This is not entirely self-evident. A case could be made that extreme pacifism encourages aggression, resulting in increased bloodshed.

I don’t want to start picking on the Anabaptists now because I agree with Michael’s concept of a larger unity. But I think that the question of whether one is responsible for the shedding of blood is not identical to the question of whether one has personally taken up arms.

Besides that, I’m sure there have been some pacifist Christians who have violated their beliefs, who ought not be disowned by their pacifist brethren.

Anna,

Your example doesn’t work. Baptism is a sacrament requiring both proper form and proper intent. It just doesn’t require a priest to take effect. How is that an example of God working without the sacraments?

Not that I don’t agree with your main point – God is not at all limited to the sacraments. However the sacraments are revealed as beneficial graces, while other graces beyond the “visible boundaries” of the Church are extraordinary, novel and complete mysteries.

Your observation about the college professor should be in the irony thread as well. He’s a Baptist and they tend to not need the physical for salvation and his idea is harsher than even us Catholics. We do allow for God working without using the sacraments. (and consider a baby baptized by a lay woman while in the arms of a rabbi to be valid.)

BIG GRIN

Isn’t God marvelous.

I am sure you don’t like it when some Protestants say Roman Catholics aren’t really Christians. They have been taught that by their church. They will explain to me why it is true. I don’t argue I just say, “hum, I know many Roman Catholics who are very profound Christians”.

When I was in college, I had a Baptist Prof who explained to our class that if you weren’t totally submerged when you were Baptized you would go to Hell when you died. After other Baptists asked him to stop saying that because that wasn’t everyones tradition and he wouldn’t, six Baptists got up and walked out of the class. There was a grade punishment for doing that so it cost them something.

Whenever I am in a situation where it’s easy just to let it go and not defend fellow Christians I think of them.

I will let God straighten it out. His ways are to wonderful for me to understand.

Happy Easter!

The RC Church makes this claim but can not PROVE it. It is what you BELIEVE to be true. But what if it isn’t?

I agree that the Catholic Church cannot “prove” that she is the Church that Christ founded, if we are using the term ‘prove’ to mean demonstrate indubitably. But with that sense of the word ‘prove’, I don’t think anyone can prove that Jesus rose from the dead, or ascended into heaven. Of course, we would agree that the evidence fits with it. (cf. Strobel’s book) But, if one is coming from a Humean or naturalistic worldview, the data can be explained in other ways. (Just go to the main atheistic websites to see that.) This is why we (Christians) believe that faith is a gift from God. Faith is not reducible to reason; that would be rationalism. The irreducibility of faith to reason does not mean that faith is irrational, or that faith amounts to fideism, i.e. a complete separation of faith from reason. Faith does not reduce either to rationalism or fideism. (Here I’m thinking of JPII’s Fides et Ratio.) Everything I’ve said so far, you probably agree with. But here’s where we might disagree. Catholics believe that faith is act of trust in Christ by trusting those whom Christ authorized and sent. So we believe in the resurrection and ascension of Christ not because those doctrines can be proven true, but because those whom Christ authorized and sent taught it, and demonstrated their authority. Likewise, Catholics believe that the visible hierarchical nature of the Church is also something that Christ’s representatives taught. So, for Catholics, this doctrine (of the visible hierarchical nature of the Church) is a matter of faith, like the doctrines of the resurrection and ascension of Christ. When we recite the Creed, we specifically speak about the Church and its four marks. So the nature of the Church is, for Catholics, itself part of the gospel. Obviously that doesn’t resolve the disagreements between Protestants and Catholics. But, maybe it might help clarify how Catholics understand the question that you are raising.

At least we can rejoice together that our Lord is risen, and that death is conquered!

In the peace of Christ,

- Bryan

*Everyone* in the Evangelical church I attended goes to Sunday School. Adults and children. Every week. Becoming educated is as much a part of the community’s practice as worship.

Catholics seem to get most of their religious education as children: once you’re an adult it stops, unless you make some efforts to seek it out.

Would that it were otherwise.

Prayers and Peace,
tony

Holy, Holy, Holy,
Lord, God Sabaoth,
Heaven and Earth are filled with Your Glory,
Hosannah in the Highest!

Blessed + is He who comes in the Name of the Lord,
Hosannah in the Highest!

I do understand what you are saying. And I agree I see it from not the Roman Church’s point of view. Saying Christ founded a church and it is my Church and is the one and only one Christ founded does not make it true. Only some Roman Catholics believe this. The RC Church makes this claim but can not PROVE it. It is what you BELIEVE to be true. But what if it isn’t?

Would you love Jesus just as much?

Saying my church is the only true church is an arrogant remark no matter who’s church it is.

This gets at, I believe, one of the most (if not the most) fundamental differences between Catholics and Protestants. Catholics and Protestants have a very different conception of what Christ founded. Protestants generally believe that Christ did not found a visible, hierarchically organized Body. But Catholics believe that Christ founded precisely that, and gave its keys to Peter. That paradigm difference makes Protestants perceive the claim by Catholics that the Catholic Church is the Church that Christ founded, not just as false, but as arrogant. Protestants are not saying, “No, it is not the Catholic Church that Christ founded, it is this *other* Body over here that He founded.” The very idea doesn’t fit the paradigm, and so they construe the Catholic claim as arrogant, because obviously (in their mind) no ‘denomination’ has any more claim to being “the true Church” than any other denomination. And that rejoinder would surely be true if all visible hierarchically organized bodies were founded by mere men. But it wouldn’t be true if one visible hierarchically organized Body was founded by the God-man. So the claim that Catholics are being *arrogant* in claiming that theirs is the Church that Christ founded, begs the question. It assumes the truth of the Protestant paradigm. It does so just as a person might respond to Jesus’ claim to be God by saying that any man who claims to be God is arrogant. Such a response presumes the impossibility of the Incarnation, and so begs the question. In order for Protestants and Catholics to understand each other, we have to be able to see each other’s paradigms, and not just see the other from our own paradigm.

Blessed Good Friday to you. (And to you Michael.)

In the peace of Christ,

- Bryan