The Catholic church was not founded by Jesus Christ...started in late 300 A.D

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havemercy

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havemercy:
I’m glad there are no hard feelings. I’ve received a lot of negativity from my Protestant friends with regards my converting to Catholicism, so talking with you here has been a delight, really.

I’d like to extend a warm invitation to you, that you might take part in the various discussions that are happening over at the CA Forums. I’ve already invited Dave (fellside) and he’s participated some (namely about Purgatory). If my Church is in such error, perhaps you can point out its errors. I’d really be interested in anyone’s pointing out that the Church before 300 A.D. wasn’t the least bit Catholic. But since I am in no way qualified to refute the statements you’re making properly, and since it is getting rather late and I’d really like to hurry off into my newly cleaned sheets and blanket to sleep, I’ll make a thread over at CAF and see what people over there have to say.
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I’m beginning to understand why there exist expert apologists. I’m not ready to deal with these kinds of polemics. Maybe I’m just overwhelmed lately with having to defend the faith online and offline a lot. I hate repeating myself to different (and sometiems the same) people, and I hate it when I leave certain things out through ignorance or forgetfullness. Sometimes I feel like the wall, a talking wall.
 
Myself
Non-Catholic
And what is the “true” Church, friend? Why is there such division in the “invisible” Church?

Because man’s heart is wicked and prideful. I do not call myself a Lutheran, Methodist, but a Christian just like the early believers were called. I am not of Paul’s, or Timothy, but Christ’s.

You are using the “your church has sinners” argument, and it…Stinks. 😦

No I’m not. I’m using the fact that G-d’s “church” would not behave in such a way the Catholic Church behaved. In order to see if something is true, tests its fruits. The Catholic Church has had a bad reputation and therefore its fruits have been exposed. Everyone’s a sinner, but a church under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit would not act like the Catholic Church has especially if it claims absolute authority.

First, no one is denying that the Catholic Church has sinners. It is precisely why Christ established His Church - to save sinners. Just because its members sometimes stray (some of whom where and are clergy), that doesn’t mean that it was not founded by Jesus Christ to teach His infallible truth.

Members? I’m talking about the leaders of your church, the Pope. The Catholic church was not founded by Jesus Christ, hence why it started in the late 300 A.D.

Second, Protestants have unfortunately also killed Catholics. I don’t judge Protestantism (or Catholicism) based upon the conduct of their members. I judge them based upon whether they teach the truth in accordance with Sacred Scripture and Tradition. If you judge truth by conduct, then you should throw out your Bible, because all its authors were sinners, especially St. Paul.

Exactly why I’m not Catholic, for its non-Biblical doctrines. Since you always use Cathlic sites for your arguments, read this. gotquestions.org/Catholic-questions.html and carm.org/catholic.htm and finally christiantruth.com/mt16.html.

…

Fourth, if you want to talk about conduct and the preservation of life, the Catholic Church has done more than any other institution to preserve and defend life. It has led the world in this regard, through its teachings about abortion, contraception, homosexuality and other life issues, while many of the Protestant sects have buckled in compromise.

**And other institutions have not done this? This is a giant leap that is easily refuted because other institutions have done some amazing things on the same level and ever surpassing the Catholic Church. **

The Catholic Church was founded by Christ in the year 33, having maintained apostolic succession until today.

Try again, the Cathlic Church was started in the late 300 A.D. Plus, Chirst did not teach pagan practices as the Catholic Church has had sneak in to its religion.

Not too many Churches claim this for themselves (challenge these claims man!)

**No problem, infact ALL the cults claim this. Check out Mormonism, they believe they are the Church Christ founded. farms.byu.edu/ and fairlds.org/. Oh and can’t forget jefflindsay.com/LDS_Intro.shtml. Might also want to check out Jehovah’s Witnesses. Oh and the Orthodox Church too, since they have been preaching the truth since 33 A.D. as well.
**

In any case, the Catholic Church had power from the very beginning, when Christ conferred the power of the Holy Spirit to them in the upper room, after having had made them apostles.

**No it had power after 300 A.D. It self-proclaimed itself the “true” church like Mormonism, Jehovah’s Witnesses, etc. **


Lord Jesus, be with us.
 
