Catholic Covenant Theology

[SemperJase]

Encapsulated in the scripture is all the doctrine we need.
2Timothy 3:16 All scripture [is] given by inspiration of God, and [is] profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:

The verse does not support your position.

1. The verse says “profitable”. Profitable does not mean “all we need”. For example dieting is profitable for loosing weight. Doctors will also tell you to exercise. So while dieting is profitable, it is not all you need.
2. Reading the context of the verse, Paul is not saying to read only scripture. He is telling Timothy that the Old Testament is still valuable for learning. It cannot mean sola scriptura as there were no New Testament scriptures from Timothy to learn the new gospel from.

Implicit in the passage is support for oral tradition.

You, however, continue in the things you have learned and become convinced of, knowing from whom you have learned them,

Whom did he learn from? Paul says in verse 10: Paul. Paul taught Timothy. Timothy did not learn of Christ from scripture alone. So it can’t have been a command for sola scriptura. Rather it was saying that even though there is a new gospel, the Old Testament is still profitable, but clearly not everything we need.

Are you claiming that there is other teaching that can be considered “equal” to God inspired scripture?

Yes, the whole word of God. No where in scripture is the Word of God described as scripture alone.

But, Jesus tells us in Matt 4:4:
Man shall not live by bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.

You are not claiming the every word that proceeds from God is recorded in the Bible are you?

I appreciate your honesty regarding reading long posts… I find them burdensome also. I will post tomorrow with arguments to the issue listed above I believe to be most important.
%between%

 

[havemercy]

Flattering done, I’ll argue.

Simply? As you saw later in the sequence, Peter is contrasted with the other disciples. He alone gets the keys (note the singular in Greek). There is no indication that the promise is ever extended to the others in this passage or in other places.

Peter said it because the Father revealed it to him. It wasn’t he was the quickest at figuring it out, it was a matter of revelation.
The promises were made to Peter as part of a chain reaction: Jesus asked them who He was, the Father told Peter, and Jesus responded to Peter. Peter is singled out not as a result of human action but divine action: both the Father and the Son. Peter here is not simply one among twelve. Something extraordinary is happening.

I willl respond to your other comments after we finish this one.

Might I add that the other apostles (whos successors are later referred to as bishops) share in the power of the Keys to the Kingdom. That is to say that this power extends over to the other apostles/bishops, but only if and when they are in communion (one might even say in submission to) with the Vicar of Peter.

 

[Truthstalker]

The verse does not support your position.

1. The verse says “profitable”. Profitable does not mean “all we need”. For example dieting is profitable for loosing weight. Doctors will also tell you to exercise. So while dieting is profitable, it is not all you need.
2. Reading the context of the verse, Paul is not saying to read only scripture. He is telling Timothy that the Old Testament is still valuable for learning. It cannot mean sola scriptura as there were no New Testament scriptures from Timothy to learn the new gospel from.

Implicit in the passage is support for oral tradition.

Whom did he learn from? Paul says in verse 10: Paul. Paul taught Timothy. Timothy did not learn of Christ from scripture alone. So it can’t have been a command for sola scriptura. Rather it was saying that even though there is a new gospel, the Old Testament is still profitable, but clearly not everything we need.

Yes, the whole word of God. No where in scripture is the Word of God described as scripture alone.

But, Jesus tells us in Matt 4:4:
Man shall not live by bread alone, but on every word that proceeds out of the mouth of God.

You are not claiming the every word that proceeds from God is recorded in the Bible are you?

Would you guys mind moving this discussion to another thread?
Thanks!

 

[bibleapologist]

I will try to kill two birds with one stone here…

Jane Francis said…

And on a very practical level, you too consider a teaching other than inspired Scripture as equally authoritative–your interpretation!

(okay. . .that last one wasn’t a question. . .but it still did burn)

and SemperJase said…

You are not claiming the every word that proceeds from God is recorded in the Bible are you?

Rather than immediately turning out questions that divert attention from the subject at hand, let’s focus on the root issue here.

Both of you, as have others, stated that you believe there are other teachings that equate with scripture as being God inspired. The Bible does not teach that in any way, but actually forbids it and exhorts Christians to only trust scripture as it was written before the end of the 1st century.

I qualified the statements in my previous post, and the statements in this one by this…

Rev 22:18 For I testify unto every man that heareth the words of the prophecy of this book, If any man shall add unto these things, God shall add unto him the plagues that are written in this book:
Rev 22:19 And if any man shall take away from the words of the book of this prophecy, God shall take away his part out of the book of life, and out of the holy city, and [from] the things which are written in this book.

