The reason for my utter lack of shock lies, interestingly enough, within two of the critical tenants of Protestant Theology: the doctrines of sola scriptura (scripture alone) and sola fide (faith alone).
Wrong, first, sola scriptura does not mean only scripture can be used in understanding God's will, but which straw man is a constant RC recourse (more in section further below ),
Second, in reality, it is the Christians and churches which hold most strongly to sola scriptura (holding wholly inspired and accurate Scripture as being the supreme and sufficient standard for Truth, but not in exclusion to other helps) and sola fide (faith alone being what appropriates justification, but a faith that effects works) that are the most conservative, far more than the overall fruit of Rome
Moreover, typically the liberal Prot churches are those which are closest to Rome!
Just a few stats among the multitudes :
79 percent of American Jews, 58 percent of Catholics and 56 percent of mainline Protestants favor acceptance of homosexuality, versus 39 percent of members of historically black churches, 27 percent of Muslims and 26 percent of the evangelical Protestants. U.S. U.S. Religious landscape survey; Copyright © 2008 The Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life. http://religions.pewforum.org/comparisons#
56% of Catholics overall (and 46% of the general public) believe that sexual relations between two adults of the same gender is not a sin, while 39%. of Catholics say homosexual behavior is morally wrong, (versus 76% of white evangelicals and 66% of black Protestants, and 40% of Mainline Protestants). 41% of Catholics do not consider homosexual behavior to be a moral issue. (Pew Research Center, Religion & Politics Survey, 2009; PRRI/RNS Religion News Survey, October 2010; http://publicreligion.org/site/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Catholics-and-LGBT-Issues-Survey-Report.pdf)
Catholics testify [2010] to showing more support (in numbers) for legal recognitions of same-sex relationships than members of any other Christian tradition, and Americans overall. Almost three-quarters of Catholics favor either allowing gay and lesbian people to marry or allowing them to form civil unions (43% and 31% respectively). Only 22% of Catholics said there should be no legal recognition of a gay couple’s relationship. (PRRI, Pre--election American Values Survey, 9/2010; http://publicreligion.org/site/wp-content/uploads/2011/06/Catholics-and-LGBT-Issues-Survey-Report.pdf.)
In a 2010 LifeWay Research survey 77 percent of American Protestant pastors (57% of mainline versus 87% evangelical) strongly disagree with same-sex marriage, with 6% percent somewhat disagreeing, and 5% being somewhat in agreement and 10 percent strongly agreeing. (5% of evangelical).
Only 3% of evangelical pastors (versus 11% mainline) somewhat agree that there is nothing wrong with homosexual marriage.
11% of evangelical pastors (versus 30% mainline) somewhat agree that homosexual civil unions are acceptable, with 67% of the former and 38% of the latter strongly disagreeing with homosexual civil unions. October 2010 LifeWay Research survey of 1,000 randomly selected Protestant pastors. http://www.lifeway.com/ArticleView?storeId=10054&catalogId=10001&langId=-1&article=LifeWay-Research-protestant-pastors-oppose-homosexual-marriage
A 2002 nationwide poll of 1,854 priests in the United States and Puerto Rico reported that 30% of Roman Catholic priests described themselves as Liberal, 28% as Conservative, and 37% as Moderate in their Religious ideology. 53 percent responded that they thought it always was a sin for unmarried people to have sexual relations; 32 percent that is often was, and 9 percent seldom/never. However, nearly four in 10 younger priests in 2002 described themselves as conservative, and were more likely to regard as "always a sin" such acts as premarital sex, abortion, artificial birth control, homosexual relations, etc., and three-fourths said they were more religiously orthodox than their older counterparts. Los Angeles Times (extensive) nationwide survey (2002). http://www.bishop-accountability.org/resources/resource-files/reports/LAT-Priest-Survey.pdf http://findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1141/is_2_39/ai_94129129/pg_2
As Catholics, the Bible is not our sole source of authority, nor was the Catholic Church based upon it.
Indeed, and which invalidates Rome as being the NT church, for in reality, as often said and shown, is that it is abundantly evidenced that Scripture was the transcendent supreme standard for obedience and testing and establishing truth claims as the wholly Divinely inspired and assured, Word of God. And which testifies (Lk. 24:27,44, etc.) to writings of God being recognized and established as being so (essentially due to their unique and enduring heavenly qualities and attestation), and thus they materially provide for a canon of Scripture (as well as for reason, the church, etc.) The church actually began in dissent from those who sat in the seat of Moses over Israel, who were the historical instruments and stewards of Scripture, and inheritors of promises of Divine guidance, presence and perpetuation. (Lv. 10:11; Dt. 4:31; 17:8-13; Is. 41:10, Ps. 89:33,34)
And instead they followed an itinerant Preacher whom the magisterium rejected, and whom the Messiah reproved them Scripture as being supreme, (Mk. 7:2-16) and established His Truth claims upon scriptural substantiation in word and in power, as did the early church as it began upon this basis. (Mt. 22:23-45; Lk. 24:27,44; Jn. 5:36,39; Acts 2:14-35; 4:33; 5:12; 15:6-21;17:2,11; 18:28; 28:23; Rm. 15:19; 2Cor. 12:12, etc.)
