That’s a summary without details.
Why did you stop at vs 9?
Because without verse 9, there is no verse 10. Works are born out the faith He gives in verses 8-9. What comes first? If you read the passage the way it is written, obviously the faith given to us by God comes first. Doing those works that He prepared for us are waht is supposed to happen. It is not that complicated.
It doesn’t happen by magic, though. We have to make a conscious choice to do them, and we have to follow through, even when we don’t feel like it.
Well, of course we do. No one is arguing that point. But those acts are bron out of faith. Paul makes that point elsewhere.
He can certainly do good works - Bill Gates as far as I know is an atheist, but he does a lot of good works. That by itself doesn’t merit Heaven, of course - but then again, someone who has faith, but does nothing, also doesn’t get to go to Heaven, if we take Matthew 25 at its face value. (Not to mention the epistle of James.)
Really? Why is that? Do you think no truth can be found in such documents? The Didache is apochryphal, do you think it is not supportive of Church Doctrine?
This is a lie you have been taught, probably by whatever anti-Catholic source that fills your mind with most of the lies you have been told about Catholicism.
True,not all Jews accepted all the books. However, our faith comes to us through some very particular Jews, the main on named Jesus, and His Apostles. Since they used the Deuterocanonical books, we accept them.
This can be confirmed by reading your posts.
We read it differently.
LOL. The deuterocanonicals are not “apochryphal”. By whose standard to you determine a “prophet”. Do you have no consideration for Jesus and the Apostles using these books to teach the faith?
Wait just a hot minute there, ja4. I see we need to back up. what do you mean “If it is true that we are all one body and we need each other”? Do you mean to tell me that you don’t see this in your NT either?!?
An educated Roman Catholic knows that there are 23 Rites in the Catholic Church, and that all of them are equally able to lead one to salvation through Christ.
Right. So,if these elders in heaven are “dead” as you keep saying, then how is it they are participating actively in heavenly worship? Also, how did the prayers of the saints get into the bowls that are held by the elders?
Just the catechism, which represents the Sacred Tradition that the saints are alive in heaven, and pray with and for us before the throne of God. Why is this a problem? I mean, will it change your faith in any way?
This is the teaching we have received from the Apostles. This is why the Apostle’s creed says that we “believe in the communion of saints”. Death cannot separate us from His Love, and the Body of which we have been made a part.
Certainly some truths can be found in them. There are also a lot of errors in the apochyra though.
Lets see if i’m lying. Here what some of the church leaders said about them:
Ok, so we agree that John is seeing a vision of heaven, and that the elders are alive and well there, offering the golden bowls. Where do you think they went later?
What we do know is that the golden bowls are being offered, and that they are referred to as “the prayers of the saints”. They are not “material” so they really don’t need a bowl…
So as not to get side tracked, perhaps we can forgo the identity of the 24 elders for another time. Suffice to say that these are human beings? Yes, this passage, like all of scripture “could mean a number of things”. this is why it is so important to have the Sacred Tradition so that we can properly interpret what is written. You are always asking about “lists” of Traditions. Sacred Tradition has more to do with a world view and a way of life. When we look at Scripture through the lens of the Sacred Tradition that produced it, we understand it the way the writers intended. The writer of this passage believed (as did all the Apostles) in the communion of saints.
Do you believe that Jesus and the Apostles, by using them, perpetrated error? If some truth can be found in them, then why should they not be used as a testimony to right doctrine?
The lie you told is that these books were not accepted as canonical until Trent. This is a falsehood. I am willing to accept that you don’t know any better. It is not a lie of your own making, you are just participating in another man’s sin.
No need, these citations are sufficient to prove the point that these books were discussed throughout the centuries. Although not all the writers accepted them, the Church did so from the time of Jesus, because He and the Apostles taught from them.John of Damascus in the eighth century expressed the same view as that of Athanasius. He stated that the Apocryphal books of Wisdom of Solomon and Ecclesiasticus were not received as canonical but were placed in a subordinate category by the Church. This view was repeated by Nicephorus, the patriarch of Constantinople in the ninth century. He cited the number of canonical Old Testament books at twenty-two and stated that the books of the Apocrypha were not received as canonical by the Church. The perspective of the Trullan Council was also reiterated by Zonaras and Theodore Balsamon, the Patriarch of Antioch in the twelfth century. Both wrote commentaries on the canons of the council of Carthage in the fourth century. They wrote that those books which were authorized for reading in the Church were the same as the ones listed by Athanasius, Amphilochius and Gregory of Nazianzus.
