Trent and reconciliation with the Reformed?

[grandfather]

There are Protestants who think that way, but they are delusional, and are certainly not representative of all modern Protestants.

 

[grandfather]

But they are extremely unlikely to be entirely either the one or the other. Complete falsehood is an ontological impossibility. Complete truth within a human mind is a practical impossibility this side of the Beatific Vision. (Yes, divine revelation is entirely true, but divine revelation exists in fallen human minds, which inevitably perceive it imperfectly.) That’s just obviously, empirically false. All truth that we know on earth is compromised truth. All mortal knowledge falls short of the divine reality.

I don’t think so. The human mind is finite, limited. God who is truth is infinite. We can only bear, comprehend so much. So we can not get it all. That does not mean we can not properly understand anything. We can know the truths God revealed correctly to the limits of our finite abilities. Jesus said He would lead His Church into all truth. All means what? Divine revelation enlightens human minds. You really are limiting God. He corrects us. You are saying it is impossible for God to fix what is broken in us enabling truth to be known for what it is. You seem to be saying that God might want to lead us into all truth as He promised, but can not, because of our fallen nature. What about the new man Paul talks of?

Certainly. There can be no deliberate compromise with error.

Deliberate or indeliberate, error is error.

We all err, but we should reject error as soon as we discover it.

And how do you know when that is?

However, we must recognize that those with whom we disagree also have some truth, and we must be open to recognizing that truth–not compromising with error but correcting our error by their truth.

Sure, but Jesus said He would lead His Church into ALL truth, not some truth. The reason is that we need all, not some.

Indeed. And when doctrines contradict, it is, practically speaking, never because one set of doctrines is entirely true and the other set entirely false (or even entirely false where they contradict the other set).

Never! Really! Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus is a created being. Jesus was born of a virgin. Jesus was not born of a viirgin. The Eucharist is the Body and Blood of Christ. The Eucharist is a symbol. Abortion is a grevous evil. A fetus is not a person and has no rights. Souls go through a period of purification before entering heaven. Souls go directly to heaven or hell. We should pray for the dead. That is nonsense. Saints in heaven love us and intercede for us and we should seek their intercession. No, that is not true.

How many either or, black or white illustrations do you need?

Error would find no purchase in the human mind if there were no truth mixed up in it, and truth would not be rejected by sincere people if it were not compromised in some way by human weakness and error (as it always is).

Just delete the always is and you will be fine. If you are right there is no hope that you or any human being will ever know and be able to embrace true religion.

Any time two people disagree, each of them has something to learn from the other, except where one of them is clinically insane or willfully lying (sometimes even then, of course).And that goes for groups as well, with the further caveat that a large group of people cannot be insane and is highly unlikely to be willfully lying as a whole.

Edwin

Good grief! How about if one is right and the other is wrong? The Arians were wrong. Jesus is not a created being. The Manicheans were wrong. The cathars, docetists, pelagians, albigensees were wrong. They believed things that are false. The pagan Romans, Aztec human sacrificers, Greek mythologists, were wrong. Minerva did not spring from her father Zeus’s head when his head burst one day from a headache. The tooth fairy doesn’t leave quarters under your pillow.

We are not going to arrive at unity by making everyone right, by harmonizing contradicting statements about reality, although that seems to be what Anglicans are hellbent on doing.

The pope is the head of the universal church, or Henry VIII is the head of the Church of England. As the pope he says Henry is wrong, or the pope has no ecclesial jusrisdiction in England. If you go with Henry you can not go with the pope. If Henry is right then Queen Elizabeth is the current religious head of the church in England and Rowan Williams is her underling. Her progeny will succeed her in authority, Charles the illustrious, William or maybe Harry.

 

[wisdomseeker]

Contarini;8642244:

My question was not from a Protestant or Catholic perspective, or who thinks that way. It probably is representative of many Protestants. What is the difference between modern and not modern Protestants? Do the modern ones have a better or more advanced outlook or doctrines than those of a couple of centuries ago?

So I guess what you are saying is if it looks like a duck, walks and quacks, it is a duck.
Protestantism is a new version or form of Christianity and separated from the original by doctrinal disagreement. Some Protestants have valid baptisms and others do not. Some deny the Holy Trinity. Some are iconoclasts. None have Holy Orders, but some claim to have them and others deny they exist. Some forbid drinking wine and others do not. Some insist dancing is sinful. Some say drinking coffee is a problem. Some are vegetarians. Some say the pope is the antichrist. Some say Catholics are not Christians. We have a lot of breeds of ducks here. Some may be turkeys, or geese or something else. They may all be traced to the same source I suppose, but they are very different. Confusion has its cost.

