A Question of Validity?

[MotoCatholic]

I’m going to try to come up with a concise question from some recurring thoughts about the “rift” between Catholicism and Protestantism (if that’s the correct way to phrase it?). Let me first say that I am trying to, at least partially, remove myself from my “Catholicness” when asking this question. I was a very uninformed Catholic and Christian for a long time. I heard every criticism possible from my protestant friends. I had no knowledge or ammunition to refute any of them. But, somehow I just knew, or felt, that something was wrong with a lot of the anti-Catholic themes, and I was never even tempted to be “converted.” I did, however, have a lot of questions, doubts, and even some bad-feelings towards the Catholic Church for a long time.

Now that I’m on a wonderful journey to know and live my faith, this same question keeps coming up, only now I’m looking at it, or asking it, from a different perspective. And what was once just a feeling, now has more depth and urgency behind it. This is basically a question of validity, and how all of my protestant friends and people in places like these forums seem to back themselves into the same corner - throwing scripture verses around, throwing all the usual complaints about the Catholic Church around, and seeming to never understand the fatal errors that they’re making.

Firstly, this “sin of interpretation and tradition” that underlies much of protestant protests is always being committed by people/churches doing the very same thing - interpreting scripture and building living church traditions. It’s so obvious as to be self-evident. What many non-Catholics or anti-Catholics are expecting us to believe is that they’re interpretation of scared scripture is right, and somehow all of Catholicism is wrong and made-up. So I/we are supposed to believe that church x or chrurch y’s interpretation of salvation or the forgiveness of sins is right, but the Catholic Churche’s is wrong. Or that “Bill’s” interpretation of x,y,or z is amazingly insightful, but the Catholic view is pagan, wrong, or somehow invalid.

I could keep going, but mercilously I will stop…my main question is this: IF in fact the Catholic Church is not the church that Christ established, IF in fact the arguments that Peter was not really Peter, or he was not “the rock” are true, IF there in fact is no appostolic succession as claimed since first-century Christianity and proclaimed in scripture by Christ Himself, IF there is therefore no validity for the Papacy…THEN we must assume that the early church fathers were wrong, that the Holy Spirit in fact did not work in guiding the early church or establishing what we call “the Bible” and the New Testament (an incredible irony to me in terms of the “sola scriptura” debate), that the Catholic Church is not the church that Christ established, that the sacraments established by Christ are not only invalid but almost herritcal (as unforunately some of my protestant frinds actually believe), AND THEREFORE the Holy Spirit only worked validly (or at all) after centuries and millenia of getting it wrong, that protestant interpretation (after the 1500’s) and tradition are indeed correct (oh wait, there are thousands and thousands of protestant churches that claim to have “gotten in right”)…Do you see where I’m going? If the Catholic church has no validity as Christ’s church, who does? If the Catholic church has no valid magisterium, who does? If the early church and early church fathers were wrong, how does Christianity stand? For if the holy spirit was in fact not working through “Catholic things/history” but only after Martin Luther, does that not mean that all of Christianity crumbles through our fingers like dust? Is it not obvious that we now find ourselves with thousands of protestant churches all claiming to have validity and authority, and all overtly or covertly speaking of the evils of the Catholic church? IS IT NOT OBVIOUS that this is exactly and precisely what the devil would want?? To sum-up - if protestants are right and all these things about the Catholic Church are wrong, then there is no valid Church, there is no Christianity, there is no divinity of Christ, the New Testament is no more valid than any other book of mythology, and we better all go and find our second favorite religion.

I’m not a scholar, in fact I’m not very smart. I look at things from a very simple perspective - but simple is not necessarily bad or incorrect. I love my protestant friends for the tremendous Christians that most of them are. I do pray for Church unity someday. I’m not proposing these questions to “prove Catholics are right.” I do want an answer/discussion so that I no longer worry that we’re all wrong.

So much for concise! Thanks for enduring the long question. God Bless!

 

[Mumbles140]

Two thoughts, and to all protestants out there, I am in no way trying to generalize or say this is the majority or even significant percentage of what you all believe - these are simply anecdotal evidences of the matter of validity.

First, my wife is a protestant and grew up belonging to different branches of Christianity (baptized Lutheran, went to Methodist, non-denom Bible, maybe Baptist at some point?), and her family (mother was the driving religious factor of the parents) preferred the ‘contemporary’ services with praise bands et al. She now attends Mass with me on Sundays, but this is moreso because she supports my faith and is still learning about God and the Bible since she does not attend protestant services anymore. However, she is not currently planning on conversion.

Now, I provide this information to focus on the point that my wife was clearly not raised in the more ‘traditional’ branches of Christianity. She asks me questions about Catholic teachings, and I do my best to explain, and often try to show what the ECF’s taught and believed, as they were preaching from Christ before there was a Bible, and long before anyone but priests and other religious could read the Bible. The truth is, she seems to gloss over that history. It has been ingrained in her that the Bible itself is all we need. No question of the Church’s role in compiling the Bible, because God willed it to be. Therefore, she was raised to believe that everything we needed was in the Bible - whether we read it ourselves and interpreted, or were instructed in it by a religious leader.

