Posted on 08/09/2015 11:06:27 AM PDT by Old Yeller
The Bible never speaks of a place where one can go to be purified of his sin. Rather, it always speaks of a Person to whom we can go to be purified: Jesus Christ. God tells us that those who refuse to trust Christ to cleanse them from their sins are condemned: Whoever believes in Him avoids condemnation, but whoever does not believe is already condemned for not believing in the name of God's only Son (John 3:18). There are only two choices: Whoever believes in the Son has life eternal. Whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but must endure the wrath of God (John 3:36; See also Revelation 20:15; Luke 16:19-31, especially verse 26). Anyone who accepts Christ is completely saved: There is no condemnation now for those who are in Christ Jesus (Romans 8:1). Saying that there is no condemnation, certainly eliminates the flames of purgatory.
Another passage which clearly excludes the idea of purgatory is, their sins and transgressions I will remember no more (Hebrews 10:17). If, as the Bible says, God no longer remembers the sins of those who are in Christ, He does not punish them for these sins. To do so would be saying that Christ had not made full payment for them and that God the Father still remembered them. (See also Romans 5:8-11; Hebrews 10:14-18; Psalm 103:12).
Anyone who does not believe that Christ has completely saved him, has not completely trusted Christ to save him. That is, he does not believe that Christ's sacrifice has paid for all of his sins, and thinks he must pay for some of them himself. However, we are saved when we stop trusting what we can do, and start trusting Christ to save us.
The idea that Christ's sacrifice is not sufficient to cleanse us from all of our sins would condemn a great sinner such as the thief who was crucified with Jesus to suffer a long time in purgatory if not for all eternity in hell! Instead, there was nothing left over that Christ's death on the Cross did not cover. When the thief placed his trust in Christ, Jesus said to him, I assure you: this day you will be with me in paradise (Luke 23:43).
If purgatory existed, and the mass helped people to get out, the rich would have a tremendous advantage by being able to pay for masses to shorten their suffering. The poor instead, would be left to the mercy of the occasional priest who might say an unpaid mass for them. One ex-priest wrote, "If we really believed that the mass would save people from the flames of purgatory, would we make them pay for it? I would even save a dog if I saw one in a fire, and I would never even think of asking to be paid!"
Purgatory was evidently a pagan idea. Virgil, the pagan Latin poet who lived 70 - 19 B.C. divided the departed souls into three different places in his writings: One for the good, one for the damned, and a third where the less bad could pay for their sins. Since the idea of purgatory existed outside of the church before it came into the church, it is probable that it was brought in by contact with pagans like Virgil. There was a great influx of non-Biblical ideas into the church around 300 A.D. when the Roman Emperor Constantine took many unsaved people in as members of the church.
In any event, there is no mention of purgatory in the Bible. Some would try, however, to make the idea sound somewhat Biblical by referring to 2 Maccabees 12:41-45, a passage in one of the apocryphal books written between the times of the Old and New Testaments. These books were never accepted as part of the Hebrew Old Testament, nor quoted in the New Testament, but they are included in the Catholic Bible, though usually with an explanation that they are of a less inspired category. Apart from this passage in 2 Maccabees, the apocrypha is little used by the Catholic church to support a doctrinal position.
It is important to notice that this passage does not speak of purgatory at all, but actually condemns idolatry, particularly the practice of wearing little images on a necklace or such. Hebrew soldiers were found wearing this sort of thing after a battle, and their buddies, on making this discovery, realized that they had died in the sin of idolatry. They then counseled prayer for their souls. The Roman Catholic position is that prayer for them would have been unnecessary if they were in heaven and useless if they were in hell, so there must be another place. The logic seems good, but the result contradicts the clear teaching of the inspired Scripture. Contradicting inspired Scripture with a philosophical response based on an apparent inference from the Apocrypha is a very weak argument indeed. The very word "Apocrypha," which comes from the Greek word for hidden, has come to mean "false," or "of doubtful authorship."
Yeah you were Catholic./ SARC.
How many "simple requests" have you ignored over the years? Stop castigating Catholics for your sins/ crimes.
No man or group of men has the authority to change that and dissolve the marriage.
Jesus never ONCE referenced a marriage that was not valid. The concept simply does not exist in Scripture, the very Scripture that Catholics claim their church wrote.
Matthew 19:3-9 And Pharisees came up to him and tested him by asking, “Is it lawful to divorce one's wife for any cause?”
He answered, “Have you not read that he who created them from the beginning made them male and female, and said, ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and his mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh’? So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”
They said to him, “Why then did Moses command one to give a certificate of divorce and to send her away?”
He said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart Moses allowed you to divorce your wives, but from the beginning it was not so. And I say to you: whoever divorces his wife, except for sexual immorality, and marries another, commits adultery.”
Mark 10:2-9 And Pharisees came up and in order to test him asked, “Is it lawful for a man to divorce his wife?”
He answered them, “What did Moses command you?”
They said, “Moses allowed a man to write a certificate of divorce and to send her away.”
And Jesus said to them, “Because of your hardness of heart he wrote you this commandment. But from the beginning of creation, ‘God made them male and female.’ ‘Therefore a man shall leave his father and mother and hold fast to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh.’ So they are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man separate.”
Malachi 2:13-16 And this second thing you do. You cover the Lord's altar with tears, with weeping and groaning because he no longer regards the offering or accepts it with favor from your hand. But you say, “Why does he not?” Because the Lord was witness between you and the wife of your youth, to whom you have been faithless, though she is your companion and your wife by covenant. Did he not make them one, with a portion of the Spirit in their union? And what was the one God seeking? Godly offspring.
