Pay No Attention to That Man Behind the Curtain! Catholic History and the Emerald City Protocol

reformation21 ^ | April 2012 | Carl Trueman

[Gamecock]

Full Title: Pay No Attention to That Man Behind the Curtain! Roman Catholic History and the Emerald City Protocol

In the field of Reformation studies, Professor Brad Gregory is somebody for whom I have immense respect.  Those outside the discipline of history are possibly unaware of the ravages which postmodernism brought in its wake, making all narratives negotiable and fuelling a rise in interest in all manner of trivia and marginal weirdness.  Dr. Gregory is trained in both philosophy and history and has done much to place the self-understanding of human agents back at the centre of historical analysis.  Thus, for those of us interested in the Reformation, he has also played an important role in placing religion back into the discussion.  For that, I and many others owe him a great debt of gratitude.

I therefore find myself in the odd and uncomfortable position of writing a very critical review of his latest book, The Unintended Reformation (Belknap Harvard, 2011). The book itself is undoubtedly well-written and deeply learned, with nearly a third of the text devoted to endnotes.  It is brilliant in its scope and execution, addressing issues of philosophy, politics and economics.  Anyone wanting a panoramic view of the individuals, the institutions and the forces which shaped early modern Europe should read this work. Yet for all of its brilliance, the book does not demonstrate its central thesis, that Protestantism must shoulder most of the responsibility for the various things which Dr. Gregory dislikes about modern Western society, from its exaltation of the scientific paradigm to its consumerism to its secular view of knowledge and even to global warming. I am sympathetic with many of Dr. Gregory's gripes about the world of today; but in naming Protestantism as the primary culprit he engages in a rather arbitrary blame game.

Dr. Gregory's book contains arguments about both metaphysics and what we might call empirical social realities. On the grounds that debates about metaphysics, like games of chess, can be great fun for the participants but less than thrilling for the spectators, I will post my thoughts on that aspect of the book in a separate blog entry. In this article, I will focus on the Papacy, persecution and the role of the printing press.  This piece is more of a medieval jousting tournament than a chess game and will, I trust, provide the audience with better spectator sport.

One final preliminary comment: I am confident that my previous writings on Roman Catholicism and Roman Catholics indicate that I am no reincarnation of a nineteenth century 'No popery!' rabble-rouser. I have always tried to write with respect and forbearance on such matters, to the extent that I have even been berated at times by other, hotter sorts of Protestants for being too pacific. In what follows, however, I am deliberately combative.  This is not because I wish to show disrespect to Dr. Gregory or to his Church or to his beliefs; but he has set the tone by writing a very combative book. I like that. I like writers who believe and care about the big questions of life. But here is the rub: those who write in such a way must allow those who respond to them to believe with equal passion in their chosen cause and to care about it deeply and thus to be equally combative in their rejoinders.

A key part of the book's argument is the apparent anarchy created by the Protestant emphasis on the perspicuity of scripture. In this, Dr. Gregory stands with his Notre Dame colleague, Christian Smith, as seeing this as perhaps the single weakest point of Protestantism. He also rejects any attempt to restrict Protestantism to the major confessional traditions (Reformed, Anglican and Lutheran) as he argues that such a restriction would create an artificial delimitation of Protestant diversity. Instead, he insists on also including those groups which scholars typically call radical reformers (essentially all other non-Roman Christian sects which have their origins in the turn to scripture of the Reformation). This creates a very diverse and indeed chaotic picture of Protestantism such that no unifying doctrinal synthesis is possible as a means of categorizing the whole.  

I wonder if I am alone in finding the more stridently confident comments of some Roman Catholics over the issue of perspicuity to be somewhat tiresome and rather overblown. Perspicuity was, after all, a response to a position that had proved to be a failure: the Papacy.  Thus, to criticize it while proposing nothing better than a return to that which had proved so inadequate is scarcely a compelling argument.

Yes, it is true that Protestant interpretive diversity is an empirical fact; but when it comes to selectivity in historical reading as a means of creating a false impression of stability, Roman Catholic approaches to the Papacy provide some excellent examples of such fallacious method.  The ability to ignore or simply dismiss as irrelevant the empirical facts of papal history is quite an impressive feat of historical and theological selectivity. Thus, as all sides need to face empirical facts and the challenges they raise, here are a few we might want to consider, along with what seem to me (as a Protestant outsider) to be the usual Roman Catholic responses:

Empirical fact: The Papacy as an authoritative institution was not there in the early centuries. 

