Testimony of a Former Irish Priest

BereanBeacon.Org ^ | Richard Peter Bennett

[Jvette]

St. Augustine, like many church fathers and doctors was never the pope.

Like Origen and Tertullian and others not quite as famous, the pope, speaking ex cathedra, has the final word on what is truth and what is not.

This is one of the things I love most about the church, and that is that I can trust that once all the theology has been studied and sifted through, the church will infallibly state what is truth and what is not.

How else could Jesus have fulfilled His promise that the Spirit would lead us to all truth and that the gates of Hell would not prevail against His church?

It is impossible for everyone to be right when thousands of interpretations contradict each other and the Word is used as a weapon against others rather than as the testament it is meant to be.

[Mad Dawg]

I think you made my point.

If the barbarians were attacking the unimportant south gate, while the more important north gate were not under attack, would you stay by the north gate or would you go repel the attack where it was actually happening?

You guys attack on statues, rosaries, Marian dogma. So we defend there. THEN you conclude that those are the things most important to us.

Despite the barrage of big letters, I think I discern the allegation that what is most important to us is hard to discern. I'd suggest the Nicene Creed is where you will find what is MOST important. It is not for me to say how recondite and difficult that might be.

But the talk of two or three lists exposes the challenge metmom made and you affirmed as really just smoke, as I thought. You're sure you're right, but when asked what you're right about, there are first two, then maybe three lists, contents to be announced later.

Whereas I can point to the Creed, and explain why it doesn't get the kind of air time here that would affirm its importance -- namely that it's not what most of you spend most of your time attacking.

Is this about truth or is it about winning?

[Jvette]

As with most protestants, you assume that it must be explicitly stated in Scripture, until it actually is and then you reject it as a Roman construct.

You say that you can easily prove sola scriptura from Scripture, though, no where in Scripture does it say that Scripture alone is all authority.

Wouldn’t that be the same as saying that sola scriptura is verifiable by Scripture though it is not explicitly stated as such in the text?

Talk about contradiction.

[Cronos]

Sigh, Iscool, excerpting again out of context -- read the ENTIRE book in context, Romans 15:19-23 gives you more clarity:

19by the power of signs and miracles, through the power of the Spirit. So from Jerusalem all the way around to Illyricum, I have fully proclaimed the gospel of Christ.
20It has always been my ambition to preach the gospel where Christ was not known, so that I would not be building on someone else's foundation.
21Rather, as it is written:
"Those who were not told about him will see,
and those who have not heard will understand."[g]
22This is why I have often been hindered from coming to you.
23But now that there is no more place for me to work in these regions, and since I have been longing for many years to see you,

What does Paul actually say?:

19 --> from Jerusalem to Albania (Illyricum), I have fully proclaimed the gospel of Christ Now, you probably have never heard of Illyricum before, or even Albania, so let me educate you -- it is east of Rome, so from Israel to the land to the east of Italy might make sense to you -- anyway, Paul said that until then he had only travelled in the eastern mediterranean, not to Italy (and Rome is in Italy...)

20 --> Here Paul says that it was always his ambition to preach where the Gospel has not yet been preached

21 --> Here Paul quotes from scripture

22 --> Here Paul explains that because his ambition was
1. to preach in places where the gospel has not yet been preached and
2. he has not travelled to Italy or west of Italy (hence never to Rome),
due to these two reasons he has not been able to come to Rome

23 --> But now he is longing to visit Rome


It is good to actually READ what one posts and READ the Bible -- your example above is a perfect case of why sola scriptura FAILS. Without the lack of knowledge on Aramaic and GReek meanings, by reading OUT OF CONTEXT and NOT IN ENTIRETY, sola scriptura fails and all your posts are perfect examples of this failure

[Quix]

NOTE: SEE SERIOUS FACEBOOK WARNING IN LAST HALF OF THIS POST.—OFF TOPIC I REALIZE

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MAD DAWG:

HONESTLY, IT IS ABOUT TRUTH.

I never had any illusions or delusions

about “winning” hereon vis a vis most RC’s.

However, I’m not very inclined to carry this further at this time. Your points are understandable and well made.

I think they left out a good deal and are askew of the import we are dealing with from our perspective.

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FACE BOOK WARNING:

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http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-10796584

100 MILLION FACEBOOK USERS DATA COLLECTED AND POSTED

[Cronos]

the ones that most Catholics hold most dear.

AHA, now are you omniscient? What exactly do you think is what most Catholics hold dear?

[wagglebee]

Whereas I can point to the Creed, and explain why it doesn't get the kind of air time here that would affirm its importance -- namely that it's not what most of you spend most of your time attacking.