The other example I have involves a friend of my wife’s, but it exemplifies the views of other non-Catholic Christians I have been friends with. They appear to believe (or, rather, choose not to discuss) the period between Christ and the Bible, as if the ECFs never existed and the Bible wrote and compiled itself ‘live’ as each of these events unfolded, rather than the whole canon being divinely determined at a later date. This stems to the belief that the Bible is pure and correct, and the Catholic Church has manipulated it, changed it, or perverted its words to express beliefs that are not in the Bible.

The friend and I were at a bar and religion was brought up (not a great place to discuss it, but it happened inadvertently). I was comparing liturgical abuses during the Liturgy of the Eucharist to a minister changing the words of the Our Father (or to most other Christians, the Lord’s Prayer). The friend responded with “Just like how you Catholics went and changed it.” This retort didn’t make me happy, and I expressed my views but letter the matter go quietly thereafter until I could research further. Looking back at the history, I found the explanation (thanks CAF), and even found out that a good amount of protestant bibles do not contain the additional verbiage ("For thine is the kingdom…)

I mention these stories to prove my point, and though likely unnecessarily wordy, I hope it comes out clear in the end: Some protestants are content with accepting the Bible in its current state, without regard to how it came to be or how a hierarchical body interpreted it. Rather, they maintain that the Bible should be interpreted by everyone, but still hold that it should be someone theologically trained to instruct on it. The history of the faith from the death of the Apostles to the Reformation is moot. They do not claim to be the real OTF because they don’t believe in the OTF as a specific church, but Christianity as a whole, practiced many different ways.

Therefore, these arguments are not typically effective unless you can truly get them to buy into the succession, not necessarily of the Papacy, but of the Apostleship and teachings, from Christ to the ECFs. If you get them to believe in that, then there is no denying history.

 

[Patrick_Cox]

I’m going to try to come up with a concise question from some recurring thoughts about the “rift” between Catholicism and Protestantism (if that’s the correct way to phrase it?). Let me first say that I am trying to, at least partially, remove myself from my “Catholicness” when asking this question. I was a very uninformed Catholic and Christian for a long time. I heard every criticism possible from my protestant friends. I had no knowledge or ammunition to refute any of them. But, somehow I just knew, or felt, that something was wrong with a lot of the anti-Catholic themes, and I was never even tempted to be “converted.” I did, however, have a lot of questions, doubts, and even some bad-feelings towards the Catholic Church for a long time.

Now that I’m on a wonderful journey to know and live my faith, this same question keeps coming up, only now I’m looking at it, or asking it, from a different perspective. And what was once just a feeling, now has more depth and urgency behind it. This is basically a question of validity, and how all of my protestant friends and people in places like these forums seem to back themselves into the same corner - throwing scripture verses around, throwing all the usual complaints about the Catholic Church around, and seeming to never understand the fatal errors that they’re making.

Firstly, this “sin of interpretation and tradition” that underlies much of protestant protests is always being committed by people/churches doing the very same thing - interpreting scripture and building living church traditions. It’s so obvious as to be self-evident. What many non-Catholics or anti-Catholics are expecting us to believe is that they’re interpretation of scared scripture is right, and somehow all of Catholicism is wrong and made-up. So I/we are supposed to believe that church x or chrurch y’s interpretation of salvation or the forgiveness of sins is right, but the Catholic Churche’s is wrong. Or that “Bill’s” interpretation of x,y,or z is amazingly insightful, but the Catholic view is pagan, wrong, or somehow invalid.

I could keep going, but mercilously I will stop…my main question is this: IF in fact the Catholic Church is not the church that Christ established, IF in fact the arguments that Peter was not really Peter, or he was not “the rock” are true, IF there in fact is no appostolic succession as claimed since first-century Christianity and proclaimed in scripture by Christ Himself, IF there is therefore no validity for the Papacy…THEN we must assume that the early church fathers were wrong, that the Holy Spirit in fact did not work in guiding the early church or establishing what we call “the Bible” and the New Testament (an incredible irony to me in terms of the “sola scriptura” debate), that the Catholic Church is not the church that Christ established, that the sacraments established by Christ are not only invalid but almost herritcal (as unforunately some of my protestant frinds actually believe), AND THEREFORE the Holy Spirit only worked validly (or at all) after centuries and millenia of getting it wrong, that protestant interpretation (after the 1500’s) and tradition are indeed correct (oh wait, there are thousands and thousands of protestant churches that claim to have “gotten in right”)…Do you see where I’m going? If the Catholic church has no validity as Christ’s church, who does? If the Catholic church has no valid magisterium, who does? If the early church and early church fathers were wrong, how does Christianity stand? For if the holy spirit was in fact not working through “Catholic things/history” but only after Martin Luther, does that not mean that all of Christianity crumbles through our fingers like dust? Is it not obvious that we now find ourselves with thousands of protestant churches all claiming to have validity and authority, and all overtly or covertly speaking of the evils of the Catholic church? IS IT NOT OBVIOUS that this is exactly and precisely what the devil would want?? To sum-up - if protestants are right and all these things about the Catholic Church are wrong, then there is no valid Church, there is no Christianity, there is no divinity of Christ, the New Testament is no more valid than any other book of mythology, and we better all go and find our second favorite religion.