Never mind.  Put together a doctrine of development whereby Christians - or at least some of them, those of whom we choose to approve in retrospect on the grounds we agree with what they say  - eventually come to see the Pope as uniquely authoritative.  

Empirical fact: The Papacy was corrupt in the later Middle Ages, building its power and status on political antics, forged documents and other similar scams. 

Ignore it, excuse it as a momentary aberration and perhaps, if pressed, even offer a quick apology. Then move swiftly on to assure everyone it is all sorted out now and start talking about John Paul II or Benedict XVI.  Whatever you do, there is no need to allow this fact to have any significance for how one understands the theory of papal power in the abstract or in the present.  

Empirical fact: The Papacy was in such a mess at the beginning of the fifteenth century that it needed a council to decide who of the multiple claimants to Peter's seat was the legitimate pope.  

Again, this was merely a momentary aberration but it has no significance for the understanding of papal authority.  After all, it was so long ago and so far away.

Empirical fact: The church failed (once again) to put its administrative, pastoral, moral and doctrinal house in order at the Fifth Lateran Council at the start of the sixteenth century.  

Forget it.  Emphasise instead the vibrant piety of the late medieval church and then blame the ungodly Protestants for their inexplicable protests and thus for the collapse of the medieval social, political and theological structure of Europe.  

Perhaps it is somewhat aggressive to pose these points in such a blunt form. Again, I intend no disrespect but am simply responding with the same forthrightness with which certain writers speak of Protestantism. The problem here is that the context for the Reformation - the failure of the papal system to reform itself, a failure in itself lethal to notions of papal power and authority - seems to have been forgotten in all of the recent aggressive attacks on scriptural perspicuity.  These are all empirical facts and they are all routinely excused, dismissed or simply ignored by Roman Catholic writers. Perspicuity was not the original problem; it was intended as the answer.   One can believe it to be an incorrect, incoherent, inadequate answer; but then one must come up with something better - not simply act as if shouting the original problem louder will make everything all right. Such an approach to history and theology is what I call the Emerald City protocol: when defending the great and powerful Oz, one must simply pay no attention to that man behind the curtain.  

Given the above empirical facts, the medieval Papacy surely has chronological priority over any of the alleged shortcomings of scriptural perspicuity in the history of abject ecclesiastical and theological disasters. To be fair, Dr. Gregory does acknowledge that 'medieval Christendom' was a failure (p. 365) but in choosing such a term he sidesteps the significance of the events of the late medieval period for papal authority. The failure of medieval Christendom was the failure of the Papacy. To say medieval Christendom failed but then to allow such a statement no real ecclesiastical significance is merely an act of throat-clearing before going after the people, the Protestants, who frankly are in the crosshairs simply because it appears one finds them and their sects distasteful. Again, to be fair, one cannot blame Roman Catholics for disliking Protestants: our very existence bears testimony to Roman Catholicism's failure. But that Roman Catholics who know their history apparently believe the Papacy now works just fine seems as arbitrary and selective a theological and historical move as any confessionally driven restriction of what is and is not legitimate Protestantism.  

As Dr. Gregory brings his narrative up to the present, I will do the same. There are things which can be conveniently ignored by North American Roman Catholic intellectuals because they take place in distant lands. Yet many of these are emblematic of contemporary Roman Catholicism in the wider world. Such, for example, are the bits of the real cross and vials of Jesus' blood which continue to be displayed in certain churches, the cult of Padre Pio and the relics of Anthony of Padua and the like (both of whom edged out Jesus and the Virgin Mary in a poll as to who was the most prayed to figure in Italian Catholicism). We Protestants may appear hopelessly confused to the latest generation of North American Roman Catholic polemicists, but at least my own little group of Presbyterian schismatics does not promote the veneration of mountebank stigmatics or the virtues of snake-oil.