The anti-Catholics claim adherence to the Nicene Creed, but their statements about the Blessed Mother would indicate that they actually adhere to either Nestorian or Arian heresies.

[Cronos]

Whereas I can point to the Creed, and explain why it doesn't get the kind of air time here that would affirm its importance --

Well, actually, I don't think many of the posters here even hold to the creed. I'll let them say small "c" catholic, but even then they don't agree with the points in the Nicene Creed.

Iscool has said he doesn't (correct, iscool?)

And Old Reggie, being unitarian wouldnt' agree to the Creed at all

Perhaps if Quix is Oneness Pentecostal then he would agree with old Reggie?

And not sure about metmum at all

[MarkBsnr]

you mean, St. Augustine wrote this: would not believe in the Gospel if the authority of the Catholic Church did not move me to do so.)

Absolutely, in his brilliant response to Mani: Against the letter of Mani, 5,6, 397 A.D.

Some more:

"We must hold to the Christian religion and to communication in her Church which is Catholic, and which is called Catholic not only by her members but even by all her enemies. For when heretics or the adherents of schisms talk about her, not among themselves but with strangers, willy-nilly they call her nothing else but Catholic. For they would not be understood unless they distinguish her by this name which the whole world employs in her regard." The True Religion, 7,12, 397 A.D.

"This Church is Holy, the One Church, the True Church, the Catholic Church, fighting as she does against all heresies. She can fight, but she cannot be beaten. All heresies are expelled from her, like the useless loppings pruned from a vine. She remains fixed in her root, in her vine, in her love. The gates of hell shall not conquer her." Sermon to Catechumens, on the Creed, 6,14, 395 A.D.

"But in regard to those observances which we carefully attend and which the whole world keeps, and which derive not from Scripture but from tradition, we are given to understand that they are recommended and ordained to be kept either by the Apostles themselves or by plenary Councils, the authority of which is quite vital to the Church." Letter to Januarius 54,1,1, 400 A.D.

"I believe that this practice comes from apostolic tradition, just as so many other practices not found in their writings nor in the councils of their successors, but which, because they are kept by the whole Church everywhere, are believed to have been commended and handed down by the Apostles themselves." Baptism 1,12,20, 400 A.D.

"Before His suffering the Lord Jesus Christ, as you know, chose His disciples, whom He called Apostles. Among these Apostles almost everywhere Peter alone merited to represent the whole Church. For the sake of his representing the whole Church, which he alone could do, he merited to hear, I will give you the keys of the kingdom of Heaven (Matt 16:19)." Sermons 295,2, 391 A.D.

"Since by Christ's favor we are Catholic Christians:" Letter to Vitalis, 217,5,16, 427 A.D.

"By the same word, by the same Sacrament you were born, but you will not come to the same inheritance of eternal life, unless you return to the Catholic Church." Sermons, 3, 391 A.D.

"Tell us straight out that you do not believe in the Gospel of Christ; for you believe what you want in the Gospel and disbelieve what you want. You believe in yourself rather than in the Gospel." Against Faustus, 17, 3, 400 A.D.

"Adam sleeps that Eve may be formed; Christ dies that the Church may be formed. Eve is formed from the side of the sleeping Adam; the side of the dead Christ is pierced by the lance, so that the Sacraments may flow out, of which the Church is formed." Homilies on the Gospel of John, 9,10, 416 A.D.

"What the soul is to man's body, the Holy Spirit is to the Body of Christ, which is the Church. The Holy Spirit does in the whole Church what the soul does in all members of one body. But see what you must beware of, see what you must take note of, see what you must fear. It happens that in the human body, or rather, off the body, some member, whether hand, finger, or foot, may be cut away. And if a member be cut off, does the soul go with it? When the member was in the body, it lived; and off, its life is lost. So too, a Christian man is Catholic while he lives in the body; cut off, he is made a heretic; the Spirit does not follow an amputated member." Sermons, 267, 4, 391-430 A.D.

"Let us not listen to those who deny that the Church of GOD is able to forgive all sins. They are wretched indeed, because they do not recognize in Peter the rock and they refuse to believe that the keys of the kingdom of heaven, lost from their own hands, have been given to the Church." Christian Combat 31,33, 396 A.D.

"The Catholic Church is the work of Divine Providence, achieved through the prophecies of the prophets, through the Incarnation and the teaching of Christ, through the journeys of the Apostles, through the suffering, the crosses, the blood and the death of the martyrs, through the admirable lives of the saints. When, then, we see so much help on God's part, so much progress and so much fruit, shall we hesitate to bury ourselves in the bosom of that Church? For starting from the Apostolic Chair down through successions of bishops, even unto the open confession of all mankind, it has possessed the crown of teaching authority." The Advantage of Believing, 391 A.D.

