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Posted on 01/22/2012 2:16:36 PM PST by Gamecock
The conversion testimony of Kevin McGrane, elder of Bury St Edmunds Presbyterian church.
I was raised in a Roman Catholic family, my father having been born in Dublin of Roman Catholic ancestry. Baptism, Confession, Holy Communion and Confirmation followed in regular course. After junior education under Ursuline nuns, I moved to a boys' grammar school established by Jesuits. The education was of a high standard (four years of Greek being particularly useful later). However, no student could take an 'O' Level in Religion as every examination board required study of the Bible, which was not permitted. Instead, we were fed a diet of Roman dogma, the sacraments, sacerdotalism, history of the Jesuits, and the Church Fathers. Catechisms instructed that doctrine was not always to be sought in the Bible but in the infallible teaching of the Church. We learned much about Christological heresies, but at no time could we have explained why Christ had died - we supposed that it was that we might have the Mass. Every week the whole school gathered for Benediction of the Blessed Sacrament, where we worshipped what we were assured was the Lord Jesus Christ, in appearance as a consecrated wafer fixed into a golden sunburst-style monstrance, borne at arms length by a Jesuit priest amidst clouds of incense. This, we sang, was the 'newer rite' that had superseded the former 'types and shadows'.
From Romanism to Atheism
The great tragedy was that there was never anything more than crumbs of truth to be gathered - a starvation diet of Scripture alongside a surfeit of error. Even my father, who hardly accepted the Vatican II reforms promoting a more enlightened view of the Bible, became critical of this policy when I left the Roman fold. And leave I did. At sixteen, though convincingly devout, I knew this heritage was slipping like sand through my fingers. I had no safe grounds for believing this dogma, and would no longer do so. My parents referred me to the parish priest, who plied me with liquor but could not induce me to recant. For me, the pursuit of truth became an overriding aim, which included opposing error, superstition and hypocrisy. I rapidly drifted into atheism, keenly pointing out to my classmates the unreasonableness of Roman dogma. I refused to attend Mass with my family, or the compulsory Masses at school. I was prepared to accept any sanctions that might be imposed. With regard to truth, I felt this would be found through the scientific enterprise, and thus it was that I became a physics undergraduate at the University of Oxford. It was easier to be a radical atheist at Oxford, away from Roman Catholic pressure, but I was also exposed to those of genuinely Christian convictions: one training for the ministry at Wycliffe Hall; another, John Hughes, a student at my college; and others. I spent many hours discussing theology with them, and also came into contact with the theologian Michael Green, then Rector of St Aldate's. I read books given to me on Christian apologetics, but these, and all the discussions, merely served to sharpen my counter arguments.
Unyielding spiritual blindness
Those who knew me as an atheist have spoken of my unyielding spiritual blindness. My response to evangelism was anything but indifference or apathy, more a reaction of fighting fire with fire. I distributed atheistic tracts, and had a determined zeal to promote atheist ideals. I should add that this was not like the contemporary New Atheist brand, which sneers and peddles weak discredited arguments. The likes of Richard Dawkins or Christopher Hitchens would have dismayed me as much then as now.
But my faith in science as a path to truth was severely shaken when I discovered at Oxford a systemic corruption in the enterprise. Science had a fatal flaw: human nature. This was a devastating and life-changing experience - the second time the bottom had fallen out of my world. Later, coming to understand more of the philosophy of science, I have never resiled from the stand I took against the corruption of science that I glimpsed at Oxford, and have seen with greater clarity since. As an idealist, perhaps, I had a very high view of the scientific enterprise, but I now see that atheism will eventually destroy it.
After leaving Oxford, I started a job in radar engineering in Chelmsford, and some months later arrived in Southampton to pursue further studies in electronics. Three hours after moving to the city, I was confronted by a Christian couple doing door-to-door evangelism. They asked me where I had studied previously. 'Oxford University,' I replied. 'That's interesting,' said the woman, 'Which college?' 'Hertford College,' I answered. 'Really? Did you know a student there called John Hughes?' 'Yes,' I responded, 'He often came to my room for discussions about Christianity.' 'He's my brother,' she replied. 'O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments, and his ways past finding out!' (Rom. 11:33).
I was invited to attend a course of Bible studies, but the leaders were ill-prepared for presentations of alternative persuasive answers to their questions. They eventually asked me to stop attending Bible studies - I mention this to their shame as well as mine, and as an example never to emulate - one of them stating that I was not interested in truth. Such a statement was quite unfair: was it not precisely because the Apostle Paul understood the implications of Christian doctrine and had a passion for what he believed to be the truth that he was so zealous to extirpate the church? Likewise, I was far from apathetic about truth, and had made bold and difficult adjustments in my life in my search for it. Yet it was a zeal not according to knowledge.