Still, for the sake of argument let us accept the fideistic notion that the events of the later Middle Ages do not shatter the theology underlying the Papacy.  What therefore of Roman Catholic theological unity and papal authority today? That is not too rosy either, I am afraid.  The Roman Catholic Church's teaching on birth control is routinely ignored by vast swathes of the laity with absolute impunity; Roman Catholic politicians have been in the vanguard of liberalizing abortion laws and yet still been welcome at Mass and at high table with church dignitaries; leading theologians cannot agree on exactly what papal infallibility means; and there is not even consensus on the meaning and significance of Vatican II relative to previous church teaching. Such a Church is as chaotic and anarchic as anything Protestantism has thrown up. 

Further, if Dr. Gregory wants to include as part of his general concept of Protestantism any and all sixteenth century lunatics who ever claimed the Bible alone as sole authority and thence to draw conclusions about the plausibility of the perspicuity of scripture, then it seems reasonable to insist in response that discussions of Roman Catholicism include not simply the Newmans, Ratzingers and Wotjylas but also the Kungs, Rahners, Schillebeeckxs and the journalists at the National Catholic Reporter.  And why stop there?  We should also throw in the sedevacantists and Lefebvrists for good measure.  They all claim to be good Roman Catholics and find their unity around the Office of the Pope, after all. Let us not exclude them on the dubious grounds that they do not support our own preconceived conclusions of how papal authority should work.  At least Protestantism has the integrity to wear its chaotic divisions on its sleeve.

Moving on from the issue of authority, we find that Dr. Gregory also argues that religious persecution is a poisonous result of the confessionalisation of Europe into warring religious factions. Certainly, the bloodshed along confessional lines in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries was terrible, but doctrinal disagreements did not begin with the Reformation. The New Testament makes it clear that serious doctrinal conflict existed within the church even during apostolic times (I hope I am allowed, for the sake of argument, to assume that the New Testament is perspicuous enough for me to state that with a degree of confidence); and the link between church and state which provided the context for bloodshed over matters of theological deviancy was established from at least the time of Priscillian in the late fourth century. It was hardly a Protestant or even a Reformation innovation.

When it comes to the empirical facts of Catholic persecution, Dr. Gregory only mentions the Inquisition twice. That is remarkably light coverage given its rather stellar track record in all that embarrassing auto da fe business. Moreover, he mentions it first only in a Reformation/post-Reformation context. Yet Roman Catholic persecution of those considered deviants was not simply or even primarily a response to Reformation Protestantism but a well-established pattern in the Middle Ages. No doubt the Spanish Jews and Muslims, the Cathars, the Albigensians, the Lollards, the Hussites and many other religious deviants living before the establishment of any Protestant state might have wished that their sufferings had received a more substantial role in the narrative and more significance in the general thesis. Sure, Protestantism broke the Roman Catholic monopoly on persecution and thus played a shameful and ignominious part in its escalation; but it did not establish the precedents, legally, culturally or practically.

Finally, the great lacuna in this book is the printing press. Dr. Gregory has, as I noted above, done brilliant work in putting self-understanding back on the historical agenda and thus of grounding the history of ideas in historical realities rather than metaphysical abstractions. The danger with this, however, is that material factors can come to be somewhat neglected. His thesis - that Protestantism shattered the unified nature and coherence of knowledge and paved the way for its secularization - does not take into account the impact of the easy availability of print. The printed book changed everything: it fuelled literacy rates and it expanded the potential for diversity of opinion. I suspect there is a very plausible alternative, or at least supplementary, narrative to the 'Protestantism shattered the unified nature and coherence of knowledge' thesis: the printing press did it because it made impossible the Church's control of the nature, range, flow and availability of knowledge.

Ironically, the printing press is one of the great success stories of pre-Reformation Catholic Europe. One might argue that it was a technological innovation and thus not particularly 'Catholic' in that sense. That is true; but for some years after it was invented it was unclear whether it would be successful enough to replace medieval book production. In fact, its success was significantly helped by the brisk fifteenth century trade in printed breviaries and missals and the indulgences produced to fund war against the Ottomans. In other words, it was the vibrancy of late medieval Catholic piety, of which Dr. Gregory makes much, that ensured the future of the printing press and thereby the shipwrecking of the old, stable forms of knowledge.

