Posted on 06/27/2009 10:33:55 PM PDT by bdeaner
The Bible came from Heaven by the instiration of God.
No, it was canonized by the Church.
By the time Rome got around to deciding what was Scripture, in the FOURTH century, because the Roman emperor wanted an "official" declaration, the true Church, guided by the Holy Ghost, already knew what was Scripture and what was not. Rubber stamp "canonization" by the papist sect is irrelevant.
it's teaching authority was established by Christ Himself through the apostles and apostolic succession.
Uhhh ... no.
You do realize that the Catechism is larded with footnotes, don't you?
So St. Augustine and St. Paul both call on the Divine...
Truth of the Bible? Absolutely.
But:
...and ultimate....
I didn't see any hint of "ultimate" in there.
Further, Sts. Augustine and Paul do NOT say Scripture ONLY.
Finally, since by its own definition sola Scriptura must be defined by Scripture alone, St. Augustine is out of bounds.
I mean, out of bounds for the sola Scriptura crowd, anyway.
Yes!
The True Church IS the Catholic Church.
So why did this "true church" fragment so badly after the "reformation?"
Did the previously zealous Holy Spirit lose interest in guiding and guarding? Did he decide it was time for men to run the Church on their own? Why did he decide it was okay to let this "true church" splinter after fifteen hundred years of solidarity?
Bloody papists want to know!
OK, how does Paul fit in with that? He wasn’t an apostle; in fact, he was an active persecutor of the early church. Yet in Acts we find him performing miracles as the apostles (Acts 19), and founding most of the churches. A man NOT commissioned by Jesus as an Apostle, and certainly NOT converted by the Apostles! In fact, it was Ananias who converted Saul to Paul.
Clearly, the concept of primacy is broken within Acts, and given that half the NT canon are works of the first example of a non-primacy conversion. For he was converted not by an apostle, but a disciple of Christ (one of the Seventy).
And this man - a convert of a non-Apostle - performed many miracles as recorded in Acts. Including the casting out of demons (bind and loose - Acts 19:11-12) and raising the dead (Acts 20:7-12).
Therefore, a man not given or under the authority of the apostles, but a direct disciple of Christ, converted Saul to Christianity, Paul who performed miracles (including the casting out of demons - who knew him by name - and raising the dead) and who became the greatest theologian and missionary of the early Church.
More importantly, because the Eastern Catholics have their own canon, we find division with the strains of Catholicism.
Really?
Jesus is God.
Who knocked Saul to the dirt on the road to Damascus?
They refer to the power of the written teachings and the teachings they left. They do not refer to the power of all future "leaders" that may come along within the church.
There is no Biblical support at all for the concept of ex cathedra, but there is support for the concept of sola scriptura from your own Saints and from the writings of Paul.
"Clearly" is a codeword meaning "you gotta believe me!"
Paul was indeed an apostle. He was not one of the original twelve.
To not know this is to display profound ignorance of church history and scripture, or cultic revisionism.
Nope.
So how does that support the concept of the papacy? In fact, we find that it reinforces NOT having a papacy. A man can be converted without the Church - he can be saved without the Church (which is opposite of the entire premise of this thread).
Willing to concede that the Church is not required for salvation? Nor required to receive power to perform miracles, nor the blessing of the churches’ leaders required to preach and spread the Good News?
Did Ananias chase up behind Saul on the road to Damascus, blind Saul with a bright flash from the sky, thunder forth "Saul, why do you persecute me?" and so forth?
You are hardly qualified to opine on that question when you seem to be ignorant of 1 Cor 9:1!
Christ was and is the leader of the Catholic Church.
Further, it was you who posted of St. Paul:
A man NOT commissioned by Jesus as an Apostle...
...which is obviously false, as I have demonstrated.
I'm sorry, I know this is a long thread, and you may have missed the fundamental claim I was addressing in post 357 where it is stated:
The concept of Primacy is rooted in the Gospels, for example, in MT: 16:16-19 we see Christ only speaking to the Apostles (e.g. The Twelve) as the parallel texts support (c.f. Mark 8: 27-30; Luke 9:18-21). Every Christian does not have the power to “bind and loose”. This was given only to the Apostles.
Clearly the example of Paul breaks that statement, as the Apostles - as defined in post 357 - are the Twelve original disciples of Christ. And we also see that the power to "bind and loose" is given to Paul, not one of the Twelve.
This is a fine example of the game of gotcha I refused to play.
Do you really believe the Apostles are defined in post 357, or are you trying to win forensic points in some kind of Great Gospel Joust-Off?
Hey, take up the claim that Paul wasn’t an apostle with the poster of post 357. He defined the Apostles as the orignal Twelve, and I was expounding on that.
IF you accept that statement, then the easiest way to show it is false is the example of Paul. Ergo, an Apostle is not just one that was directly commissioned and converted by Jesus when he walked the earth. Thus the concept that the pope must be an Apostle as commissioned by Jesus before he was crucified is broken, since Apostles are not relegated to that group alone.
Sorry if I was moving a bit too fast...
Why does the Catholic Church teach that there is “no salvation outside the Church”?
^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
If by “Church” it means Christ. Then I agree. (And...For those who have never known the Gospel or have been hurt or damaged in someway that they haven’t accepted Christ as their Savior, I trust that God is just.)
If the above sentence means “Church” as in specifically and only the Catholic Church, then they are a cult.
If the Catholic Church is teaching their children and adult members to fear leaving the Catholic Church because to do so would mean their salvation lost and they are condemned to spend eternity with the devil, then they are a cult. If they teach that salvation is only by way of the Catholic Church , its ordinances, its sacraments, its baptism, and its priesthood, and not exclusively through Christ, they are a cult. Cults do this to make members too afraid to leave.
Then stay out of it; the reply that you're trying to play "gotcha" with was NOT in any way, shape, or form addressed to you. You jumped in uninvited or unaddressed, and if you can't understand it, then it's your problem, not mine.
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