Posted on 10/28/2011 6:59:29 AM PDT by markomalley
October 31 is only three days away. For Protestants, it is Reformation Day, the date in 1517 on which Martin Luther nailed his Ninety-Five Theses to that famous door in Wittenberg, Germany. Since I returned to the Catholic Church in April 2007, each year the commemoration has become a time of reflection about my own journey and the puzzles that led me back to the Church of my youth.
One of those puzzles was the relationship between the Church, Tradition, and the canon of Scripture. As a Protestant, I claimed to reject the normative role that Tradition plays in the development of Christian doctrine. But at times I seemed to rely on it. For example, on the content of the biblical canon – whether the Old Testament includes the deuterocanonical books (or “Apocrypha”), as the Catholic Church holds and Protestantism rejects. I would appeal to the exclusion of these books as canonical by the Jewish Council of Jamnia (A.D. 90-100) as well as doubts about those books raised by St. Jerome, translator of the Latin Vulgate, and a few other Church Fathers.
My reasoning, however, was extra-biblical. For it appealed to an authoritative leadership that has the power to recognize and certify books as canonical that were subsequently recognized as such by certain Fathers embedded in a tradition that, as a Protestant, I thought more authoritative than the tradition that certified what has come to be known as the Catholic canon. This latter tradition, rejected by Protestants, includes St. Augustine as well as the Council of Hippo (A.D. 393), the Third Council of Carthage (A.D. 397), the Fourth Council of Carthage (A.D. 419), and the Council of Florence (A.D. 1441).
But if, according to my Protestant self, a Jewish council and a few Church Fathers are the grounds on which I am justified in saying what is the proper scope of the Old Testament canon, then what of New Testament canonicity? So, ironically, given my Protestant understanding of ecclesiology, then the sort of authority and tradition that apparently provided me warrant to exclude the deuterocanonical books from Scripture – binding magisterial authority with historical continuity – is missing from the Church during the development of New Testament canonicity.
The Catholic Church, on the other hand, maintains that this magisterial authority was in fact present in the early Church and thus gave its leadership the power to recognize and fix the New Testament canon. So, ironically, the Protestant case for a deuterocanonical-absent Old Testament canon depends on Catholic intuitions about a tradition of magisterial authority.
This led to two other tensions. First, in defense of the Protestant Old Testament canon, I argued, as noted above, that although some of the Church’s leading theologians and several regional councils accepted what is known today as the Catholic canon, others disagreed and embraced what is known today as the Protestant canon. It soon became clear to me that this did not help my case, since by employing this argumentative strategy, I conceded the central point of Catholicism: the Church is logically prior to the Scriptures. That is, if the Church, until the Council of Florence’s ecumenical declaration in 1441, can live with a certain degree of ambiguity about the content of the Old Testament canon, that means that sola scriptura was never a fundamental principle of authentic Christianity.
After all, if Scripture alone applies to the Bible as a whole, then we cannot know to which particular collection of books this principle applies until the Bible’s content is settled. Thus, to concede an officially unsettled canon for Christianity’s first fifteen centuries seems to make the Catholic argument that sola scriptura was a sixteenth-century invention and, therefore, not an essential Christian doctrine.
Second, because the list of canonical books is itself not found in Scripture – as one can find the Ten Commandments or the names of Christ’s apostles – any such list, whether Protestant or Catholic, would be an item of extra-biblical theological knowledge. Take, for example, a portion of the revised and expanded Evangelical Theological Society statement of faith suggested (and eventually rejected by the membership) by two ETS members following my return to the Catholic Church. It states that, “this written word of God consists of the sixty-six books of the Old and New Testaments and is the supreme authority in all matters of belief and behavior.”
