Shame on you--it's not a strawman if it's true!
The strawman here is that "The Roman Catholic Church wrote the Bible"
And again, the cultisness is demonstrated with the claim that the "Chuch did this or that..." We have The Bible because God preserved it. Whatever methods he chose are his. The " curse" of Protestsntism is what put God's Word into the hands of everyday people, in their language, so they could read and understand The True Gospel --not the lies taught by Rome.
You seem to think I value Osteen and his ilk... I don't. But God's word is not written for the theologian; it's written for us. It's a shame you place so little faith in God to guide the reading of his word, by his children, so that we understand it.
Anyone can twist scripture. The biggest offender is the Roman Catholic Church.
When Jesus himself says, "... No one comes to the Father except through me" in John 14:6, why does the Roman Catholic Churcn lie and say Mary provides grace and salvation? So do the Church Fathers and "Petrine Authrity" trump Gad Almighty himself?
By the way--it doesn't take a theologian to understand that verse. Christ wasn't talking to a theologian when he said that, was he?
Or, why does The Roman Catholic Church lie and say Mary is a "Mediatrix" when God clearly says in 1 Timothy 2:5:
"For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, "
Square the lie of Rome with God's own breathed out word.
Once the cat was out of the bag, Rome's authority was shown for what it was: a sham. That's the result of pre-Internet theologians, right?
As for the deep end of the pool, it saddens me that the attitude of wanting to restrict God's Word is still so clearly held by the Catholic Church. But , I suppose it's tough when its lies and false gospel are laid bare by simple reading of The a Bible. Wasn't it written for us?.
Nice try though.
Hoss
You write anyone can “twist” scripture. Exactly. So we have a starting point:
Christ through both his written and unwritten Word taught ONE single truth. Thus logically there is ONE teaching authority here on earth. Otherwise the Great Commission given to Peter and his successors would mean nothing.
You cannot for example have several different history professors provide conflicting views to a class on a given period of history. But here we are dealing with something infinitely more important, God’s sacred Word, as ONE truth.
That Catholic Church is the Church that through extensive theological scholarship and study over hundred- two hundred years and more authenticated for us the written Word of God. That Church existed before the canonical texts were assembled together in the Synod of Rome AD 382.
This teaching authority therefore must be for all time and it must be infallible. Apparently this logic escapes Bible Christians as they attempt to go up against a mountain of theological scholarship dating from the early Church Fathers.
Only the Catholic Church lays claim to this unbroken like succession.
We are of course peaking here about interpretation of God’s word. Not about the individuals lives of Popes and their sayings. Newsflash for the likes of CynicalBear and others. Popes too are sinners. As the renowned Bishop Fulton J. Sheen once wrote about non-Catholics, it is not so much as what they know about Catholicism as it is about what they know that is so wrong.
Bible Christians are fond of dipping into the shallow end of kindergarten learning and quoting a verse of scripture from here and there like John 14:6 to speak about anyone having the liberty to read scripture as they please since “No one comes to the Father except through me”.....etc. But the “me” here is His Church. This is the Great Commission to “Go forth and teach...”.
On this score, Bible Christians appear immune to the fact of the writings of the early Church fathers.
In the year 110 A.D., not even fifteen years after the book of Revelation was written, while on his way to execution St. Ignatius of Antioch wrote: “Where the bishop is present, there let the congregation gather, just as where Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church”. The Church believes that when the bishops speak as teachers, Christ speaks; for he said to them: “He who hears you, hears me; and he who rejects you, rejects me” (Lk 10, 16).
In the end to avoid the twists and turns of the heresies spawned by the Reformation, it’s not yours or my interpretation of the written AND unwritten word of God or our grandmothers or Rev. Jeremiah Wrights or Billy Graham that counts. We must look to the interpretations of the scripture and the sacred oral tradition as embrace by the Catholic Church.
St. Paul in his letters also warns the faithful to hold fast to the tradition they received: “We command you, brothers, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ, to avoid any brother who wanders from the straight path and does not follow the tradition you received from us” (2 Th 3, 6).
This is why the Catholic Church is the great mustard tree. Why droves of eminent Protestant theologians are decamping from the heretical nonsense of Protestantism. They are to use your word all “twists.”
Bereft of the sacraments, the belief in the Eucharist, and the Sacrifice of the Mass and Marian dogma, all these other Protestant variations are nothing more than wild mushrooms that wither and die just like those mainline Protestant denominations that now allow for the ordination of married gay and lesbians pastors and bishops.
Protestantism today is a caricature with a variation of vapid beliefs because it lacks the Petrine authority of the Church.
All discussion must begin and end with Petrine authority, not what your local corner street Foursquare Church pastor dishes out to the type of low-IQ congregants that fill up the pews in a Joel Osteen or Billy Graham or Rev. Jeremiah Wright sermon. These are all ”twists!”