I’m not a scholar, in fact I’m not very smart. I look at things from a very simple perspective - but simple is not necessarily bad or incorrect. I love my protestant friends for the tremendous Christians that most of them are. I do pray for Church unity someday. I’m not proposing these questions to “prove Catholics are right.” I do want an answer/discussion so that I no longer worry that we’re all wrong.

So much for concise! Thanks for enduring the long question. God Bless!

It seems to me that you’ve already answered your own question! Provided you are doing everything possible to live your Catholic faith, you have nothing to worry about.

I certainly support your prayer for Church unity.

 

[MotoCatholic]

Thanks for the replies. For me, this question just won’t go away. I think this is because I have many agnostic/aethiest acquaintances that often make subtle suggestions that Christianity is no different that any other cult, mythology, or “story.” And as I have dug deeper into my faith, and come to realize how amazing and unlike “mythology” it is, I worry greatly that this protestant/Catholic rift is both ridiculously unproductive, and gives dangerous ammunition to anti-Christians precisely becuase it raises real questions of validity.

I just can’t see how my protestant friends don’t see this validity problem. The only thing they see as invalid are all the questions I raised earlier. In discussions, as we get closer to facts, truth, and the simple illogicalness of their positions, they just start rejecting all things Catholic. Many simply refuse to accept anything Catholic. I’ve said this in these forums before, but these otherwise extremely intelligent people simply refuse to acknowledge facts, and with outright malice and closed-mindedness refuse to see what’s right in front of them.

I just returned from a college visit with my daughter - a Catholic college in the southern USA. It was an amazing, inspiring place. I saw students and faculty walking around campus with a Rosary wrapped aroung their hand. A protestant friend responded with a claim of “yeah muslims do that too…!” I don’t even know what that’s supposed to mean? I made a comment about how Mother Teresa was involved with the Univesity, and I got some half-vailed criticism of Mother Teresa. I mentioned that there were still lines of students waiting for confession 45 minutes after Mass (not a common thing for most college students) and I got a comment about the invalidity of confession and how “it’s all about control…” The very same people that cling to the words of Christ in the Bible, arguing that confession is nothing more than the Catholic Church “controlling” it’s members. Probably not-coincidentally this was the same person that frequently complains about the Catholic Church being communistic and in favor of a new one-world government. I have no doubt these people love Christ. They are great Christians and tremendous human beings. But they despise the Catholic Church, and that is not an overstatement.

I’m coming to understand that this all about ignorance and misunderstanding of the Catholic Church. Even at my “unimpressive” level of theological and scriptural scholarship, it’s becomming obvious to me that there are very good answers to every single anti-Catholic comment or attack that I have ever heard. I’ve offered to provide links/documents/books…I never have any takers. And if I could bring this all back to my original questions: I think the avoidance of evidence and facts is because my protestant friends would come to see the “validity” of my question, and they don’t want to face that reality.

These “arguments” make me anxious. While I’m becomming more comfortable, I still don’t like having these discussions with my protestant friends. But I feel like I’m slowly moving towards life as a junior-appologist. Considering where I was 10 years ago, that is an amazing statement! God Bless - thanks

 

[empther]

Does anybody actually read these long posts? I doubt it.

We’re all busy.

Make it short and sweet.

 

[Mumbles140]

Thanks for the replies. For me, this question just won’t go away. I think this is because I have many agnostic/aethiest acquaintances that often make subtle suggestions that Christianity is no different that any other cult, mythology, or “story.” And as I have dug deeper into my faith, and come to realize how amazing and unlike “mythology” it is, I worry greatly that this protestant/Catholic rift is both ridiculously unproductive, and gives dangerous ammunition to anti-Christians precisely becuase it raises real questions of validity.

Though not a Catholic, CS Lewis did some excellent writing on this in the autobiography on his conversion (Surprised by Joy), in which he always viewed the Bible as myth, and even noted other myths (Corn Gods in Native American mythology, I believe is the term he uses) who die and resurrect themselves. He thought Christ was just another of these examples. However, upon deeper research and a true literary examination of the Bible, he obviously found the Truth in it.

You know, that itself always surprises me. I have atheist/agnostic friends who accept Lewis as brilliant. They probably only read Chronicles of Narnia, but understand his intellectual accomplishments in both literary criticism and his own writing. And here was a man who was a staunch atheist, completely anti-religion, and very content with that. However, not through some ‘miraculous’ single experience, but through a logical understanding and accepting of truths he had previously denied, he comes to believe in God and becomes one of the greatest Christian writers of our day. How is that not proof enough for most?

 

[MotoCatholic]

empther - you’re right, I just get too excited about these things! Plus, this question is very consuming for me - I can’t seem to shake it.

I’m always telling my kids “fewer words, more meaning…” when it comes to their writing assignments at school. I’ll try, too! Thanks