It is difficult to read Augustine and even consider trying to be a non Catholic Christian...

[Quix]

Fascinating how some on your side persist in smugly posting 100% false personal assaults while holding prissy attitudes toward Proddys in general and all things related thereto.

Very impressive.

I don’t feel that I owe the sources of jerk-y brazen, outrageous falsehoods much of anything . . . excpet perhaps spit.

God has a list of what THEY hold most dear. That’s the only list that REALLY counts.

[Quix]

BTW,

Dear Bro,

Maybe, just maybe . . . you could help me with the sociology, psychology, social psychology of something persistently evident hereon as repeatedly demonstrated by a huge chunk of RC’s:

They seem to have an UTTER

INCAPACITY

OR

UNWILLINGNESS

to DISTINGUISH, DIFFERENTIATE,

to treat as functionally different

FIERCE ASSERTIONS ABOUT BELIEFS AND PRACTICES

VS

DELIBERATELY NASTY PERSONAL ASSAULTS.

WHAT IS !!!!WITH!!!!!! THAT????

I don’t see that problem on the Proddy side at all.

Zip. 0.000001%

Mystifying.

[Cronos]

1. I only see you using the term "Proddy" and using it to mean something disparaging, no one else on this thread or even this forum has used it

2. We don't have any comments about all Protestants (big umbrella here to include all groups outside the One Holy Apostolic Church (Catholic-Orthodox-Oriental-Assyrian)) --> the attackers of the Church on this thread are overwhelmingly not from any mainstream Protestant group --> you are not Anglican or Lutheran or Methodist or Mennonite or even Presbyterian or Assemblies of God Pentecostal. Some of the posters on your side are not even Trinitarians

[Natural Law]

"St. Augustine, like many church fathers and doctors was never the pope."

Protestants will not / cannot comprehend the structure of the Church because they see it through the lens of their own limitations. Within the Church it is the ideas advanced that have stature and importance and, like all endeavors sincerely interested in the truth, every idea is pushed to its extremes by peer review and testing. There is no shame for actions and positions taken in the search for the truth, even when one is publicly wrong in the process.

In contrast, Protestant dogma is dictated by a self anointed few. Protestant emphasis is on gaining personal glory and followers by finding or creating the hidden decryption keys planted by God within Scripture to ensure that only the chosen elect, clever enough to "get it", gain salvation.

We catholics are truly blesses that within the Catholic Church the Holy Spirit is allowed to speak, guide and correct through a consensus developed over thousands of years.

[Deo volente]

“IF you're not going to post some scripture in your defense, one can only conclude that those links are non-starters..”

__________________________________________________________________________
WHAT??!! Those sites that I linked are chock full of Scriptures in defense of Catholicism. Did you even bother to click on them and read them? Obviously not. The reason I didn't list all the Scriptural verses is it would clog up the thread.
But if that's what you want, here's some Scripture coming at you, in defense of the Catholic Sacrament of Confession, copied and pasted from one of those links:

. Jesus Christ Granted the Apostles His Authority to Forgive Sins

John 20:21 - before He grants them the authority to forgive sins, Jesus says to the apostles, “as the Father sent me, so I send you.” As Christ was sent by the Father to forgive sins, so Christ sends the apostles and their successors forgive sins.

John 20:22 - the Lord “breathes” on the apostles, and then gives them the power to forgive and retain sins. The only other moment in Scripture where God breathes on man is in Gen. 2:7, when the Lord “breathes” divine life into man. When this happens, a significant transformation takes place.

John 20:23 - Jesus says, “If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven. If you retain the sins of any, they are retained.” In order for the apostles to exercise this gift of forgiving sins, the penitents must orally confess their sins to them because the apostles are not mind readers. The text makes this very clear.

Matt. 9:8 - this verse shows that God has given the authority to forgive sins to “men.” Hence, those Protestants who acknowledge that the apostles had the authority to forgive sins (which this verse demonstrates) must prove that this gift ended with the apostles. Otherwise, the apostles’ successors still possess this gift. Where in Scripture is the gift of authority to forgive sins taken away from the apostles or their successors?

Matt. 9:6; Mark 2:10 - Christ forgave sins as a man (not God) to convince us that the “Son of man” has authority to forgive sins on earth.

Luke 5:24 - Luke also points out that Jesus’ authority to forgive sins is as a man, not God. The Gospel writers record this to convince us that God has given this authority to men. This authority has been transferred from Christ to the apostles and their successors.

Matt. 18:18 - the apostles are given authority to bind and loose. The authority to bind and loose includes administering and removing the temporal penalties due to sin. The Jews understood this since the birth of the Church.

