Pope Francis greets the faithful at the May 8 General Audience (Credit: CNA / Stephen Driscoll)
Posted on 09/07/2013 3:49:35 PM PDT by NYer
.- In his daily homily on Saturday, Pope Francis reflected on the question of authentic Christianity and rejected the practice of focusing more on devotions than on Christ himself.
Jesus is “the center” of faith, said the Pope. “A commandment is valid if it comes from Jesus: I do this because the Lord wants me to do this. But if I am a Christian without Christ, I do this and I don’t know why I have to do it,” he said to the congregation at the Vatican’s Casa Santa Marta on September 7.
Like the Pharisees, he said, there are some people who “make so many commandments the center of their religiosity.”
Others who have a false sense of religiosity “only seek devotions” or “things that are a little uncommon, a little special, that go back to private revelations,” noted Pope Francis.
“If your devotions bring you to Christ, that works. But if you remain there, something’s wrong,” he explained.
“If Jesus is not at the center, there will be many other things,” so that people become “Christians without Christ.”
Remembering that Jesus is the center of faith “regenerates us, grounds us.”
Pope Francis further explained the mark of a true “Christian with Christ.”
“The rule is simple: only that which brings you to Jesus is valid, and only that is valid that comes from Jesus. Jesus is the center, the Lord, as He Himself says.”
Christians can avoid false religiosity by adoring Jesus as “the Lord, the only Lord.”
“If you aren’t able to adore Jesus, you’re missing something,” warned Pope Francis.
The sign of a true “Christian with Christ” is one who does “that which comes from Jesus” and that which leads to Jesus.
Such adoration bears true fruit in the life of a Christian, encouraged the Pope.
He said that Jesus also gives “the grace of loving Him so much, of following Him, of going along the path that He has shown us.”
A “Christian with Christ” has the courage to proclaim Jesus as Lord.
Pope Francis exhorted Catholics not to focus on false piety, but rather evangelize and “take the Gospel!”
Are you so jaded that you don't feel he deserves the same protection afforded other world leaders?
I mean Jesus is King of Kings. Good thing He didn't feel he deserved the same protection afforded other world leaders.
TV?
What’s that?
No weapon that is formed against thee shall prosper; and every tongue that shall rise against thee in judgment thou shalt condemn. This is the heritage of the servants of the Lord, and their righteousness is of me, saith the Lord. (Isaiah 54:17)
“No,.. without Christ there is no Christianity...anybody can start a ‘Church’..and do.”
No, anyone can establish a sect.
“The question is always do you practice Christianity or Churchianity? There is a gulf between the two.”
“Churchianity” is not a real thing so I couldn’t practice it even I wanted to. All “Churchianity” is really is a Protestant fantasy, a straw man really, to attack the Church with because they are not in it.
I mean Jesus is King of Kings. Good thing He didn’t feel he deserved the same protection afforded other world leaders.
True. As I Catholic, I agree to that.
"This really IS what Jesus established, that souls won to faith in Christ follow Him and live their lives to honor Him and draw others to saving faith as well as band together in local assemblies for common worship, prayer, teaching and taking care of each other like family members."
Yes to that as well. It is all true --- but that's not all there is to say.
The Church Christ established has always had a differentiation of roles, a structure, which you can see in its earliest form right in the Acts and the Epistles. This structure determines that some are in authority, some teachers are legitimate and some are not ("Are all apostles? Are all prophets? Are all teachers? Do all work miracles?" 1 Cor. 12:29) --- just as St. Paul did, either approving or disapproving of would-be Christian preachers and giving authoritative judgments on disputed Christian practices. Not every fellowship constitutes a Church, and not every "fellow" constitutes an authority.
Jesus says (Matthew 18:17-18) that disputes should be taken to "the Church" and that this Church has the power to "bind and loose."
Now imagine that a couple of young men in your congregation say they want to get married to each other. Your congregation, or your pastor, tells them that that cannot be done, it's a perversion.
So they find a local congregation that calls themselves "Conservative Gay Evangelicals," (Link). They teach that the OT prohibitions on non-kosher sex were part of the same "Holiness Code" that banned non-kosher food, and therefore not applicable to gentile Christians. Furthermore, the NT prohibitions (found in Paul) were focused on pagan temple boy-prostitution and pederasty, not on marriage per se, and this is --- they say --- clarified by Hebrews 13:4, "Marriage is honourable in all, and the bed undefiled: but whoremongers and adulterers God will judge."
Therefore, since they are not temple prostitutes or pederasts, nor whoremongers nor adulterers, but just respectable Christian men who desire honorable marriage, caring of each other and forming a family, then they are justified.
I've got a feeling you'd say --- but no, you tell me. They are acting in good faith. They have interpreted Scripture based on the understanding the Holy Spirit has given them of the sacred text, and not by the traditions of men --- so they say. Their local church backs them up.
What say?
They join Billy Bob’s flock and start to tithe to him.
Grown men and women paying a man not yet dry behind the ears to preach the gospel to them.
I have about the same opposition to the Catholic and Protestant Churches alike.
