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.
Would you please show me where in Genesis 3 the creation story is?
Abdicating personal responsibility could cost you greatly.
I believe in the institution that Jesus left for us. That is my personal responsibility.
>>I would suggest that you select a particular church and look at their beliefs as advertised, and then move on to the next one.<<
I already did that. The Catholic Church was the worst. Why do you think I’m not affiliated with any organized religious organization?
I think that you are of the belief that you can create your own doctrines and that you can hold Jesus to your own standards.
Sure. Keep believing that if it makes you feel better. Your church still some issues like Mariolatry, Indulgences... you know, some extra-biblical stuff like that to deal with.
If you believe in sola, then you are already treading on non Biblical ground. If you believe in self-derived doctrines, then you have traveled far beyond Christianity and are proscribed as Acts clearly shows.
If your church could just stick to what Jesus taught, then you all would be okay. It's all the other man-made offal that your church adds that causes the issues.
We believe that the Apostles taught the Faith as taught to them by Christ. It is the aberration of the Reformation and the subsequent efforts that have deflected erstwhile Christians from actual Christianity.
Happy Thanksgiving!
Many thanks from us and our 21 pound turkey. I would extend the same wishes to you, sir.
Rather, Genesis 1 and 2, not 3. Apologies for mistyping the chapters. I trust that the quotes are from the correct chapters in my posts.
I'm sure I've seen this before, somewhere, I must have. But for some reason, this is just shining brightly right now. That is your personal responsibility? That's IT? To "believe in the institution that Jesus left for us."?
Nope. But I must then follow everything that comes from that: belief in the Christian Triune God, and all of the responsibilities that come from Christ's Commandments.
Unlike the rabble of the Reformation, I do not get to make it all up as I go along.
Acts 16:31 And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.
Romans 10:9 That if thou shalt confess with thy mouth the Lord Jesus, and shalt believe in thine heart that God hath raised him from the dead, thou shalt be saved. 10 For with the heart man believeth unto righteousness; and with the mouth confession is made unto salvation.
No institutional salvation found.
>>I think that you are of the belief that you can create your own doctrines and that you can hold Jesus to your own standards.<<
“searched the scriptures daily to see if these things are true” Can’t find the bodily assumption of Mary. Can’t find praying to those who have left this earth other than Jesus. I can’t find paying for indulgences.
I see no days attached to the list in Genesis 2, only an account. Only Genesis 1 lists the day on which each happened.
Acts 16:31 And they said, Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house.
In other words, we must believe in the institution that He Created w.r.t. the Apostles and the Holy Spirit commissioned at Pentecost. Thanks for pointing that out.
>>I think that you are of the belief that you can create your own doctrines and that you can hold Jesus to your own standards.<<
“searched the scriptures daily to see if these things are true” Can’t find the bodily assumption of Mary. Can’t find praying to those who have left this earth other than Jesus. I can’t find paying for indulgences.
You might want to find out what the early Christians believed and the documents that they used as references.
I see no days attached to the list in Genesis 2, only an account. Only Genesis 1 lists the day on which each happened.
Uh huh. Genesis 2 lists the order in which things happen. So tell me: was man Created before the animals or was he not? And please reconcile the apparent contradiction, or please let me know that you have eliminated Genesis from your Bible because it has apparent contradiction.
The indictment of Catholicism by non-Catholics is that we love and worship God imperfectly by the standards of the Reformation. Where the non-Catholics see the Church's excesses we Catholics see the deficiencies in their forms of Protestantism. Most notable are the lack of Beatitude, Love, Worship, Miracles, and Celebration. Absent these Christianity is not a gift, but a gray, humorless, loveless existence to be endured while our souls face to black.
Wouldn't we all better serve God by concentrating on what we share?
The examples given, Elijah, Gideon, the men of Succoth, the prophet Amos(a nipper of figs!) David, Peter, are all from the very strata of society that you say were overwhelmingly illiterate.
If you are correct these were the rarest of examples and with the least means of obtaining literacy.