I doubt that most Protestants would agree with that. I have a friend who is a priest in a small city. The area has 125 churches, various Lutheran types, several Baptist versions, Seventh Day Adventists, Methodists, Episcopals, Dutch Reformed, Nazarenes, a couple of different Presbyterians, Pentecostals, a slew of non denom Bible churches. The Lutheran minister invited him to join an ecumenical association of ministers who met for lunch and talked about churchy things. One church’s pastor was a lesbian living with her girlfriend on one extreme. On the other an old time religion fire and brimstone teetotaler Baptist. This is what Protestantism looks like, a hodge podge.

The priest showing up, albeit invited did not go over well and he was asked to not come back, because Catholics are not Christian. These groups, all separated from one another by their disputes can not agree on anything other than the Bible is the word of God and they are not Catholic.

That was my point. What is it hidden away somewhere inside, in the source code, that makes Christians, even though they believe radically different doctrine, desire unity? Why not go our separate ways? Who cares what those people over there believe? Let them be. Let them remain in their stew and end up where thery end up. There is something in us that causes us to desire unity. It is not about doctrine. It is about dna.

A friend of mine is a “bishop” in a wacky sect. They do not allow their women to cut their hair, ever. Ten or twenty years of hair gets heavy. It gives you a head ache. They won’t go to a doctor and will let a child die of an easy to fix ailment. They will not put some cream on poison oak and let a child suffer. They are convinced a whole body of nutty things are the way real Christians should live. There were two tiny little congregations of this denomination about forty miles apart in my area. They got into an argument over divorce and remarriage. They separated and both still call themselves by the same denominational name, but have nothing to do with one another, do not recognize the existance of the other. So we look at this hodge podge of disunity absolutely confounded at how this could come to pass.

Again, you missed the point. Even though there are similarities in what different versions of Protestants believe, one to another, and to Catholics, the differences are so great that they are bizarre. Why don’t we just accept it? Why not find some group we agree with and join it and stay there until we disagree and then move on to the next? I met a man yesterday who was raised Lutheran, then spent thirty years in a non-denom evangelical local church he helped start and build. He now rejects this version of Christianity he once was sure was the right one, and meets with a few people in his home weekly. He saw through the get saved, say this magic prayer, have a personal relationship with Jesus and be done with it doctrine. I see him as a sincere, intelligent, looking for truth, brother in Christ, but groping about, because he is separated from the vine. .

Great post. I find that protestants living in denial or they cant really see what goes on in their midst. Most protestant dont have the Catholic Creed, and rightly so. to recite the Creed that belongs to the Catholic Church which they dont believe in it is affirming a lie. It is a delusion to recite a Creed which was made for the CC and for Catholics to recite in teh Church. it does not make any sense that those outside find that they have the right to recite our Creed just because they feel they can do so just like they do with the Bible when they took out of the Church .

 

[Pfaffenhoffen]

You raise an excellant point. The one negletad aspect of the Reformation was that it was a shift in our ecclesiology, theology of the church. Withen your ecclesiology the Papacy makes sense, withen mine it doesn’t (no offense intended).

Mine makes sense, your makes sense to you, and Who is right who is wrong?
2+2=4. I say it is wrong. You say it is right. So who is wrong and right ? You or me?
The Papacy does not depend on your or my opinion. dpends on the opinion of Christ.
What is His opinion?

Do you think that Protestatism will be in the world 2000 years from now? I guess it is impossible. Nowadays there are 33 thousand Protestant churches and it is fwoing at a rate of 200 a month. When I quote this number, some people contest it but it is enough to search in the net.

The Reform was a retrocess on the question of Papacy. It Christ who wanted a Pope not you or me. It is as clear as water in the Gospel and in the first 1400 years. Reformation discovered somethin new that the earlier dumb christians did not discover?

I seriously doubt it.

 

[wisdomseeker]

Mine makes sense, your makes sense to you, and Who is right who is wrong?
2+2=4. I say it is wrong. You say it is right. So who is wrong and right ? You or me?
The Papacy does not depend on your or my opinion. dpends on the opinion of Christ.
What is His opinion?

Do you think that Protestatism will be in the world 2000 years from now? I guess it is impossible. Nowadays there are 33 thousand Protestant churches and it is fwoing at a rate of 200 a month. When I quote this number, some people contest it but it is enough to search in the net.

The Reform was a retrocess on the question of Papacy. It Christ who wanted a Pope not you or me. It is as clear as water in the Gospel and in the first 1400 years. Reformation discovered somethin new that the earlier dumb christians did not discover?

I seriously doubt it.

The reason that reasons of the past were gone within a period of time as that they did not the Bible. So, they could not go on. But today, since protestantism has taking the Bible from the Church, they have something they can build upon. I would say that there always going to be someone with the Bible in their hands building up churches everywhere. it is a matter fact there are people today, which their jobs is sole about goind around the countries building up churches. I think there will always be people out there for them to deceive.

 

[Contarini]

What is the difference between modern and not modern Protestants?