There is a lot more on this that could be cited…
Jesus let us know about their need in His Teachings. There are some who have died that are still encumbered by the weight of sins. Jesus paid the price for their sins, but they still need some cleansing. That’s what purgatory means “purgation” or cleansing by fire.
Do you believe things not written about in scripture did not occur? No, I don’t assume that those in purgatory can hear my prayers. No, I do not think that they can do anything about my requests. They are in as state of purgation. The effects of their sins, just as they do in this life, render them ineffective in the work of God.
We don’t see a “huge” difference between the saints who are here on earth, and those who have gone on before us in faith. We do not consider ourselves separated from them.
Sharing a belief is not uncommon. It also does not imply that what is believed is wrong. Some of the Jews believed in angels, too. Yet they rejected Christ, and said He blasphemed when He said that angels could come to help Him. Are you going to say that their beliefs in angels were wrong, because they rejected other things that were true? I am not at all sure that necromancers believe the way Christians do. They might, instead, believe more like you, in some sort of “soul sleep”.
Catholics are not confused about this unless they are not well educated in the Teachings of Jesus. Jesus demonstrated clearly in his conversation with Moses and Elijah that the saints who have gone on before us do, indeed, have a part in this world. Samuel also demonstrates this, when he speaks to Saul about what is going on presently, and what will happen to him and his sons the next day.
I don’t see why this is relevant. Do you think there was some point at which the 24 elders stopped offering the prayers?
Before i can answer this what are direct quotes directly from the apochyra that Jesus or His apostles quote from?
Paul used a couple of reference to some Greek writer in Titus 1:12 to make a point. It does not mean the source for it was inspired-inerrant.
Not so. . While Anglicans and some other non-Roman Catholic groups have always held a high regard for the inspirational and historical value of the Apocrypha, they never consider it inspired and of equal authority with Scripture. **Even Roman Catholic scholars through the Reformation period distinguished between deuterocanon and canon. **Cardinal Ximenes made this distinction in his Complutensian Polyglot (1514–17) on the very eve of the Reformation. Cardinal Cajetan, who later opposed Luther at Augsburg in 1518, published a Commentary on All the Authentic Historical Books of the Old Testament (1532) after the Reformation began which did not contain the Apocrypha.
If you haven’t done so yet you may want to brush up on this issue. Its not what you think it is.
This does not answer my question: Do you personally know the needs of any catholic that has died? If yes, then how do you know this?
It depends what it is and if it runs counter to what has been revealed then no.
So if you are praying to a friend that has died and is in purgatory then that friend could not help you. Correct?
Is it not true you don’t even know who these are?
I think this is a topic for another thread. Are you saying that the Catholic Church cannot lead one to salvation because the Catholic Church has a more books in the canon?
That part of it was. Paul testified that it was. "Yet he is not far from each one of us, 28 for
The Orthodox, also recipients of Apostolic Teaching consider it so, and have since the early centuries (third and on). Deuterocanonical just means “second canon”. It does not equal Apocryphal. The Protoevangelium of James is considere apocryphal.
Individuals who are in rebellion agains the teaching of the Church should not be used as a standard of the Church Teaching. You are trying to cherry pick persons who were not consistent with the Church teaching to somehow “prove” that the Church did not hold the canon. All this does is prove the opposite, that in spite of voices to the contrary, the Church faithfully held to the Canon as it was affirmed by the Apostles.
how can I “brush up” on this issue?! I have no way of knowing where the lies come from that you espouse! You probably don’t even know yourself.
I know some people that have died who had faith in Christ, but their faith was not perfected, so far as I could see. However, I don’t have to know what their particular needs are, since God knows what they have need of before I ask it.
It seems like it would be really hard to determine this, missing half the revelation…
No, I would not pray to anyone in purgatory,and I don’t know of any Catholic that does. We direct our prayers to those who have already been made perfect, because the effectual fervent prayers of the righteous are those that avail much.
Catholics do not claim to know who is in purgatory or hell. We only know who is in heaven if God reveals it to us. We know that Samuel is, because God allowed him to appear to Saul. We know that Enoch is, because Scripture tells us he was taken up. We know that Elijah and Moses are, because they appeared to Jesus and conversed with HIm. We know that Mary is because God has revealed that to the Church. This is also how we learn about the Saints.