Paul, speaking to Timothy said…

2Ti 3:14 But continue thou in the things which thou hast learned and hast been assured of, knowing of whom thou hast learned [them];

Of course, as this verse was inspired by God, and preserved by Him through the ages… it was also written for us. We are not commanded to give attention to new doctrines or teaching that doesn’t coincide with scripture, in fact the exact opposite…

Col 2:6 As ye have therefore received Christ Jesus the Lord, [so] walk ye in him:
Col 2:7 Rooted and built up in him, and stablished in the faith, as ye have been taught, abounding therein with thanksgiving.

And here again Paul exhorts Timothy…

1Ti 1:3 As I besought thee to abide still at Ephesus, when I went into Macedonia, that thou mightest charge some that they teach no other doctrine,
1Ti 1:4 Neither give heed to fables and endless genealogies, which minister questions, rather than godly edifying which is in faith: [so do].
1Ti 1:5 Now the end of the commandment is charity out of a pure heart, and [of] a good conscience, and [of] faith unfeigned:
1Ti 1:6 From which **some having swerved have turned aside unto vain jangling; **1Ti 1:7 Desiring to be teachers of the law; understanding neither what they say, nor whereof they affirm.

We are to teach NO OTHER DOCTRINE, than that which was already given.

John
www.gideonsword.net

 

[JaneFrances]

Would you guys mind moving this discussion to another thread?
Thanks!

Yep. Go here: forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=110122

 

[Truthstalker]

It is not, however, clear that challenging the leaders of the Church amounts to “bringing a different Gospel.”

If the church leaders are teaching the same message they have always been teaching, and someone else disagrees with them, teaching aomething different, then that different teaching is by definition a different Gospel.

Contarini:

You haven’t shown any link between this and no. 14.

15 follows from 13.

 

[Truthstalker]

16 follows from 14. These could be ordered better, I will admit.

The assumption that Calvin and Luther were from God is predicated on the assumption that what they did actually was from God. As they rejected not only practice but doctrine and dogma, this is questionable. There is a new covenant; Jesus is now Prophet, Priest and King; since we have the Holy Spirit, the prophetic function is now within the Church’s structure rather than standing opposite to it and outside it. Many, such as Bernard of Clairveaux, lived in worse times for the Church and said very strong things, yet they did not abandon the church nor attempt to revise the doctrine of the church. Calvin in particular is contradictory, yaerning for the days of Augustine, Basil, Chrystotom and Ambrose, as when the church was yet incorrupt, yet railed against doctrines they supported. Luther’s conduct, particularly in the interview with Catejan, and his later writings, put him in serious question as to whether he was sent from God. His advocacy of the secular authority as the one to appoint the bishop, for example, did not work.

 

[Truthstalker]

But you are assuming without evidence that it was spoken to them as the forebears of the bishops rather than as representatives of all believers.

You introduce the concept ot the “representatives of all believers” without warrant. Look at Paul’s commands to Timothy and Titus to appoint elders, not select representatives, in the respective epistes. This was spoken to the future apostles alone and not to the believers as a group. I consider this sufficient evidence.

Exactly. Us, not just some of us.With individual guidance on the individual level and corporate guidance on the corporate level. How does this detract from the argument?

Jesus also told a parable in which the steward is crooked and gets fired. . . . This is a very weak line of argument.

And there have been popes who have been crooked, yet they were stewards until judged. The concept of stewardship is a repeated theme in the Gospels.

Of course to reject the Church is to reject Jesus. But it does not follow that to reject the Pope (in the sense of disobeying his commands and incurring his displeasure) is to reject the one Jesus put in charge. After all, the people of God in the OT frequently disobeyed kings and priests and had God’s blessing for doing so. (Amos, Elijah, etc.) However under the new covenant the office is different than kingship in the old - the people insisted on a King, not God, who granted their wish. Here God has taken the initiative.

I can’t see that this chain of argument has much logic at all, frankly. It seems to be driven more by your sense of what *must *be true than by the actual Biblical evidence.

Edwin

That’s amusing because I am looking for loopholes.

 

[Truthstalker]

Bump!

 

[Contarini]

If the church leaders are teaching the same message they have always been teaching, and someone else disagrees with them, teaching aomething different, then that different teaching is by definition a different Gospel.

