SPLIT: Questions Catholics Will Not Answer.

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Pwrlftr said:
I’ll post more on this later but it shouldn’t be surprising ot anyone that the reformers struggled with the idea that they might be in rebellion. I don’t know how much they wrote on the subject if any but it sounds reasonable.
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Everyone in this thread should take a field trip to St. Andrew’s Cathedral, just outside of Dundee. (It has a rather famous golf course right next to it - just follow the signs.)

“The reformers struggled with the idea that they might be in rebellion.”

Ya think? 🤷

They broke the heads off of the statues of the 12 Apostles, and scrawled insults about them all over the walls (the broken statues and the graffitti are still there; I have seen them for myself).

I can just imagine them looking over to their leader and saying “Gosh, Father Knox, do you think we might be in rebellion?” :rolleyes:
 
IgnatiusJReilly said:
Here ya go.

orlutheran.com/html/mlsermjoh1526-1604-2.html

Martin Luther’s Sermon for the Sunday after Christ’s Ascension; John 15:26-16:4 (2nd sermon). They have it marked as page 265, paragraph 28. You get the whole sermon here. The site is Lutheran, I believe.
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This will be an interesting puzzle…Luther also says this
Luther:
  1. In this article of faith, distinction must be made between the true Church and the false; for it is the command of God and of Christ that one shall not be confused with the other. Therefore, we must separate ourselves from the papal Church, regardless of the fact that they trust in their Church authority and condemn us as apostates.
  2. If they excommunicate and persecute us because of our evangelical preaching and our knowledge of Christ, we already have the decision of Christ that they are not the true Church, and their office and all the authority of which they boast cannot avail against us; that rather our teaching and judgments against them shall avail before God in heaven. We are certain, by reason of the test which Christ here applies, that the true Church is with the few who know Christ
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How do we square this apparent contradiction?
 
Pwrlftr said:
I don’t know what you are saying.

That which was inspired by God is inerrant or infallible because it is God breathed. The nature of scripture is independent of you, me, or your church recognizing it as such.
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You are right, of course, it is infallible becuse it is God Breathed, just as the Church is.

You are also right that it is not infallible because the Church recognizes it as such. However, the Church had the duty to discern between the 300+ documents floating around, which were spurious, and which were inspired. The Church did this infallibly in a Council convened for that purpose (among others) by the Power of the Holy Spirit, just as it has happened from the council of Jerusalem to this day.
Pwrlftr said:
We were required to be circumcized at the council of Jerusalem?
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This is the council at which it was infallibly declared that circumcision of believers was not necessary, among other things. Prior to that, it was thought by some that one must become a Jew in order to join with the Messiah.
Pwrlftr said:
The trinity is found within the scriptures.
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Much more so than that man-made doctrine of sola scriptura!
Pwrlftr said:
Go to a non-catholic seminary and you will find volumes of works all on the trinity and all based on nothing but the scriptures.
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This is not true, though it may seem to be on the surface. On the contrary, the understanding of the Trinity is derived from Catholic Teaching. The scriptures are understood correctly on this point because they are written by, for, and about Catholics.
Pwrlftr said:
I’m assuming you mean my claim that your church isn’t infallible.
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The soul of the Church is the Holy Spirit. Since the HS is divine, the church is incapable of error.
Pwrlftr said:
Your church’s ecumenical councils are thought to be infallible but not every council has the charsm of infallibilit protecting it.
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I agree with you. So, how can one discern if the charism of infallibility applies? We are in agreement on the canon, the Trinity, the Sabbath observance, the hypostatic union…
Pwrlftr said:
For example, the councils of Carthage and Hippo were provinicial councils and did not declare the canon infallibly.
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ARe you assuming that no provincial council is infallible? What if a provincial council declares something infallible, like, say, the canon?
Pwrlftr said:
Code: 
BTW, typing in bold overlarge font doesn't do anything to help you prove your point.
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I agree with this too. Thanks.
 
jmcrae said:
Everyone in this thread should take a field trip to St. Andrew’s Cathedral, just outside of Dundee. (It has a rather famous golf course right next to it - just follow the signs.)

“The reformers struggled with the idea that they might be in rebellion.”

Ya think? 🤷

They broke the heads off of the statues of the 12 Apostles, and scrawled insults about them all over the walls (the broken statues and the graffitti are still there; I have seen them for myself).

I can just imagine them looking over to their leader and saying “Gosh, Father Knox, do you think we might be in rebellion?” :rolleyes:
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If you are paying…I’m there.
 
Pwrlftr said:
I’ve just skimmed through it but it doesn’t seem all that favorable of the papacy. Have you read the whole thing yet? What are your thoughts?
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I’ve read the whole thing, but it’s not fresh (been awhile).

My thoughts are that he is making the case for the “mystical body of Christ” as something separate from an institution.

But, I posted the quote because the claim was that the Reformers did not consider the Catholic Church to be the one established by Christ.

It seems to me that Luther, at least (I don’t know much about Calvin and Zwingli and all those) did think that Christ established the institution of the Catholic Church but that the people in it were doing bad things (and on this I agree with him). But, even as he makes the distinction between an institution and a mystical body, it seems to me that he acknowledges that Christ established the Church and the Church established the sacraments and so forth.

Which would stand to reason because I think Luther was trying to keep as many of the Sacraments as possible.

I know Luther rails against the Pope in other places, but I think he’s really going after the person who occupied that space at the time. I don’t think he’s going after the whole thing. He even said (somewhere, maybe in the same sermon I linked) that if other Christians wanted to stay Catholic, that was fine but they did so at their own peril (which is kind of an odd statement, but there it is).

