Posted on 04/26/2015 7:30:49 AM PDT by CHRISTIAN DIARIST
Im a woman. So said Bruce Jenner, during his coming out appearance this past Friday on a special two-hour edition of the ABC News program 20/20.
And thats not the only shocking revelation Jenner confided to interviewer Diane Sawyer. She also claimed to be a Republican, a conservative and a Christian.
Well, its conceivable that Jenner is a Republican. After all, theres a LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) group that calls itself the Log Cabin Republicans.
Its also possible that Jenner is a conservative. Indeed, there have been any number of conservative lawmakers including former Idaho Senator Larry Craig, a homosexual, and former Florida congressman Mark Foley who were outed as homosexuals.
But theres no way that Jenner, who is transitioning from male to female, is a true Christ follower.
Indeed, in his letter to the Church at Corinth, the Apostle Paul advised: Neither fornicators, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor sodomites, nor thieves, nor covetous, nor revilers, nor extortioners will inherit the kingdom of God.
Does that mean any and every one of us who has committed any of those aforementioned sins is unsaved; that we have condemned ourselves to the second death, as John of Patmos put it, when we appear before the judgment seat of Christ?
No.
Because, the Scripture assures us: If we confess our sins, He is just and faithful to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us of all unrighteousness.
Conversely, If we say that we have no sin, as Jenner, the transgender in the making maintains, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.
So it matters not if Jenner attends church every Sunday; if he tithes what earns for his upcoming reality show; if he reads his Bible every day; if he prays first thing each morning, and last thing every night.
If he unrepentantly undergoes a sex change, if he refuses to acknowledge that doing so is an abomination in the eyes of God, he will be in open rebellion against his Creator.
Thats why Christ warned us, everyone: If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and cast it from you; for it is more profitable for you that one of your members perish, than for your whole body to be cast into hell.
What that says is that we are not to surrender ourselves to sin; to deceive ourselves that God will forgive us for our unconfessed, unrepented adultery or financial wrongdoing or substance abuse or acts of violence or twisted sexual orientation.
If Jenner truly was a Christian, he would not blithely embrace transgenderism. No, he would fall on his knees and ask the Lord to free him from Satans grip. For greater is He who is in Bruce Jenner who is in all of us struggling with sin than he who is in the world.
Why do you do this, CynicalBear? Why do you impute to me what I never said and what I do not believe, and what the Catholic Church does not teach?
It is unhelpful, in fact hurtful, when you attribute things falsely to others. It does not advance the friendship and the conversation.
"It is those who put the magisterium above scripture that refuse the counsel of the Holy Spirit and find scripture hard to understand."
And once again. We are not putting Magisterium "above" Scripture. We do not refuse the counsel of the Holy Spirit. And if some find parts of Holy Scripture hard to understand --- don't we all? Didn't St. Peter say so? Didn't St. Paul say that God appoints teachers in the Church? These are Scriptures you seem to set aside as having noting to say to you.
I think our sharing would go better with greater appeals --- by both of us --- to the Holy Spirit. God will not refuse what we ask.
--(Iscool) "Well, not this time..."
:o)
Oh come now Mrs. Don-o. How many times have we seen comments about how the Catholic Church was the only "church" until the Reformation? According to Catholics here there was no other.
>>And once again. We are not putting Magisterium "above" Scripture.<<
Evidence would say otherwise. It's clear to me that Catholics put what the "magisterium" says above what scripture teaches. It's the "magisterium" to whom they appeal not only for what scripture says but additions to scripture as well.
>>And if some find parts of Holy Scripture hard to understand<<
I addressed that in my last post.
>>Paul say that God appoints teachers in the Church?<<
See Acts 17:11
"I wrote to the church,
but Diotrephes,
who loves to dominate,
does not acknowledge us.
Therefore, if I come,
I will draw attention to what he is doing,
spreading evil nonsense about us.
And not content with that,
he will not receive the brothers,
hindering those who wish to do so
and expelling them from the church."
So yeah, the Catholics who say there were no other churches before the Reformation, are mistaken in historic point of fact. There have always been other churches. You're welcome to Diophenes.
You're welcome, as well, to the Cathari, the Paulicians, and the Donatists, cited by some (such as J.M. Carroll) as precursors of today's "Bible Christians". Unfortunately, they are not doctrinally coherent enough to give you a real hermeneutic of continuity (e.g. the Paulicians and Cathari said that all of physical reality, including the human body, was created by the God of Evil) --- and not early enough to give you such ancient foundations as you have in Diophenes.
"It's the "magisterium" to whom they [Catholics] appeal not only for what scripture says but additions to scripture as well."
This is in fact true, if by "additions to scripture" you mean "Natural Law." The Catholic Church holds that Scriptural Law and Natural Law both have the same Divine Author, and that, thanks to the authority which Christ has given His Church, the Magisterium is competent to teach authoritatively about both.
As Jesus said to his appointed teachers (the 70 disciples) in Luke 10:16, "He that hears you hears me; and he that despises you despises me; and he that despises me despises Him that sent me."
And that reminds me of the original topic of this thread, which is Bruce Jenner's claim that Jesus is OK with his "sexual reassignment" project, because "sexual reassignment" is not condemned in Scripture. Do you think he's right?
Finally...An honest Catholic who will admit that it was NOT the only religion before 1600...
But one thing you forgot to mention is that while these 'heretical' churches had small issues where they disagreed with the Catholic religion, they ALL had one thing in common...They refused to submit to the Church of Rome, to the point of death...