Thus
Jesus answered and said unto them, Ye do err, not knowing the scriptures, nor the power of God. (Matthew 22:29)
And he said unto them, These are the words which I spake unto you, while I was yet with you, that all things must be fulfilled, which were written in the law of Moses, and in the prophets, and in the psalms, concerning me. (Luke 24:44)
And Paul, as his manner was, went in unto them, and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the scriptures, (Acts 17:2)
These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so. (Acts 17:11)
For he mightily convinced the Jews, and that publickly, shewing by the scriptures that Jesus was Christ. (Acts 18:28)
Those who knew not Scripture were persuaded "through mighty signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God," (Romans 15:19) which Scripture provide and sanctions, with it being the judge of them.
However, under the Roman model, an assuredly (if conditionally) infallible magisterium is essential for determination and assurance of Truth (including writings and men being of God) and to fulfill promises of Divine presence, providence of Truth, and preservation of faith, and authority.
And that being the historical instruments and stewards of Divine revelation (oral and written) means that such is that assuredly infallible magisterium. Thus those who dissent from the latter are in rebellion to God.
But which nukes the NT church itself, as it began contrary to the premise of perpetual assured magisterial veracity, but upon Scriptural substantiation as described. Which requires it to thereby continually justify its claims to be of the living God, not by relying upon self-declaration and historical descent.
And in the times preceding of the Reformation the church of Rome had come to the point where there was (by confession of their own) almost an entire abandonment of equity in ecclesiastical judgments; of discipline in morals, of reverence in divine things, and thus true religion was almost extinct, leading multitudes astray, and that the true Church had to be sought outside the then-visible institution.
In fact, what we now call “The Bible” — the collected Old Testament and New Testament writings — was put together by the Church herself, and is meant to enrich and support our doctrine and Tradition.
Wrong: Translated by Rome this means Scripture is a servant to support her as desired, but her veracity does not rest upon the weight of Scriptural warrant, but the mere fact that Rome teaches a doctrine as definitely true is a guarantee that it is true.
The reality is that most of Scripture was already established as being so before there was a church of Rome, and as both men and writings of God were recognized as being so, essentially due to their heavenly qualities and attestation, without an infallible office of men which presumes it is essential for this.
More complementary writings were provided by God in conflation with what was already established as being so, and were likewise established as the OT writings were.
And rather than simply being a supplementary source to enrich and support predetermined doctrine and Tradition as the servant of the magisterium, by whose authority doctrine and Tradition is established,, it was upon Scriptural substantiation that the NT church began, with common souls following men who established their Truth claims thereby, by whom the magisterium rejected.
Yet, the Protestant Reformation severed the Tradition from the Bible, and put all other authorities beneath it.
the Protestant Reformation severed the Tradition from the Bible, and put all other authorities beneath it. By doing so, they created a type of religious relativism (unwittingly, I’m sure) that opened the door for an “anything goes” mentality.
Wrong: As Alister McGrath [Irish theologian, pastor, intellectual historian and Christian apologist, currently Professor of Theology, Ministry, and Education at Kings College London] states in "The Genesis of Doctrine: A Study in the Foundation of Doctrinal Criticism:"
Although it is often suggested that the reformers had no place for tradition in their theological deliberations, this judgment is clearly incorrect. While the notion of tradition as an extra-scriptural source of revelation is excluded, the classic concept of tradition as a particular way of reading and interpreting scripture is retained. Scripture, tradition and the kerygma are regarded as essentially coinherent, and as being transmitted, propagated and safeguarded by the community of faith. There is thus a strongly communal dimension to the magisterial reformers' understanding of the interpretation of scripture, which is to be interpreted and proclaimed within an ecclesiological matrix. It must be stressed that the suggestion that the Reformation represented the triumph of individualism and the total rejection of tradition is a deliberate fiction propagated by the image-makers of the Enlightenment. — James R. Payton, “Getting the Reformation Wrong: Correcting Some Misunderstandings”
In contrast to Scripture being supreme, and with out date helping to understand it, and thus determining veracity upon the weight of evidence (which the church began under), the basis for the veracity of Rome's teaching is the the premise of her assured veracity.