But reading/writing in ancient Israel was also part of obedience to God, to Torah not just a practical skill for secular advancement. All the elders of Israel in Moses’ day had to know how to read and write as a matter of obedience to God's command. (Deut. 31:11) (Deut. 6:1-9)
This aspect of literacy levels is sometimes overlooked or ignored and assumed levels of infant mortality and urbanization used as surrogates for literacy levels in the general populace of Israel.
“And, as I said,....”
Yes, you have. however those solid indications we have argue otherwise for ancient Israel.
“The leap to literacy was spurred on by Gutenberg's press, sure.”
must surely be an attempt at sarcastic humor so I'll say no more for now.
“Not sure that I understand this statement. All historians that I know of link the surge in literacy in the West to Gutenberg's press.”
Chicken or egg? In any event literacy during the latter middle ages was not in/the question, thank you.
The examples given, Elijah, Gideon, the men of Succoth, the prophet Amos(a nipper of figs!) David, Peter, are all from the very strata of society that you say were overwhelmingly illiterate.
I'm sorry, but the level of education required to actually write some of the things that you list was far beyond the abilities of about 97% of the population at the time. If you study up on the agrarian peoples of the era, you might agree.
But reading/writing in ancient Israel was also part of obedience to God, to Torah not just a practical skill for secular advancement. All the elders of Israel in Moses’ day had to know how to read and write as a matter of obedience to God's command. (Deut. 31:11) (Deut. 6:1-9)
True. What percentage of the people of that era were considered elders? And remember that women were 50% or more (usually more because of warfare) of the population, and almost none of them were literate.
Chicken or egg? In any event literacy during the latter middle ages was not in/the question, thank you.
If it helps any, I was agreeing with your previous point that religious writings inspired or impelled many more individuals to read than would have otherwise been influenced.
Plenty of theologians did not consider the Apocryphal books as equal to all the other mutually agreed upon Scripture. Since we are speaking of books the Catholic Church appended to the Old Testament canon - books which the Jewish religion NEVER accepted as such - the onus is on them to qualify the status of those books. It's one thing to have a section set aside that you call books of interest and encouragement - much like letters from Clement or Ignatius - but quite another to include them as equal to divinely-inspired Scripture. What has been repeatedly stressed throughout this thread is that these books were always seen as inferior to the books of Moses and the Prophets.
The original post starting this tread was about a supposed former Protestant who converted to Roman Catholicism BECAUSE of the Deuterocanonical/Apocryphal books. Something I have a hard time believing would be an adequate reason to leave ones heritage faith. What I appreciated about this thread, though, is that is allowed the opposing views to be posted so that people can make up their own minds about these books. I have read them and I can honestly say they do not speak to my heart like other Scripture does. The Holy Spirit within me does not illuminate those words at all to me and I do NOT sense God's hand in their creation. And that's not even getting into the issue of their easily provable errors in geography, history and doctrine.
But, hey, you guys believe what you want. Just don't presume to demand all other Christians MUST follow your lead. We have higher standards, apparently.
Actually it is a brazen attempt to draw a conclusion from the parsing of an entire chapter using a context and intent not present in the original material. I expected far better from you.
I will son address this charge, but actually NL, it is you who are leaving things out, as your charge was not simply that of your usual out-of-context assertion, but was that of of specifically and repeatedly denigrating poster as in “you are certainly guilty of sloppy or dishonest scholarship” because “I happen to own the book you cited and it does not contain what you say it does,” and “that passage is NOT contained within the book quoted,” and calling it “the falsified version.. “ and now you mean to tell me that after falsely charging someone with either negligence or deception on that basis, and that was manifestly a basis, you are just going to continue your diatribe without even apologizing? What should you be considered worthy of further exchange? And unless you do, do not bother to respond.
But as your additional charges to me.
:And in context Stapleton teaches that once one decides to trust Rome, there is no more need to seek for revealed truth, as Rome has become his source and supreme authority, which was the issue."
Even that is not a complete portrayal of what Fr. Stapleton wrote or intended. You originally omitted the title of the chapter drawing the reader to a conclusion that the Church demands obedience without reason when the entire Chapter provides a reasoned argument to trust the Church in matters of faith. That is a twist that even the New York Times would applaud.
