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Ken
Guest
Handed down by whom? What specifically was handed down? Who specifically started the chain? I know the stock answer is Christ, but he really didn’t say that much if you simply look at what is quoted in the NT.
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Matt16_18
Guest
The Magisterium is the teaching office of the Catholic Church. The Catholic Church has a living Magisterium, and every bishop has a share of the teaching office of the Church. The pope is a bishop, and he, of course, has a share of teaching office that all bishops possess. The pope is also vested with authority to exercise the papal magisterium, a teaching office that he alone has a right to exercise, and which can be exercised apart from the Magisterium of the bishops. From the exercise of the teaching office of the Church, the Church receives her official teachings.
Good question. Unless God steps into our history and keeps his church from teaching error, his church would certainly become corrupted over time with false teachings. It is a logical necessity that the God must protect his church from teaching error in matters of faith and morals, for without that protection, his church would be leading people away from the truths that save. The Catholic Church was founded by Christ to bring us to salvation, and he will not allow it to become an instrument for teaching error in those things that pertain to salvation. A church that teaches moral error is worse than useless, it is a tool of Satan.
The concept is easy enough to grasp. God protects the Church he founded from teaching error in matters pertaining to salvation. It is an entirely rational and reasonable concept to understand.
The alternative to this is what you have offered. A church that will eventually become corrupted by men with defective consciences ( and it WILL become corrupted even if these men are well intentioned and not wishing to teach error – Protestantism is living proof of this).
“Infallible” means without error. When we say the Magisterium teaches infallibly, all we are saying is that the official teachings of the Catholic Church are true. This is hardly an unreasonable thing to say.
Through the official teachings of the Catholic Church that are free from error. We know that is true because Jesus promised that the gates of Hell would not prevail against his Church. This is a truth that we know by faith, and it is an entirely reasonable and rational belief.
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Ken
Guest
**Matt wrote:
“Through the official teachings of the Catholic Church that are free from error. We know that is true because Jesus promised that the gates of Hell would not prevail against his Church. This is a truth that we know by faith, and it is an entirely reasonable and rational belief.”**
How do gates prevail? It’s a somewhat strange phrase. Gates don’t go out and attack anyone. They stand in place and defend those inside.
So does the phrase refer to the Church attacking the gates of hell? How long might they stand, and what is the situation while they stand?
What does this phrase have to do with Church teachings being free from error?
“Through the official teachings of the Catholic Church that are free from error. We know that is true because Jesus promised that the gates of Hell would not prevail against his Church. This is a truth that we know by faith, and it is an entirely reasonable and rational belief.”**
How do gates prevail? It’s a somewhat strange phrase. Gates don’t go out and attack anyone. They stand in place and defend those inside.
So does the phrase refer to the Church attacking the gates of hell? How long might they stand, and what is the situation while they stand?
What does this phrase have to do with Church teachings being free from error?
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Matt16_18
Guest
Ken
Are you a Catholic?
Are you a Catholic?
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Brad
Guest
Sacred Tradition constitutes what Jesus said that is not written in the Bible.
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Brad
Guest
Ken said:
The gates of Hell prevail by trapping the Church inside them. This will not ever happen.
The phrase has everything to do with the Church teaching being free from error. If they had error, we would not know Truth and we would be misguided into thinking sin is ok, be un-repentant, and therefore choose the sin over God and end up in Hell for all of eternity. The way to escape this fate is to have a Rock (Peter - the first Pope) that would guide us to Truth so that we will know what is sin and know what to renounce and avoid and to repent from so that we will end up in Heaven.
All of this is perfectly logical as if God created the universe and He is all Love and all Truth and He loves us, then He longs for us to return His love - the perfect demonstration of this being united with Him. We cannot be united with Him if we constantly embrace false teaching, errors, and sin that are the opposite of Truth and Love.
The Roman Catholic Church is the Kingdom of Heaven on Earth. Jesus Christ established it. It would be an oxymoron for the Kingdom of Heaven to be controlled by the forces of Hell.
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Ken
Guest
Is error only possible behind the gates of hell?
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Brad
Guest
No. Error in spiritiually non-essential articles that do not involve elements of faith and morals are not interests of the spirits of evil.
These are simply errors as a result of the non-perfection of humans. Of course, God guides us to Truth in everything so that we may have a better life here on earth, but sometimes even our errors in non-essential matters can be of great benefit in deterimining truth and a better way to live.
Futher, even errors that we make in faith and morals are not behind the gates of hell - we always have an opportunity for repentance - it is the potential of our soul to be trapped behind the gates of hell that we want to avoid.
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Ken
Guest
The potential for our soul to be trapped behind the gates is different from the Chruch being free from error outside the gates.
So, if error can exist outside the gates, what does this phrase have to do with the Church and error? If you want to say the phrase means the Church won’t be trapped behind the gates - OK. And if error can exist outside the gates, then error can exist both inside and outside.
I see no connection between the phrase and error. The reasons you gave for the Church being error free have nothing to do with this phrase. You said the Church is error free because otherwise we would not know truth. We can’t logically predicate a proposition on the undesirability of the alternative consequences. Maybe we won’t know all truth. That’s life. There are lots of things we don’t know and never will know.
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martino
Guest
Alan, do you believe that the Scriptures are infallible? Or do you believe that since they were written by the hands of fallible men they*** must*** contain error? After all, how could an entire group of fallible men produce 73 infallible books?I just wonder how anybody can believe that a man with a defective conscience can claim infallibility on any teaching, much less a committee of such men.
Alan
I wonder if the Holy Spirit could have anything to do with all this?
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Brad
Guest
The phrase is not intended to be taken literally. What it communicates is that the Church is the Kingdom of God on earth, and, because the Church is the Body of Christ, and Christ has defeated Satan, the ruler of Hell, and will defeat him again at the end of time, thus the Body of Christ (the Church) shall prevail over the gates of Hell (Satan), not vice-versa. Truth is a necessary component of properly form consciences of those inside the Church - so, yes, literally, being error-free on essential teachings and the gates of Hell not prevailing over the Church are 2 separate but connected issues.
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