripture calls those individuals, bishops, pastors or overseers.
The New Testament uses the term "p?esß?te???" to refer to that newly emerges cast of believers (e.g. 1 Timothy 4:14), and it also continues with the old term, "?e?e??" to apply to both Old Testament priesthood, Christian priesthood and Christ Himself, the pattern of all Catholic priests, as the Letter to the Hebrews explains. In the English language there are no separate words for Christian Priest and other priests, so Douay, a Catholic translation, uses "priest" for both, whereas Protestant translations prefer "elder" for the Christian priests. My argument is not, however, about words but about the priestly functions seen in the New Testament, however we translate the Greek terminology of the time into English.
I went to Douy John 20: 23 and look what I found;
[23] Whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven them; and whose sins you shall retain, they are retained.
The commentary
Bishop is "overseer", -- that is what the word "ep?s??p??" means. Again, Protestant translations avoid Catholic terms and insert something else to suit their bias. A bishop is the kind of priest who also has administrative function and can ordain priests. We see such usage in Acts 20:28; they "rule the Church of God".
Go back to verse 17. You will see the commentary directed to the elders of the church. If you read the whole verse 28 you see it is the Holy Spirit who gave them charge over their flock.
There is no inspired scriptural bases for a Christian earthly church as practiced by your religion
I should proof read better. That should have read; "earthly priesthood"
I showed you the basis. If you don't agree, feel free to offer your arguments some more, but please do not tell me that the reason you don't feel like arguing is because I used something other than the Holy Scripture and the historical reality that we can glean from it.
I forgot to comment on your very valid remark, that the Old Testament spells out the priestly duties in great detail, whereas the New Testament devotes scant passages to the priestly function and does not give any such detail.
It doesn't go into detail because no earthly priesthood exists. The only NT Priest is in heaven, Christ Jesus. As I said before, read Hebrews. It is the main theme of the epistle.
I would say, that is because in general the Old Testament is written like an instruction book to the Hebrew nation, complete with the measurements of the Ark of the Covenant and 613 commandments for every occasion. The New Testament reflects the Christian theology of grace rather than the Old Hebrew theology of law. To describe the rules of the Church with any precision would be to stifle the creative spirit that indwells in the Catholic Church under the guidance of the Holy Ghost. Times change and the Church changes with them. Here is one important development: confessions in the Early Church were public and gradually the concept of privacy of the confessional was introduced, in order to encourage confessing sins that might expose unconfessed sins of others. Priestly celibacy could not be introduced in the Early Church for practical reasons, that was another innovation of early Middle Age.
I could be sarcastic and ask if you believe in a living breathing Constitution as well. God is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. He has to be. It is the only way we can trust what He says.
God told us to confess our sins to one anther openly for our benifit and the benifit of others. Doing it in private benifits no one. A preist didn't forgive sins at first either. That came with the privete confessional.
Let's see what God said He wants for Bishops.
3 This is a faithful saying: If a man desires the position of a bishop,[a] he desires a good work. 2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, temperate, sober-minded, of good behavior, hospitable, able to teach; 3 not given to wine, not violent, not greedy for money,[b] but gentle, not quarrelsome, not covetous; 4 one who rules his own house well, having his children in submission with all reverence 5 (for if a man does not know how to rule his own house, how will he take care of the church of God?); 6 not a novice, lest being puffed up with pride he fall into the same condemnation as the devil. 7 Moreover he must have a good testimony among those who are outside, lest he fall into reproach and the snare of the devil.
This looks to me like someone I would want to represent me. I wonder how practical God thinks your Church's inovation is.
I know Paul was single. That proves God can use a single person but He has shown what is His ideal. Your religon has chosen to use the eception as your rule. All single.
May God the Father lead us all to His truths, BVB
I am Catholic and I explain the Holy Scripture. If my explanation is wrong show me. So far you haven't.
and look what I found
You found Bishop Challoner's commentary. So what? I did not argue from other people's comments, but from the Holy Scripture in front of you. He explains what I explain, -- is that the point here? Both Bishop Challoner and I are Catholics.