For as said, Rome has presumed to infallibly declare she is and will be perpetually infallible whenever she speaks in accordance with her infallibly defined (scope and subject-based) formula, which renders her declaration that she is infallible, to be infallible, as well as all else she accordingly declares.
Thus, faced with the historical claims of Reformers, the recourse of no less than Manning was that,
"It was the charge of the Reformers that the Catholic doctrines were not primitive, and their pretension was to revert to antiquity. But the appeal to antiquity is both a treason and a heresy. It is a treason because it rejects the Divine voice of the Church at this hour, and a heresy because it denies that voice to be Divine....The only Divine evidence to us of what was primitive is the witness and voice of the Church at this hour." — Most Rev. Dr. Henry Edward Cardinal Manning, Lord Archbishop of Westminster, The Temporal Mission of the Holy Ghost: Or Reason and Revelation (New York: J.P. Kenedy & Sons, originally written 1865, pp. 227,28
Likewise,
The mere fact that the Church teaches the doctrine of the Assumption as definitely true is a guarantee that it is true.” — Karl Keating, Catholicism and Fundamentalism (San Francisco: Ignatius, 1988), p. 275.
"Catholic doctrine, as authoritatively proposed by the Church, should be held as the supreme law..all interpretation is foolish and false which either makes the sacred writers disagree one with another, or is opposed to the doctrine of the Church." (Providentissimus Deus;http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/leo_xiii/encyclicals/documents/hf_l-xiii_enc_18111893_providentissimus-deus_en.html)
It follows that the Church is essentially an unequal society, that is, a society comprising two categories of per sons, the Pastors and the flock...the one duty of the multitude is to allow themselves to be led, and, like a docile flock, to follow the Pastors. - VEHEMENTER NOS, an Encyclical of Pope Pius X promulgated on February 11, 1906.
"The intolerance of the Church toward error, the natural position of one who is the custodian of truth, her only reasonable attitude makes her forbid her children...to endeavor to discover religious truths by examining both sides of the question. This places the Catholic in a position whereby he must stand aloof from all manner of doctrinal teaching other than that delivered by his Church through her accredited ministers." — (John H. Stapleton, Explanation of Catholic Morals, Chapters XIX, XXIII. the consistent believer (1904); Nihil Obstat. Remy Lafort, Censor Librorum. Imprimatur, John M. Farley, Archbishop of New York )
Which is cultic, not NT!
By doing so, they created a type of religious relativism (unwittingly, I’m sure) that opened the door for an “anything goes” mentality.
Wrong, for as said and is shown, it is those who hold most strongly to the supreme authority of Scripture as being the wholly inspired and accurate word of God that are most conservative, while churches that are closest to Rome are the most liberal.
As Rome overall is herself, for what one does constitutes the evidence of what one really believes, and which Rome partly shows by treating proabortion, prosodomote promuslim RC pols as members in life and in death, and the vast majority of RCs who support them.
For years, sola scriptura was a major weapon against Catholic theology, claiming that our practices were either absent or directly forbidden by Sacred Scripture.
Indeed, as <a href="http://peacebyjesuscom.blogspot.com/2014/09/deformation-of-nt-church-and-historical.html ">so deformed is the church of Rome that it is basically invisible in the NT!
The same problem goes for sola fide. Though the only place in the Bible where the words “faith” and “alone” appear next to one another is in James 2:24 (“See how a person is justified by works and not by faith alone”), it still remains a significant tenant of Protestant Christianity.
Yet Paul clearly states faith is what actually appropriates justification of the UnGodly, (Rm. 4:1-7) but faith justifies one as being a believer (works are faith in action, as to believe is to act, like as the palsied man to be forgiven was to be healed, but which was easier to say?), and Reformers clearly preached the necessity of works of faith and holiness if one claimed faith.
However, much like sola scriptura, it has seemingly evolved into an even more bastardized version of itself that states, “As long as I’m a good person and believe in Jesus, I’m okay.”
Wrong continually, as in reality is it evangelicals who are by far the most conservative , and more unified on the most core values and beliefs overall, while Rome's treatment of Teddy K, Chavez, Menino RCs and the her liberal majority testify that the gospel Rome effectually preaches is “As long as I’m a good person and die as a Catholic, I’m okay.”
Moreover, Rome's "unity" is very limited and largely on paper, while Catholicism itself exists in schisms and sects, and what RCs can disagree on its extensive, as well as what they do.
thanks for the comparative surveys
But 99% of faithful Catholics regularly dismiss the ramblings of our incomplete brethren. We have heard it all before; our skin is thick and we are born for battle.
Sancte Michael archangele, defende nos in proelio!