They also refused to call the mother of Jesus the mother of God...They all refused to make Mary their queen of heaven...And most importantly, they rejected the Catholic idea of its Mass and their Eucharist...That's why these and Protestants are considered heretics...
"...they [the separate Christian movements] ALL had one thing in common...They refused to submit to the Church of Rome, to the point of death..."
That varied significantly from movement to movement. Many of the Paulicians and the Donatists, for instance, eventually reconciled with the See of Rome.
"They also refused to call the mother of Jesus the mother of God...They all refused to make Mary their queen of heaven...And most importantly, they rejected the Catholic idea of its Mass and their Eucharist...That's why these and Protestants are considered heretics..."
One again it varies from movement to movement.
As far as I know, the Donatists didn't differ from the universal Christian church on anything except their (the Donatists') rigorism in upholding the sacraments. The Donatists refused to forgive and reconcile the apostate priests and bishops who had fallen away from the faith during the persecution by Diocletian. They said that these traitors could not be forgiven, and that their sacramental ministry was invalid because of their previous sins.
Thus they did not reject the sacraments: they just mistakenly insisted that the value of the sacrament depended on the worthiness of the minister, and not solely on the action of Christ.
The Paulicians and Cathari did not honor Mary because of the association of motherhood with bodily life and therefore, in their eyes, corruption; and they did not accept sacraments because they were "spirituali" who did not accept the holiness of either the Creation or the Incarnation. They believed that all material things, including human bodies, are evil.
“GOD decided the sex of Jenner, not me. I also desired to be astronaut all my life, but GOD decided I would not be.”
This wasn’t about what God did. This remark was about you did in your comments. You insisted Bruce Jenner should never have disclosed to a living soul the truth of his feelings about his gender and the emotional turmoil it caused him; and then you perversely insisted he was living a lie because he did not disclose his feelings about his gender and instead went forward with marriage, the fathering of six children, and living a lie that constitutes a sin. In other words, you are saying Bruce Jenner sinned by acting upon his inner need to express a female gender role with his disclosure and then also say Bruce Jenner sinned by not disclosing the same information earlier as he lived in the male gender role. That is you who making statements which are contradictory, regardless of what Bruce Jenner did or did not do what he or someone else thinks is sinful. So, don’t try to change the subject away from your own responsibility for your own contradictory statements.
Also, you avoided answering the question of what you think you would and should have done in the event you found yourself in the same dilemma as Bruce Jennings. So, what would and should you do in the same circumstances as Bruce Jennings?
Bruce Jenner is a sick man that needs help not encouragement for his mental problems. You should really quit questioning God. He does not make mistakes.”
>>And that reminds me of the original topic of this thread, which is Bruce Jenner's claim that Jesus is OK with his "sexual reassignment" project, because "sexual reassignment" is not condemned in Scripture. Do you think he's right?<<
He's using the same line we hear from Catholics all the time!!
As for Bruce Jenner's comment that sex-reassignment surgery must be OK "because it's not explicitly forbidden in the Bible," that's exactly what a Catholic would not say.
Generally speaking, in moral terms there are two kinds of sex "treatments". There are treatments to correct and normalize sex organs which were for some reason malformed or disabled (to heal injuries or address very rare genetic conditions). On the other hand, there's surgical/hormonal "treatment" which does the opposite: which impairs or destroys the function of your normal sexual reproductive system.
There is nothing wrong with the first kind of medical intervention, because it's aimed at restoring normal, natural sexual function.
The second kind, though--- the increasingly common type they're publicizing now --- is exactly the opposite: rejecting your natural sex organs and your naturalsexual identity. This, Catholics would say, is morally wrong because it is a violation of Natural Law. The legitimate use of medical intervention is to restore, to cure and to heal, not to cut off normal, natural organs and substitute something else.
Catholic medical ethics is pretty much based on Natural Law. It's not directly Scriptural, although it's harmonious with principles found in Scripture, namely the goodness of Creation, that it is good that God made you male or female. Jenner's view and the Catholic/Natural Law view are opposites.
Touche'!
Not in the framework of the Catholic understanding of the word "church". The ekklesia of Christ has little similarity with the Catholic understanding of the word "church".
>>Generally speaking, in moral terms there are two kinds of sex "treatments".<<
I have no interest in Jenner other than to say he's perverted the natural order. My comment had nothing to do with his sexual situation. It had to do with his comment about scripture not specifically saying it's wrong. That type of comment comes often from Catholics when trying to defend beliefs and practices they have.
Then you do agree that Natural Law and Scriptural Law, properly understood, reach the same conclusions?
As I understand it, the “ekklesia” in Philadelphia (in Asia Minor) would be considered a “local church” according to Catholic ecclesiology. That is, if they had a bishop.
It all comes from the same source doesn't it? Surely you wouldn't suggest that God conflicts with Himself would you?
Exactly!
No he doesn't.
The Catholic Church uses the word "church" in two ways, to mean either: the "local particular church" ("diocese"), that is, the church under its bishop or equivalent; and the "autonomous local church" ("rites") with its own customary liturgies and canon laws, and often, language, such as the Chaldeans, the Melkites, the Maronites, the Armenian Catholic Church, etc.
All the particular Catholic Churches eastern or western, autonomous (rites) or local (dioceses) are by definition in full communion with the See of Rome.
So here's my question: do you think these seven churches of Asia were local churches in the sense of dioceses?
Exactly. We're on the same page here, CynicalBear.
I never said a word about how I felt about Bruce Jenner “disclosing” anything. I said he has a mental illness and needs help, not encouragement. He could disclose he thinks he’s a dog and wants to learn how to bark and eat Alpo. He needs Christ in his life, not liberals that try to justify his mental illness.
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