The Roman Catholic Church knew the danger presented by the easy transmission of, and access to, knowledge which the printing press provided. That is why it was so assiduous in burning books in the sixteenth century and why the Index of Prohibited Books remained in place until the 1960s. I well remember being amazed when reading the autobiography of the analytic philosopher and one-time priest, Sir Anthony Kenny, that he had had to obtain special permission from the Church to read David Hume for his doctoral research in the 1950s. At the start of the twenty-first century, Rome may present herself as the friend of engaged religious intellectuals in North America but she took an embarrassingly long time even to allow her people free access to the most basic books of modern Western thought. Women in Britain had the vote, Elvis (in my humble opinion) had already done his best work and The Beatles and The Rolling Stones were starting to churn out hits before Roman Catholics were free to read David Hume without specific permission from the Church.   

Of course, Dr. Gregory knows about the Index; but he seems to see it as a response to Protestantism, not as an extension of the Church's typical manner of handling deviation from its central tenets and practices which stretched back well before the Reformation. And therein lies the ironic, tragic, perplexing flaw of this brilliant and learned book: Dr. Gregory sets out to prove that Protestantism is the source of all, or at least many, of the modern world's ills; but what he actually does is demonstrate in painstaking and compelling detail that medieval Catholicism and the Papacy with which it was inextricably bound up were ultimately inadequate to the task which they set - which they claimed! - for themselves.  Reformation Protestantism, if I can use the singular, was one response to this failure, as conciliarism had been a hundred years before.  One can dispute the adequacy of such responses; but only by an act of historical denial can one dispute the fact that it was the Papacy which failed.

Thanks to the death of medieval Christendom and to the havoc caused by the Reformation and beyond, Dr Gregory is today free to believe (or not) that Protestantism is an utter failure.  Thanks to the printing press, he is also free to express this in a public form. Thanks to the modern world which grew as a response to the failure of Roman Catholicism, he is also free to choose his own solution to the problems of modernity without fear of rack or rope. Yet, having said all that, I for one find it strange indeed that someone would choose as the solution that which was actually the problem in the first place.

[LurkingSince'98]

You may want to address that to Elsie who also belives it is not a wager.

If you dont want to participate - dont.

But I still belive you need to speak to an elder in your denomination for direction slong thise lines,

AMDG

[RegulatorCountry]

medieval theologians and scholars understood that Jerome had intended to express a glorification of Moses' face, by his use of the Latin word for "horned."[6]:74–90 The understanding that the original Hebrew was difficult and was not likely to literally mean "horns" persisted into and through the Renaissance.M

The well established and by then fairly ancient conventionalized means of symbolizing "radiance" or "glory" in painting and sculpture was the halo, annalex. Not horns.

Michelangelo took the erroneous translation of Jerome in Exodus literally. Apparently the church hierarchy and laity did as well. And so, a statue of Moses with horns was installed in The Church Of St. Peter In Chains in Rome, in 1515, and it remains there today.

Oddly, Jerome's translation seems to have been bypassed in Bibles typically used by Catholics since the 20th century, despite the Latin Vulgate having been declared free of error.

[LurkingSince'98]

Hi just caught this comment

Words from a stranger are hearsay,

the same words from a trusted knowledgeable friend is.

If this young man counseled me to increase my donation to $2000

I would.

[LurkingSince'98]

Corrected my iPhone’s self correcting gibberish

Hi I just caught this comment

Words from a stranger are hearsay,

the same words from a trusted knowledgeable friend is testimony.

If this young man counseled me to increase my donation to $2000

I would.

[Gamecock]

Agaun, why are you so interested in making me vilolate my conscience?
This is reaching the point of making the thread personal, therefore, please knock it off.

[Alamo-Girl]

Concerning your challenge, I went to one sermon from Pastor Robert Morris, Gateway Church in Dallas and counting 30 verses he explored in his first sermon in the Free Indeed series.

The Scriptures he quoted include John 8:36, Mark 5:1-20; Matt 17:8, Mark 3:14-15, John 10:1, Lamentations 1:10 and 4:12, Luke 10:7-17.

There were 21 verses by my count in today's Daily Mass Readings. The Scriptures were Daniel 3:14020, 91-92, 95 and John 8:31-42.

Of course, the Protestant style is not a straight forward reading of Scriptures as I have experienced in Mass but rather a preaching/study.

Any hoot, that's one for your consideration.

[Alamo-Girl]

Yikes, I miscounted. That should be 37 verses in the Protestant sermon.

[LurkingSince'98]

you are confusing me with someone who cares about what you think or do.