Try again, the Cathlic Church was started in the late 300 A.D. Plus, Chirst did not teach pagan practices as the Catholic Church has had sneak in to its religion.
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If this is true, then we would expect a sea-change in beliefs from the Christians writing before 300 AD (I assume he is referring to the Edict of Milan) and the beliefs from the Christians writing after this Edict. When looking at various doctrines that are distinctly Catholic in nature, we find there is no such change. In fact, there is a huge witness to the consistency of distinctly Catholic doctrine from before the Edict of Milan to after the Edict of Milan. Read this page for such a discussion.
 
Long before the 300s, the early Church Fathers were not only calling the Church “Catholic” but also writing many things in accordance with what the Catholic Church has believed since it was founded in 33 A.D. If one wants to argue about the Church’s “un-Biblical” teachings, one should first be informed that the Bible was put together by the Catholic Church, largely because of the influence of the Early Church Fathers (who, I repeat, had been writing since before 100 A.D.). The Bible was put together to be a guide, not a sole rule of faith. The authority of the Church, in it’s writings and Traditions (of God, not men), was meant to be conveyed by people who knew the history of the faith and the context of the many passages in the Bible. Just let me know if you need me to elaborate on any of these points and I shall do so.

Your brother in Christ,
FdeS2
 
This is a load of bunkum Tony, but then you knew that.

If the doctrines of the Catholic Church are only from the 4th Century, (here he’ll attempt to use Constantine as the source, maybe even as the first Pope, something that is easily researched and refuted from history, not the least of which is that Constantine didn’t even become a baptized Catholic until just prior to his death, and ya simply can’t be pope without that, now can ya?!) then why do guys like Polycarp say they were infant baptized long before then? See the Martyrdom of Polycarp. He says he’s been a Christian for 86 years and he’s 86 years old at the time.

Why does Ignatius of Antioch preach the same Eucharistic doctrine and even call the church “the Catholic Church” in he very early 2nd century? Both of these guys were disciples and friends of St. John the Evangelist the last of the apostles to die, and they both paid with their lives for what they believed as well as serving the faithful as bishops of Smyrna and Antioch respectively.

Historical ignorance is a real shame. :rolleyes:
No I’m not. I’m using the fact that G-d’s “church” would not behave in such a way the Catholic Church behaved. In order to see if something is true, tests its fruits. The Catholic Church has had a bad reputation and therefore its fruits have been exposed. Everyone’s a sinner, but a church under the inspiration of the Holy Spirit would not act like the Catholic Church has especially if it claims absolute authority.
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By this line of reasoning every church that got epistles from St. Paul or any of the other apostles was not Christian since in most of the epistles they dealt with correcting some sort of moral failing within the body of Christ (the church).
Exactly why I’m not Catholic, for its non-Biblical doctrine.
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This is trash. Make him support Sola Scriptura from the Word of God! He can’t do it because it’s simply not there. Listen to John Martignoni’s Bible study on this HERE and be sure to print out and follow along with his notes HERE.
I’ve seen those sites he offers and they are the usual inaccuracies and out-of-context proof texting that you will find more and more as you engage in any attempt to explain and defend the Catholic faith. It looks a lot like an exchange from CARM…long on rhetoric and short on historical facts and Biblical support. This guy is most likely an “evangelical messianic Jew” or some such variant because of the characteristic use of “G-d” in place of the word God or the sacred name. Only my Hassidic Jewish friend does that and it goes all the way back through the history of Judaism and the fear of blasphemy, but has (so far as I can find.) never been the practice of Christians. (If I’m wrong someone please show me on this.)

Make him list these “Pagan practices of Catholics”. He will come up with a bunch of Jack Chickish off-the-wall bunkum that you will be able to have fun refuting. Is Catholicism Pagan? is a good place to start and you’ll find many other articles to help your refutation on that same page of the CA Library.

All the rest of his comments are just more unsupportable propaganda as if his repeating it will give it greater credence. :rolleyes:
I’m beginning to understand why there exists expert apologetics. I’m not ready to deal with these kinds of polemics. Maybe I’m just overwhelmed lately with having to defend the faith online and offline a lot recently. I hate repeating myself to different people, and I hate it when I leave certain things out through ignorance or forgetfullness.
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My experienced advice?
  1. Stay off a-C forums, especially the one you found this on. You are right in that it is boring and vexing to have to repeat the same refutations over and over.
  2. Remember what Our Lord told us. “And whosoever will not receive you, when ye go out of that city, shake off even the dust of your feet, for a testimony against them.” (Luke 9:5)
  3. Don’t rush to get into apologetics. Though learning the whys and wherefors of the faith is great fun. You’ll find it more rewarding to simply knock along, living your faith and learning all this at your own pace. As one of my hoodlum cousins once told me as a kid. “Don’t go looking for a fight. You’ll always find one.”
I hope this helps. Pax tecum,
 
I really would like to take a course in Patristics. ha
Thanks all. Off to classes, and off to mass!
 
