Posted on 07/22/2010 11:01:11 AM PDT by the_conscience
Edited on 07/23/2010 8:45:24 AM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
But is it a defensive response or do they instigate it? Pick a thread on the Religion Forum about Catholicism that has several hundred posts or more, read the first page of posts and it becomes very clear how and when the attacks started.
Why do you think that Catholics have been able to succeed in having regular caucus threads? Keep in mind that the ONLY WAY we can do this is to have these threads where opposing beliefs are not mentioned. Why is that so difficult for Protestants to do?
I just gave you a simple example. The rules here are not difficult to comply with. If you find them overwhelming, perhaps you should go elsewhere.
You wrote:
“The confession which this thread posted was pretty much consistent with the Westminster Confession which IS the “doctrine of Presbyterian (and most reformed)sects”.”
The caucus idea at the top of this thread was nonsensical to start with. And what was done was done in such a way that it allowed Catholics to post in the thread.
“Or maybe Protestants should just ask your permission before designating any topic a caucus.”
Or maybe Protestants should just follow the rules which are pretty simple. How about that?
“As I said, this thread was a very eye-opening experience and asnwered a lot of questions.”
I found it eye-opening too. The fact that someone would post something like this, “Roman Catholics please do not trash our thread. We’re trying to have a friendly dialogue here” was very telling. The thread was a bad idea from the beginning.
My first impression is that it is not simply a statement of a positive. ("The Lord IHS Christ is, as Paul saith, the Head of the Body so that no other man should be called the head of the Church on earth." Something like that, and even the "so that" clause seems unnecessary, strictly speaking.) The almost repetitive nature of it suggests that it is in reaction to something -- and, IF that's right, the something would be those churches in communion with the See of Rome.
Are you thinking it is nothing more than a statement of general principle?
I don't think it's a no-brainer either way in any event.
The principle applied here was that a caucus thread cannot [explicitly] attack a group of Christians not included in the Caucus 'set'.
So the question to argue is "Whether Chapter 10 is an [explicit] attack on the [so-called] Catholic Church."
And a related question, or an approach to the discussion might be "Whether the "if the shoe fits, wear it" standard means something is an attack or not."
In things like the Creed or the Chalcedonian Definition, I do not recall (not that that's a reliable standard) any "And they that say X are to be held accursed," or "As the so-and-so do falsely boast." But of course such language appears in later Conciliar canons.
It would be interesting to analyze the 39 articles to see if they could qualify for Caucus status. N any event the burden placed, whether fairly or not, on at least some non-Catholic groups APPEARS to be that they may have to argue that some of their statements or confessional chapters or whatever are not intended as being 'against' those Churches in communion with the See of Rome.
Depending on how one interprets "They," this could be a caucus killer.
My understanding is that those not in the Caucus 'set' cannot participate unless invited. But surely somebody in the 'set' could disagree with the post, so an "Orthodox" person could attack the "confession", isn't that correct?
It’s clearly a matter of whose straw is being picked.
That’s ok. That was the point of the exercise.
I imagine a thread like this, a “Protestant/Orthodox caucus” thread could be used as much to discuss things that are different between the two groups as are in common.
In other words, as long as the discussion was kept to the particular beliefs of the two groups, it would be possible to discuss the differences that lie between them. The Orthodox, as an example, could provide their view of icons, and the Protestants thereby oppose those views with their own.
The Protestants could defend the solas, and the Orthodox could attack that defense.
But I guess my difficulty is, if the caucus label is going to be used to “screen out” certain folks, i.e., Catholics, then what happens if topics discussed include things believed by both Orthodox AND Catholics? After all, Catholics accept icons, and fully agree with Orthodox explication of the theology of icons.
To attack the theology of icons is to attack Catholic belief as well as Orthodox belief. How could a caucus thread that excluded Catholics be used to discuss the theology of icons in a negative way? Would not Catholics have a right to offer defense for this shared Orthodox/Catholic belief?
