Protestants, how can this be possible?

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jmcrae said:
St. Peter had spoken and rendered the judgement,
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Read it again.

1st the issue is raised over which there exists a confluct
2nd the apostles AND elders meet to consider the question
3rd there is “much discussion”
4th then Peter gets up and tells his story (see Acts 10)
5th then Paul and Barnabas tell what they see God doing
and then finally
6th James speaks (vs. 19-20) “It is my judgement…”
Then, and only then it is recorded that the apostles AND the elders WITH THE WHOLE CHURCH decide to do what James had said.

James (not Peter) made the call and everyone else followed suit. James reflects on what Peter said. Peter’s experience was instrumental in informing his decision, but James is the only one in scripture who is specifically reported as offering a judgment.

Now, which James was this?
James the son of Zebedee?
James the son of Aphaeus?
Or, yet another James?
 
Grace_Seeker said:
Read it again.

1st the issue is raised over which there exists a confluct
2nd the apostles AND elders meet to consider the question
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Right.
3rd there is “much discussion”
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Right.
4th then Peter gets up and tells his story (see Acts 10)
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This is after the discussion. All are silent to listen to Peter - the discussion has ended.
5th then Paul and Barnabas tell what they see God doing
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Are they disagreeing with Peter? 🤷
and then finally
6th James speaks (vs. 19-20) “It is my judgement…”
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He is the local Bishop - this is his role.
Then, and only then it is recorded that the apostles AND the elders WITH THE WHOLE CHURCH decide to do what James had said.
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Actually, they are doing what Peter said, with Paul, Barnabas, and James voicing support and agreement.
Now, which James was this?
James the son of Zebedee?
James the son of Aphaeus?
Or, yet another James?
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It’s nearly three in the morning - I don’t remember. I am under the impression that it’s James Zebedee, but if not, then it is James Alphaeus. I am under the impression that James A. had already been martyred by that time. I am not aware of any other Jameses - the Scriptures and the Early Church writings only mention those two, as far as I can remember.
 
Grace_Seeker said:
Now, which James was this?
James the son of Zebedee?
James the son of Aphaeus?
Or, yet another James?
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James, the son of Zebedee was beheaded by Herod - Acts 12:1-3

From the Catholic Encyclopedia (but stay tuned - because some good ol’ Catholic teaching on the Council of Jerusalem follows 👍 ):

"The James (5) of Jude 1:1 must certainly be identified with James (3), the brother of the Lord and the Bishop of Jerusalem. The identification of James (3), the brother of the Lord and James (4), the son of Mary, and probably of Cleophas or Clopas offers some difficulty. This identification requires the identity of Mary, the mother of James (Matthew 27:56; Mark 15:40), with Mary the wife of Cleophas (John 19:25), and, consequently, the identity of Alpheus (2) and Clopas (4). As Clopas and Alpheus are probably not two different transcriptions of the same Aramaic name Halpai (see CLEOPHAS), it must be admitted that two different names have been borne by one man. Indeed, there are several examples of the use of two names (a Hebrew and a Greek or Latin name) to designate the same person (Simon-Petrus; Saulus-Paulus), so that the identity of Alpheus and Cleophas is by no means improbable.

On the whole, although there is no full evidence for the identity of James (2), the son of Alpheus, and James (3), the brother of the Lord, and James (4), the son of Mary of Clopas, the view that one and the same person is described in the New Testament in these three different ways, is by far the most probable. There is, at any rate, very good ground (Galatians 1:19, 2:9, 2:12) for believing that the Apostle James, the son of Alpheus is the same person as James, the brother of the Lord, the well-known Bishop of Jerusalem of the Acts. As to the nature of the relationship which the name “brother of the Lord” is intended to express, see BRETHREN OF THE LORD.
On to the Council:

It would seem that you, Grace, (please excuse if this isn’t the case) are trying to neuter St. Peter’s authority and leadership of the Church given to him by Christ Himself. St. Peter made the point moot in his declaration which is why “they all fell silent”. There was nothing more to be added to the conversation because it was what it was. St. Peter called the spade a spade. St. James didn’t ‘trump’ St. Peter…on the contrary, he agreed and supported St. Peter and since THIS James - James the Less - was the Bishop of Jerusalem where the Council was residing, he was being a good host to the Pope and tried to make it ‘kosher’ for those who all of a sudden ‘fell silent’. It was as if there was an awkward silence that St. Peter created with the truth he spoke. Perhaps a hard truth…BUT - since those who were present KNEW what St. Peter was - they respected him and ‘fell silent’. The Bishop felt obligated to help a brother out 😃 and smooth it over.

