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deMontfort
Guest
It’s funny, whenever I’ve seen someone use the term “hyper-Calvinism” they usually end up describing…Calvin himself.
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Kei
Guest
“You have free will, but if you’re not one of the elect, well then, no matter what you choose to do…”
PS, like you say we don’t accurately appraise Calvinist theology, have you considered that you do not accurate appraise Catholic theology?
PS, like you say we don’t accurately appraise Calvinist theology, have you considered that you do not accurate appraise Catholic theology?
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fhansen
Guest
Or if you’re a member of the elect, you can only choose one way anyway. But you have free will. You have no choice in your regeneration, being totally depraved in will as it were. But you have free will
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po18guy
Well-known member
You really, really need to call and speak with Dr. David Anders during his EWTN radio show “Called to Communion.” A Former Calvinist theologian, he set out to convert Catholics. You know what happened.
What’s stopping YOU from becoming Catholic?
http://www.ewtn.com/radio/weekday/calledtocommunion.asp
What’s stopping YOU from becoming Catholic?
http://www.ewtn.com/radio/weekday/calledtocommunion.asp
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fhansen
Guest
Ok, went out, had some Japanese food and wine. My wife played Aerosmith and Boston on the way home. I pretty much hate that stuff almost as much as Calvinism so I wasn’t particularly soothed. So I had more wine at home. Feeling better now. I thought I’d use a different tack so I cut and pasted the following from a post I recently made on a totally different forum, on a thread entitled “Convince me of Arminianism”:
First of all, just from the standpoint of reason alone Calvinism makes little sense. Adam freely fell; this was a matter of the human will to begin with or else God would be in the position of telling Adam not to commit the sin that Adam did commit while wanting him to do so after all. But instead Adam opposed the will of God and committed an essentially evil act that God could not be the author of. The ability to do so is the essence of man’s freedom. And the human will has been the focus, the prize so to speak, ever since.
Because if Calvinism is right, if salvation is nothing more than God regenerating a person without regard to their will, having already elected them to salvation, and failing to do so for the reprobate, then the entire history of the Fall of man and all the pain, suffering, struggle, and death that followed makes no sense whatsoever. God might as well have simply stocked heaven with the elect, and hell with the rest, from the beginning. He might as well have given Adam the grace not to sin and fall at all.
But if, instead, there was a reason for the Fall, if God allowed it knowing He could bring an even greater good out of it in the end, then the knowledge of evil, the experience of it, must play a role, a valuable one. And this experience allows man to gain the wisdom, in time, to change his mind about God, to change his will, and begin to reject evil and embrace the Good alone, even as revelation and grace are also necessary components in this change. So that, as grace precedes man’s justification, establishing cooperation with man that he could not and would not achieve on his own, man can still say no to that grace and reject it. God’s whole purpose is to draw man into justice rather than forcing him because man’s state of justice depends in part on his willing it, on his saying yes. God throws the life preserver without which man cannot possibly be saved and desires that man grab it, rather than forcing it upon him.
IOW, this world is a school where man can learn to hate and reject evil, to develop a hunger and thirst for righteousness, for God, and so come to run like Prodigals back to the the Father who’s been standing there all along with open arms.
Man’s will was never totally corrupted but rather weakened, compromised. Once the Original Sin was committed, man was lost, “dead”, spiritually separated from his Creator. He can’t find his way back, but he can remain lost if he continues to prefer that state, that path, which Adam set him on.
First of all, just from the standpoint of reason alone Calvinism makes little sense. Adam freely fell; this was a matter of the human will to begin with or else God would be in the position of telling Adam not to commit the sin that Adam did commit while wanting him to do so after all. But instead Adam opposed the will of God and committed an essentially evil act that God could not be the author of. The ability to do so is the essence of man’s freedom. And the human will has been the focus, the prize so to speak, ever since.
Because if Calvinism is right, if salvation is nothing more than God regenerating a person without regard to their will, having already elected them to salvation, and failing to do so for the reprobate, then the entire history of the Fall of man and all the pain, suffering, struggle, and death that followed makes no sense whatsoever. God might as well have simply stocked heaven with the elect, and hell with the rest, from the beginning. He might as well have given Adam the grace not to sin and fall at all.