Thus, trying to restrict the caucus to topics of either only Protestant or Orthodox interest might yield a rather number of limited topics that one might discuss about Orthodoxy, and, ironically, perhaps all of those topics might be inappropriate for a caucus thread, in that those topics would almost certainly be points of contention between Orthodox and Catholics.
It seems to me that the only fit subject matter for such a caucus would be uniquely Protestant beliefs - the Protestant defense thereof and the Orthodox argument against them. And, of course, if the Protestants desired a caucus designation, their arguments on behalf of their uniquely Protestant beliefs would have to be presented in a way that didn't disparage those beliefs of the Orthodox held in common by Catholics, and also didn't disparage the beliefs of Catholics NOT held in common with the Orthodox.
Perhaps this particular caucus combination is a chimera.
sitetest
“Depending on how one interprets...”
lol
You have to have some mighty fine cheesecloth to try and catch that gnat.
If a Protestant thinks that Protestants and Orthodox are in substantial agreement in other major areas they need to address these:
1. The Real Presence in the Eucharist.
2. The Theotokos and the Dormition.
3. Rejection of sola scriptura.
4. Iconography.
5. The Deuterocanonical Books.
I will never forget a thread a few years ago where a horde of Protestants game in despite an uncontested Caucus designation and the thread was opened, a la Obama border policy, because of the invasion, rather than the topic of the thread. I withheld donations from FR for some months in response.
Here I think Chapter ten is controversial and a reasonable person could go either way, and as I said, when you made a wholesale condemnation of us, in ignorance that at least I and probably others had decided to stay away despite what seemed to be the invalidating potential of Chapter 10, you may have fired your cannon through your own hull -- below the waterline.
That’s ok. That was the point of the exercise.
This "caucus" is evidently no more than an underhanded device by one freeper to bait and taunt Catholics. It's a contemptible and childish tactic, one which would never be used by an honorable evangelist.
Quotes from by the originator of this now-defunct "caucus" thread:
Roman Catholics please do not trash our thread. We're trying to have a friendly dialogue here.They just can’t help themselves. Please remove post.
Are you Eastern Orthodox. If not, why is it so hard to follow the rules?
My goodness! This thread is be overrun by Romanists. Can I get a witness?! Unfortunately some of your coreligionists are unable to control themselves and their only concern is disrupting things around here. You seem to be one of the few reasonable amongst your party so I have no problem with your posting on this thread.
Dear RM,
Like a horde of Turks bent on sacking Byzantine the Romanist have run roughshod over our caucus. We non-Romanists realize that Romanists believe they are above the rule of law. Here’s an opportunity for our Romanist FRiends to learn a true American value. Please delete posts: 2,14,15,17,20,25,26,28,29,31,32, and 33.
Thank you.That’s funny, I always thought “crossing the Tiber” meant entering Romanism and thus Babylon, and the whore and all that.
I think the old dictum about the 5th amendment's self-incrimination provision applies here: It is a shield, not a sword.
If a thread with a provocative OP is put up in order to prove a bias on the part of the RM, it is entirely legitimate to question the validity of its appeal for Caucus protection.
Like the cowards who launch artillery from behind a shield of women and children, those who seek to use the Caucus designation as cover for attacks on others ought not to be surprised nor consider themselves aggrieved when the designation is removed.
And as for complaining that it is straining at gnats when a wholesale attack is considered a .. wait for it .. wholesale attack, well some always complain when the rules are taken as rules.
Personally I don't think an adopted pose of injured innocence meets any of my needs, nor do I think the pose grants the poseur with any moral claim on me.
It is fascinating, but not edifying, to watch someone shoot himself in the foot and then try to blame his injury on the unfairness of others.
LOL!
As I pointed out, a caucus doesn't necessarily have to focus on common agreement between two groups. It COULD focus on the differences between two groups.
