Truth: is it relative or not?

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I’d prefer not to answer that question on this thread, as I am afraid it would devolve into something that this thread is not. In this thread, I just want to discuss the nature of truth, as Biblically presented, and as passed down through the 100 or so generations of humans who have formulated the Catholic positions.
 
philophoser said:
Years 33-1000 AD - God absolves people of their sins.
Years 1001-2020 - Priests absolve people of their sins.
Which of these competing and separate views is true?
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They are neither separate nor competing. God gives the Priest the authority to forgive sins in God’s name. In forgiving sin the priest acts as God’s agent, this has always been understood.
philophoser said:
Church: “Catholic, the church is the source of all truth in manners of doctrine and cannot err.”
Catholic: “why?”
Church: “because we said so.”
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No. The Church is the pillar and foundation of truth because Jesus said so.
The overwhelming evidence from Sacred Scripture and from extra-biblical historical documentation is that Jesus founded a Church with a visible, hierarchical teaching authority vested in the successor to St. Peter and the Bishops in union with him: the Magesterium of the Catholic Church.
 
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What a great resource. Thank you! I’m on my way to church right now but I will prayerfully read over that excellent looking collection of sources you have compiled.
 
philophoser said:
This does nothing of the sort. The “quote” written in the article, “Would the heretics dare to come to the very seat of Peter whence apostolic faith is derived and whither no errors can come ?”, appears to be a purposeful mistranslation perpetrated by an author named Karl Keating to “prove” exactly this, but the text says nothing of the sort.
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Are you qualified to judge it to be a purposeful mistranslation? What is your proof for that claim?
philophoser said:
Elsewhere, Cyprian explicitly denied the authority of one man, the bishop of Rome, to decide truth.
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Your conclusion is faulty.
Consider: teaching must be tested, to be in conformance, and not in contradiction to truth. The pope does not act on his own but in unity with the bishops, as Jesus directed, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. The council at Carthage did that, and the pope was persuaded. That’s how it works.

Same at Antioch. Paul admonished, and Peter repented. Simon Peter, not a good choice by human standards, yet chosen by Christ to lead His Church on earth. (Awesome God!)
 
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philophoser said:
Even more egregious is that Keating also appears to be the first person to quote Augustine as saying “Rome has spoken, the case is concluded”
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Are you disputing that Augustine said instead:
“Roma locuta; causa finita est”

(P.S. I doubt Keating is that old, I could be wrong.)
philophoser said:
The actual quote is “for already on this matter two councils have sent to the Apostolic See, whence also rescripts have come. The cause is finished, would that the error may terminate likewise.” That is, he takes the final appeal to the bishop in Rome to be the last gasp of this specific matter , a matter that is now concluded.
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As above, bishops united with the Pope under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. That’s how it works.
 
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“Paul admonished, and Peter repented.”.

Where does it say that Peter repented? As far as I know, it doesn’t say who won the argument. Somewhere Paul says that he is a gentile with the gentiles and a jew with the jews, which would suggest that he lost the argument with Peter.
 
It was Peter who changed his approach by agreeing not to require circumcision of the Gentiles according to Jewish law.

Edit: @JM3, the one I think about diet is related to Peter’s dream about all kinds of animals showing him the new law freed Christians from the dietary laws so he could eat with Gentiles.
 
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Yes, sometimes the other bishops submitted to the bishop in Rome and sometimes the bishop in Rome submitted to the other bishops. It depended on who was right and who was wrong. Sometimes the bishop in Rome was right and sometimes he was wrong. Until a bishop in Rome one day decided. “Hey, maybe we’re never wrong…”
Whoever this was that created this doctrine, though, it wasn’t Augustine and it wasn’t Cyprian. Regardless of how their words are translated, their actions proved otherwise.
 
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  1. We need the complete context. Are you alleging that Pope Gregory taught against the four remaining Sacraments? No? Well then…
  2. Both are true - it is a change in form only.
  3. So? We do not hang on every proclamation of every individual. That is chaos.
  4. Get a catechism. and have a read.
  5. NOT saying that you are overthinking, but it is epidemic in our age.
 
philophoser said:
From what I read in that article, there are people saved through God’s grace and the sacraments of the Catholic church and certain people of the invincibly ignorant class who seek God and do good works. Is there some other group or class of people who can be saved?
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Excellent question. Which I’ll answer obliquely…
Variations of The Golden Rule are v.widespread amongst many believe systems…
Imagining a nation of individuals - all in alignment w/it…
With The Golden Rule as the background… view this…

21 Not every one that saith to me, Lord, Lord, shall enter into the kingdom of heaven: but he that does the will of my Father who is in heaven, he shall enter into the kingdom of heaven.