I was angered and stung into reading more Christian apologetics. The arguments seemed no more persuasive than before, but now the Scripture verses underpinning them came to me as hammer blows. Why should those sentences leap off the page like a battering ram against the strongholds of my mind? How could these mere words land such devastating blows? Prayer was being made for me, and the Holy Spirit was convicting me of sin, righteousness and judgment, yet also showing me the way of salvation through faith in Jesus Christ - not through the lens of Roman Catholicism, but through the Word of God. The force of truth was irresistible, and I was granted repentance unto life. 'Remember not the sins of my youth, nor my transgressions: according to thy mercy remember thou me for thy goodness' sake, O LORD' (Psa. 25:7).
From darkness to light
I was given a Bible that day, which I read avidly, and that week I ventured into a Christian bookshop in Southampton and was amazed at the treasury of books available. The Lord, there and then, gave me a love of Reformed truth, and I was delighted to come away that day with Hodge on The Westminster Confession of Faith, Cunningham on The Reformers and the Theology of the Reformation, and a Greek New Testament. Before I returned to Chelmsford I had come to Presbyterian convictions, though such was a rather exotic species in those days.
The reaction of my parents was actually somewhat favourable to begin with: to be a Christian was surely better than to be an atheist. But when it began to dawn that this Christianity was decidedly Protestant, and Calvinist, and that I wanted them to know and believe the gospel, then a certain amount of antagonism became evident. My father quite genuinely enquired whether there were as many as twenty persons in the world who could possibly believe such things.
During my time at Chelmsford I regularly studied biblical truth within the framework of the Westminster Confession with Dennis Lewis and John Titcombe (who served as elders in the London congregations of the Free Presbyterian and Free Church of Scotland respectively before their call to be with the Lord), praying that God would again revive a commitment to full-orbed Reformed truth in England, and in Chelmsford in particular. In 1986 I attended the London Presbyterian Conference, which took the first tentative steps towards a Presbyterian denomination. I married and removed to Bury St Edmunds without yet seeing an answer to those prayers for Chelmsford, but God surely answered them by raising up a Presbyterian church in that town and elsewhere within a few years. Indeed, in 1991 my family, with a number of others, were founder members of Bury St Edmunds Presbyterian Church, where I continue to serve as a ruling elder.
'Amen: Blessing, and glory, and wisdom, and thanksgiving, and honour, and power, and might, be unto our God for ever and ever. Amen' (Rev. 7:12).
That sure is a different attitude than Paul had isn’t it.
Acts 17:11 These were more fair-minded than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness, and searched the Scriptures daily to find out whether these things were so.
It was actually the unbelieving Jews who didn’t want them reading scripture.
Acts 17:13 But when the Jews of Thessalonica had knowledge that the word of God was preached of Paul at Berea, they came thither also, and stirred up the people.
>>PiusIV ruled that local priests should first ascertain that the scriptures were true Catholic versions.<<
Yes a faulty translation that is edited to support a heresy is harmful. A contemporary example would be the inseration of the article “a” in the JW version of the Gospel of John’s first chapter. “In [the] beginning the Word was, and the Word was with God, and the Word was a god.”
You no doubt caught the difference and since you have an approved translation (not in the sense the Catholic Church approved it)you can compare and call out the error. But think if you did not know this was a JW Bible and think if this was a popular version making the rounds and you did not have another Bible to compare it with? How much easier would it be for a person to full into heresy regarding the nature of Christ.
This was the problem with some translations. Either they were translated poorly or were deliberate attempts to bolster heresy. They might also include non-canonical books such as the Gospel of Thomas.
What was forbidden was non approved translations of Scripture. It is true that before Gutenberg having a copy of the Bible was rare. It was also true that many people were illiterate and could not read the Bible.
Many lay people did own Psalters.
Romans 6:1 What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? 2 By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it? 3 Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized pinto Christ Jesus were baptized into his death? 4 We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life.
Paul wrote that. Of course passages like this may be the reason Paul heartburn heartburn for many Papists. He destroys Roman Straw dummies.
Prove that Peter ever preached in Rome or spent time there other than to be executed.
Your approach is far more logical and honest than the rest of them.
All men are fallen. Thank God for His free, unearned mercy. Without it, we’d all be lost.
