Anglican Catholic Church?

[PRmerger]

St. Gregory was one of these.

You must have come to this understanding from some information, Novo.

Please tell us where you got this info that St. Gregory “was one of these”.

Thanks.

 

[Novocastrian]

You must have come to this understanding from some information, Novo.

Please tell us where you got this info that St. Gregory “was one of these”.

Thanks.

Because he lived and died a member of the Armenian Apostolic Church, a non-Chalcedonian miaphysite Church in Asia, which during his lifetime was not in communion with Rome.

Here’s an interesting article: catholicworldreport.com/Item/3719/st_gregory_of_narek_was_the_new_doctor_of_the_church_a_catholic.aspx

 

[PRmerger]

I’m not denying that such would be misleading or problematic! In the same way, an English Roman Catholic presumably believes herself to be a member of the true Church of England, but will in general avoid publically claiming that without qualifiers due to the possible confusion such a claim (which you and she would presumably hold to be true!) would likely cause.

Yep. You ought to avoid pubically claiming that you’re a Catholic.

There’s no subset of Catholics who gets to deny the authority of the pope.

Just like there’s no Church of England folks who can deny the Scriptures as the Word of God.

And I am 100% certain that if there were a poster here who identified as being a member of the Church of England (we’ll call it the WeDenytheBibleChurchofEngland) but just a subset of this church which didn’t have to believe in the authority of the Bible–“it’s a book that has a lot of fairy tales, and Jesus didn’t actually rise from the dead, but it has a lot of truths, too!”–you’d oppose their use of that appellation as well.

 

[PRmerger]

Because he lived and died a member of the Armenian Apostolic Church, a non-Chalcedonian miaphysite Church in Asia, which during his lifetime was not in communion with Rome.

Here’s an interesting article: catholicworldreport.com/Item/3719/st_gregory_of_narek_was_the_new_doctor_of_the_church_a_catholic.aspx

Writings from him which denied the supremacy of the pope, please!

Otherwise, I am free to believe he actually believed in the authority of the vicar of Christ.

 

[Novocastrian]

Yep. You ought to avoid pubically claiming that you’re a Catholic.

There’s no subset of Catholics who gets to deny the authority of the pope.

Just like there’s no Church of England folks who can deny the Scriptures as the Word of God.

And I am 100% certain that if there were a poster here who identified as being a member of the Church of England (we’ll call it the WeDenytheBibleChurchofEngland) but just a subset of this church which didn’t have to believe in the authority of the Bible–“it’s a book that has a lot of fairy tales, and Jesus didn’t actually rise from the dead, but it has a lot of truths, too!”–you’d oppose their use of that appellation as well.

I think that’d depend. I make the claim here to believe the Catholic faith, but I’m careful also to make it clear that I belong to the “Church of England (Catholic and reformed)”.

 

[Novocastrian]

Writings from him which denied the supremacy of the pope, please!

Otherwise, I am free to believe he actually believed in the authority of the vicar of Christ.

Ha! Absolutely not. That’s not how history works and you know it. You have no good reason to believe that; that he didn’t is implicit in his membership of the Armenian Apostolic Church.

Can you provide me with writings from St John Chrysostom that deny the moon is made of cheese? Otherwise I am free to believe that he actually believed in the great dairy-ball of the sky.

 

[PRmerger]

Ha! Absolutely not. That’s not how history works and you know it. You have no good reason to believe that; that he didn’t is implicit in his membership of the Armenian Apostolic Church.

Can you provide me with writings from St John Chrysostom that deny the moon is made of cheese? Otherwise I am free to believe that he actually believed in the great dairy-ball of the sky.

Then I don’t believe that St. Gregory denied any Catholic teaching, including the teaching that all Catholics submit to the authority of the vicar of Christ, the Holy Father, the successor of St. Peter.

 

[Novocastrian]

Then I don’t believe that St. Gregory denied any Catholic teaching, including the teaching that all Catholics submit to the authority of the vicar of Christ, the Holy Father, the successor of St. Peter.

Well that’s just silly. I honestly don’t know what to say to someone who holds a belief with literally no evidence or warrant.

Unless, I suppose, you’re saying that you hold no belief concerning the truth or falsity of my claim? You simply ignore it, or profess ignorance? That seems your only option, and not an entirely dishonourable one, I suppose.

 

[PRmerger]

Well that’s just silly. I honestly don’t know what to say to someone who holds a belief with literally no evidence or warrant.

He is a saint in the Catholic Church.

Thus, until someone provides evidence that he denied a teaching of the Church, we can believe that he professed and upheld every Catholic teaching.

You have asserted that he denied a teaching.

I asked for evidence of this.

And you provided some.

Wait.

No you didn’t.



You backpedaled and said you just happened to know that he denied it because he was a member of a particular rite.