As I said Elsie said essentially the same thing I did:

To: Gamecock
Money exchanges hands. It’s is a wager.

Not quite; aws the money would be going to a THIRD party; who has NOT put any skin in the game.

Likewise; no money is being put at risk by anyone other than the first person.
761 posted on Wednesday, April 09, 2014 6:09:33 PM by Elsie

again you need to speak to someone and it isn’t me - I am asking you kindly to not post to me again tonight - take it up with Elsie if you have a problem with it.

Ad Majoram Dei Gloriam

[LurkingSince'98]

thanks for your offering however I am counting all the Scripture in the Mass versus all the scripture in the protestant service.

here is a good link with the scripture in the Mass and it is does not include the Daily readings you mentioned.

http://www.wctc.net/~mudndirt/Scripture%20in%20mass.htm

here is an excerpt of about the first 5 - 6 minutes of every RC Mass:

Greeting

Priest: In the Name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. (Matt. 28:19)

People: Amen (1 Chr 16:36)

Priest: The grace of our Lord Jesus Christ and the love of God and the communion of the Holy Spirit be with you all. (2 Cor 13:13)

People: And with your spirit.

Liturgy of the Word

Penitential Rite

All: I confess to almighty God and to you, my brothers and sisters, that I have greatly sinned, (Jas 5:16) in my thoughts and in my words (Jas 3:6) in what I have done and in what I have failed to do, (Rom. 12:16) through my fault, through my fault, through my most grievous fault; therefore I ask blessed Mary ever-Virgin, all the Angels and Saints, and you, my brothers and sisters, to pray for me to the Lord our God.(1Thess 5:25)

Priest: May almighty God have mercy on us, forgive us our sins, and bring us to everlasting life. (1 John 1:9)

People: Amen (1 Chr 16:36)

All: Lord have mercy. (Tb 8:4) Christ have mercy. (1 Tim 1:2) Lord have mercy.

Gloria

All: Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace to people of good will. (Luke 2:14)
We praise you, we bless you, we adore you, we glorify you,
we give you thanks for your great glory, (Rev 7:12)
Lord God, heavenly King, O God, almighty Father (Rev 19:6)
Lord Jesus Christ, Only Begotten Son, (2 John 3)Lord God, Lamb of God, Son of the Father,
you take away the sins of the world, have mercy on us; (John 1:29)
you take away the sins of the world, receive our prayer;
you are seated at the right hand of the Father, have mercy on us. (Rom 8:34)
For you alone are the Holy One, (Luke 4:34)
you alone are the Lord, you alone are the Most High, Jesus Christ, (Luke 1:32)
with the Holy Spirit, in the glory of God the Father, Amen (John 14:26)

the next part explains the Daily readings which you referenced, which happen next in the sequence of the Mass:

[The Liturgy of the Word consists of four readings from Scripture: the first is typically from the Old Testament, the second a psalm, followed by a reading from one of the epistles. Finally, the Gospel is proclaimed during which the people stand out of respect for the Word. The chosen readings change daily.]

For the Greater Glory of God

[BlueDragon]

Not the "Rome" part. I said something about the prosecutorial attitude of many Protestants indeed, and in fact I was agreeing with you on that score.

No, [again, as I have already shown you] you said Protestantism always seeks to destroy something. in response to myself lamenting the need to write like a prosecuting attorney, which I must do to nail down what is spoken about, instead of having it always be subtly shifting around, as you demonstrate (and I again figuratively underline) even here.

Did I quote Daniel incorrectly?

Just previously I touched upon the how's and apparent why your methodology of snipping out sentence fragment to which you then form reply, providing some brief example there for demonstration, showing how you conceptually switch positions while employing rhetorical defense -- and a well studied avoidance shall we say, of questions posed to yourself, even while yourself posturing as providing answers to the more pointed, lawyer-like interrogatories.

That this sort of subtle misrepresentation of ---just who said-- what --- comes amid your own avoidance of particular issues, even as to your own self saying one thing -- then another, changing your own story as you go along, circles us right back to the reason for my own originally expressed lament.

You don't like my habits, post to someone else.

If I can't get you to 'face the facts' as the saying goes, then perhaps I can assist in not allowing your own "habits" to obscure important considerations ("facts", as it were) which as it appears to me, are being subtly and cunningly shielded from more direct examination.

