Posted on 06/13/2010 12:16:24 PM PDT by markomalley
.- Thousands of pilgrims and faithful gathered at noon Sunday in St. Peter’s Square to pray the Angelus with the Holy Father. Before the prayer, he said that the fruits of the recently ended Year for Priests could never be measured, but are already visible and will continue to be ever more so.
“The priest is a gift from the heart of Christ, a gift for the Church and for the world. From the heart of the Son of God, overflowing with love, all the goods of the Church spring forth,” proclaimed Pope Benedict XVI. “One of those goods is the vocations of those men who, conquered by the Lord Jesus, leave everything behind to dedicate themselves completely to the Christian community, following the example of the Good Shepherd.”
The Holy Father described the priest as having been formed by “the same charity of Christ, that love which compelled him to give his life for his friends and to forgive his enemies.”
“Therefore,” he continued, “priests are the primary builders of the civilization of love.”
Benedict XVI exhorted priests to always seek the intercession of St. John Marie Vianney, whose prayer, the “Act of Love,” was prayed frequently during the Year for Priests, and “continues to fuel our dialogue with God.”
The pontiff also spoke about the close of the Year for Priests, which took place this past week and culminated with the Solemnity of the Sacred Heart of Jesus. He emphasized “the unforgettable days in the presence of more than 15,000 priests from around the world.”
The feast of the Sacred Heart is traditionally a “day of priestly holiness,” but this time it was especially so, Benedict XVI remarked.
Pope Benedict concluded his comments by noting that, in contemplating history, “one observes so many pages of authentic social and spiritual renewal which have been written by the decisive contribution of Catholic priests.” These were inspired “only by their passion for the Gospel and for mankind, for his true civil and religious freedom.”
“So many initiatives that promote the entire human being have begun with the intuition of a priestly heart,” he exclaimed.
The Pope then prayed the Angelus, greeted those present in various languages, and imparted his apostolic blessing.
Some flatter themselves in vanity at the mere expense of bandwidth.
nope...it’s boring and useless
“No, Quix, this is real life now.”
Some struggle at the distinction.
Unsupported statement.
“”ROMAN CATHOLICISM A Biblical Analysis” is by Brian Schwertley. This guy founded Westminster Presbyterian Church in the United States. WPCUS is a small Presbyterian denomination [aren’t they all??] which was constituted in January 2006 in Lansdowne, Pennsylvania. The founding churches separated from their former denominations and came together because of equivocation on central Protestant doctrines and because of tolerance of excesses in worship practices in other Presbyterian denominations.
Hey, if you can start your own church, you can write a book bashing Catholics. I’m sure it’s a best seller in Presbyterian circles. “”
If it weren’t so sad it would be a great belly laugh.
"This was why the Jews were seeking all the more to kill him, because not only was he breaking the Sabbath, but he was even calling God his own Father, making himself equal with God.
-----------------
Jesus said to them, "Truly, truly, I say to you, before Abraham was, I am." So they picked up stones to throw at him, but Jesus hid himself and went out of the temple.
Jesus was fully human in Flesh. How can fullness of nature of God be manifested in bleeding, suffering flesh?
That is a great question.
Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!"For who has known the mind of the Lord,For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.
or who has been his counselor?"
"Or who has given a gift to him
that he might be repaid?"
That is just plain wrong. Icons are used in the Apostolic Churches and they don't represent a "living image." In fact the Catholics and Orthodox are often accused of "idolatry" by Protestants for showing reverence to graven images.
The image must never be confused with the thing. No Orthodox or Catholic will tell you that an icon of Christ is a 'living image" of Christ, or Christ himself, or a copy of Christ, or a duplicate of him, or embodiment of him, etc. but only a symbolic representation of him, which makes you mentally aware of the person behind the image.
You are talking about man-made images. Paul is talking about the Person, Who is not something that was made. It says he is the image of the invisible God.
Eikon is also used in 2 Corinthians 4:4 - "Christ, who is the image of God",
2 Corinthians 3:18 - "But we all, with unveiled face, beholding as in a mirror the glory of the Lord, are being transformed into the same image from glory to glory, just as from the Lord, the Spirit",
Romans 8:29: "or those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son, that he might be the firstborn among many brothers",
and Colossians 3:10 - "and have put on the new self who is being renewed to a true knowledge according to the image of the One who created him--".
Roberton says,
Like eikwn we find prwtotokov in the Alexandrian vocabulary of the Logov teaching (Philo) as well as in the LXX. Paul takes both words to help express the deity of Jesus Christ in his relation to the Father as eikwn (Image) and to the universe as prwtotokov (First-born).