But if, instead, there was a reason for the Fall, if God allowed it knowing He could bring an even greater good out of it in the end, then the knowledge of evil, the experience of it, must play a role, a valuable one. And this experience allows man to gain the wisdom, in time, to change his mind about God, to change his will, and begin to reject evil and embrace the Good alone, even as revelation and grace are also necessary components in this change. So that, as grace precedes man’s justification, establishing cooperation with man that he could not and would not achieve on his own, man can still say no to that grace and reject it. God’s whole purpose is to draw man into justice rather than forcing him because man’s state of justice depends in part on his willing it, on his saying yes. God throws the life preserver without which man cannot possibly be saved and desires that man grab it, rather than forcing it upon him.
IOW, this world is a school where man can learn to hate and reject evil, to develop a hunger and thirst for righteousness, for God, and so come to run like Prodigals back to the the Father who’s been standing there all along with open arms.
Man’s will was never totally corrupted but rather weakened, compromised. Once the Original Sin was committed, man was lost, “dead”, spiritually separated from his Creator. He can’t find his way back, but he can remain lost if he continues to prefer that state, that path, which Adam set him on.
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MT1926
Guest
By any chance do you know how Calvin explained why regenerated people still sin?
Calvin says the corruption of our nature is what makes us sin. Isn’t the corruption of our nature “repaired” when we are regenerated? If we are freed from the bondage of sin wouldn’t that mean the only way a regenerated person would be able to sin was either from compulsion or from the fact they were not, for lack of a better term, completely regenerated? By this term I guess I am leaning towards regeneration being a life long process and not a one time event.
Thanks,
God Bless
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SojournerOnEarth
Guest
Please cite an example.
Do you know the difference between hyper-Calvinism and Calvinism?
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SojournerOnEarth
Guest
I’m using the WCF as the basis, not Calvin, here, and if you reread the opening post, you may find the answer there.ltwin:
By any chance do you know how Calvin explained why regenerated people still sin?
Calvin says the corruption of our nature is what makes us sin. Isn’t the corruption of our nature “repaired” when we are regenerated? If we are freed from the bondage of sin wouldn’t that mean the only way a regenerated person would be able to sin was either from compulsion or from the fact they were not, for lack of a better term, completely regenerated? By this term I guess I am leaning towards regeneration being a life long process and not a one time event.
Thanks,
God Bless
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MT1926
Guest
Thanks for the reply. I read number 4 but that doesn’t really answer the question for me.
Not trying to go off subject, but most of the Calvinists I have talked with claim they are completely regenerated (OSAS) and “perfectly” worthy of heaven at this exact point in time. This doesn’t seem to line up the fact that we still sin. #4 does answer why we still sin “his remaining corruption” but from the OSAS viewpoint remaining corruption and completely regenerated cannot exist simultaneously.
Don’t get me wrong here I’m not saying this is what you believe, I just don’t know a lot of “Calvinists”, the only 2 churches in our area that claim Calvinism are OSAS. I’ve been told on several occasions by them that I am going to hell for being Catholic so as you can imagine dialogue with them is pretty much impossible. Thus my question here instead of there.
God Bless
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SojournerOnEarth
Guest
I don’t call myself a Calvinist, partly because the term is so misunderstood, misappropriated, and makes it sound like I am following him, not Jesus Christ. I posted the WCF as a reference, as an authoritative statement of what a lot of Reformed people believe. I’d like the WCF examined on its merits here, not what John Calvin or some group out there holds as Calvinism.SojournerOnEarth:
Thanks for the reply. I read number 4 but that doesn’t really answer the question for me.
Not trying to go off subject, but most of the Calvinists I have talked with claim they are completely regenerated (OSAS) and “perfectly” worthy of heaven at this exact point in time. This doesn’t seem to line up the fact that we still sin. #4 does answer why we still sin “his remaining corruption” but from the OSAS viewpoint remaining corruption and completely regenerated cannot exist simultaneously.
Don’t get me wrong here I’m not saying this is what you believe, I just don’t know a lot of “Calvinists”, the only 2 churches in our area that claim Calvinism are OSAS. I’ve been told on several occasions by them that I am going to hell for being Catholic so as you can imagine dialogue with them is pretty much impossible. Thus my question here instead of there.
God Bless
This has to do with forensic justification, an entirely different subject.
Perhaps you can look at it this way: “You were dead in your trespasses and sins.” Dead people don’t will much of anything, being dead and all. They are dead. Someone who is redeemed, say for example that great example of faith, the Virgin Mary, has complete free will, yet does not sin.