Hi Tony,

I don’t know if this will help, but it’s worth a try.

If you have a Catholic Bible, there should be (usually in the front) a list of Popes from St. Peter (who received his Authority from Jesus Christ) to John Paul, II.
Therefore, there’s no way your non-Catholic friend can accurately and honestly state that the Catholic Church started in the late AD 300s.
Although, I’m sure he’ll find some lame argument to support his position. Like trying to negate the Catholic Bible by using the old and stale accusation: “The Catholic Church added books to their Bible”
I don’t know if new Catholic Bibles have been published, yet, that include our current Holy Father.

And take Church Militant’s advice. Don’t rush into Apologetics.
I’ve been intensely studying our Faith since 1996 and still have problems with certain arguments.
There’s just so much to learn. Spend your time absorbing as much as you can without having to worry about proving this teaching or that.
It’ll come to you as you further your studies.
Enjoy learning the “Who’s”, “Why’s”, “Where’s” and “When’s” without feeling pressured.

I’m not saying that you shouldn’t defend the Faith if someone starts in on you. And they will.
I’m just saying; “Don’t go looking for it”, for now.
You have plenty of time.

Again, I agree with CM: Stay off those forums for a while.
Enjoy being Catholic and loving and serving the Lord.
If you were as poorly catechised as I was growing up, there’s so much you need to learn.
Stick around here, and learn from the many very knowledgeable Catholics who post on these forums.
These good people have taught me so much just by reading their posts and replies.

Also, John Martignoni is a fantastic Apologist. I’ve learned so much listening to his talks and reading his newsletters.
His apologetics is also Catechesis in some ways, because in defending our Faith, he also teaches us our Faith.

God Bless!
 
havemercy << Members? I’m talking about the leaders of your church, the Pope. The Catholic church was not founded by Jesus Christ, hence why it started in the late 300 A.D…Try again, the Catholic Church was started in the late 300 A.D. Plus, Christ did not teach pagan practices as the Catholic Church has had sneak in to its religion. >>

Ask the person which of these Fathers he thinks were non-Catholic? St. Ignatius of Antioch? St. Justin the Martyr? St. Irenaeus of Lyons? St. Cyprian of Carthage? Which of these guys will he claim as Christians? Then show the person what they believed about the nature of the Church, etc.

Late 300 A.D. ? Does this mean “sometime in November, 300 A.D.” 😃 or does this mean 399 A.D. ? Get him to narrow down to the year, and hopefully the month and day the original “Christian Church” founded by Jesus became the “Catholic Church” of the 300s. That’s always fun. 🙂

Phil P
 
havemercy << Oh and the Orthodox Church too, since they have been preaching the truth since 33 A.D. as well. >>

Ask the person: do you really believe that? Then why aren’t you Orthodox? If they say No, then have them give you a year, month, and day when the “Christian Church” became the “Orthodox Church.” That’s fun too. 🙂

Phil P
 
I feel for you, Sister. What I tell the numbskulls is:
“There are people who guide us on our road. They are called Priests, Deacons, Bishops, Cardinals, Teachers. I am none of those. There are people who spend their time debating and defending the faith. They are called Apologetics. I am not one of those. There are people who live their lives, as best they can, according to Church teaching. They are called Christians. I am one. I have a very full life. It leaves me no time or interest in your silly debate. But I will introduce you to my priest. If you’re serious, I’ll see you Sunday at Mass. If you’re just playing head games, go play somewhere else.”
I realize that this approach is not for everyone. Let me try to express to you that you are not alone. You may be out-numbered, in THAT situation. When you find yourself alone, out-smarted and out-manuevered, remember that you have brothers and sisters who ARE Priests, Deacons, APOLOGETICS, etc.
Challenge those so-smart people! Challenge them to quit picking on a layman. Challenge them to bring their questions to this forum, or your parish. Feed the lions to the Christians for a change! Bring them to your brothers and sisters. Then sit back and learn some more while the Christians de-claw that lion.
I offer you this advice because it’s what I do. It works, for me, every time. Good Luck to you. jt
 
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