Did the Protestant Reformation do anything good?

[CopticChristian]

CopticChristian;8319897:

I don’t believe that deacons are allowed to marry. As you seem to be trying to say in the second sentence, deacons are usually already married when ordained.

It is a fairly ancient tradition of the Church, East and West, that marriage is not allowed after

ordination to the diaconate.

I have heard stories of anxious Orthodox seminarians running around trying to find a wife before ordination. . . . .

Edwin

Orthodox seminarians would be becoming priests. Orthodox priests can be married.

A deacon as far as I know is not required to be celibate. They in the Catholic tradition are helpers not priests.

catholic.com/thisrock/2005/0510fea2.asp

The word deacon comes from the Greek word diakonos, meaning “servant” or “helper.” Officially, deacons are one of only three groups of ordained ministers within the Catholic Church, the others being bishops and presbyters. Deacons may be either single or married. In the United States, they are required to be at least thirty-five years old.

I do not know of any requirement for celibacy for a deacon.

 

[Swiss_Guy]

CopticChristian;8319897:

I don’t believe that deacons are allowed to marry. As you seem to be trying to say in the second sentence, deacons are usually already married when ordained.

It is a fairly ancient tradition of the Church, East and West, that marriage is not allowed after

ordination to the diaconate.

.

Edwin

I believe that you are correct in saying you can’t marry once ordained, even to the diaconate.

Joey.

 

[Swiss_Guy]

Swiss Guy;8319873:

… thats not the point.
**
the point is that using the logic that something should not be done … because it was not done by the early church … doesnt work as a criteria.**

The marriage criteria for Priesthood in the RCC today ( or whatever the equivalent was then) … was not the criteria in the early Church​

… I was referring to the RCC in my example … and choosing to obey the rule is prerequisite to becoming a Priest in the RCC … if they dont choose celibacy then the Church wont choose them to be a priest … with a few noted exceptions …

(to the bold): of course not - that’s sola scriptura. We are always learning John 16:13.

And how do you know what the marriage criteria for the early church was? A Catholic bible of course. But back on topic.

1 Timothy talks about bishop-priests to be married only once - well, they would already have been married when ordained, so I see no problems there.

Disciplines like celibacy for priests can be changed, but doctrine can’t. The reason the western/latin rite doesn’t allow married men to become priests is out of tradition (note the lower case t). The eastern tradition allows them to become priests.

I don’t see what the problem is with not having priests be able to marry. it helps them focus on their “job” so that they can serve Christ and the Church better.

Joey.

 

[CopticChristian]

Contarini;8319960:

I believe that you are correct in saying you can’t marry once ordained, even to the diaconate.

Joey.

I believe you are wrong on marrying after becoming a deacon. It is not my hill to die on. I will be OK. I am sure that someone knows the answer. I will continue to look. If I am wrong, and I do not think I am, I will leave it as is and we can then find understanding. If I am correct, I will say nothing and we can find understanding.

 

[CopticChristian]

Contarini;8319960:

I believe that you are correct in saying you can’t marry once ordained, even to the diaconate.

Joey.

I have searched and it appears that celibacy is a requirement if single prior to the deaconate. If married then you can still be a deacon.

I have become so used to married deacons that I never really gave it much thought. We both have understanding.

 

[Contarini]

Swiss Guy;8320048:

I have searched and it appears that celibacy is a requirement if single prior to the deaconate. If married then you can still be a deacon.

I have become so used to married deacons that I never really gave it much thought. We both have understanding.

CC, that was my point–marriage is not allowed after ordination to the diaconate. Most permanent deacons are ordained when already married. The same is true of Orthodox deacons and priests, hence the rush to find a spouse before ordination.

Edwin

 

[tqualey]

Hi, CC,

A truly excellent post!

One of things I found most strange about Luther was his reported comparisson to us being dung and God’s Grace covering us with snow (so now, we don’t look like what we really are!). Here is an interesting link: socrates58.blogspot.com/2005/10/has-martin-luthers-snow-covered.html

This seasonal analogy always bothered me because Christ really does change us - and when the Spring comes, Luther’s snow melts and revleas that nothing has changed. God’s Grace is for all Eternity!