22 Many will say to me in that day: Lord, Lord, have not we prophesied in thy name, and cast out devils in thy name, and done many miracles in thy name?

23 And then will I profess unto them, I never knew you: depart from me, you that work iniquity.

24 Every one that hears my words, and does them, shall be likened to a wise man that built his house upon a rock.

============================

25 On one occasion an expert in the law stood up to test Jesus. “Teacher,” he asked, “what must I do to inherit eternal life?”

26 “What is written in the Law?” he replied. “How do you read it?”

27 He answered, “‘Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind’
and, ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.

28 “You have answered correctly,” Jesus replied. “Do this and you will live.”

29 But he wanted to justify himself, so he asked Jesus, “And who is my neighbor?”

30 In reply Jesus said: “A man was going down from Jerusalem to Jericho, when he was attacked by robbers. They stripped him of his clothes, beat him and went away, leaving him half dead. 31 A priest happened to be going down the same road, and when he saw the man, he passed by on the other side. 32 So too, a Levite, when he came to the place and saw him, passed by on the other side. 33 But a Samaritan, as he traveled, came where the man was; and when he saw him, he took pity on him. 34 He went to him and bandaged his wounds, pouring on oil and wine. Then he put the man on his own donkey, brought him to an inn and took care of him. 35 The next day he took out two denarii and gave them to the innkeeper. ‘Look after him,’ he said, ‘and when I return, I will reimburse you for any extra expense you may have.’

36 “Which of these three do you think was a neighbor to the man who fell into the hands of robbers?”

37 The expert in the law replied, “The one who had mercy on him.”

Jesus told him, “Go and do likewise.”
 
It would appear that at this point in your life, invincible ignorance may apply to you.
 
Everybody keeps avoiding that question (how are people admitted into heaven or purgatory) but also acting like I should know the answer. Is this a hard doctrine to understand? Is the answer unknowable? What’s the deal?
tafan2 said:
It would appear that at this point in your life, invincible ignorance may apply to you.
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In what way? I know all the things that the Catholic Church wants me to do. But I don’t do them.
 
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philophoser said:
Everybody keeps avoiding that question (how are people admitted into heaven or purgatory) but also acting like I should know the answer. Is this a hard doctrine to understand? Is the answer unknowable? What’s the deal?
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I haven’t… Yes?
 
  1. Judgement belongs to Jesus. He knows who is going and who is not.
  2. Luke 6:46
 
philophoser said:
In what way? I know all the things that the Catholic Church wants me to do. But I don’t do them.
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You have a background that seemingly precludes you from accepting the truth. Others have a much more strict definition of invincible ignorance. Having spent a lot of time around cradle Protestants, I find that it is very difficult for most to even consider many of the Church’s teachings as true.

BTW, I don’t know if the question in the thread totke has been answered. Truth, by definition, cannot be relative. One can ask/debate if we can ever know what is true. But one cannot ask if truth is relative.

Truth:. that which is true or in accordance with fact or reality.
 
tafan2 said:
You have a background that seemingly precludes you from accepting the truth.
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Yet, when p responds … it comes across as if it’s intended to be not untrue…

Relativism posing as true Can not support itself…
 
Maybe a different example will explain my question about whether truth is relative in Catholicism.
AD 50 - Paul writes Titus, says that a priest can be “husband of one wife.”
AD 1100 - people are now disqualified from holding the priesthood because they are “husband of one wife.”

Does this mean that what Paul wrote was true for AD 50 but false for AD 1100 (or 2020 for that matter)?
 
philophoser said:
Maybe a different example will explain my question about whether truth is relative in Catholicism.
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In Christianity… Truth is about as Opposite to Relativism as is possible.

Jesus IS TRUTH …

What you’re doing is merely sifting for undotted ‘i’s’ in a failed debunking effort?
 
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