BREAKING: Pope Harming the Church
Cardinal Burke: Pope is harming the Church by not making his position clear.
Posted on 10/17/2014 5:25:44 PM PDT by Brian Kopp DPM
Sounds a bit tongue-in-cheek and if so, I agree. I think the headline should be, Christianity and Religion Collide...
Please provide clear Biblical support of this alleged special channel to the pope.
Please provide clear Biblical support of this alleged special channel to the pope.
No allegory. No appeal to the ECFs. No it looks like, feels like.
Something this important should be clear in Scripture.
Sin is a negative reaction to God’s love for us.
This is EXACTLY on the mark. The problem throughout the gathering of Catholics is their adherence to "sacred tradition" and their abandonment of God's Word. They have their false hope in what they do - not in what Christ did.
There are exceptions - but NOT among those on this forum who relentlessly defend their "faith."
““Negative reactions” includes our sins.”
Sin is an action, not a reaction.
“But how can anyone deny that the Scribes, Pharisees, Judas, and the mob “reacted negatively” to Jesus.”
Who is doing that?
“Certainly the mob in Nazareth that tried to push him off a cliff reacted negatively.”
That’s all? It was just a negative reaction and not a sinful attempt to take Jesus’ life?
“Please provide clear Biblical support of this alleged special channel to the pope.”
Sure. As soon as you provide Biblical support for the false doctrine of sola scriptura.
“Please provide clear Biblical support of this alleged special channel to the pope.”
Sure. As soon as you provide Biblical support for the false doctrine of sola scriptura.
“No allegory. No appeal to the ECFs. No it looks like, feels like.”
Sure. As soon as you provide Biblical support for the false doctrine of sola scriptura. No verses that merely show the importance or inspiration of scripture, or the value and greatness of scripture. No, just verses that show sola scriptura.
“Something this important should be clear in Scripture.”
Something as important as sola scriptura - which Protestant anti-Catholics insist on as a standard in post after post to Catholics - should be clearly presented in scripture. Where is it?
“Sin is a negative reaction to God’s love for us.”
Sin is a rejection of God’s love not a negative reaction to it. If it were a negative reaction to it then people would never agree to enjoy it in the first place. Instead, what we do is knowingly reject it rather than negatively react to it (as if it were new and unknown to us).
“In essence, particular mortal sins show a rejection of God.” http://www.ewtn.com/library/ANSWERS/MORTSIN.HTM
“Not exactly... Luther tried for YEARS to reform the Catholic church from the wickedness and debauchery its leaders had sunk to.”
False. Luther came up with his own doctrines around 1511-12. He only openly started his “reform movement” on October 31, 1517. He was calling for acts of violence and theft against the Church in 1520. Thus, at most, you could say his career as a “reformer WITHIN the Church” lasted three years. And even that conclusion is fraught with difficulties because of Luther pushing his own doctrines rather tha actually trying to reform anyone from “the wickedness and debauchery [they] had sunk to.”
“In turn, he got threatened, persecuted, chased out of his home, pursued by kings, princes and clergy in order to execute him.”
He was hunted by those who knew he was a heretic and that he would cause civil war - which happened and continued to happen for centuries. Remember there were only two religious wars anyone could think of in Europe before that time: 1) against Islam (a defensive war) and against heretics like the Hussites and Albigensians (which were considered defensive as well for the good of society). Now, they knew there would be more war. And that’s what Europe got - for four centuries.
“It was when he was excommunicated for refusing to recant his thesis and preaching questioning the novel doctrines, depraved clergy and perverted gospel within the Roman Catholic church, that he finally left.”
No. The problem with your THESIS (please note, it is a thesis, Luther had THESES) is that it doesn’t take into account what actually happened. Luther’s doctrines were the novel ones. Even Protestants sometimes admit this. Alister McGrath admits this about Luther in his doctrinal dissertation (I read it myself; the two volume published version). Also, the gospel of the Catholic Church is in fact THE gospel as more and more Protestants are tacitly admitting with their theological halfway house called “the New Perspective on Paul”. Also, if you’re saying now that Luther was done only when he was excommunicated - which happened in January 1521 - then that means his whole career as a “reformer WITHIN the Church” lasted a whopping 3 years and 3 months. That was not exactly a long career now was it?
“The “scandal” was not remedied from within as it should have been and is why he, as well as thousands of others, left.”
His false doctrines were the scandal. He was excommunicated. It was remedied from within.
“They did not give up on their faith but chose to worship with those who also realized that the “fullness of the faith” could no longer be found with the leaders in Rome.”
