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“Stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by a letter of ours.” ~ St. Paul to the ThessaloniansA former student of mine is thinking of becoming a Catholic, and she had a question for me. “I don’t understand the deuterocanonical books,” she ventured. “If the Catholic faith is supposed to be a fulfillment of the Jewish faith, why do Catholics accept those books and the Jews don’t?” She’d done her homework, and was troubled that the seven books and other writings of the deuterocanon had been preserved only...

The Trouble With Calvin – Pt. 3 In my last two blog posts, we examined the first two of the “five points” of Calvinism popularly known by the acronym, TULIP, which represents 1. Total Depravity 2. Unconditional Election 3. Limited Atonement 4. Irresistible Grace 5. Perseverance of the Saints (“once saved, always saved”). In this post, we will tackle the third point:Limited AtonementNo Christian that I know of would deny that some doctrines are more or less clear than others in Scripture. When it comes to the atonement of Christ, the Scriptures are most clear: Jesus Christ died on the...

The Trouble With Calvin – Pt. 2 In my last post, I began a series of critiques of John Calvin’s famous “five points,” most often referred to using the acronym, TULIP, which represents Total Depravity, Unconditional Election, Limited Atonement, Irresistibility of Grace, and The Perseverance of the Saints (“once saved, always saved”). In this installment, we’ll deal with Unconditional Election.Calvin’s idea of Unconditional Election simply means that God “elected” certain men for salvation and others for damnation from all eternity, rooted in texts of Scripture, as we will see below, like Romans 9:10-12:And not only so, but also when Rebecca had conceived...

Bill Watterson is the Bigfoot of cartooning. He is legendary. He is reclusive. And like Bigfoot, there is really only one photo of him in existence. Few in the cartooning world have ever spoken to him. Even fewer have ever met him. In fact, legend has it that when Steven Spielberg called to see if he wanted to make a movie, Bill wouldn’t even take the call. So it was with little hope of success that I set out to try and meet him last April. I was traveling through Cleveland on a book tour, and I knew that he...

Calvin, Aquinas and a Whopper with Cheese "Be Your Way!" The new slogan sums up the philosophy that drives our public debate on morality “Have It Your Way!” You’ve heard it thousands of times. That’s because Burger King has been drumming it into our heads for forty years. But you’re not going to hear it any more. Burger King no longer wants you to “Have It Your Way!” That’s not good enough for you. From now on, “Be Your Way!” According to Associated Press, Burger King wants to communicate that customers, “can and should live how they want anytime. It’s...

Yesterday marked the 450th anniversary of the death of John Calvin. Here are nine things you should know about the French theologian and Reformer. 1. From an early age, Calvin was a precocious student who excelled at Latin and philosophy. He was prepared to go to study of theology in Paris, when his father decided he should become a lawyer. Calvin spend half a decade at the University of Orleans studying law, a subject he did not love. 2. Calvin wrote his magnum opus, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, at the age of 27 (though he updated the work...

  SEE: Purging Out Pollock: The Constitutionality of Federal Wealth or Sales Tax By Calvin H. Johnson I have studied the above cited article and was astounded that one article could have so many misrepresentations and inaccurate conclusions which were apparently concocted in the author’s mind to promote a tax scheme contrary to the true intentions and beliefs under which our Constitution’s original tax plan was agreed to. Calvin writes:The apportionment clauses of the Constitution say that federal "direct taxes" must be apportioned among the states according to their population … Apportionment according to population is a hobbling requirement, somewhere between...

The Trouble With Calvin – Pt. 1 Over my next five blog posts, I am going to critique the famous “five points” of Calvinist theology: 1. Total Depravity 2. Unconditional Election 3. Limited Atonement 4. Irresistibility of Grace 5. Perseverance of the Saints (“Once Saved, Always Saved”).Pt. 1 – Total DepravityIn John Calvin’s magnum opus, The Institutes of the Christian Religion, Calvin presents a view of man that is very much like Luther’s, but contrary to what we find in the pages of Sacred Scripture. Calvin used texts like Gen.6:5,The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great...

Although the Institutes itself grew five-fold from its first to the fifth edition, the contents of the Preface written to King Francis I remained largely the same. Precedent for publishing an introductory theological essay to the King had been set by both Guillaume Farel and Huldrych Zwingli in 1525. Thus, in 1536, at the occasion of the first edition of the Institutes, Calvin wrote what was in effect a letter (a "Prefatory Address") to the King, which was included in all succeeding editions, both Latin and French. Though minor changes were made, reflecting historical developments in the 1550s in France...