Well, the big one is that there are many more kinds of modern Protestants!

Do the modern ones have a better or more advanced outlook or doctrines than those of a couple of centuries ago?

Many changes have taken place. Some are good, some aren’t. The fact that most Protestants have a more ecumenical outlook toward Catholicism is, in my opinion, a very good change.

Protestants have “development of doctrine” too, you know. It’s just wilder and crazier than the Catholic version!

Protestantism is a new version or form of Christianity

But as you say, it’s really many new versions. You’re the one who chose to generalize about “Protestants.”

and separated from the original by doctrinal disagreement. Some Protestants have valid baptisms and others do not.

Who doesn’t and why?

Some deny the Holy Trinity.

Yes, but the Protestants who don’t are the majority and pretty uniformly reject the others as heretics, from whom they are far more divided than they are from Catholics. So it’s a bit unfair to lump them together. It would be like the Orthodox saying “some Western Christians deny the Holy Trinity, so we can’t affirm that Eastern and Western Christians both believe in the Trinity.” It wouldn’t be appropriate to talk that way.

They may all be traced to the same source I suppose, but they are very different.

Indeed, but that doesn’t affect the principle I articulated.

I doubt that most Protestants would agree with that.

It’s hard to say what “most” would do. Mainliners certainly would, and the more moderate evangelicals as well.

I have a friend who is a priest in a small city. The area has 125 churches, various Lutheran types, several Baptist versions, Seventh Day Adventists, Methodists, Episcopals, Dutch Reformed, Nazarenes, a couple of different Presbyterians, Pentecostals, a slew of non denom Bible churches. The Lutheran minister invited him to join an ecumenical association of ministers who met for lunch and talked about churchy things. One church’s pastor was a lesbian living with her girlfriend on one extreme. On the other an old time religion fire and brimstone teetotaler Baptist. This is what Protestantism looks like, a hodge podge.

The priest showing up, albeit invited did not go over well and he was asked to not come back, because Catholics are not Christian.

Who told him this? In what exact words?

I don’t believe your claim that all these clergy agreed that Catholics are not Christians. It is completely contrary to my own experience, and I have some experience of all the varieties of Protestantism you mention (i.e., I’ve either been to their churches or had substantive theological conversations with well-informed members or read scholarship by them, etc.) Of course some of the very conservative ones would say this, and perhaps one of them took upon himself to tell the priest this. Though I am highly dubious of why a fundamentalist would have fewer problems with a lesbian pastor than with a Catholic priest. The story as you tell it just isn’t believable. I don’t think you are lying, but you have the story at second hand and I’m confident that it has been garbled somehow.

That was my point. What is it hidden away somewhere inside, in the source code, that makes Christians, even though they believe radically different doctrine, desire unity?

Most basically, from a Catholic perspective, it’s the indelible character imprinted on the soul in baptism. More broadly, it’s our common creation in God’s image, which makes us desire unity with *all *humanity. But we’re talking about something more specific here.

Why not go our separate ways? Who cares what those people over there believe? Let them be. Let them remain in their stew and end up where thery end up.

That’s not a position that is open to Catholics, surely, given what you believe about baptism. Even in more Protestant terms, faith in Christ unites everyone. Jesus unites us. If we have Jesus in common, we have in common what matters most.

To deny this is to distort the nature of the Christian faith, which is centered on Jesus and our incorporation into Jesus in baptism.

There is something in us that causes us to desire unity. It is not about doctrine. It is about dna.

It is about doctrine, as I have said above. The indelible character of baptism is doctrine. The fact that all valid baptism incorporates a person into the Catholic Church (so that all Protestants are, in a sense, fallen-away Catholics, though most are not morally responsible for this) is doctrine. The fact that Jesus died and rose again to bring all who believe in Him into one body is doctrine.

Doctrine is DNA for Christians!

Again, you missed the point.

I didn’t miss it. I *rejected *it (there’s a difference), for the excellent reason that our incorporation into Jesus through faith and baptism isn’t just “a similarity.” It’s our core identity. It’s the root from which everything springs. You’re reducing it to just one item on a list. How can you do that?

Your stories about the vagaries of Protestantism are interesting, and I could add many of my own (both stories and vagaries!), but they don’t affect my point at all, which is that Christians have to care about other Christians, because we are all baptized into the same Jesus.

Edwin

 

[grandfather]

Well, the big one is that there are many more kinds of modern Protestants!

 

[grandfather]

Though I am highly dubious of why a fundamentalist would have fewer problems with a lesbian pastor than with a Catholic priest.

One would think so. By the way, he also told me that subsequent to this he became very close friends with the Lutheran minister. He went to Mejugorie with a Lutheran minister, possibly the same one, I don’t know, and the minister wanted the priest to hear his confession. He could not give absolution to a non-Catholic, but this seemed quite interesting. Makes you wonder what is going on.