[emphasis mine]
http://studylight.org/com/rwp/view.cgi?book=col&chapter=1&verse=15
"He who has seen Me has seen the Father"
Roberton says of verse 17:
Colossians 1:17 Before all things (pro pantwn). Pro with the ablative case. This phrase makes Paul's meaning plain. The precedence of Christ in time and the preeminence as Creator are both stated sharply. See the claim of Jesus to eternal timeless existence in John 8:58; 17:5. See also Revelation 22:13 where Christ calls himself the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning (arxh) and the End (telov). Paul states it also in 2 Corinthians 8:9; Philippians 2:6.
http://studylight.org/com/rwp/view.cgi?book=col&chapter=001&verse=017
The Greek original says in him (en autos). Sometimes the proposition in is translated differently because otherwise it may sound awkward in English, but there is no doubt that the Greeks swear in the prophets then by the prophets. Perhaps saying "in his name" would preserve the original meaning if not the form.
You are correct here - Robertson again points to, "in him" as the sphere of creative activity, and "through him" as the intermediate and sustaining agent. And don't forget "And unto him". And "because of whom" and "by means of whom" are applied to God concerning the universe in Hebrew 2:10. But he also says, "This central activity of Christ in the work of creation is presented also in John 1:3; Hebrews 1:2 and is a complete denial of the Gnostic philosophy."
http://studylight.org/com/rwp/view.cgi?book=col&chapter=001&verse=016
In short, there is nothing here in any of these comparative and superlative terms to support the heretical notion that Christ is a created being, In fact, the whole context proves just the opposite.
Cordially,
“On one hand the Catholics criticize Protestants for sola scriptura, relying on the Bible alone”
As it should be since sola scriptura is not Scriptural and but one way God communicates to us.
“and on the other hand, are now criticizing for abandoning Scripture.”
Both sides do this at times to zealously prove the other wrong. Again, a logical refutation.
After all, that's what is wrong with the whole thing. With bits and pieces, like a Leggo set, you can build whatever you want, and if you ignore the context, historical and other factors, never mnind the language, that are involved in these different writings then you are on a verge of fraud that looks deceptively true.
Jesus is quoted as saying that he is "I am"; he also claims to be the "other" lord in Psalm 100:1, which to a Greek unfamiliar with Judaism may seem perfectly believable, especially given that the LXX addressed both Lords with the same word (kyrios), unlike Hebrew which leaves no doubt the first Lord is the Lord God (Yahveh) and the second one is not divine (because that word is never used as a divine title).
And, given the intended purpose of the Psalms, which would be unknown to an average Greek listener, or for that matter any non-Jewish person being "saved" by the wondeirng apostles and missionaries, the "official truth" would be easily established.
There are many instances in the NT where Jesus is not making himself equal to God the Father, but lesser to him, but I didn't expect you to balance your examples with those or to explain why John would be more likely to say so then the others.
Man is an icon of God, according to the Bible, and with the Holy Spirit supposedly indwelling the believer, all the fullness of deity is in him bodily too! So what's the difference, except that Jesus, according to Paul, was the first to be transformed that way, hence the "firstborn of all creatures"!
Your examples of 2 Cor 3:18 (I imagine inadvertently) confirms this.
He who has seen Me has seen the Father"
How can that be? When, on another occasion, whoever wrote it the same Jesus says "the Father is greater than I"
If he and the Father are one (and the same, save for his Sonship) then how can he not know some things that only the Father knows?
If I hadn't mentioned the "in him" that would have been conveniently ignored and the "by him" would suggest otherwise. All these verbal acrobatics are an English necessity to attempt to express without going into deceptive language the meaning of the original languages.
In short, there is nothing here in any of these comparative and superlative terms to support the heretical notion that Christ is a created being, In fact, the whole context proves just the opposite
It doesn't prove anything. The Bible is believed on faith. That is its "proof." This book has been 'cooked' numerous times for the past 2,000 years and subjected to innumerable rationalizations, alterations, redactions, additions and deletions, to make it appear "harmonized" and without contradiction. Apparently, the "harmonization" continues to mimick the prevailing doctirne of the editors.
For a Book that is supposedly perspicuous, that even a 5-yearold can understand [sic], it sure is laborious and requires endless hyperbolic exegetical explanations by multiglot PhD intellectuals who can selectively stitch together any "official truth" to their liking.
Obviously debating to you means "agreeing with." That's novel. Debates, dear mom, are by definition encounters of opposite minds. We don't have presidential candidate debates because the candidates think alike, but because they disagree.
but [someone who] seems to make it their [sic] life’s mission to cast doubt and dispersion on the Bible and it’s truthfulness for the sole purpose of destroying another’s faith
How do you know that? Why don't you ask such individuals what their "life's mission" is rather than speculate they have one and what its "sole purpose" is?
As someone commented, why should anyone take the interpretation of the Bible of a self-proclaimed agnostic seriously?
Maybe you can tell me why should anyone take seriously biblical interpretations by a self-proclaimed believer? Especially, since there are so many variations in interpretations by vairous believers!
vairous =various
Catholics invest all of their theological validity tokens in the group authority of the Romanist priesthood. That Romanist priesthood accepts and continues to embrace Pelosi, Biden, Kennedy, and a host of other reprobate communist child murder-supporting servants of Lucifer, thereby negating any validity they may have held up to that point.
Sweeping untrue generalizations allow one to ignore the harder burden of thought.
