Rome, for Protestants

  • Thread starter Thread starter Son_of_Niall
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
S

Son_of_Niall

Guest
Most people today ooh-and-aah when they experience or envision a trip to Rome.
It was not always so. Until the era of modern tourism, trips to Rome were rare, undertaken only by the wealthy. For devout Protestants, encountering Catholicism’s Eternal City could often induce more revulsion than admiration.
In light of all this, it should come as a surprise that today there is a plan afoot, recently approved by Rome’s city council, to create a “Martin Luther piazza” in Rome. The site selected is on hill-top park area that overlooks the Colosseum. The impetus has come, of all places, from Rome’s small community of Seventh-day Adventists, an American Protestant denomination that traces its roots back to the Millerites, who among other things believed that the world was going to end in 1843.
Click to expand...
Surprisingly, the Vatican has reacted positively to the news, issuing the following statement: “It’s a decision taken by Rome’s] city hall which is favorable to Catholics in that it’s in line with the path of dialogue started with the ecumenical [second Vatican] council.”
Click to expand...
patheos.com/blogs/anxiousbench/2015/08/rome-for-protestants/
 
Contrary to the impression the blogger gives, Rome has had Protestant churches and institutions for centuries, even when the popes ruled the city. The Church’s toleration of Protestants is nothing new.
 
Surprisingly, the Vatican has reacted positively to the news, issuing the following statement: “It’s a decision taken by Rome’s] city hall which is favorable to Catholics in that it’s in line with the path of dialogue started with the ecumenical [second Vatican] council.”
Click to expand...
Needless to say (or is it?) this doesn’t mean that every single individual Catholic is favorable toward the development.
 
Actually, the Vatican itself could be said to be surrounded by insults to the Papacy - after Rome was captured by the Kingdom of Italy in 1870 a lot of town planning, building and renaming took place nearby so you get things like: Corso Vittorio Emanuele II, Piazza Cavour, Piazza Del Risorgimento and even Via Cola di Rienzo after a 14th Century opponent of Papal power.

Luther would be in good company 😛
 
PaulfromIowa said:
Contrary to the impression the blogger gives, Rome has had Protestant churches and institutions for centuries, even when the popes ruled the city. The Church’s toleration of Protestants is nothing new.
Click to expand...
I have had many friends and family members (non-Catholics) who have visited Rome, and in particular, the Vatican. They have been very impressed with it all. I think Pope John Paul II and now, Pope Francis, are positive images for the Catholic Church.

I wish I could take a journey there but…only on TV and in my dreams.

God bless, all!

Rita
 
That has got to be one of the most poorly sourced, haphazardly written, and quite disjointed pieces I’ve read in a while. The third sentence is a thinly veiled tautology (before modern tourism trips to Rome were rare? All trips everywhere were rare before modern tourism). The first actual citation to Protestant rage against Rome (of a whopping total of two citations) was Mark Twain, in which the article actually admits his nominally Protestant nature. The second being none other than Martin Luther himself. Are we really to believe that this author found it so laborious to source any history between the architect of the Protestant Reformation and Mark Twain?

I won’t pretend to know what “Protestants” think about Rome, have thought about Rome, or will think about Rome, but I’m pretty sure that this piece doesn’t accurately do the “Protestant” position justice given the fact that it’s written with the same kind of historical simplicity that we too often see here from armchair historians on CAF.
 
spedteacherita said:
I have had many friends and family members (non-Catholics) who have visited Rome, and in particular, the Vatican. They have been very impressed with it all. I think Pope John Paul II and now, Pope Francis, are positive images for the Catholic Church.

I wish I could take a journey there but…only on TV and in my dreams.

God bless, all!

Rita
Click to expand...
My eldest son just returned from a trip to Rome, and sent me a postcard from the Vatican. The postage stamp honored Pope Francis - I did not realize that the Vatican had it’s own stamps!
 
Brandon_Cal said:
That has got to be one of the most poorly sourced, haphazardly written, and quite disjointed pieces I’ve read in a while.
Click to expand...
I envy you. 🙂 (I guess I ought to cut down on the amount of blogs and forum postings that I read.)
 
Peter_J said:
I envy you. 🙂 (I guess I ought to cut down on the amount of blogs and forum postings that I read.)
Click to expand...
I’ll grant you, I wasn’t including my time spent here on CAF (or any other apologetic blog/populist comment mill).

I imagine, though, that we share the same amount of “ecumenical rage”. 😛
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top