But the belief that the Bible consists only of sixty-six books is not a claim of Scripture, since one cannot find the list in it, but a claim about Scripture as a whole. That is, the whole has a property – i.e., “consisting of sixty-six books,” – that is not found in any of the parts. In other words, if the sixty-six books are the supreme authority on matters of belief, and the number of books is a belief, and one cannot find that belief in any of the books, then the belief that Scripture consists of sixty-six particular books is an extra-biblical belief, an item of theological knowledge that is prima facie non-biblical.
For the Catholic, this is not a problem, since the Bible is the book of the Church, and thus there is an organic unity between the fixing of the canon and the development of doctrine and Christian practice.
Although I am forever indebted to my Evangelical brethren for instilling and nurturing in me a deep love of Scripture, it was that love that eventually led me to the Church that had the authority to distinguish Scripture from other things.
Perhaps you did not read the credit to the author. Look again, or give me the post number and I’ll look at it for you. “Which cannot be authenticated?” BWHAHAHAH! NOTHING your Church SAYS can be “authenticated”. From fraudulent writings contributed to the early Church Fathers, to varying and disagreeing statements and “histories” of popes and their decrees, excommunicating each other, concordats with EVIL, and persecution of all who do not bend the knee to Rome. It’s ALL one big fraud. You’ll look in vain for a truthful exegis on the Catholic Church. Unless you look at former Catholics who have come forward with the “truth” of your Church. But then, you won’t believe them, will you? They are Church “heretics” and “anathema”. That leaves a real conundrum. Challenge away, it’s one institution’s lies against former member’s testimonies. You choose which to believe. You all take at face value what is presented to you as truth. The Scriptures are not searched to “see if those things were so”. They are just accepted as “fact” by the “faithful”. That’s not my problem. That’s RCC members problem. It seems. Good luck
What is your extrinsic evidence for this? Show me the verse apart from John Calvin’s Institutes on the Christian Religion, which invented this whole notion.
The Bible is not exactly plain and easy for just anyone.
Explain to me for example why Martin Luther was unbiblical when he taught baptismal regeneration without appealing to the Bible.
We can play Bible bingo all night, but it still comes back to your personal TRADITION of biblical hermaneutics.
When I was a Lutheran, I was taught Sola Scriptura, but our interpretation of the Bible alone was radically different than what Evangelicals believe.
Do you think you are personally infallible when you interpret the Bible?
The Catholic Church venerates those specks of truth and the remnants of God’s original revelation to Adam where they make themselves present.
So the fact Muslims are monotheists and venerate Abraham is commendable, but it ends there.
Yeah well, Luther wasn’t such a nice guy and Calvin had Servetis (sp?) burned at the stake so I don’t agree with all of their beliefs either. That’s why I believe in Sola Scriptura. I’ll listen but I’m going to check how it stacks up with scripture. If what they teach or do doesn’t, I don’t believe it. If we can’t trust scripture with the help of the Holy Spirit then we have nothing. If we begin to believe other men completely there is more chance of getting led astray.
Therefore because the divine nature and human nature were inseparable she became the Mother of God.
By saying that Mary was not the Mother of God you are denying that Jesus’s human nature and divine nature were inseparable after the incarnation.
Doing so would be shear Nestorianism.
The catechism attributes that quote to St. Athanasius from his work defining his theology of divinization, so he would be the author, not the catechism.
As I said, I cannot fully quote the piece nor explain it.
But, from what I understand of it.
The author is saying that we become God in the sense that we are adopted as His sons and daughters through our faith in Jesus.
Jesus tells us to be perfect as God is perfect, yet we have no hope of that on our own. It is this adoption, through the sacrifice of Jesus that makes us perfect in God’s eyes, as Jesus, God, is perfect.
It is only through His grace that we can hope for eternal life with the Holy Trinity.
Hebrews 11:1 — Now faith is being sure of what we hope for and certain of what we do not see.
Life where we will no longer have any human defects which separate us from Him. Life where we are perfectly united to Him.