John 20:22-23; Matt. 18:18 - the power to remit/retain sin is also the power to remit/retain punishment due to sin. If Christ's ministers can forgive the eternal penalty of sin, they can certainly remit the temporal penalty of sin (which is called an “indulgence”).

2 Cor. 2:10 - Paul forgives in the presence of Christ (some translations refer to the presences of Christ as “in persona Christi”). Some say that this may also be a reference to sins.

2 Cor. 5:18 - the ministry of reconciliation was given to the ambassadors of the Church. This ministry of reconciliation refers to the sacrament of reconciliation, also called the sacrament of confession or penance.

James 5:15-16 - in verse 15 we see that sins are forgiven by the priests in the sacrament of the sick. This is another example of man's authority to forgive sins on earth. Then in verse 16, James says “Therefore, confess our sins to one another,” in reference to the men referred to in verse 15, the priests of the Church.

1 Tim. 2:5 - Christ is the only mediator, but He was free to decide how His mediation would be applied to us. The Lord chose to use priests of God to carry out His work of forgiveness.

Lev. 5:4-6; 19:21-22 - even under the Old Covenant, God used priests to forgive and atone for the sins of others.
 

II. The Necessity and Practice of Orally Confessing Sins

James 5:16 - James clearly teaches us that we must “confess our sins to one another,” not just privately to God. James 5:16 must be read in the context of James 5:14-15, which is referring to the healing power (both physical and spiritual) of the priests of the Church. Hence, when James says “therefore” in verse 16, he must be referring to the men he was writing about in verses 14 and 15 – these men are the ordained priests of the Church, to whom we must confess our sins.

Acts 19:18 - many came to orally confess sins and divulge their sinful practices. Oral confession was the practice of the early Church just as it is today.

Matt. 3:6; Mark 1:5 - again, this shows people confessing their sins before others as an historical practice (here to John the Baptist).

1 Tim. 6:12 - this verse also refers to the historical practice of confessing both faith and sins in the presence of many witnesses.

1 John 1:9 - if we confess are sins, God is faithful to us and forgives us and cleanse us. But we must confess our sins to one another.

Num. 5:7 - this shows the historical practice of publicly confessing sins, and making public restitution.

2 Sam. 12:14 - even though the sin is forgiven, there is punishment due for the forgiven sin. David is forgiven but his child was still taken (the consequence of his sin).

Neh. 9:2-3 - the Israelites stood before the assembly and confessed sins publicly and interceded for each other.

Sir. 4:26 - God tells us not to be ashamed to confess our sins, and not to try to stop the current of a river. Anyone who has experienced the sacrament of reconciliation understands the import of this verse.

Baruch 1:14 - again, this shows that the people made confession in the house of the Lord, before the assembly.

1 John 5:16-17; Luke 12:47-48 - there is a distinction between mortal and venial sins. This has been the teaching of the Catholic Church for 2,000 years, but, today, most Protestants no longer agree that there is such a distinction. Mortal sins lead to death and must be absolved in the sacrament of reconciliation. Venial sins do not have to be confessed to a priest, but the pious Catholic practice is to do so in order to advance in our journey to holiness.

Matt. 5:19 - Jesus teaches that breaking the least of commandments is venial sin (the person is still saved but is least in the kingdom), versus mortal sin (the person is not saved).

[Dr. Eckleburg]

Perhaps you've never heard of the Presbyterian Order of Worship. It is uniform throughout Presbyterian churches. I googled "Presbyterian Order of Worship" and this is the first entry that came up. I don't even know where this church is located. Please note the "Gospel reading" from Matthew 6:19-33 and later Matthew 28:18-20...

ORDER OF WORSHIP

[don-o]

Pretentious and patently delusional puffery. But since 99.99% of the poster’s contributions consist of nothing but negation and ridicule, not at all surprising.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

I can only assume you are aware of the long road Augustine took until he came to his mature faith in Scripture and God's hand in all things.

If not, read up about him. He's a fascinating character. His early life was unencumbered by God and grace, his early ministry was popish, and his mature works are Predestinarian and Scriptural.

[Global2010]

Great testimonial.

Thanks for sharing.

IMO personal testimonials such as yours draws us all closer together as God intends in Love/Praise/Worship/Celebration ect.

Your a lucky man to be married to Mrs.Don-o.

[Quix]

I think it’s a silly question, MOSTLY, anyway.

Any Proddy congregation worth the label is awash in Scripture every week year around.

Matching some prissy hollow hypocritical phoney RELIGIOUS law sort of criteria of major idolators and blasphemers is not an exercise that seems remotely reasonable or fruitful, to me.

[Global2010]

OK my mistake to post it. /admitting I was wrong

So I will assume the lipstick form would be not a good idea either. /smart alec