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.
I too will no longer get drawn into a food fight by those who would rather deal with personalities than the truth. That said, please continue to refute the lies because they have an identity all to themselves.
13For such are false apostles, deceitful workers, transforming themselves into the apostles of Christ.
14And no marvel; for Satan himself is transformed into an angel of light.
I fail to see any point to your question.
Oh, I am SURE you do, Judith Anne. Of that I am certain...
Actually, I’m watching the Homestead NASCAR race for the Sprint Cup race right now, so I’m a bit distracted.
It was NOT apparent to me so that claim is false.
Whatever. bless your heart...
God bless. I have nothing else to say to you.
This is a perfect example of me not raising to the bait. I can effectively address the errors without having to address their source. Matthew 23 similarly says not to call anyone a teacher or a leader. No one seriously says we should refrain from using these words either, but context is everything.
All we have gotten is a superficial regurgitation of the same error based upon the limitations of English. We still do not know which of the three functional definitions Protestant knickers are in a twist over. I seriously doubt they do either.
The Book of Macabees speaks of prayers for the Dead. As for “Queen of Heaven” that is Roman. In the Orthodox Faith we venerate her as Most Glorious Lady Theotokos, and Ever-Virgin Mary. I don’t think the Lord has to put down that you need to use common sense. Veneration for his beloved Mother is not worship.
You can call it anything you like. A person is either Catholic, or guilty of schism and heresy. That is it. No middle road.
Now when was that decided? Certainly not at the First General Council of Christians. Acts, Chapter 15. Were they all already Catholics when they met at this first general council?
Beautifully done. I’m impressed.
Only really bad ones...like Roseanne Barr, or Rosie O’Donnell...LOL!
LOL I should be so blessed.
Being called a heretic against the Catholic church is no big deal. Jesus is my judge, not the pope, a priest, some magisterium or any other group of self-appointed men in ecclesiastical garb.
I am IN CHRIST through the work of the Holy Spirit, and nothing can take that from me, especially the empty words and threats of men.
Romans 8:31-39 31What then shall we say to these things? If God is for us, who can be against us? 32 He who did not spare his own Son but gave him up for us all, how will he not also with him graciously give us all things? 33Who shall bring any charge against God’s elect? It is God who justifies.
34 Who is to condemn? Christ Jesus is the one who died—more than that, who was raised— who is at the right hand of God, who indeed is interceding for us. 35Who shall separate us from the love of Christ? Shall tribulation, or distress, or persecution, or famine, or nakedness, or danger, or sword?
36As it is written, "For your sake we are being killed all the day long; we are regarded as sheep to be slaughtered."
37No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38For I am sure that neither death nor life, nor angels nor rulers, nor things present nor things to come, nor powers, 39nor height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in Christ Jesus our Lord.
So Rome was already there when Leviticus was written? Wow! First I heard of that.Oh, and isn't it Macabees that has all the historic inacuracies?
>> Veneration for his beloved Mother is not worship.<<
Well, maybe we should break it down. Let’s take the prayer of Prayer of Pope Pius XII. [http://catholicism.about.com/od/tothevirginmary/qt/Honor_Immacula.htm]
I’ll use just the bolded excerpts from the prayer.
we cast ourselves into your arms
1 Peter 5:7 Casting all your care upon him; for he careth for you. (When did we need to replace God with Mary?)
confident of finding in your most loving heart appeasement of our ardent desires, and a safe harbor from the tempests which beset us on every side.
Hebrews 4:15-16 For we do not have a High Priest who cannot sympathize with our weaknesses, but was in all points tempted as we are, yet without sin. Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need. (once again Catholics replacing Christ with Mary)
O crystal fountain of faith
Romans 12:3 according as God hath dealt to every man the measure of faith. or "a measure of faith." (but Mary is the “fountain of faith” for Catholics)
Lily of all holiness
1 Samuel 2:2 There is none holy as the LORD: for there is none beside thee: neither is there any rock like our God. (for Catholics however, “all holiness” is given to Mary)
Conqueress of evil and death
Hosea 13:14 I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death: O death, I will be thy plagues; O grave, I will be thy destruction: repentance shall be hid from mine eyes. (but Catholics claim it was Mary who conquered death)
Convert the wicked
John 16:7 Nevertheless I tell you the truth; It is expedient for you that I go away: for if I go not away, the Comforter will not come unto you; but if I depart, I will send him unto you. 8 And when he is come, he will reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment: 9 Of sin, because they believe not on me; (Catholics have even replaced the Holy Spirit with Mary)
Statement by catholic Bishop Liqouri “.......We often more quickly obtain what we ask by calling on the name of Mary than by invoking that of Jesus.....” She...is our Salvation, our Life, our Hope, our Counsel, our Refuge, our Help”
Need I go on? Catholics have replaced virtually every attribute and working of God and given that to Mary in their worship.
or... you could just post your link.
I have done as you suggested, but the result of doing so will be disappointing.
I am only further convinced of Mary’s queenship and further grateful to God for having revealed to us through His Church, the true Queen of Heaven by revealing to us the true King of Kings, Jesus.
The OT tale are about HUMANS who sought to supplant God and take for themselves the worship and power that belongs to Him alone.
That was not Mary.
Semiramis was a woman of ill repute.
Mary was not.
Semiramis used first her husband and then her son for her own glory.
Mary did not.
Mary was a girl of humility and devotion to God, whom God chose to bear His Son.
Semiramis was not.
The contrasts are too numerous to list here.
There is no way in which the two women are alike and to use Semiramis as a comparison to the Catholic understanding of Mary is inauthentic.
Because God is the one, true God and Mary is the one true mother of Jesus. The authentic mother of the authentic King.
What protestants such as Hilsop and “you know who” seek to suggest with the comparison of the two women denies that
We believe in one Lord, Jesus Christ,
the only Son of God,
eternally begotten of the Father,
God from God, light from light,
true God from true God,
begotten, not made,
of one Being with the Father;
through him all things were made.
For us and for our salvation
he came down from heaven,
was incarnate of the Holy Spirit and the Virgin Mary
and became truly human.
For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate;
he suffered death and was buried.
On the third day he rose again
in accordance with the Scriptures;
he ascended into heaven
and is seated at the right hand of the Father.
He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead,
and his kingdom will have no end.
I see more and more why the Marian doctrines are so important in relation to our understanding of who and what Jesus is and how the leaders of the Church were led to define them.
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