Actually, it is Stapleton who states “he can leave reason, like a lantern, at the door,” and if you who read the my post you can see the quote was was distinctly qualified by me, that once he once he joins the Catholic church “he has no further use for his reason,” which level of faith was and remains the issue. The fact that one is leaving reason once he joins the church (and is given “the superior light of revelation and faith,” and wherein he must believe things without the immediate help of reason) presupposes a prior use of reason, but the subject was the basic requirement of Catholics to thus obey.
In addition, my post to Boatbum's post was on the basic requirement of Catholics to follow with Christian obedience their pastors, was without commentary. In other posts as other times i have supplied material on when Catholics can dissent. I did not know the whole scope of boatbum's contention, but no one TMK was arguing that the Church demands obedience without reason before they enter, or that the required submission after that is not done by full consent, which is what you misunderstood me before as arguing.
But i do apologize for not taking the time to add more explanatory comments, which would have clarified the conditions of such requirements, as i have done so in the past, though it is my experience that nothing is satisfactory to some Catholic posters if it in any way impugns upon their exaltation of Rome.
I seriously doubt that you read the entire book or even the entire Chapters you cited. These snippets are available, completely out of context and without a sympathetic representation of original intent on any number of anti-Catholic websites. That is sloppy if not dishonest scholarship.
So in the light of the manifestation of your unfamiliarity with the book, being ignorant of the text you charge was absent and falsified but which was 4 chapters ahead of what you quoted, and of your failure to see it in the attribution which i supplied, your response is to malign the poster who did the research and posted both chapters in attribution? And who had read enough of it as to add the qualifying statement that this leaving of reason was after one joins the church?
And again, the post was on the basic issue of the need for Catholics to obey, and was to a Protestant, and the statements were carefully attributed (though i a link to Stapleton as well would have helped), and are fitting, and in my next post ,which was to the same poster, i mentioned the official requirement for implicit obedience was limited to infallible decrees, and then i confirmed to you in my next post that Roman Catholic have freedom for some degree of dissent in the majority of what she teaches and believes, and which explanations went beyond what i have seen you state in response to this issue here.
Similar is your treatment of the THE TRUE SPOUSE OF JESUS CHRIST; OR, THE NUN SANCTIFIED BY THE VIRTUES OF HER STATE.(Note; you truncated the title too) You mislead the reader into believing that this is a teaching to all Catholics when in fact it is a treatise for Nuns and other religious. The quote you cited is not in the work, which is only 177 pages (not the 358+ in your citation) and the call to obedience is to emulate Mary's obedience to the Holy Spirit. The book, along with many of his other writings can be found at http://www.goodcatholicbooks.org/pdf/liguori-true-spouse-of-jesus-christ.pdf.
Thou doth protest too much and too soon. I did not shorten the title, which is another, if minor, false charge (rather than hastily jumping to an accusatory conclusion, you should have said the title you supplied is a truncated one), and which infers i did something deliberately deceptive, as instead i gave it as i received it, not being cognizant of any other, and this shorter, primary title is found in Catholic resources themselves.
And despite your protestations, again, these quotes were simply various verses on the subject of obedience to a Prot, providing examples of to one poster on how it was, and without commentary, (I” have nor been following this thread much, but i think these may be relevant to your post”) :, and I hardly think anyone here understood this one as applying to laity now. It clearly refers to one's confessor, and Liguori is famous as a spiritual writer, and i assume that for present and former Roman Catholics here it would be apparent, as it was to me without reading anything more, that it refers to those in religious vocations. And again, my next comments after this post clarified that implicit obedience is what is required for infallible decrees, while some Catholic writers themselves unclear statements as regards obedience being required of Rome.
