Protestants, when did the Catholic Church go bad?

[Radical]

well, thanks for the invite…but it don’t pay nearly enough.

 

[Radical]

hmmm…I didn’t see that expressly stated in that passage…or implied either for that matter.

Ephesians 4:4-5:

There is one body, and one Spirit, even as you are called in one hope of your calling;

One Lord, one faith, one baptism, One God and Father of all, who is above all,

and through all, and in you all.

well, technically if the baptism of Paul, the baptism of you and the baptism of the Ethopian eunuch can all be considered one baptism, then technically there is nothing preventing the baptism of Bob at one month and the baptism of that same Bob at 18 years being considered both part of the one baptism…but since Paul connected belief with baptism, it would be best to consider the infant baptism as not being a proper baptism at all.

 

[Nicea325]

you know, I can’t show where the Bible specifically says NOT to accept historicity of the Book of Mormon either.

empirical eveidence? It seems that you are confusing the way that science is done with the way that history is done.

Then show us primary sources…there…that help?

 

[stewstew03]

you know, I can’t show where the Bible specifically says NOT to accept historicity of the Book of Mormon either.

Yes, but we know Mormonism is in error because it contradicts scripture. Are you saying that infant baptism is the moral equivalent to practicing a polytheistic religion?

 

[fbl9]

did you think passing through the Red Sea was an actual baptism…and that Paul wasn’t speaking metaphorically?
legs and arms carried the kids…

almost anything can be supported by scripture…it is what can be legitimately supported that matters

I just don’t get how you Catholics keep missing this…there is so much that is wrong with the way you want to use that passage:

a) the kids weren’t baptized

b) those kids had acquired the kingdom of heaven

c) therefore baptism was not the means by which those kids obtained the kingdom of heaven

d) as such, the passage has nothing to do with infant baptism

e) the disciples were hindering the kids in coming to Christ…not “disallowing the children to come to the kingdom”…the kingdom already belonged to such as those

thanks for taking the time to address my piddly post radical.
you missed the point St.Paul says** all **not just adult aged persons.
In the first verse St.Paul writes he does not want the readers to be ignorant of this event.
St.Paul calls this a type not a metaphore. verse 11

Why didn’t the egytians make it across? They had no faith. Therefore the children should have been sallowed up as well cause they could not have faith.paint it your way and this is what should have happened.

 

[Isaiah45_9]

I just don’t get how you Catholics keep missing this…there is so much that is wrong with the way you want to use that passage:

a) the kids weren’t baptized

b) those kids had acquired the kingdom of heaven

c) therefore baptism was not the means by which those kids obtained the kingdom of heaven

d) as such, the passage has nothing to do with infant baptism

e) the disciples were hindering the kids in coming to Christ…not “disallowing the children to come to the kingdom”…the kingdom already belonged to such as those

Radical,

You understand that you are not only fighting what the Church has been doing for almost 2,000 years with some of the most amazing theological minds in human history, but you are also completely ignoring the laws of logic and reason?

There are 4 kinds of categorical propositions:

Universal Affirmative: All of the household was baptized.

Universal Negative: None of the household was baptized.

Particular Affirmative: Some of the household were baptized.

Particular Negative: Some of the household were not baptized.

If a sentence is proposed as a categorical proposition in the universal affirmative, there is no room for a particular negative unless you have a particular affirmative exception in the predicate. Which is completely absent in the verses we are discussing.

The attempt to insert an exclusion to these verses are from different verses that deal with a different proposition that ALSO pertains to baptism.

Do you know if ALL of the adults in the households discussed professed their belief in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior?

No, we do not know.

However, you don’t have a problem not analyzing ALL the adults in the household under the universal affirmative. For children and infants you want to bend this universal affirmative to something you want to interpret from other passages that offer adult experiences.

Would you agree that Jesus rebuked the Apostles when they wanted to keep the children at a distance from Him?

Why would you want to make the same mistake they did?

 

[Cat_Herder]

Interesting distinction to make…but I don’t see Paul making that distinction in Colossians (which was the passage under consideration). Here it is again (NJB):

In him you have been circumcised, with a circumcision performed, not by human hand, but by the complete stripping of your natural self. This is circumcision according to Christ.

You have been buried with him by your baptism; by which, too, you have been raised up with him **through your belief **in the power of God who raised him from the dead.

You were dead, because you were sinners and uncircumcised in body: he has brought you to life with him, he has forgiven us every one of our sins.

He has wiped out the record of our debt to the Law, which stood against us; he has destroyed it by nailing it to the cross;

emboldenment added by Radical

Now the Catholics around here want to to say that Paul was describing what baptism achieved (and not just what a believer’s baptism achieved, but what any Catholic baptism of an infant achieves). They do this b/c they want baptism to be the new circumcision, something that can be applied to infants as well.

Concupisence is not a sin (it is a product of free will in a fallen world), nor did circumcision remove concupisence. I don’t see the logic here, and neither did Paul, judging by his admonition in Heb 10:26.

