Posted on 04/14/2005 12:00:51 PM PDT by Dean Baker
Baptist church 'fake pope' sign attracting attention, criticism By JEANNINE F. HUNTER, hunter@knews.com April 13, 2005
NEWPORT, Tenn. - Two days after being posted, a church marquee message that questions the purpose of the papacy is still attracting attention in this small community.
"What I am trying to do is to let people know there's only one way to heaven through Jesus Christ," said the Rev. Cline Franklin, pastor of Hilltop Baptist Church. "There's no need for help. God sent his son, Jesus Christ. We're all priests if we're saved. I don't need to go to anybody else to pray."
The sign's side facing Broadway, the main thoroughfare in Newport, reads, "No truth, No hope Following a hell-bound pope!" On the other side, facing the church parking lot, it reads: "False hope in a fake pope."
The message appeared days after Pope John Paul II's funeral last week.
"It is unfortunate when it comes from within the Christian church. It's really sad," said the Rev. Dan Whitman, 54, pastor of Newport's Good Shepherd Catholic parish and Holy Trinity parish in Jefferson City. "You learn how to deal with it and pray not to be that way yourself."
It does not reflect mainstream Baptist thought, said Dr. Merrill "Mel" Hawkins, associate professor of religion and director of the Center for Baptist Studies at Carson-Newman College in Jefferson City.
"When you see signs like that, they are almost like relics or artifacts of a bygone era," Hawkins said.
He spoke about animus between Protestants and Catholics persisting after the Protestant Reformation and for centuries, during which "harsh things were said, couched within misperceptions, misunderstandings."
Among the major misperceptions is that Catholics "venerate the pope on the same level as Jesus," Hawkins said, and that "the pope is connected to their salvation in place of Jesus Christ."
Catholics make up about 12 percent of the population in the South.
"Catholics are a minority faith in the South, and there's often bias toward minority religious communities because people don't understand," he said.
James Gaddis, a lay speaker who also chairs the board at First United Methodist Church, said he had not seen the sign but had heard about it.
"I understand that it's very degrading," he said. "I think it's tragic that any church group would stoop to this posture."
Following Tuesday night's council meeting, Newport Mayor Roland Dykes Jr. said he was a little saddened by the message.
"It doesn't behoove any of us to determine who is going to heaven or hell. I think the pope is a highly, highly respected person," he said.
Franklin's church is a five-year-old independent Baptist church. When asked what the message meant, he said: "What does 'pope' mean? It means father. We have a heavenly father, and the Bible says we shall call no man a father. "
He said people have been driving by or taking pictures or calling to share their views. He said the intent was not to offend Catholics and people are misunderstanding the sign.
Copyright 2005, Knoxville News-Sentinel Co.
With this post I was going to suggest you were the strangest person posting on this thread. Then I remembered someone a few hundred posts ago talking about the “Babylonian Brotherhood”. As far as I can tell, this is a theory that the world is ruled by an ancient race of lizards, and some modern day people are in fact lizards. They include Bob Hope, Kris Kristofferson, The Queen Mother and George Bush. The reptiles' "hybrid reptilian-human DNA" allows them to change from reptilian to human form if they consume human blood. Anyone can check this stuff out on Wikipedia, which is where I got it.
BriarBey, you don’t believe an ancient race of reptiles secretly rules the world, do you?
I've been in a particular "church" and thought I WAS IN HELL...
What church.?. I ain't sayin... d;-!~
Are you claiming to be a prophet?
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I don't claim to be anything...I just give what I am given, and it is never liked.
BriarBey, you don’t believe an ancient race of reptiles secretly rules the world, do you?
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roflol!! No...sorry. Not one of my beliefs. I think mankind can do enough damage without throwing lizards into the mix....lol.
You must be Pentacostal.
It was NOT 'traditions of the Fathers' but 'the Book of the LAW' that men were instructed to follow!
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No Elsie...Jesus said "I came not do to away with the law and the prophets but to fulfill them." We follow Christ.
You can never fullfill the law, you will fail. He didn't.
You must be Pentacostal.
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No thank you.....!!! Far to much witchcraft blended into that mess for me to want anything to do with it.
I'm not anything...just a believer in Christ and I follow Him.
LOL You all remind me of my kids when I gave them their first bite of meat as infants.....Oh the faces and the spitting it out and the look of disgust as tho I had lost my mind to ask them to eat such a thing. Reaching for their milk bottles. They can all down a good thick rare steak in nothing flat now. roflol.
I don't remember dreams unless they are prophetic, so basically in 50 yrs. I have had 4 dreams that I can still give you exact detail about....Only one brought complete and total destruction of a church, with the forewarned Pastors wife dieing in a freak..freak accident. He should have listened, but then who am I and dreams are just dreams aren't they? That dream was not only for that time but for what is coming upon the church businesses set up in this country.
Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. (Matt. 7:15)
Beware of the false prophets, who come to you in sheep's clothing, but inwardly are ravenous wolves. (Matt. 7:15)
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Actually they also come crying peace and safety and all it well.
I have no agenda, I have no where for you to send your money, I'm not asking you to join any denomination or sect, there is none. So what is it exactly Tight...that I am being ravenous about? And what will you do when you see him emerge from the conclave? All I have done is warn of what is coming...you either listen and decide for YOURSELF what action you will take or you don't. Its pretty simple.
I gain nothing, other than a sigh of relief for those who will have eyes to see and ears to hear. There is nothing I can do about the ones who won't.
That is debatable.
And what will you do when you see him emerge from the conclave?