I can’t see that. We all know that doctrine develops. The Church is not teaching *exactly *the same message as it did two thousand years ago. That’s an absurd proposition. Rather, the Catholic claim is that the teaching is *essentially *the same, and that the apparent changes either do not affect the essentials of the Faith (papal appointment of bishops, for instance, or communion in one kind), or actually constitute a further elaboration of the essential teaching (which elaboration must now be accepted with the same faith given to the original teaching).

And it’s those two propositions that Protestants challenge. Therefore your argument makes no sense. Is it “teaching a different Gospel” to say (as Protestants said) that communion in one kind violated the essence of the Sacrament? Unquestionably communion in the apostolic era (and for centuries thereafter) was offered in both kinds. So if anyone was teaching “a different Gospel” there, it would be the Catholic Church.

But of course it’s not that simple. The fact that the early Church practiced communion in both kinds doesn’t prove that they thought it was necessary. So neither side can be obviously convicted of “teaching a different Gospel.”

The same is true with important doctrinal issues like justification by faith or the authority of Scripture. You can find aspects of the teaching of both sides in the Bible and in the early Christian writings. I’m not saying that both sides were equal on all points, only that both of them were developing their views from the common Christian heritage.

You are assuming that the Magisterium has the sole right to decide what is or is not a “different Gospel.” But nothing in your “chain of logic” proves this.

15 follows from 13.

But as I said, I don’t deny this. I deny the combination of these points with 14 to argue that anyone who incurs the condemnation of the Papacy is automatically a schismatic. (Rather, I would say that anyone who condemns as a heretic one who is not a heretic is a schismatic, whatever office he/she does or does not hold. Since I don’t think either Luther or the Papacy was heretical, I think they were both schismatics. Certainly one could make the case that a greater guilt lies on Luther, since he should have given the Pope the benefit of the doubt because of his office. But given the horrible ways in which the papacy of that era betrayed their office–stopping short IMHO of actual heresy–I can’t blame Luther too badly.)

Edwin

 

[Contarini]

16 follows from 14. These could be ordered better, I will admit.

But you’re assuming that a “schismatic” is someone who challenges ecclesiastical authority. By this standard the prophets and apostles and Jesus Himself were schismatics of the Old Covenant.

The assumption that Calvin and Luther were from God

What does “from God” mean?

I don’t assume that they were prophets, if that’s what you are saying. I don’t take it upon myself to judge such things. As far as I’m concerned they were theologians who had some good ideas and some bad ones. Nothing they taught warranted schism–but that’s a condemnation of the Catholic Church as much as of the Reformers.

is predicated on the assumption that what they did actually was from God. As they rejected not only practice but doctrine and dogma, this is questionable.

First of all, you’ve bought the Catholic argument that practices are less important than dogmas. I dispute this. Catholics make a great deal of the *doctrine *of utraquism, for instance. I’m willing to grant that the dogmatic denial of the validity of communion in one kind is wrong. But in my book an overly dogmatic insistence on the apostolic model is far less serious than the wholesale abandonment of that model, which is what you saw in late medieval Catholicism.

The same with married priests. Whatever we think about priestly celibacy (and I’m honestly ambivalent about it), there’s no denying that presbyters in the apostolic era were generally (perhaps always) married. So how is it rejecting historic Christianity to try to restore what unquestionably was practiced in the NT?

There is a new covenant; Jesus is now Prophet, Priest and King; since we have the Holy Spirit, the prophetic function is now within the Church’s structure rather than standing opposite to it and outside it.

The number of dubious assumptions in that sentence is breathtaking. In fact, if what you are saying is Catholic doctrine (I hope it isn’t), then there is no hope that I will ever be Catholic.

First of all, note the ambiguous “we.” Later on you criticize me for saying that Jesus’ promises to the apostles apply to all Christians by virtue of the gift of the Spirit. Your “we” seems to benefit only the Church hierarchy. This makes no sense. St. Peter quoted the prophet Joel saying that the Spirit would be poured out on men and women, servants and handmaidens–on all the faithful, in fact. So I fail to see how the gift of the Spirit shows that prophecy must only exist within the “structure of the Church” (presumably you mean the Church hierarchy, since we aren’t talking about unbaptized prophets).

A far more defensible position would be that since *we *(and really “we,” not just certain Church officials speaking in our name) have the gift of the Spirit, there is no need to identify a particular person as being a prophet or not. In other words, your concern with whether Luther or Calvin was “from God” is misguided if we all have the gift of the Spirit. Perhaps Luther was a deluded maniac and Calvin a pompous jerk, but in their words ordinary believers heard truth that they had not heard from the Church hierarchy. Perhaps, in other words, the true prophetic gift lay with ordinary believers who were empowered to claim their full participation in Christ’s Body in ways they had not done before.