The Institutes begins with an introductory, "To the Reader" making references to the unexpected "success" of "the first edition" (1536), the "summary" nature of its contents, the publication of further editions (in Latin: 1539, 1543, 1550 and 1559; and in French: 1541 and 1560), and the hope that in this (1559) edition he has "provided something that all of you will approve," written in the winter of 1558 when in the grip of a fever which he believed threatened his life and a rumor that he had defected "to the papacy." His aim throughout, he tells us, is "to benefit...

Featured Term (selected at random:REFORMATION DOGMA The dogmatic teaching of the original Protestant reformers. They were constrained by the logic of separating from Rome to defend their new doctrinal positions. Thus we find Luther writing numerous treatises on faith, grace, and justification, and John Calvin (1509-64) producing in 1536 his Institutes of the Christian Religion, as the first systematic compendium of Protestant doctrine. "My design in this work," wrote Calvin in the introduction, "has been to prepare and qualify students of theology for the reading of the divine word." The beginnings of the Reformation were thoroughly dogmatic in character. The...

Thursday, March 18, 2010 The "Catholic" John Calvin: 50 Areas Where His Views Are Harmonious With Catholic Teaching The Young Calvin, by Oliver Crisp [ source ] All sources with Roman numerals (example: IV, 4:20) are from The Institutes of the Christian Religion (translated by Henry Beveridge for the Calvin Translation Society in 1845, from the 1559 edition in Latin; reprinted by Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing Co.: Grand Rapids, Michigan, 1995): available online. Note: I don't intend to imply that Calvin agrees with Catholics in every jot and tittle of all the following categories. What is agreed-upon is what...

Guest Jason Stellman, a former Presbyterian minister, tells Marcus what convinced him that the Catholic Church is the true Church.

Did God provide for the salvation of sinners that he chose to be saved, or did God provide a way of salvation and then it is up to sinners to choose it? Wrong question that has been asked... The question that SHOULD be asked: Did God know which choice we would make (as to salvation) when He created this universe and bring into existence that choice to be saved, or did He bring into existence His choice for whom He would save when He brought this universe into existence? Is the ultimate, final answer to this either/or, neither/nor, or both/and?...

Thursday, November 14, 2013 The Fallible Prophets of New Calvinism by Michael John Beasley From the website: This book examines Dr. Wayne Grudem's controversial teaching on fallible prophecy in view of various lexical, exegetical, and historical points of analysis. It also addresses the teaching's popularity and continuing advancement through many charismatics within the "New Calvinism" movement. The doctrine of fallible prophecy is neither benign nor harmless, rather it constitutes a troubling strange fire for the body of Christ and continues to spread through the advocacy of popular continuationists like Wayne Grudem, D.A. Carson, John Piper, and Mark Driscoll: 1. Chapter...

(This is the second part of my series on TULIP. The first part, based on the writings of the Church Fathers, is available here.) Calvinists often claim that "T.U.L.I.P." -- an acronym that summarizes their core beliefs -- has been supported by many of the great historical Protestant leaders, but below are some quotes that seem to disprove this assertion. This list is not comprehensive. Total Depravity - "..as a consequence of the Fall of man, every person born into the world is morally corrupt, enslaved to sin and is, apart from the grace of God, utterly unable to choose...

Calvinists get a bad rap, but how many of the critics really understand him? James R. Rogers points out how few of us read the Institutes or bother to think seriously about Calvin in today’s On the Square. Instead, we rely on easy stereotypes: Some of the answer certainly derives from misunderstandings of Calvinism. I recall in elementary school my teacher instructing the class that when the Puritans sailed to America on ships, if someone fell off the ship into the water, the others would not attempt to save him, because they believed that God had predestined that person to...

Calvin placed preaching the Scripture squarely at the center of the church. In his words, “Wherever we see the Word of God purely preached and heard, and the sacraments administered according to the institution of Christ; there, it is not to be doubted, is a church of God.” Out of his many writings on Scripture, a few choice quotes remind us how to handle God’s written Word properly—and why it’s important to do so. 1. Scripture should be treated with reverence. “We owe to the Scripture the same reverence that we owe to God; because it has proceeded from him...

Many of us grew up in theological backgrounds where the psalms were known, but not sung. These theological backgrounds are anomalies throughout the history of the Church. E.F. Harrison observed that "Psalmody was a part of the synagogue service that naturally passed over into the life of the church." Calvin Stapert speaks of the fathers' "enthusiastic promotion of psalm-singing" which he says, "reached an unprecedented peak in the fourth century." James McKinnon speaks of "an unprecedented wave of enthusiasm" for the psalms in the second half of the fourth century. Hughes Oliphint Old argued that Calvin appealed to the church...

Today is the 504th anniversary of the birth of John Calvin (July 10, 1509). Here are nine things you should know about the French theologian and Reformer.