God bless

Try a simple explanation.

Extrinsic Justification. This is justification by grace alone the doctrine of extrinsic justification and the rejection of the Catholic view of faith formed by charity as “saving faith.” Extrinsic justification is the idea that justification occurs outside of man, rather than within him. The Reformers, like the Catholic Church, insisted that justification is by grace and therefore originates outside of man, with God. But they also insisted that when God justifies man, man is not changed but merely declared just or righteous. God treats man as if he were just or righteous, imputing to man the righteousness of Christ, rather than imparting it to him. Calvin tried to circumvent the biblical problems of the extrinsic justification theory by positing a systematic distinction between justification, which puts us in right relation to God but which, on the Protestant view, doesn’t involve a change in man; and sanctification, which transforms us. Yet this systematic distinction isn’t biblical.

Intrinsic Justification. Catholicism holds that justification is by grace alone. In that sense, it originates outside of man, with God’s grace. But, according to Catholic teaching, God justifies man by effecting a change within him, by making him just or righteous, not merely by saying he is just or righteous or treating him as if he were. Justification imparts the righteousness of Christ to man, transforming him by grace into a child of God. There is neither a logical nor a biblical reason why God cannot effect a change in man without undercutting justification by grace alone. Whatever righteousness comes to be in man as a result of justification is a gift, as much any other gift God bestows on man. Nor does the Bible’s treatment of “imputed” righteousness imply that justification is not imparted. On these points, the Reformers were simply wrong:

There is no doubt that grace, for St. Paul, however freely given, involves what he calls ‘the new creation’, the appearance in us of a ‘new man’, created in justice and holiness. So far from suppressing the efforts of man, or making them a matter of indifference, or at least irrelevant to salvation, he himself tells us to ‘work out your salvation with fear and trembling’, at the very moment when he affirms that ‘. . . knowing that it is God who works in you both to will and to accomplish.’ These two expressions say better than any other that all is grace in our salvation, but at the same time grace is not opposed to human acts and endeavor in order to attain salvation, but arouses them and exacts their performance."

In the Bible, justification and sanctification–as many modern Protestant exegetes admit–are two different terms for the same process. Both occur by grace through faith and both involve a faith “informed by charity” or completed by love. Faith in the Pauline sense, “supposes the total abandonment of man to the gift of God”–which amounts to love of God. He argues that it is absurd to think that the man justified by faith, who calls God “Abba, Father,” doesn’t love God or doesn’t have to love him in order to be justified.

So with this in mind if someone offered you the opportunity to be declared righteous or to become righteous which is most appealing. Put it another way. If you are a Catholic and accept being declared righteous, are righteous are a child of God really and truly to become Protestant means you have to give this notion up and become a creature declared innocent and not be truly righteous just be declared righteous. Both are on account of the righteousness of Christ.

I like being a child of God, not an acquitted criminal, given the grace to please God and then getting rewarded by my Father and I don’t deserve it and I didn’t earn it, reminds me of my daddy…

 

[guanophore]

The problem with the Protestant understanding of justification is that it is deeply mired in nominalism.

What do you mean by that?

The forensic understanding of justification is according to McGrath a theological novum. It is not something that you will find in the early Church. This split between justification and sanctification was never there.

While I do agree that there was never a split between justification and sanctification, if the forensic understanding of justification were not part of the Divine Deposit of Faith, it would not have been recorded in the NT. Paul makes reference to elements of it throughout his letters and Jesus is quite explicit about Law and justice.

It cannot hold because if salvation consists in being justified (forensic) then what is the need for sanctification.  Isn't the whole goal just to be saved?

A Reformed Christian would say that sanctification is the natural consequence of justification. If a person is “truly saved” then he will, by virtue of his new nature, produce the fruits that befit repentance. If a person does not do this, then one might question if they are “truly saved”.

Rom 8:29-30
30 And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.

I have heard this referred to as the “golden chain of salvation”. All the links are inextricably meshed. People are justified so that they can be sanctified, and those who are sanctified will be glorified.

