Posted on 01/05/2010 9:46:47 PM PST by the_conscience
I just witnessed a couple of Orthodox posters get kicked off a "Catholic Caucus" thread. I thought, despite their differences, they had a mutual understanding that each sect was considered "Catholic". Are not the Orthodox considered Catholic? Why do the Romanists get to monopolize the term "Catholic"?
I consider myself to be Catholic being a part of the universal church of Christ. Why should one sect be able to use a universal concept to identify themselves in a caucus thread while other Christian denominations need to use specific qualifiers to identify themselves in a caucus thread?
Of course you haven’t. I don’t know of any Protestant who does, here or in real life
it is a long thread, ph=placeholder
Trying to keep up with you Pentecostals/Reformers/Baptists/Papists.
“It’s our humility that makes us great.” Ray and Tom Magliozzi
Strange how these very long threads have a predictable life cycle. Once the angst has been addressed, the deeper discussion of theology begins and the conversation becomes increasingly respectful.
(Mr. Rogers was quoting moi. Hence the use of quotation marks.)
Scriptural truth is victory. Nothing "bogus and illusory" about that.
The RCC teaches that men's good works earn them salvation and also shave off time in purgatory for themselves (and for those they pray for) where they finish atoning for left-over sins (in contradiction to Hebrews 10 which says since Christ has atoned for the sins of His flock there is no more atoning work necessary.)
Purgatory is a cruel fiction which again illustrates Rome's error of believing men's own good works save them. .
RCC Catechism #2027 -- No one can merit the initial grace which is at the origin of conversion. Moved by the Holy Spirit, we can merit for ourselves and for others all the graces needed to attain eternal life, as well as necessary temporal goods.
It doesn't matter if some RCs say faith is necessary along with good works because God's word tells us our own good works are not a requirement for salvation, but a result of our salvation.
"Not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy he saved us, by the washing of regeneration, and renewing of the Holy Ghost" -- Titus 3:5
Sounds about right.
Hmmm.
You've birthed foals. Mary shed blood for Christ. Not that that's conclusive, but it's not irrelevant either. There is no birth without water and blood, as far as I know.
The whole thing is what I sometimes tag in my own diseased mind as "the flip."
Clearly, in the first iteration (so to speak) EVERYTHING is done by God in Christ. We experience ourselves as helpless. We can argue about the exact sequence and the reality of the perception of struggle and 'work,' but the over-riding perception and the one that makes us resonate with Paul and which belongs at the core of our thought is that we are born along on the flood, the healing tide, like twigs in rapids.
Here's where I get either to write a bazillion words or to sketch it out -- and I won't be addressing the (secondary) primacy of Mary too much.
In my "scheme", major themes are being born again AND dying. Going along with those themes are flesh and spirit.
How to say it? The 'self' that was saved was saved through its own death as much as through Christs's -- BY and THROUGH Christ's death, through my own as well. That death is the "coming true" of the choice I made in Adam, namely: to turn away from the source of that breath which, breathed into molded clay, made me a living soul.
Now, the language is, I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me. How does He do so? By the Spirit He breathed into me to resurrect the dead, spirit-less me.
It is now HIS spirit, not mine at all. As I share in that spirit, I share in His Sonship. As I share in His Sonship, I share in His work - yet not I, but Christ who lives in me. Sharing in His work means to share in His redemptive work.
So the "flip" is that FIRST WE HAVE to understand our passivity, that we have no more to contribute than a corpse. But once we, so to speak, die into THAT truth, we also start to live into Him.
There is always a difference between creature and creator, but in Christ that difference is, what, overwhelmed.
If I say, I, Mad Dawg, have participated actively in the redemptive work of Christ, I am wrong in an especially deadly way. But I think I can say that Christ does his redeeming work in what was me before it died.
Okay, and that helps me (if nobody else) with why Mary should have any kind of preference before the Twelve. Its not that she 'earned' it by suffering. It's not earned by anyone. For the Twelve, by the Spirit and through their experience with IHS before and after Easter and their continued life in the Spirit, the graft between them and the Vine becomes ever sounder. It's about the union.
Mary's union with Christ is, in this 'scheme' also not in any way earned. It is given. Given at her conception (we would say, but for this that's not so important), at the Annunciation, and from then on, moment by moment it is knitted and it grows stronger. The gift of her motherhood is the gift of a union with Christ NOT different in kind from that of any other saint ("small 's' saint") but different in degree because of the Love which the perfect Son bears for her who bore Him. It is grace in her as it is grace in the saints.
But the grace of Christ is to draw us more and more into everything that he is and does.
I'm not going for the sale here. I'm trying to reconcile two seeming irreconcilables, the all sufficient grace coming from Christ's atoning work AND the sense, which seems to be a Catholic idea, that we somehow can be said to share in that work, and not simply as beneficiaries.
;-)
I think, within certain limits, the arguments about who calls whom what are misdirected and fruitless. "Feelthy papist" is, among other things, my way of saying that if we all did our work properly we wouldn't get all cranked up about nomenclature.
I get that you all think our claims to be "Catholic" in a special way are bogus. We wouldn't be arguing here if you didn't. But to circle each other, tails lashing our flanks, fur standing up, hissing and yowling over what we're going to call ourselves just seems silly to me.
But then I thought it was silly when the North Vietnamese argued about the seating arrangements at Geneva. I mean, heck, let's just get a bunch of bean bag chairs and everybody plop down in the one closest to him and let's talk.
Of course, I was the one who suggested we call our parish shooting club "The Fighting Mackerel Snappers."
Late to the thread, TLDR the comments, but must mentioned I got nailed by Catholics in another thread that said Mary didn't shed blood in the birth of Jesus, she basically had him float out of her with herself being unscathed (you know what I mean).
Take something for that and try to calm down.
Nor does it say, "A new heart is given and he believes."
Sure it does, many times in many ways. Men receive a new heart from God in order to believe. Why would someone get a new heart after they have already believed?
I asked Jesus to enter my life and change me, and make me his. Why me? Why indeed! I don?t have a clue.
Sure you do. You just told us. You have less pride than the guy next door who doesn't believe.
Why?
I don’t think anyone here cares what you call yourselves, but please make it clear to newcomers that that is how you refer to yourselves, not something Protestants routinely call you
Yes, and believing is the "work" Jesus said we are to do. That implies that believing is an ongoing and continual process and an integral part of the Christian walk. It is not a one time event.
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