I am 100% convinced that the Catholic Church has the fullness of Truth. But, if what the Church teaches becomes an obstacle to someone knowing and serving the Lord Jesus Christ because in their hearts they truly are not able to believe some of those doctrines I would rather they became good devout Protestants than remain luke warm Catholics who might even feel hostile towards the faith.
I know there are Catholics who disagree with this, but I believe when we find what we are convinced in all aspects is the Truth we must follow it. If a person believes what the Catholic Church teaches is a lie and a barrier to Christ it would be a sad thing for them to stay.
Anyone up for a popearoni pizza?
Freep-mail me to get on or off my pro-life and Catholic List:
Please ping me to note-worthy Pro-Life or Catholic threads, or other threads of general interest.
...in three...two...one..
Don’t much care for popecorn because there’s too many carnal’s in the bag and soda pope goes flat when opened to the light of truth. Popearony pizza only comes in their version and is doctored.
if the early Roman Christians weren't Catholic...what were they, There was nothing else.....real old Lutherans???
anchovies?
Substitute the word "Christian" for "saved." It's the same thing. The proof is in the pudding.
If a person acts like a Christian, believes like a Christian and prays like a Christian, chances are that person is a Christian.
Same with being saved. If a person acts as a Christian, believes as a Christian and prays like a Christian, that person is most probably saved
And if we murder and lie and cheat without remorse or repentance, we were probably never Christians to begin with and thus we are not saved.
It's not rocket science. We are what we believe.
That this canard continues to be repeated (refuted almost weekly on a FR) is another testimony to the deception in RC apologetics, as the facts are that the canon was not infallibly, indisputably settled until the year of Luther's death, and doubt and disagreement about books Luther also questioned continued right into Trent by some of Rome's top scholars. See here and links therein.
And thus Luther had strong precedent and scholarly reasons for his rejection of some books (which he nonetheless included in his Bible) while the 39 book Hebrew canon was from antiquity, as was the 27 N.T. canon. The page to see on Luther's canon is here.
In addition, the idea that the N.T. church was the same as one that ordained a separate class of formal sacerdotal priests (versus bishops/elder) and prays to the departed, and looked to Peter as the beginning of an assuredly infallible perpetuated Petrine papacy reigning supreme over all, etc. (and yes, we've seen the assertions and eisegetical wresting of text) is neither Scriptural or historical, while the idea that the early Bible was the work of various editors is one the liberals love.
But that is the nature of much of Roman Catholic scholarship, as even seen in your approved notes in your own official American Bible, which relegates stories like Jonah and the fish, Balaam and the donkey to be fables, the conquests of Joshua to be folk tales, and questions whether Jesus Christ was actually involved in some conversations which the gospel records, and thinks that most of which Jesus is recorded as saying was probably theological elaboration by the writers, and who likewise simply placed the Lord Jesus on a hill in giving the sermon on the Mount etc.
Likely you were not informed of much of this but there is much to know.
I think that the Catholic church did a magnificent job and we should all be very thankful that she protected and preserved the word of God throughout sometimes a very troubled history.
Even if one accepts your premise, yet, that does not render them the assuredly infallible interpreters of it , anymore it did to the Jews who were the instruments and stewards of divine revelation, (Rm. 3:2; 9:4) or even to those who sat in the seat of Moses. (Mt 23:2) However, what the history of the canon does do is refute the the fantasy of da Vinci code theorists who imagine that the Catholic Church wrote the Bible to justify itself. But if that were the case then she lacked much foresight, as with a few additions (like just one example of someone praying to the departed) Rome would not have to resort to the degree of extrapolation of Bible texts they must resort to in defending her.
As for protecting the Bible, Rome did do quite a job in doing that, even from free access by her own. And as with the other issues, I hope you read before you responded as do not think I overstated the case.
And as the Scriptures today are under attack perhaps as never before in recent history, may the Lord mightily confirm His word and more believer become his vessels for such. (Mark 16:20)
LOL Everything their a part of seems fishy.
Revelation 22:
16 I Jesus have sent mine angel to testify unto you these things for the churches. I am the root and the offspring of David, the bright, the morning star.
17 And the Spirit and the bride say, Come. And he that heareth, let him say, Come. And he that is athirst, let him come: he that will, let him take the water of life freely.
**The proof is in the pudding,**
Exactly, and yet we all sin. I have seen the sin of hate, ridicule, slander, gossip used right here on FR. That is sad.
And you are so right; the proof IS in the pudding. When I see these things happen, I know that these people are not in a Christ-like spot.
the pudding is a two edged sword?
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