Go back to verse 17. You will see the commentary directed to the elders of the church. If you read the whole verse 28 you see it is the Holy Spirit who gave them charge over their flock.
Verse 17" ...μετεκαλεσατο τους πρεσβυτερους της εκκλησιας (...he called the ancients of the church). Observe, the operative word is again presbyter which is priest. It can of course be also translated as ancient or elder. Why did Douay chose "ancients" we'll see in a moment. It is to them that St. Paul's farewell speech is addressed, and he says. among other things, "το πνευμα το αγιον εθετο επισκοπους ποιμαινειν την εκκλησιαν του κυριου και θεου", literally, "The Holy Ghost placed you bishops to rule the church of God the Lord". So "presbyters" are later called "bishops". That should not surprise us. The dioceses were small in ancient times: most priests were also bishops of the diocese, which all consistent of a single church; we see the mixing of these two terms all the time in the New Testament. It is also possible that St. Paul was addressing a mixed by status group, and he directed the reminder of the leadership role special to bishops in that verse. Possibly for that later reason the translator of Douay chose more neutral "ancients" to describe the group. The issue is not the translation but the original, and the original presents no quandary whatsoever: there is a group of priests and some of these priests are bishops and it is specifically to the bishops that the "ruling" part of the speech is specifically addressed.
It is, of course, God who makes our bishops rulers of the Holy Church. I hope I never appeared to argue otherwise.
no earthly priesthood exists. The only NT Priest is in heaven, Christ Jesus. As I said before, read Hebrews. It is the main theme of the epistle.
In Hebrews the distinction is drawn between the ministry of Levitical priests of the Old Testament and the priesthood in Christianity. St. Paul explains that the priesthood of Christ is not levitical but rather in the order of Melchisedek. It is true that theologically speaking there are no separate Catholic or Orthodox priests, they are all, in their sacred duty, One Christ, "high priest of our confession, Jesus" as they serve in His person. However, it is the same man, St. Paul, who also wrote three epistles about selection of bishops and priests and in fact commanded Titus: "ordain priests in every city, as I also appointed thee" (Titus 1:5 -- καταστησης κατα πολιν πρεσβυτερους ως εγω σοι διεταξαμην), so clearly in St. Pauls mind there were earthly priests of the kind that Bishop Titus should ordain, as well as Christ the High Priest, giving them His pattern.
I could be sarcastic and ask if you believe in a living breathing Constitution as well.
I believe in what the Constitution prescribed: a certain branches of government that must make laws of the United States and allows for changing a law, and I believe in what the Holy Scripture prescribes: a certain method of government of the community of Christian faith, the Holy Church, ruled by the Pope and our Bishops, which allows for internal reform as necessary.
told us to confess our sins to one anther openly for our benifit and the benifit of others. Doing it in private benifits no one. A preist didn't forgive sins at first either. That came with the privete confessional.
Where did the Scripture say "openly"? I am familiar with James 5:16, where you could conclude that confession of sins to those we had grieved is encouraged, but that does not say openly. Confessing a sin to a priest privately has the obvious benefit of salvation as the priest can forgive the sin before God (John 20:23 again). There is no difference, by the way, for the absolution whether it is done privately or publicly, and in fact a priest may give public and general absolution on certain occasions; the reason the confession must, per rule of the Church be private is so that the material of the confession incurs no earthly consequence, but solely a spiritual consequence. A vivid example would be a confession of adultery: by definition another person is involved in that sin, and so confessing it would disclose the other sinner before he or she is also disposed to confess.
This looks to me like someone I would want to represent me.
And that is who the Church strives to consecrate as bishops, except today, celibate men can be found with ease.
That proves God can use a single person but He has shown what is His ideal.
1 Timothy 3:2 does not say the married status is the ideal, but that it is preferred to men who had several wives. St. Paul, however, does explain that celibacy is the ideal in 1 Cor. 7:7, 32-34).