So guard yourselves in your spirit, and let none of you be faithless to the wife of your youth. “For the man who does not love his wife but divorces her, says the Lord, the God of Israel, covers his garment with violence, says the Lord of hosts. So guard yourselves in your spirit, and do not be faithless.”
When a couple stands before God and makes vows to each other and then consummates the marriage (has sex) they become one flesh. Breaking that is not permitted by God.
Calling it an annulment doesn't change the fact that it's breaking the one flesh union between a man and woman.
The Catholic church in stating the the marriage was not valid, is then establishing that the couple was living in sin and engaged in fornication for all those years and their children are illegitimate.
Annulment is church sanctioned divorce.
You’re wrong.
...and a revenue generator.
What is the cost of annulment these days?
That too.
I don’t know what they run.
But all I know is that if you have enough money, you can buy whatever you want from the Church.
Kennedy and Chavez come to mind just for starters.
Yeah that is what I thought, No answer, bullies always back down when confronted with the truth.
Good thing Kennedy was loaded. (pun intended)
That is right, and since the marriage was never valid to begin with, THERE IS NO MARRIAGE TO DISSOLVE!
The Catholic church in stating the the marriage was not valid, is then establishing that the couple was living in sin and engaged in fornication for all those years and their children are illegitimate
Document from a CATHOLIC source and only a CATHOLIC source that the Church believes these children to be illegitimate.
It is a simple request
Once again you are showing complete ignorance of Catholic teaching and ignorance of the difference between a legal civil marriage and a valid Sacramental marriage.
There is NOTHING that can ever cause us to understand and appreciate what Christ went through to pay for our sins.
The nice, neat, tidy, sanitized Jesus that is hanging on the Roman Catholic church cross isn't even an accurate representation of the physical state Jesus was in when He was crucified.
It CAN'T remind us of what He suffered if it's not accurate to begin with. And you're right. It only deals with the physical suffering, not what was the worst of it, separation from the Father.
1 Corinthians 15:1-19 Now I would remind you, brothers, of the gospel I preached to you, which you received, in which you stand, and by which you are being saved, if you hold fast to the word I preached to you—unless you believed in vain.
For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received: that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the Scriptures, that he was buried, that he was raised on the third day in accordance with the Scriptures, and that he appeared to Cephas, then to the twelve. Then he appeared to more than five hundred brothers at one time, most of whom are still alive, though some have fallen asleep. Then he appeared to James, then to all the apostles. Last of all, as to one untimely born, he appeared also to me. For I am the least of the apostles, unworthy to be called an apostle, because I persecuted the church of God. But by the grace of God I am what I am, and his grace toward me was not in vain. On the contrary, I worked harder than any of them, though it was not I, but the grace of God that is with me. 11 Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed.
Now if Christ is proclaimed as raised from the dead, how can some of you say that there is no resurrection of the dead? But if there is no resurrection of the dead, then not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, then our preaching is in vain and your faith is in vain. We are even found to be misrepresenting God, because we testified about God that he raised Christ, whom he did not raise if it is true that the dead are not raised. For if the dead are not raised, not even Christ has been raised. And if Christ has not been raised, your faith is futile and you are still in your sins. Then those also who have fallen asleep in Christ have perished. If in Christ we have hope in this life only, we are of all people most to be pitied.
Our victory isn't in the suffering. It's in the resurrection, the conquering of death, once for all.
Then provide the list ealgeone is asking for.
So, then, the Catholic church does not recognize any marriages that it hasn’t validated.
It is then stating that anyone not married in the Catholic church approved manner is then not in a valid marriage, they are living in sin and their children are illegitimate.
Where did God ever give the Catholic church authority to determine under what conditions a marriage valid or legitimate?
Still none of your business.
AND IT WAS DONE ALREADY UP THREAD GO BACK AND LOOK, DUH.
It is a simple request. Have someone explain this to you.
So first you thank one for a testimony that teaches some people get out via reincarnation, and then post another demonic deception.
For we have not followed cunningly devised fables, when we made known unto you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of his majesty. (2 Peter 1:16)
Purgatory is never seen in Scripture, nor is it supported by 2Mac. 12, as shown, but is a tradition for which attempted support is erroneously extrapolated out of texts which do not teach it, as can be shown by God's grace, based upon the fallacious premise that perfection of character is required to see God, and sins must be atoned for after death by an possibly eons of years of suffering.
“There is NOTHING that can ever cause us to understand and appreciate what Christ went through to pay for our sins.”
How right you are, MM. I’ve often thought of the most innocent person I know suffering what our Christ suffered, but it’s impossible to even come close because that person is also with sin and hasn’t known the love of The Father since before time itself in order to be separated from His love.
You are so right. Praise be to Him that:
“Our victory isn’t in the suffering. It’s in the resurrection, the conquering of death, once for all.”
Ah, but there is. Christ tells the Pharisees they killed Zechariah, not the prophet who the book is named after, between the temple and the altar. The passage in Chronicles matches this description. I do not believe there is another that does.
Now if we were using the Catholic /Christian order of the canon I could agree with you up to a point. Since the order of our canon is Torah, writings, Prophets.
The current order of the OT is irrelevant in this discussion. We have to consider how the Hebrews had the OT arranged. In their order Genesis was first and Chronicles last as has been noted.
With this statement Jesus is saying the OT canon is what the Hebrews had at that time and referenced in their order and it did not include the apocrypha....though it was in existence at the time.
Historical knowledge
Still waiting!
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