Verga, verga, VERGA!!!
Don't you know when you 'quote' something you should give a reference as to where to find it?
Anything less is considered to be poor form.
Posted on 01/31/2015 8:43:45 PM PST by Morgana
My new book, The Protestant's Dilemma, shows in a myriad of ways why Protestantism is implausible. We sifted through many arguments to boil the book down to the most essential. A few chapters didn't make the cut but are still good enough to share. Here's one of them.
If Protestantism is true,
There's no way to know whether you're assenting to divine revelation or to mere human opinion about divine revelation.
Protestants and Catholics both believe that God has revealed himself to man over the course of human history, culminating in his ultimate self-revelation in Jesus Christ. But whereas Catholics believe that Christ founded a visible Church—which subsists in the Catholic Church—and has protected its doctrines from error, Protestants reject the notion of ecclesial infallibility, maintaining that no person, church, or denomination has been preserved from error in its teachings. Which means that anyone could be wrong, and no person or institution can be trusted with speaking the truth of divine revelation without error.
Universal Fallibility
“No one is infallible.” If Protestantism has a universal belief, this is it. Luther pioneered this idea when he asserted that popes and Church councils had erred. If they had erred, it meant God had not guided them into all truth; instead, he allowed them to fall into error and, worse, to proclaim error as truth.
And so the most a Protestant can do is tentatively assent to doctrinal statements made by his church, pastor, or denomination, since those statements, being fallible, could be substantively changed at some time in the future. We see this all the time in Protestantism, most commonly when a Protestant leaves one church for another due to doctrinal disagreement, especially after his church changed its position on an issue he considered important.
Consider the question of same-sex “marriage.” Until quite recently, all Protestant denominations taught this was a contradiction in terms. But now many have modified or even completely reversed this doctrine. Those Protestants who accept this new teaching believe that the old one was wrong—an erroneous human opinion that became enshrined in their church’s statement of faith. They can do this confidently, knowing that none of their fellow church members can plausibly claim that it contradicts an irreformable dogma that was infallibly revealed by God.
Ultimately, then, a Protestant (who remains Protestant) studies the relevant sources—Scripture, history, the writings of authoritative figures in his tradition—and chooses the Protestant denomination that most aligns with his judgment. But then, they say, Catholics do the same thing: studying the sources and then choosing the Catholic Church based on their own judgment. So they see no difference in this regard.
Because Catholicism is true,
Christians can know divine revelation, as distinct from mere human opinion, because God protects it from authoritatively teaching anything that is false.
How is the Catholic’s judgment different from a Protestant's, if at all? The difference lies in the conclusion, or finishing point, of the inquiry they make. Whereas the Protestant can ultimately submit only to his own judgment, which he knows to be fallible, the Catholic can confidently render total assent to the proclamations of the visible Church that Christ established and guides, submitting his judgments to its judgments as to Christ's.
And so a Catholic can know divine revelation, as distinct from human opinion, by looking to the Church, which speaks with Christ’s voice and cannot lie. For a Protestant, only the Bible itself contains God’s infallibly inspired words, so he desires to assent to that. But since the Bible must be interpreted by someone, the closest he can come to assenting to biblical teaching is assenting to his own fallible interpretation of it. And assenting to yourself is no assent at all.
The Protestant’s Dilemma
If Protestantism is true, all are fallible. So the Protestant must rely on his own judgment above that of his church. And the orthodoxy of the church itself is judged against his interpretation of the Bible. Thus is becomes impossible to distinguish between what divine revelation actually is versus what a fallible human being thinks it is. This fact makes the Catholic Church, philosophically speaking, preferable to Protestantism, since God’s truth can be known—and known with certainty.
Verga, verga, VERGA!!!
Don't you know when you 'quote' something you should give a reference as to where to find it?
Anything less is considered to be poor form.
"Glory is fleeting, but obscurity is forever."
- Napoleon Bonaparte
I suspect this or a quite similar messages are going to him Privately from his fellow Catholics.
Does this mean what it seems to mean?
Yer halfway there, son.
“Catholicism is the only religion that does promote thought and reason”
The whole reason why there was a “Protestant” schism is because the Catholic church of the time thought EVERYONE was too stupid to notice what was going on - from whoring popes to financial corruption and more. I’d say those who stuck around did so more from lack of thought than those who left.
You can call Protestantism whatever you want, but to say that it came about from a “lack of thought” is a little flimsy an argument - even for a deep-thinking Catholic like yourself.
“Not a single protestant contributed to that.”
LOL....The Catholic church of that time was a far cry from the one corrupted by men over centuries that precipitated the Protestant Reformation - and Catholicism did reform - but would not have had the Protestants not acted and forced them to do so, lest they lose the who shebang with their moral and tyrannical corruption of the 16th century and before.
Protestants have every claim on what happened before the Reformation as Catholics do. What nonsense to think otherwise!
By the way, Speaking for all Protestants (tounge-in-cheek there....) You’re Welcome for the save.
“False Dichotomy.”
I don’t think it is. Read what he said. (can I properly deduce that you agree with him?)
Throw some of those “Catholics are the only ones who think” brain cells into the problem.
You’ll get it eventually.
The truth is they began a conversation with a Non Catholic friend or acquaintance who ends up taking them to a service or two. They get swept up by the music and the friendliness of the environment and the next thing you know they are jumping ship.
The other option is that they have an issue with divorce, abortion, birth control, or some other similar issue. These are the ones that will tell you that the Catholic Church needs to move into the modern times. They end up in the church or Que sera sera anything goes. They have been poorly catechized and really have no idea of what the Church teachers or why.
On the other hand... Every single protestant convert or revert to Catholicism did so based on solid research and reason. Look at Scott and Kimberly Hahn, Marcus Grodi, Jeff Cavins, Cardinal Newman. < P>Do yourself a favor and read some of their testimonies. They reasoned their way into the Catholic Church by studying both SCRIPTURE and history.
“Virtually every protestant I know left for an emotional reason NOT one based on reason. “
“Virtually” eh? So therefore it must be that that every Protestant - based on your opinion (and we know only Catholic Opinion matters here). Ok.
“They get swept up by the music and the friendliness of the environment and the next thing you know they are jumping ship.”
So you are saying every Protestant, based on your Catholic Opinion, simply falls for smiles and music over God and Reason.
” Every single protestant convert or revert to Catholicism did so based on solid research and reason.”
Therefore every single protestant is unreasonable and unthinking - incapable of proper opinion on matters of religion.
Do you not see your circular reasoning here?
feel free to have the last word, it is not worth wasting either my breath or my time.
LOL.
I don’t think I did put words in your mouth. You and the author of the article in the post write as if you share an opinion of Protestantism and Catholicism that is not borne out by facts.
You and the author of the article also write as if you share opinions of Protestants and Catholics that are hateful and self-congratulatory respectively - and are also not borne out in fact.
It’s not your fault that you’re wrong about just about everything you have posted to me on this thread - you simply have not learned to think - rather you let Rome think for you.
Fortunately most Catholics I know are not like that. Most Catholics would not fall for the nonsense in this article. Lucky for Catholicism, most Catholics do not behave as you do.
Discuss the issues all you want, but do not make it personal.
No reply. Rather than repentance for regularly posting unattributed material as part of (indulgence gaining?) multiplicity of devotional post to oneself, it appears we have a agenda to even the score for being called on it.
As if an occasional failure to provide attribution, or links to one's own material, would do that.
placemarker
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