No, they gave up the only faith they had ever known and that any of their ancestors had known and replaced it with a false gospel.
Sigh.
Rejection is a negative reaction.
I’m done with with you on your silly semantics. Go find somebody else to play with.
As I thought. Caths can’t defend their position without having to deflect. The clear teaching of Jesus appealing to scripture establishes the precedent for relying upon the Word.
“Sigh. Rejection is a negative reaction.”
No. Again, if you have a “negative reaction” that means you never accepted it in the first place. God’s love is continuous once accepted. If we commit a mortal sin, we are rejecting His love. We are not reacting to His love since we already had that.
If you quit a job at a company after working there for 20 years in order to work elsewhere (we sin in order to acquire perceived goods), you are rejecting their employment, you are not “negatively reacting” to their employment of you. If you thought their employment was worth having a negative reaction to it that would have come when you were hired rather than 20 years later. To say otherwise is to say that someone could even possibly have a negative reaction to God’s love. That’s not possible. We reject it in pursuit of perceived goods. We never have a negative reaction to it in itself.
“Sin sets itself against God’s love for us and turns our hearts away from it” (CCC 1850).
In CCC 397 it is clear that all since is a rejection of God, not a “negative reaction” to His love for us. This is the language of scripture as well:
1 Samuel 10:19 (RSVCE)
19 But you have this day rejected your God, who saves you from all your calamities and your distresses; and you have said, ‘No! but set a king over us.’ Now therefore present yourselves before the Lord by your tribes and by your thousands.”
“I’m done with with you on your silly semantics.”
In other words, you’re wrong and can’t make anything even approaching an argument in defense of your false claims. Yeah, that was obvious from the start.
“Go find somebody else to play with”
I don’t play. You don’t either. You just fail and then quit.
“As I thought. Caths can’t defend their position without having to deflect.”
As I thought, anti-Catholic Protestants can’t defend their heretical position - sola scriptura - with any actual evidence form scripture. This not only shows the doctrine is unscriptural by their own standards, but also the hypocritical nature of Protestant anti-Catholics.
“The clear teaching of Jesus appealing to scripture establishes the precedent for relying upon the Word.”
Except that Jesus did not only rely on scripture, the scriptural authors did not rely solely on scripture, and no verse of scripture says what you just said. Add to that the fact that no where in scripture is the canon actually defined and you can see how easily sola scriptura becomes entirely unworkable from a theological and logical stand point.
Seriously. Pope Francis is not going to make a dogmatic definition contrary to the Faith. The video explains why.
As great as Luther is, he didn’t go back to the Bible.
"We may trust unconditionally only in the Word of God and not in the teaching of the fathers; for the teachers of the Church can err and have erred. Scripture never errs. Therefore it alone has unconditional authority. The authority of the theologians of the Church is relative and conditional. Without the authority of the words of Scripture, no one can establish hard and fast statements in the Church." ~ Martin Luther
“Unless therefore I am convinced by the testimony of Scripture, or by the clearest reasoning, unless I am persuaded by means of the passages I have quoted, and unless they thus render my conscience bound by the Word of God, I cannot and will not retract, for it is unsafe for a Christian to speak against his conscience. Here I stand, I can do no other; may God help me! Amen!” ~ Martin Luther
Though Luther wasn't revolutionary in this, of course:
“Have thou ever in your mind this seal, which for the present has been lightly touched in my discourse, by way of summary, but shall be stated, should the Lord permit, to the best of my power with the proof from the Scriptures. For concerning the divine and holy mysteries of the Faith, not even a casual statement must be delivered without the Holy Scriptures; nor must we be drawn aside by mere plausibility and artifices of speech. Even to me, who tell you these things, give not absolute credence, unless thou receive the proof of the things which I announce from the Divine Scriptures. For this salvation which we believe depends not on ingenious reasoning , but on demonstration of the Holy Scriptures.” (Cyril of Jerusalem, Cat. Lecture 4, Ch. 17)
What "false" doctrines are those?
No, they gave up the only faith they had ever known and that any of their ancestors had known and replaced it with a false gospel.
Incorrect. The only things "they" gave up were the novel dogmas invented/developed/changed by Roman Catholicism (i.e., indulgence payments; "tradition" and "magesterium" being placed as equal to Divinely-inspired Scripture; justification by faith AND works instead of by grace alone through faith alone). Belief in Jesus Christ, God incarnate, his death, burial and resurrection, complete sacrifice for our sins, the Trinity and all the other central tenets of the historic Christian faith were and remained. Even the Orthodox rejected the claims of Rome five hundred years earlier for the SAME reasons as the Reformers. If you or anyone would like to read Luther's actual correspondences with the Pope of Rome and others as this was going on and how it led up to his excommunication, read http://beggarsallreformation.blogspot.com/2005/10/letters-of-martin-luther.html.