Many, such as Bernard of Clairveaux, lived in worse times for the Church and said very strong things, yet they did not abandon the church nor attempt to revise the doctrine of the church.

Of course Bernard revised the doctrine of the Church, in some very significant ways. The Cisercian movement led to a more Christocentric piety and a far greater focus on the Blessed Virgin.

Of course, these things may not count in the RCC’s narrow definition of “doctrine.” Too bad for that definition. If doctrine is not what is actually taught by the clergy and believed by the faithful, then it’s a sterile concept.

 

[Contarini]

Calvin in particular is contradictory, yaerning for the days of Augustine, Basil, Chrystotom and Ambrose, as when the church was yet incorrupt, yet railed against doctrines they supported.

You’re too quick to assume contradiction. Calvin never said that the Church was completely uncorrupt at any time–he had a realistic view of these things and recognized that there was always going to be some corruption and error.

Luther’s conduct, particularly in the interview with Catejan,

What is so shocking about that interview?

and his later writings, put him in serious question as to whether he was sent from God.

As a prophet, you mean? Don’t you in fact claim that the Church as a whole has the prophetic gift, so that a separate prophetic office is not necessary? In that case, it makes no sense to ask if Luther was one.

If you mean something else by “sent from God,” please tell me what. I believe that all of us have vocations from God, and all of us mess them up to some degree. I don’t think Luther was an exception on either point.

The problem with your paradigm is that it puts a disproportionate burden on Protestantism, since Catholics of course don’t claim that Papal actions are valid evidence for whether Popes are “sent from God” or not.

His advocacy of the secular authority as the one to appoint the bishop, for example, did not work.

Which proves that he was fallible. Shucks, I think Luther was probably wrong more often than right. I’m not a Protestant because I agree with Luther–I’m a Protestant because that is the tradition which I heard the Gospel, and because I think Protestants are truly Christian. That’s sufficient reason to stay Protestant. It has nothing to do with whether Luther was “from God” or not, whatever that means.

The question you or I face is not what we think of Luther or Calvin, but what we think of the visible means of grace that have nourished us up to this point. From where I stand, you (and most other prospective converts) are holding the wrong end of the donkey. You’re approaching Catholicism from the same ultra-intellectualized, semi-Gnostic perspective that is the curse of Protestantism. You’re asking “where is the Great Authority in the Sky that will Authorize my Worldview,” instead of “is the community in which I currently worship a valid Christian community.”

Edwin

 

[Truthstalker]

Contarini,

I intend to reply at length later. I don’t know if you follow the Catholic readings, but today’s included the prophesying by the “unauthorized” in the Book of Numbers:

11: 24 So Moses went out and told the people the words of the LORD; and he gathered seventy men of the elders of the people, and placed them round about the tent. 25 Then the LORD came down in the cloud and spoke to him, and took some of the spirit that was upon him and put it upon the seventy elders; and when the spirit rested upon them, they prophesied. But they did so no more. 26 Now two men remained in the camp, one named Eldad, and the other named Medad, and the spirit rested upon them; they were among those registered, but they had not gone out to the tent, and so they prophesied in the camp. 27 And a young man ran and told Moses, “Eldad and Medad are prophesying in the camp.” 28 And Joshua the son of Nun, the minister of Moses, one of his chosen men, said, “My lord Moses, forbid them.” 29 But Moses said to him, “Are you jealous for my sake? Would that all the LORD’s people were prophets, that the LORD would put his spirit upon them!”

as well as those who did miracles outside the apostolic ministry (Mark 9:38):

38 John said to him, “Teacher, we saw a man casting out demons in your name, and we forbade him, because he was not following us.” 39 But Jesus said, "Do not forbid him; for no one who does a mighty work in my name will be able soon after to speak evil of me. 40 For he that is not against us is for us.

Interesting. Thank you for your reply.

 

[Truthstalker]

The question you or I face is not what we think of Luther or Calvin, but what we think of the visible means of grace that have nourished us up to this point. From where I stand, you (and most other prospective converts) are holding the wrong end of the donkey. You’re approaching Catholicism from the same ultra-intellectualized, semi-Gnostic perspective that is the curse of Protestantism. You’re asking “where is the Great Authority in the Sky that will Authorize my Worldview,” instead of “is the community in which I currently worship a valid Christian community.”