 

[CopticChristian]

I don’t think that the reformation reformed the Catholic Church, doctrinally speaking that is, although it certainly spurred the CC along giving way to a very necessary house cleaning. Can you imagine if the Luther’s and Zwingli’s of the reformation would have persevered with patience and simply trusted in the providence of God, as did the Assisi’s and Laboure’s did? Phew…No doubt that necessary house cleaning (God’s House) - would have occurred anyway, only according to God’s timetable, thereby making available to so many more God loving Christians, the holy Eucharist. Just food for thought…

I was listening to Patrick Madrid about rape, abortion and othe topics. He said that we in the Church live by not doing evil to produce a good. Shall we sin that grace may abound. Only good fruits produce good fruits. Woe to those that call evil good and good evil. With that in mind a few thoughts.

Protestanism at it’s inception is heresy.
Heresy is either good or evil!
Knox, Calvin, Luther, Zwingli denied the Eucharist…good or evil?

In consideration of all else they did and the consequences concerning the reformation and all of this dialogue did those who did what they did at the inception do good or evil?

The answer to that then translates to did the reformation do any good if the progenitors in action as a cause did good or evil?

With that in mind Patrick Madrid says that in the face of evil God can produce good. If true then if the reformation produced any good it was not as a result of its first cause.

We give glory and honor to the wrong entity if we look to the cause and not the action of the cause that produced good.

 

[CopticChristian]

Do you think the Protestant Reformation did anything good? I personally thing it was one of the greatest tragedies in the history of the human race, but could’ve been avoided. And if it were avoided, things would be a lot better off today. Why did it happen, and what could have been done to stop it, and what can be done now to reverse the damages wrought by it?

My answer is a solid no based on my prior answer.:idea:

 

[benedictus2]

First of all, Reformed folks would generally say that “salvation” includes both justification and sanctification.

And surely it is monstrous to suggest that the goal for any Christian should just be to have one’s sins forgiven? Justification exists for the sake of sanctification–in classical Protestant theology, it gets the worry about one’s acceptance by God out of the way so that one can get on with really loving God and neighbor.

Actually not quite I think. This monergism/synergism is just an attempt to get out of the quandary they’ve gotten themselves into by their forensic understanding of justification and this split with sanctification.

If justification and sanctifcation are truly necessary, what happens when one is justified then dies? Is being justified enough for salvation? If not then how does he get sanctified?

That is, by the way, what Luther meant when he said hyperbolically, “Sin boldly, but believe even more boldly.” His purpose was not to encourage sin but to get scrupulous people to stop worrying about acceptance by God and focus on the stuff that really mattered–faith working through love.

That is an attempt to sanitize his statement. Sin boldly is precisely that - an encouragement to sin - because you will get out of it anyway, by believing boldly. It is a stupiid statement by a man who thought he has found a way to get out of scrupulosity.

His theology was one-sided and misleading in many ways and he was wrong to divide the Church over it, but he was not telling people that good works and inner transformation were not important. To think that he was is to misunderstand him–and Protesantism generally–radically.

His theology is misleading because it is wrong This idea of a break between justification and sanctification is an invention which came up with because of his nominalism which by the is also the parent of the evil isms.

 

[benedictus2]

What do you mean by that?

Nominalism means that living beings have no real natures or essences, only nominal essences i.e. the label we attach to these essences.

I quote here from "The Recovery of Unit: A Theological Approach " by E.L Mascall as quoted by Beckwith in “Return to Rome.”

Now, by the end of the Middle Ages, nominalism was in the ascendant in philosophy and theology alike… The consequence was that the reality of an object tended to be identified entirely with its observable characteristics. Each object was a separate bundle of sensible particulars; there were no real relationships between beings, and in each individual being there was nothing but its observable behaviour.
**
*How, then, is somebody whose mentality has been cast in the mould of nominalism to conceive the activity of justifying grace? He cannot think of it as consisting in a supernatural transformation of a man’s being in its ontological depths beneath the observable level; for on nominalist principles there is nothing beneath the observable level to transform. On the other hand, if justifying grace were to consist of a transformation on the observable level, the man would be simply justified by his works; for on nominalistic principles a man’s observable behaviour is neither more nor less than his total activity. *
**
What, then, was there left for Luther to say, being convinced as he rightly was by St Paul, that a man cannot be justified by works? Only this: that there is no real change in the man at all, but God treats him as if there was. By a sheer gratuitous act of his love God imputes to the man the merits of Christ; God treats him as if he were as sinless as Christ himself, while leaving him the sinner he was.

