Selling Indulgences

[MrZetterlund]

I once heard a quote that said something along the lines, “a journey into history is a journey out of Protestantism” -or something like that (feel free to help me out if you can.) The way I see it, either Catholicism/Greek Orthodox is right, or Christianity has been wrong for fifteen hundred years. However, I can’t help but feel discomforted when looking at the corrupting of selling of indulgences that was used to fund the building of Vatican city during the Middle Ages. Doesn’t this come into opposition with the lesson we learn in Acts 8:20, when St. Peter says, “May your money perish with you for believing that you may purchase the gifts of God!” Nevermind Martin Luther’s doctrines of Sola-Scriptura and Sola-Fide, to me, this is the true foundation for the initiation Protestant reformation…

Does anyone have anything to say in regards to this?

Thanks, Jared Z.

 

[anodos]

Cardinal John Newman: “To be deep in history is to cease to be Protestant.”

 

[Neil_Anthony]

However, I can’t help but feel discomforted when looking at the corrupting of selling of indulgences that was used to fund the building of Vatican city during the Middle Ages.

Selling indulgences was definitely a bad idea. However, the idea that almsgiving and other forms of penances can reduce our time in purgatory (with certain conditions) is valid theology. So, donating money towards the building of a church, with the proper intent to do it as a sacrifice, could earn the penitent time off of purgatory, as the indulgences claimed.

On the other hand, as an actual practice, it can so easily be abused so it’s not something we should do, and its great that the church condemned the practice. Also they did not take into account the fact that a poor person’s alms mean a lot more than a rich person’s.

 

[sedonaman]

… However, I can’t help but feel discomforted when looking at the corrupting of selling of indulgences that was used to fund the building of Vatican city during the Middle Ages. …

Would you feel better if the pope had the whole city bulldozed to the ground?

 

[1ke]

selling of indulgences that was used to fund the building of Vatican city during the Middle Ages.

The Church was doing no such thing.

Almsgiving is a legitimate act of charity. Giving alms towards the building of St. Peter’s was not a corrupt action.

Individual priests committed acts that were abuses of indulgences.

 

[Jim_Dandy]

I once heard a quote that said something along the lines, “a journey into history is a journey out of Protestantism” -or something like that (feel free to help me out if you can.)

Take a look at my signature.

The way I see it, either Catholicism/Greek Orthodox is right, or Christianity has been wrong for fifteen hundred years. However, I can’t help but feel discomforted when looking at the corrupting of selling of indulgences that was used to fund the building of Vatican city during the Middle Ages. Doesn’t this come into opposition with the lesson we learn in Acts 8:20, when St. Peter says, “May your money perish with you for believing that you may purchase the gifts of God!” Nevermind Martin Luther’s doctrines of Sola-Scriptura and Sola-Fide, to me, this is the true foundation for the initiation Protestant reformation…

Does anyone have anything to say in regards to this?

I say you should have put these questions to rest before you became a Catholic. After joining the Catholic Church, you don’t know whether Catholicism or Orthodoxy is right? Your RCIA teachers failed you. How disappointing. But you can begin a study of the history of Christianity – which is the history of the Catholic Church – right now.

Maybe this will help to answer the question for you. It’s a start, at least. This was published in the Catholic Answers Magazine, formerly known as This Rock, in the October 2008 edition, listed on the cover as “The Appeal of Eastern Orthodoxy – and Its Fatal Flaw.”

catholic.com/magazine/articles/why-i-didn%E2%80%99t-convert-to-eastern-orthodoxy

The Church is sinless. She is the Bride of Christ (Ephesians 5:25-33; 2 Corinthians 11:2; Revelation 21:9-14, 22:17). She is “without spot or wrinkle or any such thing, . . . holy and without blemish.” The Church is the very Body of Christ (Colossians 1:15-18, 1:24, 2:19; Ephesians 1:22-23, 4:4-7, 4:11-16; Romans 12:4-5; 1 Corinthians 6:1, 12:27), Christ, the head of the Church is sinless, and so is His Body.

The members of the Church are sinners, including me, myself, and I – and you.

Jim Dandy
Ex-Southern Baptist, ex-agnostic, ex-atheist, ecstatic to be Catholic!

 

[MrZetterlund]

Take a look at my signature.

I say you should have put these questions to rest before you became a Catholic. After joining the Catholic Church, you don’t know whether Catholicism or Orthodoxy is right? Your RCIA teachers failed you. How disappointing. But you can begin a study of the history of Christianity – which is the history of the Catholic Church –

For the record, Jim, I took your post rather offensive. My RCIT teachers are very informative and helpful, and I chose Roman Catholic over Orthodoxy because I recognized that the primacy of the Pope as the successor of St. Peter clearly had biblical roots, and was clearly expressed in the consensus of early Christian writers. However I have much respect for the Orthodox church because they have legitimate apostolic succession and retained many vestiges of the Christian faith…

 

[Jim_Dandy]

Jim Dandy;8786328:

Take a look at my signature.

I say you should have put these questions to rest before you became a Catholic. After joining the Catholic Church, you don’t know whether Catholicism or Orthodoxy is right? Your RCIA teachers failed you. How disappointing. But you can begin a study of the history of Christianity – which is the history of the Catholic Church –

For the record, Jim, I took your post rather offensive. My RCIT teachers are very informative and helpful, and I chose Roman Catholic over Orthodoxy because I recognized that the primacy of the Pope as the successor of St. Peter clearly had biblical roots, and was clearly expressed in the consensus of early Christian writers. However I have much respect for the Orthodox church because they have legitimate apostolic succession and retained many vestiges of the Christian faith…

Mr. Z,

I sincerely, apologize.