After all, the points of agreement between Protestantism, generally speaking, and Orthodoxy amount to little more than a bit of shared Trinitarianism (even the Orthodox understanding of the papacy is far closer to the Catholic understanding than the general Protestant rejection of it). It'd be a short conversation. And the rationale for excluding other Trinitarians (e.g. - Catholics) would be little more than spite.
Thus, perhaps, a caucus thread could be established between Pentecostals who believe in UFOs and Pentecostals who don't. Or between Anglicans who accept the ordination of women and those who don't. Or between some Protestant group that generally believes that women should and can be ministers, and another Protestant group that doesn't.
And these two groups could have at it with each other, without interference from others.
I mean, heck, we Catholics don't believe that any Protestants have any sort of valid Holy Orders, so we should be indifferent to the question of whether women can be Protestant ministers. We don't have a dog in that fight.
Even with regard to the question of the Real Presence, since no Protestants whatsoever have the True Sacrament, as long as the caucus participants were careful not to directly disparage Catholicism, what would we care if the OPCers went after the Lutherans on the question?
The difficulty with a “Protestant/Orthodox (exclusive of Catholic) caucus” is that there is an identity between most of our theology and most of Orthodox theology. It isn't even that we agree with the Orthodox on most things, it's that we share nearly all the same theology. Both of our spiritual ancestors sat together at the Councils to affirm Christ's two natures, the Trinity, the Theotokos, the rejection of iconoclasm, etc.
It's not that there is an Orthodox theology of the two natures of Christ and a Catholic theology of them, and ours is like theirs. It's that there is a theology of the two natures of Christ of the Undivided Church, to which both Orthodox and Catholic are the legitimate heirs.
Thus, to attack the “Orthodox” teaching of this theology is to attack the Faith of the Undivided Church, in which the Catholic Church shares as well.
And to try to hold a caucus that would be meant to discuss differences between Protestants and Orthodox while excluding Catholics from the discussion would be a little difficult, since little of what the Orthodox believe is not what Catholics believe, too.
sitetest
I wonder if they have actually used such tactics on Catholics in person? If so, I can only be thankful that the the success rate would have to be low to nil.
Like the cowards who launch artillery from behind a shield of women and children, those who seek to use the Caucus designation as cover for attacks on others ought not to be surprised nor consider themselves aggrieved when the designation is removed.
It is evident to me that fruitful dialogue was not the goal. Not at all.
Personally I don't think an adopted pose of injured innocence meets any of my needs, nor do I think the pose grants the poseur with any moral claim on me.
Amen, brother.
I can see you are very used to telling people to do this. Which is very consistent with what I've seen on this thread.
That's not quite true with regards to certain Anglicans (and possibly some Lutherans).
Thus, to attack the “Orthodox” teaching of this theology is to attack the Faith of the Undivided Church, in which the Catholic Church shares as well.
My suspicion is that there is an ongoing attempt to drive a wedge between the Catholics and Orthodox on FR.
The major disagreements between the Catholics and Orthodox are over papal primacy (the Orthodox do not reject the pope as a bishop and are typically willing to acknowledge him as "first among equals," but they reject primacy) and the Filoque (an issue that Protestants typically agree with Catholics on and non-theologians typically don't understand the significance of).
Chapter 10 says nothing that Chapter 25 of the Westminster Confession doesn't say. Clearly a doctrinal creed. I guess we can't have the Westminster Confession quoted on a Protestant caucus thread either. I've seen Catholic caucus threads which go on and on about the authority of tradition. This could just as easily be characterized as an attack on Protestants as chapter 10 in the creed originally posted on this thread is asserted to be. The hypocrisy and venom is breathtaking.
Of course not, the premise of this was a confession of a Orthodox patriarch which was totally rejected by the Orthodox; however, NOTHING in the body of the thread acknowleded this fact (interestingly enough, if you click the link, this fact IS acknowledged by the source but this was excerpted WITHOUT ANY INDICATION).
This thread would be akin to posting a thread based on the writings of Nestorius and never acknowledging that the Catholic Church had rejected them.
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