Mainly the Sunday Sabbath and tithes.
I was frustrated and spoke out. Particularly frustrated with the (sexually active) gay mafia who hold positions in the Church.
Reality: I am a Catholic. I belong to the Body founded by Peter at His direction. Just frustrated with the men in charge right now.
The word used there is “assembly” not church and each assembly of believers was an autonomous group. Despite what the RCC teaches there was no governing body over all of those “assemblies” we now refer to as churches.
>> I've got a feeling you'd say --- but no, you tell me. They are acting in good faith. They have interpreted Scripture based on the understanding the Holy Spirit has given them of the sacred text, and not by the traditions of men --- so they say. Their local church backs them up.<<
One only need read about the churches in Revelation to realize that some of them didn’t stay with what the apostles taught. They stand before God for their own actions.
Those have mostly been weeded out thanks to Pope John Paul II, Pope Benedict XVI — who sent emmissaires into the seminaries to clean them out and Pope Francis.
We just got a conservative Bishop replacing a fairly liberal one out here.
Keep the faith and pray for the Bishops as they are chosen.
You can call churches “sects” if you want, no doubt those who are members of their churches would certainly disagree with your term...but calling them sects doesn't make them that any more than calling them a church does....because.... Christ's Church is made up of ALL those who believe in Him and His ‘finished work’ on their behalf, regardless of where they worship Him....
As believers ‘WE ARE’ that building:
.......” But you ARE a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation,.. ‘a people belonging to God’,.. that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. ... Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God;... once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy”....
1 Peter 2:9-10
.....” Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but....” fellow citizens with God's people”.... and “members of God's household”, built on ‘the foundation of the apostles and prophets’, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone......”In HIM” the ‘whole building’ is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord..... And in him you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his Spirit.”.....
Ephesians 2:19-20
Churchianity certainly is a real thing....we have all seen many people sit in the pews week after week yet they have never been saved....they go because that is what they were raised to do but their hearts are far from Him...and this unrecognizable to them because they are going through the motions of Christianity but not of it. They can even use Christian terminology yet not have an understanding of what it means ‘to know Christ personally’.
They have their liberty in Christ to interpret Scripture as seems right to them and the Holy Spirit --- or so they say. They are not under the Law, they owe no man anything but to Love One Another --- or so they say. And no man has authority over them --- or so they say.
What say?
Some of them have. A lot in fact. But many have not and still hold positions of power. This is personal knowledge, not rumor.
And I will pray for them.
....”Catholicism is a very demanding religion....the lukewarm are winnowed out”.
What an awful thing to say about those who are seeking to know Christ...... Jesus welcomes all who would seek Him, and accepts all who care to know Him at whatever level of understanding they might have. HE is not a hard taskmaster.
We all know there are those among us in all churches who will grow in Christ at various levels of understanding...and we love and care for them all...lukewarm, the lost, and all who would come are welcomed and should be honored no matter what level they are at in understanding the things of our Lord.
For....”there are many parts, but one body..The eye cannot say to the hand, “I don’t need you!”.... And the head cannot say to the feet, “I don’t need you!”.....
On the contrary,... those parts of the body that seem to be weaker ...’are indispensable’... and the parts that we think are less honorable we treat with special honor. ...
..... God has combined the members of the body and has given ..’greater honor’.. to the parts ‘that lacked’ it, so that there should be no division in the body, but that its parts should have equal concern for each other.”
I Corinthians Chapter 12.
Much truth there.
I know that there are several Bishops that need to be replaced. Seems like their retirements will be in two to three years.
Then will we be finished with Bernardin’s Boys and Jadot’s Jots?
The problem is that Rome treats such as members in life and in death, including the Kennedy clan, and thus effectually conveys that what really is necessary is that you die in her hands, thus fostering confidence in the Church of Rome.
True believers have the same Holy Spirit as the apostles did. As we can see in many religious organizations, and earthly over riding authority is no guard against error. The RCC included.
Acts 15:8 And God, who knows the heart, bore witness by granting them the holy Spirit just as he did us. 9 He made no distinction between us and them, for by faith he purified their hearts. 1 Corinthians 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual. 14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned. 15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man. 16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? but we have the mind of Christ.
>>And how could one correct them?<<
Each autonomous assembly answers for themselves as we can see in Revleation.
>> On the basis of what? If you follow the link, you can see they are convinced they have Scripture on their side.<<
On the basis of scripture and it’s not an earthly organization that is responsible. It’s the local assembly as all instruction from the apostles show. Each was to control their own assembly.
Once again, an earthly over riding organization is no guarantee against error as evidenced by the RCC and most every organized religion I know of. Each of us is answerable to Christ on our own. Scripture is the only reliable source and those who God has called have been promised the indwelling of the Holy Spirit to teach what that person needs. If anyone thinks belonging to an organized religion is somehow a “safe haven” they are deluding themselves.
Being in a sect means you’re a sectarian. A sectarian will not have the faith given by Christ as Christ gave it. That matters. I do not deny that Christ still loves them. Christ will not, however, necessarily know them (Matthew 7:23). That matters.
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