Comments on: Honest Thoughts On The Catholic Discussion: Is This The Best We Can Do?

By: Slouching towards the “American Jesus” – part I « Reditus: A Chronicle of Aesthetic Christianity

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:02:16 +0000

[...] my virtual shadow graze by their screen full of pixels. One post on Josh S.’ blog did link to a post on this other blog, and since I have of late thought that I am being unfair to Protestant religious [...]

By: The Monday Melange 11.09.09 (HOMECOMING EDITION): Man Talk and Manu Ginobili « Everyone’s Entitled to Joe’s Opinion

Mon, 09 Nov 2009 04:04:25 +0000

[...] have another Michael Spencer post that I want you people to take a look at. As someone who grew up in the Catholic Church, I totally get what he is expressing here. And I [...]

By: Luis González

Luis González — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:32:55 +0000

I grew up as Catholic in Spain. Now I live in Rome. In my opinion, Protestants who lives in non-catholic countries have an unreal (idealized) image of Catholic Church.
Claims and reality are light years away.
Maybe for disenchanted evangelicals like many of you this is incredible, but in many ways I have a deep envy of your biblical culture. In catholic countries, the Bible is not part of religious culture (most catholics aren’t able to find the book of Jeremiah in theirs Bibles). The Bible, in popular mentality, is not for common people, Bible is for priest or for scholars. In practice, saints are minors deities (often specialized deities, S. Antonio for lost things), the statues of the saints have magical powers (for many people without theological formation). In Italy Catholic Church have a strong political power, many people sees protestants as sectarian and dangerous people (in catholic countries, for many people protestant and Jehovah Wittness is almost the same thing)…
Perhaps living in a Catholic country would be an interesting experience for many evangelicals. They could learn to appreciate more their christian background.

I apologize for my English.

By: Sam Urfer

Sam Urfer — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 22:03:35 +0000

On the contrary, we have very sophisticated methods of distinguishing truth and error, and have doctrines like papal infallibility to curb the power of prelates (yes, papal infallibility was largely pushed to limit Popes originally. Ain’t it ironic?).

By: Daniel

Daniel — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:57:45 +0000

I thought your objections were a little uncharacteristic until I realized the thread to the common perception amongst Protestants that we do these things strictly because we aren’t good enough to talk to God directly. All Catholics do talk to God directly. Hell, the Catholic understanding of the Eucharist would literally be horrifying if we didn’t believe Jesus loves us more than he hates our sins. (Any Christian anywhere understands that God hates our sins BECAUSE he loves us.) There IS an element in intercession that maintains those closer to God are “heard” by him in greater proportion, something that’s very apparent in the Old Testament that Catholics still believe to be in effect and I suppose that Protestants believe was rent obscure by Christ’s redemption of humankind, that this dynamic was meant only to anticipate and prophecy the person of Christ. But there’s also a belief in our tradition that the very greatest of sinners sincerely seeking conversion gets the most attentive audience of all. Most of these dynamics are more based on a belief of the immediacy of being drawn into Christ’s family. They are understood to be involvement in the whole life of Christ in about the same way you’d make friends with your newlywed wife’s friends.

Sounds like at the end of the day Purgatory is going to give you the most trouble as you continue your discernment process. It’s a place where sins are forgiven, but all the garbage in a person’s soul has to be burned away. Makes sense, right? (I know it doesn’t.) Catholics understand 1 Corinthians 3:10-15 to describe an event that’s posthumous (this is suggested in 3:13, but is by no means perfectly clear, and probably why Protestants reject our doctrine), where one “is saved,” but suffers “loss through fire.”

Anyway, the best thing to do would be to borrow or if you’re really serious buy a Catechism of the Catholic Church and get Catholicism straight from the horse’s mouth. The good thing is you don’t have to second guess whether or not you’re getting a good representation of the Church’s self-understanding when you read it, because it is pretty much by definition what the Catholic Church is; you only have to judge if what is portrayed seems reasonable to believe in.

By: Brigitte

Brigitte — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 21:03:42 +0000

Thanks for introducing yourself! I don’t think I’ve come across another LCC member, here, knowingly.

However, I notice Bryan Cross has still not answered my question for the fourth time. I wish him all the best. He has been on my mind all day.

By: Obed

Obed — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:49:13 +0000

FWIW, no where in Scripture does the command to have communal worship on the 7th day exist. The biblical commands regarding the Sabbath are to rest on it, not attend a worship service. The Jewish tradition of attending synagogue on the Sabbath arose in the intertestamental time and was instituted not by the Scriptures, patriarchs, prophets, or Moses, but by the man-made rules of the Jewish religious leaders. Jesus’ attendance of synagogue service on Sabbath doesn’t make it a biblical command any more than him celebrating Hanukkah (Jn 10:22ff) or wearing sandals makes it biblical commands to do so.

All that to say is that communal worship on a given day is beyond the scope of the Scriptures. It’s all man’s tradition. But in the New Testament worldview, we have the freedom to worship on Sunday or on the Sabbath (or on any other day). The NT does not give us a specific system of worship (beyond commanding us to “not forsake the assembling’) but rather gives us the example of it including partaking in the Lord’s supper, “psalms, hymns, and spiritual songs,” and listening to someone explain the Scriptures and/or the Apostles’ teachings. Examples in Acts also show that the habit of Christians meeting on the First Day was already being established in the Apostolic period (see Acts 20:7ff).

And KJV-only? C’mon… where in Scriptures does it ever imply that a single English translation would be the only inspired/authoratative version? Talk about “traditions of men…”

So, yeah, we should maybe do our homework in the bible, Church History, etc. before resorting to hearsay, propoganda, and other irresponsible methods of lack-of-research.

By: Greg R

Greg R — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:40:02 +0000

Bryan, thanks for giving of your time, talents, and passions to the IMONK community. Thanks for seeing past some of our rampant border patrolling, and working for the unity Christ bled for.

May HE give us the desire of HIS heart
Greg R

By: Jjoe

Jjoe — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:39:44 +0000

Scroll down to the Seventh Day Adventist post.

Assuming you’re not of that denomination, how do I discern which one of you is speaking truth and which one is speaking error? You both claim Scripture as your final authority.

To me, as I read this series, this is perhaps the most compelling rationale for Catholicism — that you can believe just about anything as a Protestant as long as you can assemble a scriptural argument for it. There is no authority; it is every man and his Bible for himself.

And with no final authority other than personal interpretation, what we end up with is personal truth, which cannot help but be relative.

For example, we could solve the energy crisis if we could harness the heat and light generated by arguments over free will vs. predestination.

By: Sam Urfer

Sam Urfer — Thu, 05 Nov 2009 20:38:53 +0000

Interesting that it’s always the sacramental passages the Catholic take literally, but that Protestants want to make symbolic or spiritual in nature.