The story as you tell it just isn’t believable. I don’t think you are lying, but you have the story at second hand and I’m confident that it has been garbled somehow.

That could be, but I have heard similar stories.

Most basically, from a Catholic perspective, it’s the indelible character imprinted on the soul in baptism.

Are you referring to Holy Orders?

More broadly, it’s our common creation in God’s image, which makes us desire unity with *all *humanity. But we’re talking about something more specific here.

This sounds nice. I hope that is the case. It seems if it were true though that all people would have this desire. I am not sure this is true. It is true for me. Maybe another word that might help is communion. There is a desire for communion, to be connected spiritually, to live with uniity (com union), joined together by God, in Him.

That’s not a position that is open to Catholics, surely, given what you believe about baptism. Even in more Protestant terms, faith in Christ unites everyone. Jesus unites us. If we have Jesus in common, we have in common what matters most.

To deny this is to distort the nature of the Christian faith, which is centered on Jesus and our incorporation into Jesus in baptism.

I think the essence of faith is a starting point, common ground. If Christendom were united, Christian civilization would not be so battered and would be able to better resist the evils of the age. When Saint Paul speaks of unity he exhorts us to agrre on all tihngs.

We are so far from that ideal that if I did not have faith that the Holy Spirit will not abandon us and in the promise to be with us until the end of time it gets pretty discouraging.

It is about doctrine, as I have said above. The indelible character of baptism is doctrine. The fact that all valid baptism incorporates a person into the Catholic Church (so that all Protestants are, in a sense, fallen-away Catholics, though most are not morally responsible for this) is doctrine. The fact that Jesus died and rose again to bring all who believe in Him into one body is doctrine.

You seem to have a knack for putting in one paragraph something to agree and disagree with. I have a non-intellectual sense that hearts are united even when minds disagree. In that sense there is a communion. This is not at all about doctrine. It is above doctrine. Even though Christians believe opposing contradicting doctrines they can still ove one another and be in communion. At the same time they are divided and the consequences of division are terrible. All we can do is pray that God will reunite all His Church, graft back together the branches that are cut off from the vine and restore complete unity.

While it is impossible for me to know what most Protestants think and there are wide gaps in doctrinal matters it seems to me from the Protestant friends I have that there is a desire for communion with all Christians. I would say that is much more so than with Orthodox. They seems much more hardened and accepting of division, but I could be wrong.

Doctrine is DNA for Christians!

Christians doctrinally disagree and be moved by the Holy Spirit to want to overcome it? That is what I meant by dna. We are programmed for unity even though we are intelectually divided.

Your stories about the vagaries of Protestantism are interesting, and I could add many of my own (both stories and vagaries!), but they don’t affect my point at all, which is that Christians have to care about other Christians, because we are all baptized into the same Jesus.

Some do and some don’t.

 

[hn160]

I appreciate you post. Yeah the thing with the Joint Declaration is that confessional Lutherans, as I understand it, did not sighn that document. In a way they just moved towards the Roman Catholic position. As far as perseveriance goes it is not an exscuse to sin which seems to be the misconception.

We do, in principle, beleive that our doctrines are fallible. But can Roman Catholics stay true to Trent and yet reconcile to confessional Prostetants? In short is it possible for Roman Catholics to stay Roman Catholics and confessional Protestants stay confessional Prostetants? I just don’t see a way without one side moving towards the other. Maybe the answer to my question is there isn’t.

The Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod, The Wisconsin Evangelical Synod and the Evangelical Lutheran Synod did not sign the JDDL. It is their position that Rome didn’t change it’s position on Justification but both sides use language that sides agreed that they agreed on Justification, it was all a smoke screen.

 

[hn160]

No one person could ever speak for the whole group, that is not how we operate. It interesting that you bring worship as an important disagreement btween us, the other issues you raised are just as important though (if not more imortant). We take worship very seriously in the Reformed faith. We have the regulative principle that states that only those things which Scripture commands may be used in worship.

But the Reform has Christ’s body confined to Heaven, therefore His very Body and Blood cannot be in the bread and wine. This is one of the most important points of doctrine that divides the Lutherans and the Reform.
One one to agree on unity is for both the Reform and Catholics to agree on the Lutheran Book of Concord/Lutheran Confessions.

 

[CopticChristian]

But the Reform has Christ’s body confined to Heaven, therefore His very Body and Blood cannot be in the bread and wine. This is one of the most important points of doctrine that divides the Lutherans and the Reform.
One one to agree on unity is for both the Reform and Catholics to agree on the Lutheran Book of Concord/Lutheran Confessions.

Explain this “One one”.

 

[hn160]

Explain this “One one”.

Because we believe that the Lutheran Confessions are the correct exposition of Scripture.

 

[grandfather]

Because we believe that the Lutheran Confessions are the correct exposition of Scripture.