So…I’m going to go with the presumption of innocence, until you can prove that he denied papal supremacy.

 

[PRmerger]

Well that’s just silly. I honestly don’t know what to say to someone who holds a belief with literally no evidence or warrant.

Unless, I suppose, you’re saying that you hold no belief concerning the truth or falsity of my claim? You simply ignore it, or profess ignorance? That seems your only option, and not an entirely dishonourable one, I suppose.

BTW, Novo, in the future, I’d be very judicious about professing some scandalous assertions that are undocumented about our very highly regarded Catholic saints.

Saying a saint denied a teaching of our faith is very close to demonstrating contempt for Catholicism, something which is not permitted here.

 

[Novocastrian]

He is a saint in the Catholic Church.

Thus, until someone provides evidence that he denied a teaching of the Church, we can believe that he professed and upheld every Catholic teaching.

You have asserted that he denied a teaching.

I asked for evidence of this.

And you provided some.

Wait.

No you didn’t.



You backpedaled and said you just happened to know that he denied it because he was a member of a particular rite.

So…I’m going to go with the presumption of innocence, until you can prove that he denied papal supremacy.

There was no backpedaling. I pointed out that my claim was much more careful than what you suggested I had claimed! I said that we have absolutely zero evidence that he was in communion with Rome, or that he held Roman Catholic dogmas regarding the Pope. You assert that he did; you’re the one who cannot prove it.

And, to reiterate, even in the absence of evidence, his membership of the Armenian Apostolic Church strongly suggests that he *didn’t *hold the beliefs that you suggest he did. Why? Because they’re not Armenian Apostolic beliefs.

Your position is, to use a particularly erudite turn of phrase, gaga lala nonsense.

 

[Novocastrian]

BTW, Novo, in the future, I’d be very judicious about professing some scandalous assertions that are undocumented about our very highly regarded Catholic saints.

Saying a saint denied a teaching of our faith is very close to demonstrating contempt for Catholicism, something which is not permitted here.

I have the very highest regard for Catholicism.

I’m just stating the historical fact that the saint lived and died in a communion which did not profess the fullness of dogma taught by the Apostolic See. I am making no value judgement whatsoever. I’m just asserting that he existed, and that he wasn’t in communion with Rome.

I’m sure that you don’t mean the above to come across as a threat, rather as a friendly warning, but to some it might look like it is one…

 

[KjetilK]

Really? So you’re a Jehovah’s Witness, since you witness for Jehovah?

Okey dokey then. I’m going to start calling my Lutheran friends here Jehovah’s Witnesses.

I know you think that you have provided me with some kind of gotcha-moment, but what you have actually done is to reveal your own ignorance on the matter. Note what I wrote:

There is no meaningful difference between Catholic and catholic. English, as you probably know, is not God’s language. Capitalization is a west Germanic thing that doesn’t say anything about the meaning of a word.

What you then end up doing is to make my point for me. Because it is quite obvious that you are writing from the presumptions of West Germanic languages (which include German, English, Scots, Dutch, Afrikaans, the Frisian languages, Low Saxon languages and, to some extent, Yiddish). And from these languages, you write from the presumption of English.

The problems with this is quite obvious. In West Germanic languages, it is common to capitalise nouns, and sometimes adjectives (in the case of, IIRC, English, Scots, and the Frisian languages). Examples of the latter are adjectives like American or Catholic. Note that this is not the case in German, where the equivalents of these are amerikanisch and katholisch.

Now, in Norwegian, which is a North Germanic language, we do not have that kind of capitalisation, for neither adjectives nor nouns (unless the noun in question is a place or a name). We therefore say Norge (Norway), Bergen (a Norwegian city) and John, but we also say Jehovas vitner (Jehovah’s Witnesses, where Jehova is capitalised, because it is a name), Den norske kirke (the Church of Norway) and Den romersk-katolske kirke (the Roman Catholic Church, or Den katolske kirke as they use).

We see the same in Greek. In the Greek New Testament, if the word God appears in the middle of a sentence, it is written θεός, not Θεός. And, most importantly, we also see this in Latin, where there originally was no lower-case/upper-case distinction, but where one started to use upper class in names and places, but not adjectives and nouns in general. (In some ancient documents, we see capitalisation, but that often reflects the writer, or copier’s native tongue.)

Consider, for example, the Te igitur (the first prayer of the Roman Canon, following the sanctus). In english, it says (from this version, p.635):

To you therefore, most merciful Father, we make humble prayer and petition through Jesus Christ, your Son, our Lord: that you accept and bless + these gifts, these offerings, these holy and unblemished sacrifices, which we offer you firstly for your holy catholic Church. Be pleased to grant her peace, to guard, unite and govern her throughout the whole world, together with your servant N. our Pope and N. our Bishop, and all those who, holding to the truth, hand on the catholic and apostolic faith.