However, being that it WAS a Council, even if St. James DID object to what St. Peter said (which he didn’t) then he had right to do so CHIEFLY because it’s a Council. It’s a meeting of the minds of the leadership of the Church. All Councils of the Church provide the opportunity of the Bishops and Cardinals, a.k.a. the Magisterium, - to discuss doctrine. It is then clarified for the rest…and formalized in a letter. This can be dogma which means infallibility must be invoked. Or it can be just an instruction…which after more discernment and discussion - could change - at a later date even. The Apostles were doing then what was best for the Church - and the respect is felt for St. Peter by everyone there - when they all fell silent. It’s the same sense of respect good Catholics should have for our Pope now. We might not like what Peter has to say - it might hurt - but what the Pope says is respected and good Catholics fall silent and humbly obey. We don’t assert ourselves as our own popes and declare the authority Christ gave to Peter alone invalid when it hurts…out of respect for the office of the Papacy - we too fall silent. That is what you are witnessing…right there in Scripture.

It’s an amazing passage for us Catholics to look upon. Because you have the Council taking place in which you have discussion over what should happen. The Pope is the one who makes a judgement under collegial agreement - and the Bishops translate it for the people with the Apostolic gifts given them. Then there’s a letter - is this like the first recorded encyclical then?

To the T - it is the structure of what occurs TOday…and began 2000 years ago. Glorious…Majestic…and Ancient is the Church Christ established…that gates of hell itself have never prevailed against.

God bless you,
luke1_28
 
luke1_28 said:
The only Church to believe that what they are receiving is the actual Body and Blood of Christ is the only Church Christ intended to exist. Anything else is man made and deficient.

If you do not receive the actual flesh and blood of Jesus Christ - and merely consider it symbolic, then you receive nothing but bread and wine - or juice. Christ gave us His flesh and blood to eat because just as in the Old Testament - it wasn’t enough to just kill the lamb as a sacrifice…the lamb had to be eaten. It was the completion of the offering to God for the sins of men. A holy meal.

It was Christ Himself who said, “Unless you eat My Body and drink My Blood, you cannot have My Life within you.” We know all that talk wasn’t symbolic because Christ did not chase after the ones who walked in John 6 who said it was too hard of a saying to accept. He didn’t care to chase after those who would not believe because they did not have the eyes of faith to see…and WHO authoritatively spoke on behalf of the rest of the Apostles when Christ asked of the Apostles if they were to leave too? Peter. The Rock. “Master, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life. We have come to believe and are convinced that you are the Holy One of God.”

The Eucharist - the Body and Blood of Christ offered on the altar cleanly and perfectly - is being observed daily in the only Church that Christ founded. In the Old Testament, the altar was ANYTHING but clean and perfect. It was blood stained and carcasses of dead animals were laid waste. The perfect Sacrifice is one identifying characteristic of the Church that Christ set up for man to worship Him perfectly, His Sacrifice on the altar and the consuming of this Sacrifice in the Last Supper. This is what makes the worship complete. Therefore, the Catholic Mass is made up of two parts. The Liturgy of the Word and the Liturgy of the Eucharist. In correlation and fulfillment of the Old Testament, it is the perfection of the worship in the synagogue AND the worship in the temple. He came to “make all things new” and not “make all things different”.

Because a man started your church. You do not have the Eucharist. God the Son started my Church. I have the Eucharist. Your services are not complete because you do not have the Eucharist. It goes without saying that your church IS deficient in light of all of what is recorded in Scripture. Even in the attempt to worship God through the use of Scripture like the Jews did in synagogue worship is slighted because again, a man started your church. By design, your pastor has no authority to teach. God started mine and through Apostolic Succession and the ordination of priests, my pastor has authority to preach.

I pray for nothing more than you will not see me as attacking you but instead that I am trying to help you. It isn’t about feelings and emotions and how church should make you feel good. It is about faith and the reality that man cannot save himself through LCD projectors beaming hymns of worship and praise. Man can only save himself by the offering of and consuming of the Body and Blood of Jesus Christ as God the Father wills it to be. This is how man was provided the opportunity to know The Way, The Truth, and The Life. This is how man can have Christ’s Life within him. Man didn’t make that up - Christ did.

God bless you,
luke1_28
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Who says we don’t have a Eucharist.

We do observe it every month. I myself wish it was more often, but the frequency is not a biggie for me.
 
NotTooSmart said:
Who says we don’t have a Eucharist.

We do observe it every month. I myself wish it was more often, but the frequency is not a biggie for me.
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It is not valid for several reasons, including a lack of apostolic succession and a denial of the real presence.
 
CHESTERTONRULES said:
It is not valid for several reasons, including a lack of apostolic succession and a denial of the real presence.
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Since Protestants are told we don’t take Scripture literally in regards to the Eucharist, I will turn this one back on you.

Where is this in Scripture?

I actually agree with the Catholics on this as far as applying Scripture literally to the Eucharist.
 
NotTooSmart said:
Since Protestants are told we don’t take Scripture literally in regards to the Eucharist, I will turn this one back on you.