HN,
If scripture is the word of God and Christ’s promises found in scripture can be relied on, Luther’s doctrines must be false. Here is why.

Jesus promised that He would send the Holy Spirit to lead His Church into ALL truth, and to be with His Church until the end of time. He made promises guaranteeing the doctrines of His Church, binding in heaven what His apostles bind on earth. He founded His Church on men, not scripture, according to scripture.

If we are to take Him at His word then we can conclude that the things the Church believed in the year 100 were true. The same is true for the year 500, 1000, 1500, 2000.

One test of any doctrine would be whether or not it agrees with the truths of faith the Church has always taught. For example only, if some group or sect comes along at some late date and says they refuse to believe that babies should be baptized, and there is historical evidence from the very beginning that the Church baptized babies, the novel doctrine must be false if Christ’s promises to His Church as found in scripture are true.

The Holy Spirit is either leading us into all truth for all time, past, present and future, or He is not. According to Christ’s promises the Church can not believe or teach error, ever. If Joseph Smith’s claims are true, that he have a vision of an angel who told him no Christian group’s doctrines are true, the Christ’s promises are false.

If history shows that the Church has always prayed for her beloved dead and someone says this is nonsense that person is wrong, or Christ’s promises are false. Truth can not change. The oldest historically known rote prayer is from the year 50. Mary was still alive. It is a prayer to Saint Joseph. This is history not theology. If someone says it is wrong or useless to pray to the saints and the Church has always done this, the novel doctrine or Christ’s promise is false.

The same is true of morals. If the Church has always taught that it is sinful for people to engage in homosexual behavior and it is not sinful as some now claim to have discovered, and they are correct, then the Church was wrong since the begining and Christ’s promises are false, because the Church taught and believed error. This is very serious matter. It would mean the Church has heaped guilt and shame on people unjustly for two thousand years.

Anyone who opposes the constant practice of faith the Church has always upheld, under the claimed authority of their personal reading of scripture, must either be wrong, or Christ’s promises to us about leading into all truth for all time are false.

If Luther taught what contradicted faith and practice that was believed from the beginning based on his personal understanding of scripture, he is wrong.

If Luther is right and the Church is wrong this would also mean that no doctrine can be relied upon. It becomes impossible to know that what you believe is true if it can suddendly be declared by someone as an error based on some new understanding of scripture. This is what unleashed denominationalism on us, which is a never ending adjusting and changing and fixing doctrines according to someone’s new opinion.

 

[guanophore]

I am curious if any reconciliation can ever be made after the Council of Trent between confessional Lutherans and Reformed? It seems to me that one side or the other would have to abandon their position. I think that it is no problem to have this agree to disagree mentality. You be Catholics and we’ll be confessional Lutherans and Reformed. But is there some other foundation to bridge the gap.

Of course unity is attainable, or Jesus would not have commanded us to be ONE. Unity,however, lies in adherance to the Truth. It is not furthered by abandoning the faith that was handed down to us from the Apostles. There is no other foundation than that which has been laid, which is Jesus Christ. Catholics believe that Jesus’ is preserved infallibly by the Holy Spirit in His One Body, the Church. Because of that, we are not at liberty to jettison aspects of the One Faith as have our Lutheran and Reformed brethren. We are under Apostolic command to preserve that which was once for all deposited.

 

[guanophore]

I appreciate you post. Yeah the thing with the Joint Declaration is that confessional Lutherans, as I understand it, did not sighn that document. In a way they just moved towards the Roman Catholic position. As far as perseveriance goes it is not an exscuse to sin which seems to be the misconception.

We do, in principle, beleive that our doctrines are fallible. But can Roman Catholics stay true to Trent and yet reconcile to confessional Prostetants?

We are all called to love one another, and be reconciled to one another. This does not require that we abandon our faith.

In short is it possible for Roman Catholics to stay Roman Catholics and confessional Protestants stay confessional Prostetants?

Obviously this is possible, or it would not be happening.

I think you are asking; “Can there be unity” in this case. No, only disunity.

I just don’t see a way without one side moving towards the other. Maybe the answer to my question is there isn’t.

There are many ways to move toward one another. The Joint Declaration, for example, just clarified the Catholic faith, and corrected misconceptions that were rampant in Luther’s day and age. Since it affirms the Truth, it has a unifying result.

 

[Contarini]

I don’t think so. The human mind is finite, limited. God who is truth is infinite. We can only bear, comprehend so much. So we can not get it all. That does not mean we can not properly understand anything.

Yes, I think it does.

We can know the truths God revealed correctly to the limits of our finite abilities.

Yes, but for a finite mind to know infinite truth is like squaring the circle. It’s never going to be entirely correct.

Jesus said He would lead His Church into all truth.