Based on your "premonitions" of a black man biting an animals head off? Nothing. First, I'm not Catholic and second I don't listen to what Benny Hinn has to say so why would I listen to you? You blast the Catholic church on their "pagan" "idolatry-loving" beliefs and preach that we should follow the Bible's teachings only and then you want us to listen to your rantings based soley on "prophetic dreams" that you've had. That sounds an awful lot like people who believe in Our Lady of Fatima....Our Lady Of Guadalupe. Things you abominate.
Based on your "premonitions" of a black man biting an animals head off? Nothing. First, I'm not Catholic and second I don't listen to what Benny Hinn has to say so why would I listen to you? You blast the Catholic church on their "pagan" "idolatry-loving" beliefs and preach that we should follow the Bible's teachings only and then you want us to listen to your rantings based soley on "prophetic dreams" that you've had. That sounds an awful lot like people who believe in Our Lady of Fatima....Our Lady Of Guadalupe. Things you abominate.
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Maybe you should listen because of this:
Acts 2:17
"In the last days, God says, I will pour out my spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your young men will dream dreams. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my Spirit in those days, and they will prophecy. I will show wonders in the heaven above and signs on the earth below, blood and fire and billows of smoke.
The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and glorious day of the Lord.
And everyone who calls on the name of the will be saved."
You need to argue with the Lord because you just called Him a liar.
And everyone who calls on the name of the will be saved."
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opps correction:
"And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved."
Things you abominate
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I can't abominate that which is already an abomination to the Lord. Idolatry has never been something He favored, and He will destroy it...all of it.
1."You shall have no other gods before me."
2."You shall NOT MAKE for yourselves an in the form of anything in heaven above or on the earth beneath or in the waters below.
3."You shall not bow down to them or worship them; for I, the Lord your God , am a jealous God, punishing the children for the sin of the fathers to the third and fourth generation of those who hate me......
Notice....the idolotry is 2 different verses..."You SHALL NOT MAKE"......boy we're rolling them out like hotcakes right now aren't we...crosses, crucifixes, Jesus Images,(earth below) angels (heavens above), fish (beneath or in the waters below)....we market and prostitute our beliefs and Christ quite well don't we?!!! Here buy a new trinket...people will think you holy!! How sickening.
You don't have a clue...how fast that cup of wrath is filling. When the day comes for the overflow of that cup...you will cry for the rocks to fall on you, because of your ignorance, and your pride and your self-serving whorish religions that stink to the heavens. And God's people will come out of them or...as He said.
"Come out of her, my people, so that you will not share in her sins, so that you will not receive any of her plagues;
for her sins are piled to heaven, and God has remembered her crimes. Give back to her what she has given; pay her back double for what she has done. Mix her a double portion from her own cup.
Give her as much torure and grief as the glory and luxury she gave herself.
In her heart she BOASTS, I sit as queen (What religion on the face of the earth declares a queen? Mary..Queen of Heaven?) I am not a widow.............
If you want to know what it says go find it yourself (Rev.18)..make a little effort, for pitys sake, I'm not going to spoon feed you, there's been enough of that going on in the church, its all there, and scattered throughout scripture.
Problem is...its like trying to feed a kid good healthy food when all they know is candy and junk food.
Okay - I did find one translation that translated this "full of grace." "Grace" typically means "favored" or "blessed" or something to that effect. Without a doubt, Mary being Jesus' mother qualifies her for being "highly favored," "highly blessed," and "full of grace." However, this does not mean "sinless," which is apparently what Catholicism teaches. There has been one and only one sinless Person: Jesus Christ Himself. Mary was in no way sinless, and anyone who says she was is teaching heresy. She was a sinner just like I am, and I believe she herself would have said so. And if she had actually been sinless, would it not seem not only reasonable but imperative that the New Testament would have explicitly and unequivocally so stated? There is absolutely no question that Jesus was sinless, and the New Testament affirms that numerous times. (After all, being sinless is not exactly common.) And as I said above, anyone who teaches that Mary was sinless is teaching a heresy. Blessed and favoured yes; sinless, no way.
"She was only conceived without sin through the application of Christ's sacrifice."
Not sure I follow this at all. Do you mean she was physically conceived by her parents in sinlessness?
So I guess I should be listening to Benny Hinn? I should have followed David Koresh.....Jim Jones perhaps? They prophesied as well. What is the difference between you and them? What is the difference between you and the three children who had "visions" in the village of Fatima. Why are they crazy and yet you are not? You say that Catholics are foolish to listen to such nonsense but they should listen to you and your dreams.
I think I'm up for it! (Famous last words...) :)
I agree with you - no arguable points there.
It's important to understand what the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception is and what it is not. Some people think the term refers to Christ's conception in Mary's womb without the intervention of a human father; but that is the Virgin Birth. Others think the Immaculate Conception means Mary was conceived "by the power of the Holy Spirit," in the way Jesus was, but that, too, is incorrect. The Immaculate Conception means that Mary, whose conception was brought about the normal way, was conceived without original sin or its stain-that's what "immaculate" means: without stain. The essence of original sin consists in the deprivation of sanctifying grace, and its stain is a corrupt nature. Mary was preserved from these defects by God's grace; from the first instant of her existence she was in the state of sanctifying grace and was free from the corrupt nature original sin brings.
Mind you, this was not made up by Pius IX in 1854. He merely reiterated and formalized the teaching which went back to the very early centuries of the Church.
Was it necessary for Mary to be without sin in order for her to give birth to Our Lord? Of course not; God could have accomplished His Will in whatever way He chose. We simply believe that this is the particular way He chose.
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