Nobody worships Martin Luther nor do I consider him the Pope of Protestantism. He's a fallible man - as we ALL are - but a man who loved the Lord and his fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. I admire and respect his sincerity, faith, strength and trust in Almighty God through many trials and struggles. From his letter of April 7, 1516, we read about the sincere faith he had and we see how God used him to clarify the TRUE gospel and lead souls to saving faith in Jesus Christ:
Beware, my brother, at aiming at a purity which rebels against being classed with sinners. For Christ only dwells among sinners. For this He came from heaven, where He dwelt among saints, so that He might also sojourn with the sinful. Strive after such love, and thou wilt experience His sweetest consolation. For if by our own efforts we are to attain peace of conscience, why then did Christ die? Therefore thou wilt only find peace in Him when thou despairest of self and thine own works. He, Himself, will teach thee how in receiving thee He makes thy sins His, and His righteousness thine. When thou believest this firmly (for he is damned who does not believe) then bear patiently with erring brothers, making their sins thine. If there be any good in thee, then receive ye one another, even as Christ received us, to the glory of God. “Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: who being in the form of God, thought it not robbery to be equal with God.” Be thou the same. If thou esteem thyself better than others, do not pride thyself on that, but be as one of them, bearing their burdens. For he is a pitiable saint who will not bear patiently with those worse than himself, and longs only for solitude, when he, through patience, prayer, and example, might be exercising a salutary influence over others. This is burying his Lord’s talent, and not giving his fellow-servants their due. Therefore, be thou a lily or rose of Christ, knowing that thy walk must be among thorns.
Only see that through impatience, hasty judgments, or secret pride, thou dost not thyself become a thorn! “Christ’s kingdom,” says the psalmist, “subsists in the midst of its enemies.” Why then rejoice in being surrounded only by faithful friends? If He, thy Lord, had only lived among the good, or had died only for His friends, for whom then would He have died, or with whom could He have lived? Remember this, brother, and pray for me. The Lord be with thee. Farewell, in the Lord! Your brother, MARTIN LUTHER, Augustinian. (De Wette.) TO GEORGE LEIFFER Luther comforts a brother in Erfurt.
“What “false” doctrines are those?”
His.
“Incorrect. The only things “they” gave up were the novel dogmas...”
Protestantism was a novelty. As Alistair McGrath mentions Luther introduced novelties into theology. It’s just that simple.
Why should the opinions of an Anglican priest matter? He's not a Protestant. If you cannot even name what those "novel" or "false" doctrines are, what's the point of your continued comments? You've made no secret of your contempt and disgust of "Protestants" and "Protestantism". Using Free Republic's Religion Forum for your own personal diatribe soapbox seems like a waste of time if you think anyone will be swayed by such tactics. They won't be. It's just that simple!
“Why should the opinions of an Anglican priest matter?”
Well, he’s a notable scholar - as recognized by everyone.
“He’s not a Protestant.”
Anglican = Protestant. Hence, in America, the former name of the Anglican Church was “Protestant Episcopal Church”.
“If you cannot even name what those “novel” or “false” doctrines are, what’s the point of your continued comments?”
I can name them. I see no reason to name them other that to say “His” since it is well known what doctrines he invented.
“You’ve made no secret of your contempt and disgust of “Protestants” and “Protestantism”.”
Actually Protestantism and Protestant anti-Catholics. The average Protestant is just a well-meaning person who doesn’t know better.
“Using Free Republic’s Religion Forum for your own personal diatribe soapbox seems like a waste of time if you think anyone will be swayed by such tactics.”
I think that is a very telling comment coming from someone who has - over the years - spent hundreds and hundreds of hours posting anti-Catholic comments.
“They won’t be. It’s just that simple!”
Actually, two Protestants, both anti-Catholics too, have converted that I know of. I only know this because they told me. This was while I was posting elsewhere before FreeRepublic but I posted in the same fashion that I do here. Also, many Catholics private message me about how much they appreciate my defense of the faith. Your comments about my supposed tactics of whether or not they sway anyone are completely irrelevant to me.
I can say I appreciate what you bring to the RF. It's been an inspiration to me and helped me to grow in my faith both in knowledge and spirit.
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