Indeed. You and some other conservative Catholics seem to think that this means that we can now expect that the Church has been led into all truth. But given the obvious fact (acknowledged by Catholics) that doctrine develops, this doesn’t make any sense. When, according to you, was the Church “led into all truth”? At Pentecost? Then what happened with the development of the doctrine of the Trinity? Wasn’t that an example of the Spirit leading the Church to understand the truth more fully? Hasn’t this continued right up to the present? Won’t it continue in the future?

The promise is very real, but it refers to a continuous process, not something that can be declared to be finished at some point in the history of the Church.

Divine revelation enlightens human minds. You really are limiting God. He corrects us.

Definitely. I’m not disputing that.

You are saying it is impossible for God to fix what is broken in us enabling truth to be known for what it is.

Not at all. I’m simply saying that this is a continuous process.

Deliberate or indeliberate, error is error.

Certainly. But morally and spiritually deliberate embrace of error (or acquiescence in it) and the unintentional error to which humans are prone are two completely different things.

And how do you know when that is?

By a variety of ways, which would depend on the particular circumstances and the particular issue. There is no “magic bullet.” The efforts of both Catholics and Protestants to provide such a “bullet” have clearly failed. They are incoherent, and most good theologians on both sides now recognize this. That’s not the purpose of either Biblical or ecclesial infallibility.

As for my claim that no “set of doctrines” is entirely true or entirely false–note that I said “set of doctrines,” not “individual proposition.” I should perhaps have said more clearly “set of doctrines as held within a human mind or by a particular community in their full intellectual and social context.”

Of course you can abstract individual propositions and oppose them to each other in such a way that truth opposes error. But if you take the erroneous proposition and look at it in its full context as actually held by some particular heretic or heretical group, you will find that there’s some truth there, and that this truth plays a role in causing the heretics to question or reject orthodoxy.

 

[Contarini]

Never! Really! Jesus is the Son of God. Jesus is a created being.

The Arians were trying to oppose the Sabellian heresy (some of Athanasius’s theological allies, such as Marcellus of Ancyra, appear to have been pretty close to Sabellianism) and maintain the Biblical and traditional truths concerning the Father as sole arche, Jesus’ filial relationship with the Father, etc. (See Arius’s letter to Alexander for a statement of his concerns, though many people labeled “Arian” had little to do with Arius.)Eventually, the developed doctrine of the Trinity answered these questions more adequately than the original “homoousian” position had done.

Jesus was born of a virgin. Jesus was not born of a viirgin.

Have you ever looked at the arguments of theologians who question the virginal conception (Pannenberg, for instance)? Again, they have legitimate concerns about the way the virginal conception can be seen as the thing that makes Jesus divine, which actually contradicts orthodox Christology and makes Jesus a demigod rather than 100% human and 100% divine.

The Eucharist is the Body and Blood of Christ. The Eucharist is a symbol.

The Eucharist is a symbol–it’s just a lot more than a symbol! Zwingli had a lot of good points about the community becoming the Body and Blood of Christ, about the sacraments as a form of “soldier’s oath,” about the Eucharist as pointing to the eschatological banquet, etc. That doesn’t make him right in his denial of the Real Presence, of course.

Abortion is a grevous evil. A fetus is not a person and has no rights.

Again, if you actually read pro-choice writings, typically what they are concerned about is the way they see prolife folks treating women as mere “breeders,” vessels of reproduction. This is a valid concern to which prolife folks need to listen.

Souls go through a period of purification before entering heaven. Souls go directly to heaven or hell.

The Catholic Church today does not appear to teach that purgatory must involve time. Why? Because those who reject purgatory have made legitimate points. Contemporary concepts of purgatory make much less distinction between purgatory and heaven than some traditional ones did, while preserving the dogmatic truth that purgation does occur at/after death. This is one of the easier ones, actually (Arianism, the virginal conception, and abortion are relatively much more clear-cut in my opinion).

We should pray for the dead. That is nonsense.

At this point your reduction of the “erroneous” view to a simple proposition has become a caricature, with no positive content that can be evaluated at all. Again, look at what it is that they are affirming. Typically what you find them affirming is that this life is a time of decisive probation, which is true.

Saints in heaven love us and intercede for us and we should seek their intercession. No, that is not true.

Again, you’re simply giving a negative. Look at the point they are concerned to maintain and it will usually be something along the lines of Christ’s uniqueness as a Mediator. Which is, again, a legitimate point.

How many either or, black or white illustrations do you need?

We could keep this up all day for weeks if we had nothing else to do.

Just delete the always is and you will be fine. If you are right there is no hope that you or any human being will ever know and be able to embrace true religion.

You’re assuming that it has to be perfect or nothing. This is an unreasonable assumption.

Good grief! How about if one is right and the other is wrong? The Arians were wrong. Jesus is not a created being.

Indeed. But they were right that Christ is the only-begotten Son of the Father; that God is not divided into parts; that there is a real distinction and relationship between Christ and the Father; and so on.