Where is this in Scripture?

I actually agree with the Catholics on this as far as applying Scripture literally to the Eucharist.
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1 Cor 11
28A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. 29For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself.

If eating and drinking brings judgment upon you, then you are not receiving a valid eucharist.
 
CHESTERTONRULES said:
1 Cor 11
28A man ought to examine himself before he eats of the bread and drinks of the cup. 29For anyone who eats and drinks without recognizing the body of the Lord eats and drinks judgment on himself.

If eating and drinking brings judgment upon you, then you are not receiving a valid eucharist.
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Who says that my eating and drinking bring judgment upon myself?

(should this be a separate thread…probably too late though)
 
Grace_Seeker said:
No. I am not laboring under such an assumption. The assumption I labor under is that “an assembly of all who believe in him as their Lord and Savior” and an “Institution” are not necessarily identical to one another. I believe it is most likely that the institution is contained within the assembly, but that the assembly cannot be fully contained with the Institution.

The verse (18:20, not 18:15-18) says: “For where two or three come together in my name, there am I with them.” It is used to substantiate the other concepts. It is not dependent on their being a request for anything. It is a simple reality that where 2 or 3 are gathered in Jesus’ name, there Jesus is as well. Now is this Jesus’ “real presence”? Is this his body? We are the body of Christ. You have agree that all baptized persons are part of the body of Christ. I assert that that the gathering of all those believers is the Church.

Why do I say that, because the word we translate into English as “Church” is the word “ecclesia.” And the term 'ecclesia" in Greek is not just for Christian gatherings; the term simply means “assembly”. A crowd gathered in a courtroom to hear the sentence passed on a man on trial was an ecclesia just as much as an assembly of persons gathered to worship. Of course the Christian community took over and reshaped that word so that by the time that Paul uses it, he means specifically a Christian assembly. But when Jesus uses it, it doesn’t mean Church in the same sense that we mean it today. He means if the brother won’t listen to 2 or 3, then tell it to the assembly. He is given advice on not making things big right away. For Paul, however, the assembly is that which is gathered in Christ’s name, and that is what makes it a Church. Hence, any assembly that is gathered in Christ’s name is a part of this larger community that we all belong to, the body of Christ. So, you have a visible assembly of people and you have a larger community and both of these are the body of Christ. The smaller group meeting in a home is a church – in Greek an assembly of believer, in Hebrew a synagouge (or congregation) of followers. And the collection of all of these groups meeting scatterd around the world is also the Church, which is the body of Christ.

So, while a local congregation is a church, in a larger sense the Church is inclusive of all who should they walk into the congregation’s gathering would also be a part of it for they are brothers and sisters of one another in Christ. To deny that they are all of one Church is to deny that they are brothers and sisters in Christ.

And my understanding is then that though we are not of the same denomination, and don’t have the same temporal authority over us, that we are call called to unity as well. That unity is catholic (my enphasis on the small “c” to distinguish it from institutional forms of Catholicism) because despite some difference we still have one Lord, one faith, one baptism. And, YES. I would assert that though you are Catholic and I am not, that we still have one faith. Not all of our beliefs are identical. But again, as I have found myself reminding folks of quite a bit lately, No two people, even if they are both Catholic, have identical beliefs. The quesiton is do we have common beliefs? And we do, for we are both, as you have testified, in the body of Christ. And in that context, I find this passage applies fully:

“There is one body and one Spirit—just as you were called to one hope when you were called— one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is over all and through all and in all” (Ephesians 4:4-6).

You recognize God. I recognize God. We both agree that he is over all and through all and in all.
We share a common baptism.
We share a common faith in the one who to which we are called.
We acknowledge one Lord.
We agree that there is one Spirit.
We we recognize one another as belonging to the same one body.

You call it the Catholic church, and I call it the catholic Church. Our only difference is in our definition of what to name the body. But we are still of one body. And, afterall, isn’t that what is really important?
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Grace,
You have indeed made a most eloquent case for your position and I see that we are both able to support our respective views with Scripture (sometimes even with the same verse). Yet, for all of this effort we cannot reach a consensus agreement. And, I submit that such an agreement is necessary for the peace of The Church and the healing of the wounds of division within the Body of Christ.
You list many things that we have in common. Yet you leave out a belief that IS essential, and has been held as essential since the early Church. That is the Value and necessity of the Eucharist and the Belief in the Real Presence. This is not a Practice like genuflecting or praying the rosary, this is a matter of Christ’s own words that, “Unless you Eat My Flesh and Drink My Blood you have no life in you.” This is not an issue upon which we can simply agree to disagree. Thus we have an impasse.
So what did Christ Propose, indeed command us to do with this?
He told us to “Tell it To The Church” (Mt 18: 17) and then to abide by the decision of “The Church”.
Now please remember that this is an issue that effects Salvation, for Jesus tells us that without it we have no life, and St Paul has told us that if we recieve the Eucharist unworthily we eat and drink condemnation on ourselves, therefore we can’t just blow this one off as practice. This issue needs to be settled for the entire Church and not just the local community.