 

[stewstew03]

Radical,

You understand that you are not only fighting what the Church has been doing for almost 2,000 years with some of the most amazing theological minds in human history, but you are also completely ignoring the laws of logic and reason?

There are 4 kinds of categorical propositions:

Universal Affirmative: All of the household was baptized.

Universal Negative: None of the household was baptized.

Particular Affirmative: Some of the household were baptized.

Particular Negative: Some of the household were not baptized.

If a sentence is proposed as a categorical proposition in the universal affirmative, there is no room for a particular negative unless you have a particular affirmative exception in the predicate. Which is completely absent in the verses we are discussing.

The attempt to insert an exclusion to these verses are from different verses that deal with a different proposition that ALSO pertains to baptism.

Do you know if ALL of the adults in the households discussed professed their belief in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior?

No, we do not know.

However, you don’t have a problem not analyzing ALL the adults in the household under the universal affirmative. For children and infants you want to bend this universal affirmative to something you want to interpret from other passages that offer adult experiences.

Would you agree that Jesus rebuked the Apostles when they wanted to keep the children at a distance from Him?

Why would you want to make the same mistake they did?

Well said.

Radical, I’ll ask for a third time (previously asked here and here) - is it your contention that infant baptism is strictly prohibited?

 

[Radical]

no, its 'cuz you all are so terribly delightful

 

[Nicea325]

Well said.

Radical, I’ll ask for a third time (previously asked here and here) - is it your contention that infant baptism is strictly prohibited?

Good luck! Radical will make circular arguments and turn the table around. Precisely why Protestanism is what it is: PROTEST. No wonder it continues to divide and always will.

 

[Radical]

Then show us primary sources…there…that help?

well, I’ll give you the primary sources which we have that list all of the names of Christians who were baptized as infants (apart from emergency situations) before the fourth century:

drum roll…and ta da! Done.

Now that would be quite the thing if infant baptism was something initiated by the apostles. As to a primary source opposing infant baptism, you could look at the work(s) of Tertullian mentioned earlier in this thread. Hmmm…the first father to mention the thing opposes it. Again, that would be an odd thing if infant baptism was something initiated by the apostles…there…that help?

 

[Radical]

Yes, but we know Mormonism is in error because it contradicts scripture. Are you saying that infant baptism is the moral equivalent to practicing a polytheistic religion?

I am saying that Paul didn’t address either b/c neither was around in his day.

 

[Radical]

thanks for taking the time to address my piddly post radical.

no problem…I got tired of counting spring gophers

you missed the point St.Paul says** all **not just adult aged persons.

and? he says “baptized” when no baptism occurred…any way you cut it, it wasn’t a literal baptism

Why didn’t the egytians make it across? They had no faith.

no, it was b/c they weren’t God’s children and God was saving his children

Therefore the children should have been sallowed up as well cause they could not have faith.paint it your way and this is what should have happened.

it would first have to be an actual baptism to get to this consideration…it wasn’t…they weren’t dunked, they weren’t sprinkled, they walked across a sea bed on dry land. That isn’t a baptism…it is something that Paul used as a metaphor

 

[Isaiah45_9]

well, I’ll give you the primary sources which we have that list all of the names of Christians who were baptized as infants (apart from emergency situations) before the fourth century:

drum roll…and ta da! Done.

Now that would be quite the thing if infant baptism was something initiated by the apostles. As to a primary source opposing infant baptism, you could look at the work(s) of Tertullian mentioned earlier in this thread. Hmmm…the first father to mention the thing opposes it. Again, that would be an odd thing if infant baptism was something initiated by the apostles…there…that help?

First thing first.

Where is the source of your Tertullian opposition?

Second, but really more importantly.

Why would Tertullian oppose something unless it was a practice at the time?

Now Tertullian lived about c. 160 – c. 225 AD, which can only mean that it was something the Apostles passed down to them .

In Him.

 

[stewstew03]

I am saying that Paul didn’t address either b/c neither was around in his day.

He also didn’t address how much water to apply to believers (full immersion, half immersion, etc.).

Scripture tells us to be cautious groups that teach false doctrines (such as those found in the Mormon church) that deviate from the Christ’s message. (Rom. 16:17-18)

Scripture does not forbid us from baptizing infants.

 

[johnjay01]

Excuse me, please allow me to drop a line or two on this…May I suggest you read Acts chapter 10 and /or a good commentary on that chapter and look to see what is meant by Cornelius “whole HOUSEHOLD” being converted and what was meant by that. I sure you will find that even Protestant theologians admit that it strongly suggests infant Baptism and not Credo (believers) baptism. Infant Baptism and the controversy around it has been around since the beginning since it was also a Jewish tradition to have a ritual bath to become “clean” as in after a sacrifice of atonement.
One other thing, more than a few of the protestant traditions were formed out of political rejection of Roman Christianity and had nothing to do with true biblical scholarship.
The RC has often acted politically rather than spiritually in religious controversy and there were consequences to that behavior becasue it was not always in the best interest of souls.

