"The Church was pure until Constantine"

[DeusVult09]

You hold the position many if not most “conservative” believers hold…I do not begrudge you that…I simply do not hold your beliefs.

That’s fine im not here to force my beliefs on you I just believe in following the evidence rather than scholarly assumptions and misrepresentations of some of the scholars you mentioned. I am a creature of evidence and if that makes me conservative then im conservative. i do not automatically think all liberal scholars are wrong like i did find some of the stuff in borg’s book reading the bible again for the first time credible. as a believer in theistic evolution I found the chapter on genesis quite informative. Likewise I did find the chapter on revelation interesting. But some other things in the book i seriosuly seriosuly disagreed with.

You seem to think I disagree with scholars just because they are liberal but I follow the evidence. it seems like you think all the books by conservative and moderate scholars are just worthless exercises in “pious faith building”

 

[rinnie]

yes i agree no matter how many sex scandals there are in the church it will not corrupt the church which is led by the holy spirit.

Amen! Jesus said I will not leave you orphans I will be with you until the end of time. Jesus is the CC and will never leave us. We have a Father who keeps his Promises:thumbsup:

 

[JustaServant]

The Faith wasn’t adopted as the official religion in the age of Constantine, it was only freed from legal disabilities. Paganism was also tolerated. There was actually a pagan emperor who reigned after Constantine who was raised as a Christian in Constantine’s family household named Julian. He tried to restore paganism to dominance, but he died early, in a battle on the eastern frontier.

Under the emperor Theodosius (born in Spain, reigned 379 to 395AD) Nicene Apostolic Christianity was made the official religion, and received state sponsorship.

None of this supports the critic’s contention that the church was invented by Constantine, but it is our history.

Excellent points, and exactly what I was looking for. It was far more complicated than evangelical ‘scholars’ purport.

 

[JustaServant]

Constantine took the Church in a different direction, no doubt about that.

Proof?

 

[Nicea325]

Dr. Carroll, author of the Baptist church history entitled “The Trail of Blood,” makes the claim that Constantine called a council in 313 AD, the same year he issued the Edict of Milan, and this council first formed the hierarchy of the Catholic Church. This theory breaks down, though, when one begins to read the history books and discovers that no Church council was held in 313.

But the main problem with all of these theories is that, if they were true, one would expect to be able to find all of the doctrines that are specifically “Catholic” coming about only after the “invention” of the Catholic Church. Whatever year one proposes as the beginning of Catholicism, one should expect to see none of these Catholic doctrines before it. Even a cursory reading of the Church Fathers from the first, second, and third centuries shows that this is not the case.
http://www.turrisfortis.com/hierarchy.html

Nicea, August 24, A.D. 325, 7:41 p.m. “That was powerful preaching, Brother Athanasius. Powerful! Amen! I want to invite any of you folks in the back to approach the altar here and receive the Lord into your hearts. Just come on up. We’ve got brothers and sisters up here who can lead you through the Sinner’s Prayer. Amen! And as this Council of Nicea comes to an end, I want to remind Brother Eusebius to bring the grape juice for tomorrow’s closing communion service . . .”

Ah yes, the Baptists at the Council of Nicea. Sound rather silly? It certainly does. And yet, there are those who claim the Church of Nicea was more Protestant in belief and practice than Catholic. I recently read an article in The Christian Research Journal, written by a Reformed Baptist apologist, who argued this very point. No, I’m not making this up. The article, “What Really Happened at Nicea?” actually claimed the Fathers of the Council were essentially Evangelical Protestants.
As a trained patristics scholar, I always feel a great deal of sadness and frustration when I encounter shoddy historical “scholarship,” whether it be in the pages of The Watchtower, a digest of Mormon “archaeology,” or a popular and usually well-produced Evangelical Protestant apologetics journal. But this article was so error-laden, so amateurishly “researched,” and so filled with historical and theological fallacies, that I simply couldn’t let it stand without response.
envoymagazine.com/backissues/2.4/coverstory.html

Oh yeah…I am familiar with the above. The early church fathers were Evangelical Protestants? LOL! U-huh and I seriously doubt the so-called the Reformed Baptists apologist gives a distinct list of which Protestant church each father belong to?

What nonsense!

 

[Nicea325]

Since I’m not getting an answer on this subject, and I don’t want to derail a thread, I thought it best to give the question a new thread.
“The Church was pure until Constantine”
I used to buy into this lie at one time.
Now, I have asked for proof of this assertion.
I await with baited breath, the results.

That is open to interpretation? What exactly is meant by pure? Last time I checked,Jesus left a church full of sinners,not perfectionists.

 

[Hesychios]

That is open to interpretation? What exactly is meant by pure? Last time I checked,Jesus left a church full of sinners,not perfectionists.

This is an excellent point.

One thing needs mention. After the royal family embraced the ‘new’ religion of Christianity there were certain advantages to civil servants and businessmen who might wish to embrace it as well, There is no way to know how many insincere converts may have come into the church at this time. Likewise there were no more bloody persecutions, and very few martyrs after that time except in mission areas outside the empire and Armenia. The church membership was becoming very cosmopolitan, and exhibiting many of the signs we see in our own day: lackluster devotion and insincerity being big problems. Also attachment to worldly goods and ambition were prime movers in some of these conversions, so some of these people were works ‘in progress’ (it makes me think of the “rice Christians” in mission times here in China, who went through the motions when it meant they could eat).

One of the results of these ‘sea changes’ was a yearning for something more holy, to be ‘set apart’ from this world. The answer turned out to be hermit life and monasticism. The life of Saint Anthony of Egypt (and come to think of it, Saint Mary of Egypt) is a good start to understanding this phenomenon.

The retirement of so many sincere Christians to the remote landscape and wildernesses played an important role in the conversion of rural areas, which were naturally conservative and had lagged far behind the cities in embracing Christianity.

 

[Nicea325]

This is an excellent point.

One thing needs mention. After the royal family embraced the ‘new’ religion of Christianity there were certain advantages to civil servants and businessmen who might wish to embrace it as well, There is no way to know how many insincere converts may have come into the church at this time. Likewise there were no more bloody persecutions, and very few martyrs after that time except in mission areas outside the empire and Armenia. The church membership was becoming very cosmopolitan, and exhibiting many of the signs we see in our own day: lackluster devotion and insincerity being big problems. Also attachment to worldly goods and ambition were prime movers in some of these conversions, so some of these people were works ‘in progress’ (it makes me think of the “rice Christians” in mission times here in China, who went through the motions when it meant they could eat).

One of the results of these ‘sea changes’ was a yearning for something more holy, to be ‘set apart’ from this world. The answer turned out to be hermit life and monasticism. The life of Saint Anthony of Egypt (and come to think of it, Saint Mary of Egypt) is a good start to understanding this phenomenon.

The retirement of so many sincere Christians to the remote landscape and wildernesses played an important role in the conversion of rural areas, which were naturally conservative and had lagged far behind the cities in embracing Christianity.

 

[JustaServant]

Excellent replies so far,