Salvation subsists within the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church guards the deposit of Revelation.
The Church is always reformed, but always in need of reform.
Therefore everyone has the right to call for the authentic reform of the Church.
And nobody has the right to call for the deformation of the Church.
>The Church is always reformed, but always in need of reform.
>Therefore everyone has the right to call for the authentic reform of the Church.
>And nobody has the right to call for the deformation of the Church.
Does that mean that nobody has the right to stop the reform of the Church, if needed?
Hmmm. So then Trent was wrong to kick out those that were attempting what is needed?
You will note that the Reformers wanted to be back with the RCC, and were, much like Athenasius calling for the reform needed within, until Trent kicked them out... Trent was a door slammed in the reformers faces, a firm rebuke to those doctrines that were fine just a decade prior to Luther, though Hus might argue that the debate was getting rather heated, pardon the pun. That was the cause of the schism, not the call for reform.
Athanasius, like the reformers, was not just fighting one diocese, but the majority of the church was Arian, and after the Pope Honorius signed, maybe coerced, an Arian creed, then (according to Vatican I) the whole of the Church was against him. Athanasius Contra Mundum.
Should Athanasius have submitted to the Pope and, now, the whole of the church on this, a central tenet of the small o orthodox faith? With the reformers, there was a movement, with Athanasius, there was only him. Even after Athanasius, and after Nicea the point was not settled (which makes the reaction of the church to the early popes not quite the same as the church gave to later popes.) It took many many years of convincing through the scriptures to kill that heresy.
Note that prior to the reformation, those that held to reformational ideas were happily within the RCC, with hardy debate, but nothing worth a Foxes Book of Martyrs entry, oh, except for Hus and a few others (so much for separated brethren being an unchanging teaching of the Church.) The Reformation did not come out of whole cloth, thus those of the Protestant ilk can truthfully claim that what we believe was held by those within the church prior to Trent.
Note that during Trent, a plurality, not a majority, actually voted for the canonization of the deuterocanonical books, thus even within the scholars and doctors of the faith, had they stuck with their pre-Trent beliefs, they too would be outside the body of Catholic believers. But unlike Athanasius, they did not stick with their beliefs, and just submitted to something which they did not hold. Not that this is a HUGE issue with Protestants, it might have led to a firmer grip on the scriptures.
Just saying...
And nobody has the right to call for the deformation of the Church.
Bull.
I guess it would be in bad taste to mention the Counter Reformation. Loved your post.