 

[JonNC]

… I sure you will find that even Protestant theologians admit that it strongly suggests infant Baptism and not Credo (believers) baptism. …

Please forgive the truncating of your post, as I only wanted to respond to this.
Admit makes it sound like reluctance. Here from the Augsburg Confession:

Article IX: Of Baptism.

1] Of Baptism they teach that it is necessary 2] to salvation, and that through Baptism is offered the grace of God, and that children are to be baptized who, being offered to God through Baptism are received into God’s grace.

3] They condemn the Anabaptists, who reject the baptism of children, and say that children are saved without Baptism.

Much more than admit, we confess it stridently!!

Jon

 

[Radical]

Radical,
You understand that you are not only fighting what the Church…

not the Church…a portion of the Church

…has been doing for almost 2,000 years

probably around 1850 years…but the percentage of the Church doing this thing is dropping

…with some of the most amazing theological minds in human history,

my side has some pretty amazing minds in its quiver too…and WRT the minds that you would like to enlist, how many of those minds had an objective look at the issue utilizing the historical evidence as extensively as Everett Ferguson did in Baptism in the Early Church? How many of those minds even had access to a comparable amount of the evidence? What historian (writing in the last decade or two) would you direct me to on this issue?

…but you are also completely ignoring the laws of logic and reason?

we’ll see

There are 4 kinds of categorical propositions:
Universal Affirmative: All of the household was baptized.
Universal Negative: None of the household was baptized.
Particular Affirmative: Some of the household were baptized.
Particular Negative: Some of the household were not baptized.
If a sentence is proposed as a categorical proposition in the universal affirmative, there is no room for a particular negative unless you have a particular affirmative exception in the predicate. Which is completely absent in the verses we are discussing.

you seem to have entirely missed the point. The question is: What did Luke mean by “all of the household”? Allow me to give you another example…one where you don’t have so much invested. Let’s say that you find a log from an 18th century ship. For June 3 it reads that everyone on board was given a salt pork ration. In that case “everyone on board” did not mean “everyone on board”. Slaves were on board (and they wouldn’t have received that ration), but the keeper on the log knows that the readers of the log would understand that 1) slaves were on board, 2) that slaves were never given salt pork rations on his vessel and 3) slaves were so inconsequential (in their view), that the consideration of what they received or didn’t receive, just wasn’t important enough…and so, they did not form part of such a consideration. As such, “everyone on board was given a salt pork ration” really meant all non-slaves on board received a salt pork ration.

Luke, in Acts mentions “believed and were baptized” repeatedly…the connection between belief and baptism is easily strong enough that Luke could have figured that his readers would have employed just a little common sense and understood that “all of the household was baptized” meant “all of the believers within the household were baptized”. Before you complain too much about this assertion, please keep in mind that you do the same WRT “all have sinned…” when you argue, given that we all know that Mary was free from sin, a little common sense tells us that “all have sinned…” really means “all (except for Mary) have sinned…” .

Do you know if ALL of the adults in the households discussed professed their belief in Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior?

well, Acts 16:34 reads (NIV):
The jailer brought them into his house and set a meal before them; he was filled with joy because he had come to believe in God—he and his whole household.
There the whole household believed and the whole household was baptized….it seems the adults all believed….but can we know whether the household had infants and whether Luke was including such infants in the term “whole household”? If there were infants, then Luke wasn’t including them as believers.

However, you don’t have a problem not analyzing ALL the adults in the household under the universal affirmative. For children and infants you want to bend this universal affirmative to something you want to interpret from other passages that offer adult experiences.

given that belief was so strongly tied to baptism in the NT period it would take very little common sense for the reader of Acts to understand that Luke meant “all of the believing adults in the household” when he wrote “all of the household”. At that time there just wasn’t any example of baptism w/o belief.

Would you agree that Jesus rebuked the Apostles when they wanted to keep the children at a distance from Him?

would you agree that the passage has nothing to do with baptism?…the kids weren’t baptized, they weren’t coming to Jesus to be baptized and the kingdom already belonged to them.

Why would you want to make the same mistake they did?

their mistake in no way involved prohibiting infant baptism….is that really how those amazing minds of your Church want to utilize that passage?

 

[Radical]

Radical, I’ll ask for a third time … is it your contention that infant baptism is strictly prohibited?

No, it is my contention that in the NT era infant baptism was not envisioned as something that would be done. Belief was absolutely necessary. There was no need to prohibit that which wasn’t contemplated.

 

[Cat_Herder]

No, it is my contention that in the NT era infant baptism was not envisioned as something that would be done. Belief was absolutely necessary. There was no need to prohibit that which wasn’t contemplated.

How did babies go to heaven if they were subject to original sin and couldn’t be baptized?