As for your absolute statement the statement by Liguori is not in that work, and that it is only 177 pages, what you found is not proof, as there is more than one version (with a Second Edition Revised) and printings, with different numbers of pages (one has with 300 pages, and another old Protestant work has the quote form page 445) and i have found online versions some are missing content that others have. And Google book searching shows the text in its book searches, “Obey blindly; that is, without asking reasons. Be careful, then, never to examine the directions of your confessor....that in obeying your confessor, you obey God; force yourself, then, to obey him in spite of all your fears. And be persuaded that if you are not obedient to him, it will be impossible for you to go on well; but if you obey, you are always secure. But, you say, if I am damned in consequence of obeying my confessor, who will rescue me from hell? What you say is impossible; for, it is not possible that obedience, which is the secure way to heaven, should be for you the road to hell." — St. Alphonsus De Liguori, The complete works of Saint Alphonsus de Liguori: the ascetical works: Volumes 10-11, which is also offered as The True Spouse of Jesus Christ in the previous link, so that shows it shows it coming from de Liguori, although Google books does not supply the viewing of it except by searching parts of the quote.
The quote, “But you say, if I am damned, in consequence of obeying my confessor, who will rescue me from hell?” is also found in “God the teacher of mankind: or, Popular Catholic theology, ...: Volume 3 - Page 292, by Michael Müller, who indicates he was familiar with Liguori (p. 290). And i found Liguori makes much the same point in “The vocation to the religious state”, p. 45,46, which expresses the nature of obedience he exhorts for those in religious vocations clearer:
“He, then, who wishes to enter religion must resolve to renounce altogether his own will, and to will only what holy obedience wills. God preserve any religious from ever letting fall from his mouth the words / will or / .will not I But in all things, even when asked by Superiors, what he desires, he should only answer, / wish that which holy obedience wills. And, provided there is no evident sin, he should in every command imposed on him obey blindly and without examination; because the duty of examining and deciding the doubts belongs not to him, but to his Superiors. Otherwise, if in obeying he does not submit his own judgment to that of the Superior, his obedience will be imperfect. St. Ignatius of Loyola said thai prudence in things of obedience is not required in subjects, but in Superiors; and if there is prudence in obeying, it is to obey without prudence. St. Bernard says, "Perfect obedience is indiscreet" (De Vit. sol.); and in another place he said, " For a prudent novice to remain in the congregation is an impossible thing;" and adding the reason for it, he said : "To judge belongs to the Superior, and to obey to the subject" (/bid.).' (http://books.google.com/books?id=0jtGAAAAYAAJ&pg=PA50&lpg=PA46&ots=abaEOZuwV3&dq=%22Obey+blindly,+without+asking%22+Liguori&output=text)
Thus rather than the text being absent as per your manner of research, what is best evidenced is that it is a genuine Liguori quote.
I asked a number of questions earlier on this thread that have not even been acknowledged. Perhaps you would like to respond:
Again until you apologize for your slander, why should these be replied to? But i will answer these in the light of your stone throwing. .
-Do you believe or expect anyone else to believe that God needs to lie to reach Catholics or that He would approve of these deceptions?
No, and i myself try to avoid extreme claims, and work to substantiate things. And these posts at issue are not willful deceptions unless they are used to assert that Roman Catholics must give implicit assent to all that Rome teaches, which i clearly clarified was not the case, or were fabrication, which is not the case. However, as you are the one who lied, first by denigrating a poster as sloppy or deceptive by posting a supposedly non-existent, fabricated quote when it was you who was negligent, and then by arguing it was all about misrepresentation when it was not all that it was about, and inferring concluding i i then you must ask yourself this question and the next as regards defending Rome.
-Who is the “Father of Lies” and who do you think these falsehoods actually serve?
Falsehoods are counterproductive, and while things like exaggerated numbers of those killed in the inquisitions are wrong and unnecessary to condemn them, you need to ask who authored the forgeries and propaganda, even if in part, which were used by Rome, such as the Pseudo-Isidore decretals and the Donation of Constantine.
-Why is it that there needs to be and are so very many false assertions made about Catholicism?
Ask Catholics who made the above, and also make them about men like Luther (who confessed faults of his own) and which need correction, but it does happen on this side, and i think it probably is because they are ignorant of facts, which is much due to Rome's failure as a teacher on the practical level, as vast multitudes or Roman Catholics are confused as to what doctrine of Rome. But Rome herself supplies what is needed to expose her false teachings, while i agree that fallacious arguments are counterproductive, as are reactionary Catholics who are too quick to judge others who oppose Rome, and who go to extremes in their zeal to defend Rome.