One analogy that may be helpful is that of a drowning man chained underwater to a boat. An insane man would refuse help. A sane man would appreciate someone cutting his chain and the sane man would immediately swim to the surface. His will has been freed and he does what is sane. He is, in a sense, not free to remain under water because that would be insane, and he, a sane man, is not insane. God makes us sane. That does not mean we do not still fight habitual and residual insanity. So if your will is healed, you will choose to follow God, and follow Him freely. Why? Because it is the sane and right thing to do.
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MT1926
Guest
Fair enough.
I will drop the subject of Calvin.
I would like to give you a little advice though. If you want the WCF examined as an authoritative statement of what the Reformed believed then your post should have stated…
THE REFORMED believe in Free Will
or
THE WCF believes in Free WIll.
If you are going to get upset when we start talking about Calivin then don’t make him the subject line of your post.
God Bless
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SojournerOnEarth
Guest
You are absolutely correct. I wish I had titled the thread better. Sigh.
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ltwin
Guest
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ltwin
Guest
It’s like Catholic baptism. Baptism washes away the stain of original sin, but you still have these sinful tendencies to fight against. This is where the Calvinist belief in progressive sanctification comes into play.
According to Calvinists, the freedom of the will is restored when God effectually calls, so even though ultimately the truly regenerated will win the battle against sin and corruption, there is still a battle to be fought. And since no one can be completely sure in this life if they are predestined to eternal life or reprobation, this should make people extremely careful to cling to Christ and seek after his righteousness.
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ltwin
Guest
A lot of people who advocate OSAS are actually advocating a form of antinomianism and very distorted views of Calvinism. They take the idea of eternal security but throw out the idea of progressive sanctification, and it leads to a very unbalanced form of Calvinism.
I don’t even believe in Calvinism, but I will say that as a complete system there is a lot more stress on personal holiness and piety than you often find from the reductionistic versions floating out there.
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SojournerOnEarth
Guest
The Reformed insist we CAN know. However, it is not necessarily an instant “ticket to heaven” type of assurance. That would be an entirely different thread (or series). It can be found, in some cases, after many years of following God: “I guess I AM saved. Wow. Thank you, Jesus!”
The emphasis in Reformed thought is always on God, never on man. We are saved because of HIS completed work on the cross, not because we believe. Because he gave us faith, we believe, and because we believe, we are saved. “To God alone be the glory”. The Reformed are highly suspicious of anything that would seem like an attempt to glorify anyone except God.
How do Catholics interpret 2 Peter 1:10 (New International Version)
You can only obey this if there is a way to confirm your calling and election.
Was David presumptuous in Ps 23:6 when he said
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Vonsalza
Guest
In fairness, Luther had a tremendous amount of personal anguish over that very question. He wasn’t so sure. In one text he’d support it, in a private letter written in the same time period, he’d lament over it.
Then one could readily counter that you’re not actually describing assurance, then.
The uncertainty in the intervening time of “after many years” contradicts it.
As are Catholics.
I’m pretty sure most everyone here would agree with you on that point. But again, we’re not Calvinists.
Don’t pull your theology from Psalms and Songs. We also read of “the fruit of the lap”, in these passages despite the Church’s attitudes on oral sex.
The Bible wasn’t written as one tome. It’s constituent sections thus rationally demand discrete approaches.
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SojournerOnEarth
Guest
We are not talking about Luther.SojournerOnEarth:
In fairness, Luther had a tremendous amount of personal anguish over that very question. He wasn’t so sure. In one text he’d support it, in a private letter written in the same time period, he’d lament over it.
Not at all. This demonstrates a superficial understanding of Reformed theology, if any.
Absurd.
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Vonsalza
Guest
You stated that “the Reformed insist we CAN know”. He was and continues to be a paragon of the Reformation and didn’t seem to [consistently] share your certainty - at least in private.
But at any rate…
If your concept of “Reformed theology” includes the perseverance of the saints, then there is no uncertainty expressed because that would undermine the supposed absolute sovereignty of God in the entire salvific process from start to finish.
Of course, it would be at this point that you might need to get a bit more specific about what you mean by “Reformed theology”. Luther’s? Calvin’s? Knox’s?
Not absurd at all.
Using different lenses for different texts is something covered in the opening 5 minutes of your Textual Criticism class at your local U or seminary…
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