I guess the Catholic Church wasn't sucked into abandoning the corruption in it that Luther spoke against after all, then, was it?
You know, things like the corrupt papacy, indulgences, money grubbing....
Oh, yeah, like Pope Oral Roberts, Bishop Benny Hinn, Cardinal Jimmy Swaggart, those guys? Oh, wait....
You know, things like the corrupt papacy, indulgences, money grubbing....
. . . RC SEX-CAPADES
Thank you all for your lively participation on this important topic.
I don’t know how is it that you posted so much yesterday and I could not connect either time I tried. Please consider contributing to FR. I am not aware of another forum where conservative Christians can mix and argue religion with such ease.
I will get to all your posts, hopefully, within a day or two, failing that, over the weekend.
In the meanwhile, I encourage you to read back to the beginning of the thread, where similar questions and objections were raised and answered with sufficient clarity.
To reiterate with a blanket statement, priests and the Catholic Church are a gift of God to us indeed; the Holy Scripture records that gift being given in the shape of the bishops/priests commanded to feed us the Eucharist, forgive or retain our sins, spread the gospel of salvation by grace of God alone, and give us guidance in everyday lives.
The heresy of salvation being not only by grace alone but also by faith alone is taught against in the scripture, al;most anywhere you look. We are, in scriptural fact, saved by both faith and good works, both of which are given us by the merciful God in grace.
Good works are not to be confused with pharisaical legalistic works “of law” that is doen out of obligation, against the salvific nature of which Christ argued witht he pharisees a lot and St. Paul wrote, especially in the letters to Galatians and to Romans
You don’t have to talk to me on FR to avail yourselves of these truths. Read Mathew 5-7. and 25, the ending chapters of any gospel, James 2, or examine your favorite prooftext from St. Paul and you will see that salvation by faith alone is never proclaimed in the gospel, but salvation by sovereign grace of God through faith and works of love is taught by all the scripture.
Note also that nowhere does the scripture say that works are an automatic consequence of faith. Good works often result from faith, but good works are a result of grace, not necessarily of faith. It is not merely an abstract heresy to separate the two, it has a harmful effect on society around us. Turn away from it.
This is not to dismiss any individual post to me; I will respond soon.
Some impulses behind the reformation were valid; it was certainly worthwhile to discern the proper biblical doctrine of justification in the face of Luther's queries. But the true reform occurred thanks to the council of Trent.
As to the Church's occasional failings, it is an institution made up by people. We see tha Apostles failing in the Primitive Church, we see bishops failing today. That is neither here or there as far as our theological dispute goes.