So in this matter Christ has told us to “Tell it To The Church” and to obey The Church. Thus I make this appeal to you that we obey Christ and take this matter to “The Church” for resolution just as those in Antioch did regarding the Judaizers.
I further affirm that I will, in all humility, submit my will to the decision of The Church in this matter.
Please tell me how we should proceed?

Peace
James
 
jmcrae said:
That was the consensus of the Council, as expressed by St. James in his summarizing statement. (St. James was the Bishop of Jerusalem; it was his role as host to do this, once St. Peter had spoken and rendered the judgement, which we see in the previous few verses. At that time, St. Peter was both Pope and Bishop of Antioch. He was not taken away to Rome until quite a bit later.)
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Right. Peter was only Bishop in Rome for a short time until he was martyred there.
 
NotTooSmart said:
Who says that my eating and drinking bring judgment upon myself?
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St. Paul…in Corinthians.

If you actually agree with the Catholics on the Scriptural literalness - I can promise you that you are very FEW among many in the AOG that believe in transubstantiation.

Only the Levitical priests from the Old Testament could offer sacrifice in the Temple worship because God willed it so. Christ, in perfecting all things regarding the Law, willed just as Our Father did, that only priests could offer sacrifice. The tradition of that priesthood - thus perfected by Christ Himself - is passed on continuously because they are validly ordained by those of Apostolic origins. It is only the priests of the Orthodox and Catholic communions - that can consecrate the bread and wine and through the offering of it, it becomes really and wholly the Body and Blood of Christ.

The Apostolic Succesion and origin of your church ended when your church splintered from Rome. Therefore, your pastor cannot validly consecrate the Eucharist because the Succession has been broken. Christ willed it that way. Man cannot will it that way. The teaching is clear IN Scripture and IN the Church. If you really do believe that it is the Body and Blood of Christ you are receiving - wholly and completely, then you eat and drink unworthily. You are trying to make something you ‘feel’, true. This is precisely why God gave passion driven mankind ONE Church. We can feel however we want - but it won’t be true if it contradicts Church teaching or Scripture.

There is a reason it is called Holy CommUNION. It unites us spiritually and physically as the Body of Christ - the One Mind and One Body. Christ loved us so much to take our bodies to become one of us. Christ wants us to love Him so much to take His Body to become one with Him. “Unless you eat of My Body and drink My Blood, you cannot have My Life within you.” But there is hope for you because there is only ONE Church practicing the Holy Sacrifice of the Altar which is the sign of the New Covenant. Become the COMPLETE disciple that Christ wants you to be and you to can have His Life within you.

If you subscribe to the Catholic belief in the Eucharist - that is huge. The Holy Spirit is working in you. I will pray that this bears more fruit. As your brother in Christ, I would like you to facilitate the process when the Spirit communicates this to you by offering frequent Spiritual Communion such as this one:

My Jesus,
I believe that You
are present in the Most Holy Sacrament.
I love You above all things,
and I desire to receive You into my soul.
Since I cannot at this moment
receive You sacramentally,
come at least spiritually into my heart. I embrace You as if You were already there and unite myself wholly to You. Never permit me to be separated from You.
Amen.

But please trust me - since we Catholics in your eyes seem to have got this one thing right, then I sincerly advise and beg you to not receive communion from your church again. It isn’t valid and no matter how much you wish it to be valid, it will never be so. The above prayer said once will gain you more grace than a million communions from your church.

God bless you greatly,
luke1_28
 
Justy90 said:
By what authority do you make this judgment?
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The authority of Jesus, granted to his Church, passed on by the apostles to their successors.

I submit my will to the Church. I have no authority.
 
Justy90 said:
Right. Peter was only Bishop in Rome for a short time until he was martyred there.
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True.

It is important to recognize that Peter’s role in the Church has nothing to do with his location.
 
CHESTERTONRULES said:
Paul did.

If you don’t recognize the body of the Lord, that is.
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Hmm…my translation in v. 29 says “judge the body rightly”. But whatever…

Who says I do not “recognize the body of the Lord” or “judge the body rightly”?
 
luke1_28 said:
St. Paul…in Corinthians.

If you actually agree with the Catholics on the Scriptural literalness - I can promise you that you are very FEW among many in the AOG that believe in transubstantiation.
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My beliefs on the subject are very simple.

Believe in the Scripture literally and above all do NOT overanalyze.

And that includes Matthew 26:26-29.

I am not sure whether that is the same as transubstantiation (I sort of doubt it) but I will let others be the judge of that.
 
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