That’s my reading of it, in a nutshell. Your mileage may vary. Again, so the main point doesn’t get lost, I think that Luther, at least, acknowledged that institution of the Catholic Church was established by Christ.
 
IgnatiusJReilly said:
I’ve read the whole thing, but it’s not fresh (been awhile).

My thoughts are that he is making the case for the “mystical body of Christ” as something separate from an institution.

But, I posted the quote because the claim was that the Reformers did not consider the Catholic Church to be the one established by Christ.

It seems to me that Luther, at least (I don’t know much about Calvin and Zwingli and all those) did think that Christ established the institution of the Catholic Church but that the people in it were doing bad things (and on this I agree with him). But, even as he makes the distinction between an institution and a mystical body, it seems to me that he acknowledges that Christ established the Church and the Church established the sacraments and so forth.

Which would stand to reason because I think Luther was trying to keep as many of the Sacraments as possible.

I know Luther rails against the Pope in other places, but I think he’s really going after the person who occupied that space at the time. I don’t think he’s going after the whole thing. He even said (somewhere, maybe in the same sermon I linked) that if other Christians wanted to stay Catholic, that was fine but they did so at their own peril (which is kind of an odd statement, but there it is).

That’s my reading of it, in a nutshell. Your mileage may vary. Again, so the main point doesn’t get lost, I think that Luther, at least, acknowledged that institution of the Catholic Church was established by Christ.
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The sermon you provided is pretty interesting so thanks for posting it.
 
Pwrlftr said:
This will be an interesting puzzle…Luther also says this

How do we square this apparent contradiction?
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Maybe the key is at the end:

"And where the true Church is and abides, there remain, also, the offices of the Church, the sacraments, the keys and all things to it by Christ; it needs neither to ask nor to receive them from pope or council. In the true Church, not only is the office pure in itself, but those who exercise it use it lawfully.
  1. We admit that the papists also exercise the appointed offices of the Church, baptize, administer the sacrament etc., when they observe these things as the institution of Christ, in the name of Christ and by virtue of his command (just as in the Church we must regard as right and efficacious the offices of the Church and baptism administered by heretics), yet if they attempt to pervert the right use of these offices by exercising them against us, we may, by virtue of the judgment of Christ, declare their action void and regard themselves as apostates of the Church of Christ."
Maybe what he’s getting at is, “When they excommunicate you, don’t worry about it because I think they do so invalidly.”

I mean, that’s why the whole thing started, right? Abuse of office - not the office itself.
 
guanophore said:
I agree with you. So, how can one discern if the charism of infallibility applies? We are in agreement on the canon, the Trinity, the Sabbath observance, the hypostatic union…
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As you know, I don’t believe there is any charism of infallibility for the pope, magesterium, or councils.
guanophore said:
ARe you assuming that no provincial council is infallible? What if a provincial council declares something infallible, like, say, the canon?
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Which provinical council did that?
 
Pwrlftr said:
what does this mean
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The person subscribed to the thread, so they will recieve notifications when there are any new posts on the thread. I think you can subsribe from some toolbar or something, but usually posting on a thread will subscribe you to it. Make sense?
 
Tim_Kirchoff said:
The person subscribed to the thread, so they will recieve notifications when there are any new posts on the thread. I think you can subsribe from some toolbar or something, but usually posting on a thread will subscribe you to it. Make sense?
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Makes sense.

I’ve never seen anyone do it that way before.
 
Pwrlftr said:
what does this mean
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When a new forum member finds an interesting thread, they know if they post on it, they will automatically be subscribed. They usually are not aware of the utility under “thread tools” that they can subscribe without posting. They are interested in the thread, and want to come back and read it later, so they post something like this so it will show up on their profile under subscribed threads.
 
Pwrlftr said:
It was recognized by the early church as being canonical. Where you and I disagree is that I don’t think any pope, council, or magesterium is infallible.
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How, then, did the “church” recognize it as canonical?
 
Old_Scholar said:
You are certainly incorrect here. It was constantly changed from council to council.

Well let’s see. The council of Carthage and the council of Hippo gave different lists of the canon.

Jerome made a distinction between the canonical books. Augustine also had his separate canon. John of Damascus had a list, then Gregory the Great had a different list. They doubted the canonicity of the deuterocanonical books, as did Walafrid, Nicolas and Tostado.

There was a great deal of disagreement on the canon for many years. The infallible church couldn’t make up its mind. Was it because the Holy Spirit was not guiding it?

While the 6th Ecumenical Council accepted the canon of the council of Carthage, they also accepted the canons of Athanasius and Amphilocius and they were all different.

John of Damascus in the 8th century listed the books as we do today, without the deuterocanonical books, as did Jerome.

I could go on and list many before Trent but for one to say it was always the same is disingenuous.

So that answer can’t be accepted.
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Based on all of the historical data that I have read, I would say that your contentions about the canon and the councils is simply erroneous. We are talking about the dueterocanonical books here, and all of the councils included them. Likewise, individuals are not councils. The reservations that they may or may not have had on particular books at any given point in time does not constitute a council.

Let’s take a quick look at your claims concerning Jerome. Jerome had some doubts about some of the books, but Jerome humbly submitted himself and completely subordinated his views to that of the Church. That is one of the reasons he is considered a Catholic saint. Likewise, all of the other ECF’s that are considered Catholic saints did the same thing including Augustine.
 
Pwrlftr said:
I don’t believe one can have infallible certainty. Remember, you are the one with the fixation on infallibility, not me.
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So, the Bible is not an infallible list of infallible books, huh? For all you know you’ve been reading from a book that was not meant to be in scripture.
 
Maintain the highest level of charity in all posts from this point on or expect to deal with the consequences. This discussion should be conducted with maturity and charity.
MF
 
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