If you don't like be written to in manner reminiscent of a prosecuting attorney, something's got to give, and I cannot allow for it to be me, though I do wish it could be...

Nothing personal. Just my own being after the "business" of Our Father in heaven ---which Rome has now long distorted, and *some* (but not all) of who's apologists continue the distortion, by any means possible.

It is interesting that on this thread entitled Pay No Attention to That Man Behind the Curtain! Catholic History and the Emerald City Protocol your entree to this thread came about by way of yourself bringing image of a man behind a curtain, and how your own posting Protocol (on open threads) is so, shall we say -- instructive.

Thank you for the performances. For those with eyes to see it, it all becomes --- in believe it or not -- condensed form, difficult as it can be to keep track of all the various twists and turns the conversations take, illuminative of reasons why such a title came to be applied, including considerations in regards to what has been termed the perspicuity of scripture, and we are not even yet to a thousand replies in number, on this thread...

Should we all laugh -- or cry, depends upon one's own place(s) of perspective, with those natural arising responses from within a soul reading through this thread, seeming too as fluid as your own support, first for a this, then for a something subtly other, then back towards that which was just backed off from, to once again include the same that, while seemingly also seeking to blame it all on someone else, namely -- those protestants, and now " those mariophobic bastards" as you termed it, since the Greek Texts do not fully (pun intended) support how the Latin (NT) texts were worded.

[Alamo-Girl]

I think you should only count the actual Scriptures quoted because if Protestants likewise count the Scripture reference in prayers, amens, hymns and such involved in a service, the number of verses would multiply.

Robert Morris' sermon was given on September 25, 2013. The Mass Readings for that day included Ez 9:5-9 and Luke 9:1-6 which is 11 verses compared to his 37.

[BlueDragon]

Sincerest form of WHAT?

flattening, I meant to say flattening like bunny-pancakes, so i can pretend i don't know what you are talking about

[metmom]

She’s not a graven image.

[metmom]

Yeah. They dis Scripture and then try to get into a spitting contest about who reads more.

So what if there is Scripture read at every mass.

How many of them read it every day outside of church?

It’s not like church is the only place one can or should be reading the Bible.

If they’re not getting it on their own, it doesn’t really matter if *more* is read in church once a week or not.

[boatbums]

would not have a clue

Happens to you often.

Retract the claws, Miss Kitty. All too often partial sentences are quoted so as to imply something other than what the poster actually said. Here was Metmom's:

Anyone simply looking at that image would not have a clue what it is about without someone telling them.

She was correct and you admitted it. Enough with the games and petty sniping. We're all supposed to be grown-ups here.

[metmom]

For Catholics the Mass is first and foremost.

For Christians, CHRIST is first and foremost.

Our relationship with Christ permeates ever aspect of our lives every minute of the day.

Our spiritual life is not compartmentalized out into church and not church.

Church is nice and good but should not be the center of the Christians life. The Christian's relationship with Christ should be such that church is optional.

I realize that Catholicism teaches it's a mortal sin to miss mass, but all that does is put one into bondage. Scripture never puts that requirement with those consequences on the believer.

[LurkingSince'98]

I agree the Scriptures quoted will multiply like baby bunnies.

these are from the part of the Mass immediately after the Daily readings that you mentioned:

All: I believe in one God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth, (Gen 14:19) of all things visible and invisible. (Col 1:16) I believe in one Lord Jesus Christ, the only Begotten Son of God, (Luke 1:35) born of the Father before all ages, God from God, Light from Light, True God from True God, begotten not made, consubstantial with the Father; (Heb 1:3) through him all things were made. (John 1:2-3) For us men and for our salvation he came down from heaven: (John 3:13) and by the power of the Holy Spirit he was incarnate of the Virgin Mary, (Matt 1:18) and became man. For our sake he was crucified under Pontius Pilate, (John 19:16) he suffered death and was buried, and rose again on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures. (1 Cor 15:3-4) He ascended into heaven (Luke 24:51) and is seated at the right hand of the Father. (Col 3:1) He will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead (2 Tim 4:1) and his kingdom will have no end. (Luke 1:33) I believe in the Holy Spirit, the Lord, the giver of Life, (Acts 2:17) who proceeds from the Father and the Son, (John 14:16) who with the Father and Son is worshiped and glorified. He has spoken through the prophets. (1 Peter 1:10-11) I believe in one holy, catholic and apostolic Church. (Rom 12:5) I confess one baptism for the forgiveness of sins (Acts 2:38) and I look forward to the resurrection of the dead and the life of the world to come. (Rom 6:5) Amen