“However, given the chronic slams from some of them”
Pot meet kettle.
Kettle...pot.
From “chronic” to ironic.
Credibility...
Epic fail lol.
That guy is a charlatan.
LOL.
Those “walks on by” are very numerous and large and colorful.
Nice try. Fail.
“It is somewhat pretentious of scholars today to presume they understand the koine Greek better than the Church did in her own language.”
NO ONE had a copyright on koine’ Greek. Sorry. And whether pretententious or not is not the question but their accuracy and scholarship.
So grab a concordance and discover that “hear” is often used to mean “understand” just as it does in English.
Bible translators may either keep to a more literal translation or use a dynamic rendering. Some examples:
Heb 5:11 “Of whom we have many things to say, and hard to be uttered seeing ye are dull of hearing.” AV
Heb. 5:11 “Concerning Him we have much to say, and much that it would be difficult to make clear to you, since you have become so dull of apprehension.” Weymouth New Testament
Heb. 5:11 “We have much to say about this, but it is difficult to explain because you have become too lazy to understand.” International Standard Version
Whether a translator maintains a more literal translation or not the context shows that AKOUO was used as a idiom for understanding or similar meanings. Example:
Romans 11:8 “as it is written God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see and ears that they should not hear unto this day.” AV
Mark 8:17,18 “And when Jesus knew it, he saith unto them, Why reason ye because ye have no bread ? perceive ye not yet, neither understand have ye your heart yet hardened
Having eyes, see ye not ? and having ears, hear ye not ? and do ye not remember” AV
So far you've been "kosta" along on your opinions, do you have anything more than that to offer? Not that they're pretentious or anything, no..no..nooo.
I’ll don’t worry that anyone is going to destroy my faith if that is their intent and I’ll debate as long as I see some reason to do so beyond finding a soft spot to poke. And my soft spots are not very tolerant of poking either.
Who knows, there may be a Barnabas under that Apollos hide.
How else am I supposed to post things that Calvin absolutely said and wrote? Sorry ,dear sister ,youtube was not available back than ;)
It’s interesting how it’s acceptable to some when they use them but not acceptable when it’s used back at them by others.
I don't see your point or connection since what I posted was what calvin actually wrote and believed-that Christ suffered in hell. The Church does not teach such a hideous diabolical thing,so there is nothing for you to cut and paste
Do you believe Christ suffered in hell?
Nice try at rewriting the history. Paul was preaching to Greek-sepaking crowds and the Gospels and the rest of the epistles were written after the destruction of the Temple (70 AD) when Christianity was all but rejected and actively persecuted by Israel and Rome.
The Church in Jerusalem was closed after, as the legend goes, James was stoned to death (62 AD), and by then Peter (who was in Rome and either dead or soon to be, but he wasn't in the Aramaic-speaking part of the world. Mark was in Egypt where Alexandrian Jews haven't spoken anything but Greek in centuries, and Thomas was in or near India. Andrew was in Asia minor (Greek speaking), and the rest of the legendary apostles were only God knows where, but they were not in Israel.
So, when the NT was written it was written in Greek, by Greeks and for Greeks. By the end of the century, Judaism rejected all Christian books (including the Old Testament LXX) because they were not in Hebrew, as well as their beliefs.
At that point, Christianity was no longer a Jewish sect by any stretch, but a sect of a Greek-speaking people, and that's when "John" wrote his Gospel, hellenizing Jesus into a Platonic deity for the pagan Greeks to find acceptable.
I don't need 19th century Protestant concordance sources because the Greek Church has records dating back to antiquity when the language of the Gospels was still the spoken language of the Fathers and the Church.
Their records therefore do have a copyright to koine Greek, understood and written in context of the times and culture when and where the NT was written. Your Protestant scholars don't.
Modern Evangelical translations seek to "harmonize" scripture at all cost even if it means changing the original. The Greeks swear "in" their prophets and not "by" their prophets and translating it as "by" is incorrect.
It is better to say "in the name of their prophets" then "by their prophets" because the "by" on many occasions in English leads to a conceptual change in biblical verses, which leads to theological errors due to translation.
One such famous change is to be found in "by whom all things were made..." rather than "in whom all things were made..." as written in the oldest of manuscripts in the original Greek.
On rare occasions akouo is pared with the verb to understand and in that context it is understood as a secondary form of 'understanding,' the way English expression "I see" can be.
But just as the English "to see," by itself, never means to understand, so neither does the Greek "akouo," by itself, mean to understand. Moreover, negative "akouo" by itself never means to not understand, which is precisely what the NIV and the like are peddling with Act 22:9, just so there would be no internal inconsistency.
It wouldn't be the first alteration of the text intended to fit the doctrine. The Bible is full of them.
Christ is with me all the time, and I receive His body blood soul and divinity as a meal at the Eucharist, as He commanded.
The commandment to do so is in every gospel (check “this is my body”); the Christ abiding in us is a promise of John 15:4; the verse you quote describe the coming of Christ in glory at the end of days but does not negate the completeness of His presence in the Eucharist. We are doing just fine. You?
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