The Manicheans were wrong.

About many things, certainly. But they were right to see salvation as a cosmic victory of light over darkness, and according to at least one scholar, they had a personal devotion to Jesus that was not prevalent in orthodox Christianity in their day and which deeply influenced Augustine and through him later Christianity (I’m not entirely sure this is true, but it’s an interesting idea).

I won’t try to do this for all the heretical groups you mention, but I could.

 

[Contarini]

They believed things that are false.

Certainly. But not only were not all of their beliefs false (it is of course impossible for anyone to believe anything that is wholly false, because falsehood, like all evil, is a defect and not a thing in itself), but they often affirmed truths that were the mirror images of the weaknesses in the beliefs and practices of their orthodox opponents. That’s the point I’m making. Not that all views are equally true, which I think is how you have misunderstood me. (I spoke simplistically, because you were speaking simplistically and I wanted to make a strong rhetorical point.)

The pagan Romans, Aztec human sacrificers, Greek mythologists, were wrong.

Really? Wrong from beginning to end, without qualification?

The Aztecs, for instance, were surely right about the need for blood sacrifice to keep the universe going. Both their myths speaking of the self-sacrifice of a god and their appalling practice of sacrificing human beings as a stand-in for that divine sacrifice pointed to the truth of the willing self-sacrifice of the God-man.

Minerva did not spring from her father Zeus’s head when his head burst one day from a headache.

Wisdom does not spring like a virgin from the mind of God?

The tooth fairy doesn’t leave quarters under your pillow.

At that point we’ve left anything that could be called a “set of doctrines” far behind, and I don’t think I’m obligated to find some truth there (though I probably could if I tried hard enough, such as that outgrowing childishness has its rewards!).

We are not going to arrive at unity by making everyone right

Of course not by claiming that everyone is entirely right. But we will move toward unity insofar as we are willing to see what is right in the positions of the other.

by harmonizing contradicting statements about reality

Apparent contradiction is not always real contradiction, and when two human beings or human groups maintain opposite propositions, more likely than not there is truth in each which corresponds to the error (or simply lack of complete perception of the truth) in the other.

The pope is the head of the universal church, or Henry VIII is the head of the Church of England.

This dichotomy would surprise most Catholic monarchs of the Middle Ages or the early modern period. I’m actually more likely to agree that Henry VIII was entirely wrong than Catholics at any point between Constantine and Vatican II would have been. . . .

Early modern Catholics lived the reality that you claim to be a contradiction!

Again, if you look at the positive claim of the 16th century Anglicans, it has to do with the unity of the Christian commonwealth, which definitely does have some truth in it.

As the pope he says Henry is wrong, or the pope has no ecclesial jusrisdiction in England.

Or maybe the Pope did claim certain kinds of temporal rights that were not entirely appropriate, without Henry’s outright rejection of papal authority being correct?

And so on, and so forth.

What I am arguing, while not uniquely Anglican, is certainly influenced by the Anglican theologian F. D. Maurice, who said that people are typically right in what they affirm, but wrong in what they deny. Now this is a bit too simple, because affirmation and denial go together. But it’s true insofar as any person or group–particularly a large group of people including devout and sincere individuals–is going to be affirming some truth even in the midst of their error. And more controversially, when they differ from other sincere and devout people it will be because each side sees some aspect of the truth that the other side doesn’t perceive as clearly.

This does not mean that everyone is equally right. I agree with you that there is in fact a difference between imperfect truth and error. The difference is that an imperfect statement of the truth doesn’t block the way to further truth. An error, doctrinally speaking, is a statement that outright contradicts revealed truth in some way, so that until the statement is repented of it is impossible to perceive that portion of the truth. The Catholic claim, as I understand that, is that the Holy Spirit prevents the Church from officially teaching doctrinal error of that kind. Nothing I have said here contradicts that claim.

There really is a difference between heresy and orthodoxy. But the difference is not that one is entirely right and the other entirely wrong, or even (more reasonably) that the former is wrong in every place where it opposes the currently articulated form of the latter. The difference is that heresy formally and explicitly contradicts some truth revealed by God, while orthodoxy does not. That’s why heresy is so important in the development of orthodoxy. Look at any doctrinal conflict in the history of the Church and you see this pattern. A heretic teaches something that contradicts revealed truth, but emphasizes a truth that needs to be further developed. Defenders of orthodoxy come up with articulations of the truth that attempt to answer the heretic’s challenge. Usually these are very far from adequate, at first. The heretics keep refining their objections, and the orthodox keep refining their defenses. This goes on until the orthodox position comes to embrace whatever truth is found in the heretical position.

And that, I submit, is one of the principal means by which the Holy Spirit continues to lead the Church into the fullness of truth!