I can’t remember the exact quote but Luther said once that Ockham was the only true philosopher of note (or something along those lines)

 

[benedictus2]

While I do agree that there was never a split between justification and sanctification, if the forensic understanding of justification were not part of the Divine Deposit of Faith, it would not have been recorded in the NT. Paul makes reference to elements of it throughout his letters and Jesus is quite explicit about Law and justice.

Paul did not make reference to a forensic understanding of justification nor is it in the NT.

A Reformed Christian would say that sanctification is the natural consequence of justification. If a person is “truly saved” then he will, by virtue of his new nature, produce the fruits that befit repentance. If a person does not do this, then one might question if they are “truly saved”.

Which is nothing more than an attempt to get out of the quandary they’ve put themselves in due to their forensic understanding of justification.

We are declared just when we have been made just through sanctification. Otherwise, it would be like God lying to Himself then proceeds to make a truth out of the lie by transforming us.

Rom 8:29-30
30 And those whom he predestined he also called; and those whom he called he also justified; and those whom he justified he also glorified.

This does not spell forensic justification.

I have heard this referred to as the “golden chain of salvation”. All the links are inextricably meshed. People are justified so that they can be sanctified, and those who are sanctified will be glorified.

And what happens if at the point of justification the person dies? So he enters heaven still very much a sinner but cloaked in Christ’s righteousness? Dungheaps covered with snow?

Another thing that protestant theology can’t escape is that, taken to its logical conclusion, protestant theology is essentially Calvinist in its view of predestination. They just have not extended their principles enough to see this.

 

[benedictus2]

Requiring Church leaders not to marry was not found in the early church … Using the fact that ‘they didnt do it then so they cant do it now’ as a criteria … doesnt stand up to inspection.

And how in the world is that supposed to be even within cooee of what you were replying to?

---

If sanctification is moot …

Then why did Jesus have to pray for Peter to be restored?
and … Why did Paul teach us to “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind through the washing of God’s word” ?

… and why dont they just hold people under the water at Baptism until they go to be with God … since the job is finished …

Exactly my point! Sanctification is moot if we believe in forensic justification.

 

[benedictus2]

… thats not the point.

the point is that using the logic that something should not be done … because it was not done by the early church … doesnt work as a criteria.

…

It is one thing to develop doctrine (natural and logical progression) and another to corrupt it and invent one just to calm one’s scrupulosity.

 

[Petergee]

Respectfully, I’m pretty sure you are mistaken here. The KJV preface refers to the Psalter and various other parts of Scripture being translated in Anglo-Saxon times, which is quite correct (the first six books of the OT were translated for sure, as were the Gospels). However, that was not the whole Bible, and at any rate would have been unreadable to most people (if not to everyone) by the later Middle Ages. I don’t think that so much of the Bible was ever translated into English again until the “Wyclif” Bible of the 14th century, though certainly parts (mostly the NT) were translated at times and far more was paraphrased. The KJV preface’s references to “Trevisa,” and to complete manuscript copies of the English Bible, are almost certainly talking about the Wyclif Bible. I have been told before on this forum (or a similar one) that St. Thomas More refers to an English Bible being translated for the use of a monastic community, but I have not seen documentation of this. Of course, the fact that sixteenth-century people claimed that something had happened does not necessarily mean that it did happen.

So I am afraid I have to stand by my claim: there is no convincing evidence for a complete translation of the English Bible before the Reformation except for the “heretical” Bible associated with Wyclif and his followers. Large parts of the Bible were certainly translated, together with much more extensive paraphrasing and general Biblical catechesis. One of the huge mistakes made by Protestants is to assume that because the Church was nervous about people simply sitting down and reading a more or less literal translation of the Bible (which the late medieval Church definitely was), therefore the Church didn’t try to teach people the Bible at all. And of course I haven’t even mentioned art. Lay piety in the later Middle Ages was saturated with the Bible, even if people weren’t reading a chapter a day in the approved later Protestant fashion!