Note that this English version faithfully preserves the capitalisation of the Latin text: …in primis, quæ tibi offerimus pro Ecclesia tua sancta catholica… (“…which we offer you firstly for your holy catholic Church”…). And note that Catholic (or catholic) IS an adjective, which is quite obvious in both German and Latin: Die römisch-katholische Kirche and Ecclesia catholica.

So yes, there might be some kind of difference between Catholic and catholic in English, but that distinction is purely one of style, not of meaning. And there is no such distinction is Norwegian or Latin, or even in German. And last time I checked, Latin, not English, was the official language of the Roman Catholic Church.

So no, you won’t come far with your argument.

 

[KjetilK]

Just to be clear: you don’t see a difference between “God” and “god”?

I want to be very sure of your position here, Kj.

In Greek there is not. There is in Norwegian, but in Norwegian, ‘God’ is considered a name.

 

[KjetilK]

Then I don’t believe that St. Gregory denied any Catholic teaching, including the teaching that all Catholics submit to the authority of the vicar of Christ, the Holy Father, the successor of St. Peter.

And on what are you basing this belief?

 

[Per_Crucem]

And, to reiterate, even in the absence of evidence, his membership of the Armenian Apostolic Church strongly suggests that he *didn’t *hold the beliefs that you suggest he did. Why? Because they’re not Armenian Apostolic beliefs.

Also, if he was a member in the Armenian Church…which explicitly, in its canons, denies papal supremacy and authority over the whole Church…and yet did hold to Latin Catholic teaching regarding the Pope, it would mean he wasn’t faithful to his own Church’s confession of faith. That would be regarded by the Armenian Church as heterodox at best, heretical at worse. If the Armenian Church was aware of it, he would have been excommunicated. So I am not sure if that is very saint-like

 

[Novocastrian]

Also, if he was a member in the Armenian Church…which explicitly, in its canons, denies papal supremacy and authority over the whole Church…and yet did hold to Latin Catholic teaching regarding the Pope, it would mean he wasn’t faithful to his own Church’s confession of faith. That would be regarded by the Armenian Church as heterodox at best, heretical at worse. If the Armenian Church was aware of it, he would have been excommunicated. So I am not sure if that is very saint-like

I don’t know enough about the canons of the mediaeval Armenian Church to know if it was then explicitly referenced, so I’m not keen on making an argument on that explicit basis.

But your general point seems correct: it would certainly be unusual for a mediaeval Armenian to hold the Papal dogmas, so I think we’d expect to see it somewhere in the historical record. As far as I’m aware, we don’t.

 

[PRmerger]

There was no backpedaling. I pointed out that my claim was much more careful than what you suggested I had claimed! I said that we have absolutely zero evidence that he was in communion with Rome, or that he held Roman Catholic dogmas regarding the Pope. You assert that he did; you’re the one who cannot prove it.

Could you point where that was in your original statement, please?

And, to reiterate, even in the absence of evidence, his membership of the Armenian Apostolic Church strongly suggests that he *didn’t *hold the beliefs that you suggest he did. Why? Because they’re not Armenian Apostolic beliefs.

You’ll have to offer some support for this, too, regarding the Armenian Apostolic Church’s beliefs for the papacy at the time of St. Gregory.

Your position is, to use a particularly erudite turn of phrase, gaga lala nonsense.

 

[PRmerger]

I have the very highest regard for Catholicism.

I believe that.

I’m just stating the historical fact that the saint lived and died in a communion which did not profess the fullness of dogma taught by the Apostolic See. I am making no value judgement whatsoever. I’m just asserting that he existed, and that he wasn’t in communion with Rome.

His beliefs on the papacy are what’s important here.

You need to offer something which shows he was in the same position as those of you who wish to be called Catholic yet refuse to be subject to the successor of Peter.

I’m sure that you don’t mean the above to come across as a threat, rather as a friendly warning, but to some it might look like it is one…

Oh, I offer friendly warnings all the time.

But I am not averse to reporting folks for contempt of Catholicism.

 

[Novocastrian]

Could you point where that was in your original statement, please?

See posts #153 and #176. St. Gregory was my example regarding the statement contained in those two posts.

You’ll have to offer some support for this, too, regarding the Armenian Apostolic Church’s beliefs for the papacy at the time of St. Gregory.

Sure, here’s my support: the Armenian Church wasn’t in communion with Rome. It follows that it didn’t accept the supreme jurisdiction or infallibility of the Roman Pontiff (otherwise it would have been in communion with Rome); and it certainly did not see communion with Rome as a criterion of catholicity or orthodoxy. If you could identify my logical or historical mis-step, I’d be glad.