Human beings do not partake in God’s essence, but rather in his energies.
http://www.oodegr.com/english/theos/energeies/energeies1.htm
According to Fr. John Zuhlsdorf, a well-respected Catholic liturgicst and Latin scholar, Nostra Aetete is mistranslated to say that Catholics and Muslims worship the same God.
http://wdtprs.com/blog/2010/09/questions-raised-by-nostra-aetate-about-the-christian-god-and-muslim-allah/
The lineage was from Joseph, not Mary.
Luke 1:27 27To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin’s name was Mary.
The Bible doesn’t teach Sola Scriptura.
I read the credit to the author, what I did not see is from where the author got the quote; the original writing of Pelagius in which he said that.
I have googled it several times and there is not one single hit on a source other than this author.
That is what I mean by authenticated.
Give me the original attribution to Pope Pelagius, an official document wherein he says this.
If you cannot, then retract it.
Otherwise, it is exactly as I said, the quote was meant to defame not edify.
So, by its own admission, the RCC cherry picks what it wants of the *church fathers* to support its doctrine.
IOW, if it supports current church doctrine, the church father is to be depended on and quoted as *proof* ( of something or other) but if it doesn't, he's branded as a heretic and not all his writings are even legitimate.
Sheesh......
Either the man was a church father and his writings counted or they did not.
Cherry picking is not just intellectually dishonest, it's just plain dishonest.
Jesus could not have gotten His divine nature from Mary else she would be God.
A human being cannot produce or generate a divine nature.
"ANSWER THE QUESTION!!! Or prepare to SUFFER the consequences of the answer someone else gave! NOW ANSWER THE QUESTION!!!"
John 14:17 the Spirit of truth, whom the world cannot receive, because it neither sees Him nor knows Him; but you know Him, for He dwells with you and will be in you.
John 15:26 But when the Helper comes, whom I shall send to you from the Father, the Spirit of truth who proceeds from the Father, He will testify of Me.
It’s the scripture which was intended to “make us wise unto salvation”. Do you think God wouldn’t make it possible to follow His only inspired word with the “testimony” of the Holy Spirit?
2 Timothy 3:15 And that from a child thou hast known the holy scriptures, which are able to make thee wise unto salvation through faith which is in Christ Jesus. 16 All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: 17 That the man of God may be perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good works.
The gospel is “made manifest” or made known to all nations “by the scriptures of the prophets”. Not by interpretations of men.
Romans 16:26 But now is made manifest, and by the scriptures of the prophets, according to the commandment of the everlasting God, made known to all nations for the obedience of faith:
Read this. He promised the Holy Spirit, but I dispute that 2 Timothy 3:15 teaches Sola Scriptura.
http://www.ewtn.com/library/scriptur/solascri.txt
As I am fond of pointing out, the Bible is inerrant, but your reading is fallible.
It is as I thought.
I would say thanks for the honest and friendly debate, but that would be as big a lie as the supposed quote from Pelagius.
As I would say “prove the quote from Pelagius was a big lie and a “supposed quote.”
If you compare the genealogies of Matthew 1 (Joseph’s) and Luke 3 (Mary’s) you would understand that both Joseph and Mary were “of the house and lineage of David”. Mary was the descendant of David’s son Nathan, brother of Solomon. Joseph was from the line of Solomon.
Then you really need to tell whoever writes the Catholic Catechism.
CCC841 The Church's relationship with the Muslims. "The plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator, in the first place amongst whom are the Muslims; these profess to hold the faith of Abraham, and together with us they adore the one, merciful God, mankind's judge on the last day.
And when Pope John Paul said the same thing someone should have informed him as well. Yes?
I didn’t get that from that guy Aetete whatever. IT’S IN THE CATECHISM OF THE CATHOLIC CHURCH Did you see the CCC841?
The lineage of Christ that enables Him to sit on the throne comes through Mary, not Joseph.
One of Joseph’s ancestors, Jehoiachin, was cursed that no descendent of his would ever sit on the throne. (Jeremiah 22:30)
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