The Catholic Encyclopedia has a good list of the medieval versions known to exist at the time the CE was published. The article mentions the sixteenth-century claims to which you allude, but I repeat: these claims do not prove much. I do study the sixteenth century, and I know how loose sixteenth-century writers can be in their claims about history.

But they weren’t “claims about history”. They weren’t writing for the benefit of us 500 years later. They were writing for their contemporaries, and they did in fact state that entire Bibles in English were at that time to be seen in England. Why would they invent a lie which could so easily be proved wrong by any of their contemporaries?

I grant you Foxe was later extremely dishonest with his exagerrations of the sufferings of protestants under Good Queen Mary. And Abp Cranmer dishonestly kept a de facto wife for years whilst outwardly professing to be true to his vow of celibacy. But the KJV authors were not known to be dishonest as far as I know. And none of the protestants had any **motive ** to claim that there were English Bibles available if there were in fact none.

More had the motive, but come on, he was a highly intelligent and accomplished lawyer and judge, used to using precise language, who chose to be put to death rather than tell a lie. He would not carelessly toss out any such claim unless it could be solidly proven.

And as for Wycliff, historians seem to believe that he did not, and indeed could not have, produced a version of the entire Bible.

I think you’re making a bit of a leap when you assume that they would have destroyed Bibles. Yes, it’s possible that such a thing did happen because mobs or soldiers just thought a book looked “Papist.” But it’s a huge stretch to conclude from the theoretical possibility that copies of the Scriptures were sometimes destroyed that therefore whole Bibles must have existed in the Middle Ages!

Not at all theoretical. The fact that Bibles were systematically destroyed wholesale by protestants also is attested by Protestant historians.

What we have actual evidence for is, as I said, very extensive partial translations in the Anglo-Saxon era; somewhat less extensive manuscript translations in the Middle English period before Wyclif (and I should add that there’s not a lot of evidence that these were widely circulated); and then the highly controversial Wyclif Bible.

Edwin

It’s true that that myth, like the myth that the Catholic Church “sold” indulgences, has found its way into many generally otherwise reliable standard textbooks, but it simply doesn’t fit the evidence.

 

[tqualey]

Hi, 1Voice,

When Christ gave the Keys to Peter (Matt 16:18) with the authority to bind and lose, Christ gave total authority to Peter, and his successors, to make any changes that they determined necessary. This complete authority is under the eternal protection of the Holy Spirit so that no error can be taught.

The determination has been made by the Successors of Peter that the clergy will be celebate. Is your argument that the Church does not have the power to change their regulations and disciplines?

God bless

Requiring Church leaders not to marry was not found in the early church … Using the fact that ‘they didnt do it then so they cant do it now’ as a criteria … doesnt stand up to inspection.​

If sanctification is moot …

Then why did Jesus have to pray for Peter to be restored?
and … Why did Paul teach us to “Be transformed by the renewing of your mind through the washing of God’s word” ?

… and why dont they just hold people under the water at Baptism until they go to be with God … since the job is finished …

 

[tqualey]

Hi, Benedictus2,

I can usually follow you train of thought … but my little engine jumped the track when it hit ‘cooee’… and had to go look that one up! en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cooee And, here I was thinking you were speaking English…

Yes, I think 1Voice may have jumped the track, too…! I was not expecting that one.

God bless

And how in the world is that supposed to be even within cooee of what you were replying to?

Exactly my point! Sanctification is moot if we believe in forensic justification.

 

[guanophore]

Swiss Guy;8319873:

Deacons can marry. The laiety usually are the deacons prior to being deacons.

Deacons are expected to remain celibate if they are widowed after they are ordained, or if their wife leaves them. They can be received and ordained if already married.

 

[guanophore]

… I was referring to the RCC in my example … and choosing to obey the rule is prerequisite to becoming a Priest in the RCC … if they dont choose celibacy then the Church wont choose them to be a priest … with a few noted exceptions …

Yes, this is true. It is a choice - for both parties.