Your post sounded like you had already become a Catholic and still had this question. You wrote: QUOTE; The way I see it, either Catholicism/Greek Orthodox is right . . . END QUOTE.

Sorry for my misunderstanding.

 

[Buck_Crosswhite]

The selling of indulgences ceased 500 years ago. Why are you still worried about it? Protestants still use it as ammunition against the Church, but it’s really weak ammunition.

 

[Andromedus]

Here in Sweden you hear sometimes that people had to give money to priests if they wanted to have their sins forgiven, which is one of many things people traditionally has used as propaganda against the Catholic Church in an attempt to show how bad she is and that it was both important and good that we adopted Lutheranism. The funny thing though is that the Catholic priests actually never did demand money from people in order to forgive their sins, but Lutheran priests in the Church of Sweden actually did so sometimes. They were told to do so in different documents etc. Sadly I don’t think people generally knows this though even if they know about the innocence of the Catholic priests, at least in the regard of demanding people to give them money to forgive sins thing.

Never mind, you should not let this upset you, it was a very long time ago and Catholics today have no reason to feel guilty or any other form of discomfort because of it.

 

[pablope]

I once heard a quote that said something along the lines, “a journey into history is a journey out of Protestantism” -or something like that (feel free to help me out if you can.)

. However, I can’t help but feel discomforted when looking at the corrupting of selling of indulgences that was used to fund the building of Vatican city during the Middle Ages. me, this is the true foundation for the initiation Protestant reformation…

Does anyone have anything to say in regards to this?

Thanks, Jared Z.

It was a myth…look at q 7 of this CA tract:catholic.com/tracts/myths-about-indulgences

Myth 7: A person used to be able to buy indulgences.

One never could “buy” indulgences. The financial scandal surrounding indulgences, the scandal that gave Martin Luther an excuse for his heterodoxy, involved alms—indulgences in which the giving of alms to some charitable fund or foundation was used as the occasion to grant the indulgence. There was no outright selling of indulgences. The Catholic Encyclopedia states: “*t is easy to see how abuses crept in. Among the good works which might be encouraged by being made the condition of an indulgence, almsgiving would naturally hold a conspicuous place. . . . It is well to observe that in these purposes there is nothing essentially evil. To give money to God or to the poor is a praiseworthy act, and, when it is done from right motives, it will surely not go unrewarded.”

But abuse did creep in. Trent reformed these abuses.*

 

[Ignatius]

I once heard a quote that said something along the lines, “a journey into history is a journey out of Protestantism” -or something like that (feel free to help me out if you can.) The way I see it, either Catholicism/Greek Orthodox is right, or Christianity has been wrong for fifteen hundred years. However, I can’t help but feel discomforted when looking at the corrupting of selling of indulgences that was used to fund the building of Vatican city during the Middle Ages. Doesn’t this come into opposition with the lesson we learn in Acts 8:20, when St. Peter says, “May your money perish with you for believing that you may purchase the gifts of God!” Nevermind Martin Luther’s doctrines of Sola-Scriptura and Sola-Fide, to me, this is the true foundation for the initiation Protestant reformation…

Does anyone have anything to say in regards to this?

Thanks, Jared Z.

I cant’ help feel uncomfortable with the notion that there would be sinners in Christ’s Church. That would be like having weeds in a field of wheat.

 

[Calgar]

The selling of indulgences ceased 500 years ago. Why are you still worried about it? Protestants still use it as ammunition against the Church, but it’s really weak ammunition.

I’ve never needed to use it.

 

[Jim_Dandy]

I cant’ help feel uncomfortable with the notion that there would be sinners in Christ’s Church. That would be like having weeds in a field of wheat.

The Church is a training ground for saints and a hospital for sinners. There is room in such a Church for me, a sinner.

Jim Dandy
Ex-Southern Baptist, ex-agnostic, ex-atheist, ecstatic to be Catholic!

 

[MrZetterlund]

My English teacher says that there was a person who would convict lay-people of sin and condemn them to hell, then they would go to a pardoner to pardon their sins for a some of cash, then that cash would go to the pope to fund the building of Vatican city. I heard this in my World Hirstoy class last year, too.

 

[MrZetterlund]

MrZetterlund;8792773:

Mr. Z,

I sincerely, apologize.

Your post sounded like you had already become a Catholic and still had this question. You wrote: QUOTE; The way I see it, either Catholicism/Greek Orthodox is right . . . END QUOTE.

Sorry for my misunderstanding.

I said:

The way I see it, either Catholicism/Greek Orthodox is right, or Christianity has been wrong for fifteen hundred years.

because Orthodox and Catholics agree on the sacraments and method of worship as they have since the religion started, whereas Protestants basically preach from the Bible for an entire worship service and condemn Catholics AND Orthodox Christians for “following the tradtions of men.” It’s a tad bit hypocritical from what I saw in my former Baptist background…

 

[Neil_Anthony]

Jim Dandy;8797958:

I said: because Orthodox and Catholics agree on the sacraments and method of worship as they have since the religion started, whereas Protestants basically preach from the Bible for an entire worship service and condemn Catholics AND Orthodox Christians for “following the tradtions of men.” It’s a tad bit hypocritical from what I saw in my former Baptist background…

That’s how I took it too, the first time you posted it