Edwin

Actually the question is more “what does God consider valid” and “what is God’s worldview.” I would rather have His worldview than mine. To determine whether one is in a valid Christian community one must have a standard for what is valid. And then there is the question of degrees of validity: “what is closest to what God wants?” I don’t think truth is relative or embedded in community in an undetectable sense. There is absolute truth and God promised we would find Him if we search for Him with all our hearts. What is the standard for what is valid, especially where the Bible is silent but standards must be set? What is a valid community? What determines whether one is more valid than another?

 

[Truthstalker]

The question you or I face is not what we think of Luther or Calvin, but what we think of the visible means of grace that have nourished us up to this point. From where I stand, you (and most other prospective converts) are holding the wrong end of the donkey. You’re approaching Catholicism from the same ultra-intellectualized, semi-Gnostic perspective that is the curse of Protestantism. You’re asking “where is the Great Authority in the Sky that will Authorize my Worldview,” instead of “is the community in which I currently worship a valid Christian community.”

I am also attempting to approach this from the standpoint of the criticism of Western thought in which the individual is rated supreme, as opposed to the standpoint in which the individual is first recognized as a member of the church rather than the church surrounding the paramount individual.

I like the phrase “ultra-intellectualized, semi-Gnostic perspective that is the curse of Protestantism” but I am not sure what you mean by it. You imply a superior viewpoint that would be of interest. Are you looking for truth to be revealed through the community?

 

[Truthstalker]

bump.

 

[Stephen_C]

TS,
Are you waiting for Contarini to reply? I think he is on sabatical from this forum.

 

[Truthstalker]

I know he’s on sabbatical.

I don’t see this as a one on one debate between him and myself.

 

[Stephen_C]

I know he’s on sabbatical.

I don’t see this as a one on one debate between him and myself.

Ok, I did not know. Just from your last post (Oct 3) you had asked him a question.

Sorry…my bad.

 

[Verita]

Whatcha think of this? I stole this off another forum.

1. Jesus Christ is the final covenant God made with man.
2. When God makes a covenant, He makes it with Himself, and He promises to fulfill it. He is the author and the finisher of the covenant. The covenant consists of the promises made as part of that covenant.
3. Every promise Jesus made when He was here on earth was part of that covenant. He is the Word. Everything He said is part of that covenant.
4. Jesus promised to Peter that He would build His church on that rock in Matthew 16.
5. In Matthew 16:13-20, the Greek distinguishes between when Jesus is speaking to all the disciples and to Peter alone.
6. Therefore certain promises were made to Peter apart from the rest of the disciples.
7. Jesus referred to giving Peter the keys, a reference to Isaiah 22-22, where there is the promise of the office of steward.
8. Jesus therefore gave Peter primacy over the other disciples.
9. This can be observed in the Gospels and the book of Acts, where Peter is generally mentioned first. He also speaks more than the other disciples.
10. Peter directed church activity in Acts 1:15 following. Peter gave the first Christian sermon in Acts 2:14. This primacy was clearly recognized by the other disciples. There are numerous examples of this in the book of Acts.
11. Paul recognized the primacy. In Galatians 1:18 he went to Jerusalem and visited Cephas (=Peter) only.
12. Jesus made an everlasting covenant, meaning that although Peter died, the office would continue. We see succession of apostles started in Acts 1 by Peter.
13. The covenant being everlasting, its promises are also everlasting. Therefore the office continues today.
14. There are repeated warnings in Scripture against schismatics and heretics. We see this in the early church fathers as well. Paul warns against those bringing a different Gospel in Galatians 1:6-9, for example.
15. There is therefore a divinely authorized bishopric which developed into the Papacy.
16. Neither Luther nor Calvin nor any other reformer was authorized to bring reform to the Catholic church.
17. Jesus said, “he who receives you, receives me, and he who receives me, receives him who sent me.” This was spoken to the apostles, the forebears of the bishops of the Church.
18. Jesus promised to be with us always. He does not abandon us, but He sent His Holy Spirit to guide and direct us and the Church.
19. This is all part of the Covenant Jesus made at the cross.
20. Jesus made a number of parables in which a man goes away and leaves a steward in charge. This is no coincidence. Jesus went away and left a steward in charge.
21. To reject the Church is to reject Jesus. To reject the Pope then is to reject the one He put in charge.

I like your list! I would be careful with number 16. Luther (he was a priest) certainly did have a right to bring reform to the church and the church badly needed reform. What he didn’t have a right to do was try to change the structure or teachings of the church. You may want to word that differently.