In Christ,

Edwin

 

[CopticChristian]

Certainly. But not only were not all of their beliefs false (it is of course impossible for anyone to believe anything that is wholly false, because falsehood, like all evil, is a defect and not a thing in itself), but they often affirmed truths that were the mirror images of the weaknesses in the beliefs and practices of their orthodox opponents. That’s the point I’m making. Not that all views are equally true, which I think is how you have misunderstood me. (I spoke simplistically, because you were speaking simplistically and I wanted to make a strong rhetorical point.)

Really? Wrong from beginning to end, without qualification?

The Aztecs, for instance, were surely right about the need for blood sacrifice to keep the universe going. Both their myths speaking of the self-sacrifice of a god and their appalling practice of sacrificing human beings as a stand-in for that divine sacrifice pointed to the truth of the willing self-sacrifice of the God-man.

Wisdom does not spring like a virgin from the mind of God?

At that point we’ve left anything that could be called a “set of doctrines” far behind, and I don’t think I’m obligated to find some truth there (though I probably could if I tried hard enough, such as that outgrowing childishness has its rewards!).

Of course not by claiming that everyone is entirely right. But we will move toward unity insofar as we are willing to see what is right in the positions of the other.

Apparent contradiction is not always real contradiction, and when two human beings or human groups maintain opposite propositions, more likely than not there is truth in each which corresponds to the error (or simply lack of complete perception of the truth) in the other.

This dichotomy would surprise most Catholic monarchs of the Middle Ages or the early modern period. I’m actually more likely to agree that Henry VIII was entirely wrong than Catholics at any point between Constantine and Vatican II would have been. . . .

What I am arguing, while not uniquely Anglican, is certainly influenced by the Anglican theologian F. D. Maurice, who said that people are typically right in what they affirm, but wrong in what they deny. Now this is a bit too simple, because affirmation and denial go together. But it’s true insofar as any person or group–particularly a large group of people including devout and sincere individuals–is going to be affirming some truth even in the midst of their error. And more controversially, when they differ from other sincere and devout people it will be because each side sees some aspect of the truth that the other side doesn’t perceive as clearly.

This does not mean that everyone is equally right. I agree with you that there is in fact a difference between imperfect truth and error. The difference is that an imperfect statement of the truth doesn’t block the way to further truth. An error, doctrinally speaking, is a statement that outright contradicts revealed truth in some way, so that until the statement is repented of it is impossible to perceive that portion of the truth. The Catholic claim, as I understand that, is that the Holy Spirit prevents the Church from officially teaching doctrinal error of that kind. Nothing I have said here contradicts that claim.

There really is a difference between heresy and orthodoxy. But the difference is not that one is entirely right and the other entirely wrong, or even (more reasonably) that the former is wrong in every place where it opposes the currently articulated form of the latter. The difference is that heresy formally and explicitly contradicts some truth revealed by God, while orthodoxy does not. That’s why heresy is so important in the development of orthodoxy. Look at any doctrinal conflict in the history of the Church and you see this pattern. A heretic teaches something that contradicts revealed truth, but emphasizes a truth that needs to be further developed. Defenders of orthodoxy come up with articulations of the truth that attempt to answer the heretic’s challenge. Usually these are very far from adequate, at first. The heretics keep refining their objections, and the orthodox keep refining their defenses. This goes on until the orthodox position comes to embrace whatever truth is found in the heretical position.

And that, I submit, is one of the principal means by which the Holy Spirit continues to lead the Church into the fullness of truth!

In Christ,

Edwin

You will have difficulty in your thinking believing that there is no possibility to believe that it is not possible to believe something that is entirely false. For this to be true you must believe that it is impossible to believe something is entirely true.

2+2= 4. This is entirely true.

2+2= 3 This is entirely false.

If you believe as you say concerning heresy and orthodoxy then the only way any Protestant in the Reformed position is to recognize where they have accepted heresy and where they have accepted orhtodoxy. The orthodoxy comes from what they learned as transmitted in time from the OHCAC. The heretical belief once corrected then becomes orhtodoxy. Union will only be as individuals not as ecclesial communities. There are few if any ecclesial communities that have the abilities to correct heresy to orhtodoxy and unite. The Anglicans have been evidence of a group.

 

[IggyAntiochus]

As far as the confessional Lutheran rejection of the Joint Declaration goes, I’m not sure that this stemmed from an actual conflict with the confessions so much as confessional Lutherans’ dislike of any form of ecumenism–but I could be wrong.

Edwin

While I certainly grant that we do tend to be indifferent toward ecumenism with Rome (and anyone else for that matter), confessional Lutherans did not agree with the document because it doesn’t say anything substantially different than what Rome has been saying for the last five hundred years. The LWF churches that did agree to it no longer maintain any kind of theological orthodoxy anyway, so I am not sure how much weight it carries even in Roman circles, let alone Lutheran ones.