-Why is it necessary to go to the extremes of having to hide these lies within falsified documents and attributions?
Ask the ones like yourself who makes false charges of lying or negligence, due to their own negligence to read an attribution, and who fail to apologize for it but instead misrepresent what the specific charge was which was responded to.
-Why is the intensity of this hatred so great that there had to be a list of banned websites and sources within the Religion Forum when there is to corresponding listing of Catholic sponsored anti-Protestant sites and material?
Why is the intensity of this hatred against Protestant so great that your false charges took place, and a Catholic site is denigrate as a dumpster simply because it supplied something that was used against Rome? As for the banned websites, i think that is because, as you have repeatedly shown, Roman Catholics doth protest too much, due to their church being much their salvation, while we show more tolerance.
-Why are there so very many anti-Catholic pejorative terms and monikers when there are almost none by Catholics against other faiths?
Why do over protective Catholic even consider using “Rome” or “Roman church” to be offensive?
-Why is it that you and so many others are so very eager to accept and repeat these falsified factoids about the Church without verification?
No statement i have provided was shown to be false, the only question is what book the Liguori statement comes from. Meanwhile, why is it that you and so many others are so very eager to accuse your opposition of falsifying when they are verifiably not false?
-Have you ever considered why Catholics continue to come to this cesspool of lies and go to the trouble sifting through the garbage to sort fact from fiction over and over again?
Have you ever considered why certain Catholics call things a lie when it is used against their church even when the statement is verifiably true, and is accessible for anyone to examine.
We are waiting for your apology.
I agree what you said is an idiotic notion and, if you actually examined the meaning, you would have to admit that you are a literalist, too. Now, no one's saying that everything the Bible says must be taken literally, not even Literalists. So just as when Jesus uses allegories, allusion, figurative language and parables, we can know when something is or isn't to be taken literally. I hope you're not saying you are a "Figurativist" are you? Certainly, you MUST accept that at least some things are meant literally, don't you?
The Chicago Statement on Biblical Inerrancy says:
WE AFFIRM the necessity of interpreting the Bible according to its literal, or normal, sense. The literal sense is the grammatical-historical sense, that is, the meaning which the writer expressed. Interpretation according to the literal sense will take account of all figures of speech and literary forms found in the text. WE DENY the legitimacy of any approach to Scripture that attributes to it meaning which the literal sense does not support. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chicago_Statement_on_Biblical_Inerrancy)
Literal interpretation does place emphasis upon the referential aspect of the words or terms in the text. It does not, however, mean a complete denial of literary aspects, genre, or figures of speech within the text (e.g., parable, allegory, simile, or metaphor).[5] Also literalism does not necessarily lead to total and complete agreement upon one single interpretation for any given passage. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biblical_literalism
What I gather from your past posts, is you do not believe the Bible is inerrant nor that it contains literal truths. This, I think, is your loss.
I for the life of me cannot see what the problem is. In Genesis 2 there is no specific chronological order given. Genesis 1 specifically states on which day each thing was created. Genesis 2 simply reiterates what was done and gives a more specific description of the Garden of Eden. There are no contradictions.
Of course Catholics are Bible literalists. When it suits them.
Or their doctrine.
I agree, there is no contradiction at all. I gave several explanation for the reasons of different orders discussed. I think the problem is that some people MUST prove the Bible unreliable so that they can assert a higher authority for their own hierarchy to be over God's word. There is a good rule of thumb to remember when seeming contradictions show up - whenever there is the possibility of legitimate reconciliation between passages that superficially appear to conflict, no contradiction can be charged. That our friend refuses to accept these reasoned explanations say more about him than it does about the Bible.
Were the first Jewish Christians bound by the agreement reached at the Council of Jerusalem?
Protestants love to remind us that Paul rebuked Peter when he wasn’t living up to what the leaders had determined; that the Gentiles were not bound to being circumcised, and were to be welcomed and afforded the same respect as their Jewish brothers and sisters.
“Obey” is something protestants seem to think is optional.
“He who hears you hears me, he who rejects you, rejects me, and he who rejects me, rejects the One who sent me.”
“As the Father has sent me, so I send you.”
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