Liturgy of the Eucharist

[The gifts are brought to the altar. These include the bread and wine and the offering collected from the people.] (Malachi 3:10)

Priest: Blessed are you, Lord, God of all creation. Through your goodness we have this bread to offer, which earth has given and human hands have made. (Eccl. 3:13) It will become for us the bread of life. (John 6:35)

People: Blessed be God forever. (Ps 68:36)

Priest: Blessed are you, Lord, God of all creation. Through your goodness we have this wine to offer, fruit of the vine and work of human hands. It will become our spiritual drink. (Luke 22:17-18)

People: Blessed be God forever. (Ps 68:36)

Priest: Pray, brethren, that our sacrifice may be acceptable to God, the almighty Father. (Heb. 12:28)

People: May the Lord accept the sacrifice at your hands for the praise and glory of his name, for our sake and the good of all his holy Church. (Ps 50:23)

Priest: The Lord be with you.
People: And with your spirit.
Priest: Lift up your hearts.
People: We lift them up to the Lord. (Lam 3:41)
Priest: Let us give thanks to the Lord our God. (Col 3:17)
People: It is right and just. (Col 1:3)

Preface Acclamation

All: Holy, holy, holy Lord, God of hosts. Heaven and earth are full of your glory. (Is 6:3) Hosanna in the highest. Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. Hosanna in the highest. (Mark 11:9-10)

.

The statement I made that created the furor was:
“I wouldn’t know since I have never been to a protestant service, however, I have been told by protestants that there is more Scripture in a Catholic Mass than they hear from their preacher or pastor on any given Sunday.”

These are church going protestants who I consider very faithful and truthful. I believe that they were talking about the whole entire Mass.

So we need to see the totality of Scripture in EVERY Catholic Mass versus the totality of scripture in ANY protestant service.

Thanks

Ad Majoram Dei Gloriam

[Alamo-Girl]

I've attended Mass quite a bit and they have never quoted the Scriptural basis of the phrases in the liturgy as you have here. But they do quote the Scriptural basis when reading from the podium (Old Testament, Epistles, etc.) or from the Gospel.

Protestant services likewise do not quote the Scriptural basis for the phrases used in prayers, hymns and such. And the services can be - often are - much longer than a Mass. The pastors themselves often speak a familiar verse without quoting it. In Morris' sermon I was only looking for the actual quotes of Scripture.

To be compared fairly, one cannot look at the entire Mass but only the Sermon portion of a Protestant Service. And if you take the entire (what might be several hours long at Gateway) Protestant Service in consideration to gather up Scripture references as well as quotes, the result would weigh very heavily in favor of the Protestant side.

[BlueDragon]

Of course when I pray to Mary or to any other saint I pray to that particular saint, -- for his/her intercession, or advice, etc. However, by doing so I venerate God, "For it is God who worketh in [them], both to will and to accomplish, according to his good will" (Phil. 2:13).

This is yet another example of a goodly thing being held up -- while slight but subtle change of identity has been made, with that change being the [ ] bracketed word "them" which is swapped out for the more precisely expressed as comes through translation into English word --- "you".

In the context from which it is derived, namely chapter 2 of Paul's epistle to the Philippians, that "you" (which you changed to a "them") was none other than the Philippians to whom the letter was addressed.

From the link, quoting there from Young's Literal Translation;

9 wherefore, also, God did highly exalt him, and gave to him a name that [is] above every name,

10 that in the name of Jesus every knee may bow -- of heavenlies, and earthlies, and what are under the earth --

11 and every tongue may confess that Jesus Christ [is] Lord, to the glory of God the Father.

12 So that, my beloved, as ye always obey, not as in my presence only, but now much more in my absence, with fear and trembling your own salvation work out,

13 for God it is who is working in you both to will and to work for His good pleasure.

14 All things do without murmurings and reasonings,

15 that ye may become blameless and harmless, children of God, unblemished in the midst of a generation crooked and perverse, among whom ye do appear as luminaries in the world,