What would science have to do to disprove Catholicism?

[PRmerger]

This reaction is pretty bizarre to me.

Me: Catholics base some beliefs on the OT.

Again, please understand this: we do NOT “base some beliefs” on the OT. Nor on the NT.

Our beliefs do not come from the Bible.

Please review this over and over so that you can stop making this mistake.

Again:

[SIGN1]Our beliefs do not come from the Bible.[/SIGN1]

[SIGN1]Catholicism was whole and entire before a single Bible was ever completed[/SIGN1]

 

[PRmerger]

So which is it?

Both/And, JK.

That’s what makes Catholicism so formidable to argue against. The ever-present and irrefutable Both/And.

But let’s be clear: we use all of what we have been given to come to a knowledge of truth: the Scriptures, science, philosophy, etc etc.

But that’s not to say that Catholicism gets its doctrines from the Bible.

The Catholic faith existed before the Bible.

Think about your history, JK.

When was the Bible put together?

In the 4th century at the earliest.

So how could the early Christians extract doctrines from something which didn’t even exist?

So think about how silly what you keep proposing is…

 

[Usagi]

Has ever the church changed His mind on a topic?

Her. The Church is referred to as a she (Bride of Christ and all that).

The Church has changed many of her customs and practices over time.

The Church has changed her practical moral conclusions (loosening up on whether charging interest or committing suicide is always mortally sinful; tightening up on when in a pregnancy abortion is equivalent to murder) because of an improved understanding of economics, psychology, or biology, but has not altered the underlying principles.

The Church has promoted certain teachings to more certain status (the Immaculate Comception, the ability of the papal office to teach infallibly on its own, the Assumption) and clarified that others are common theological opinion but not formal Church teaching (limbo of infants), but has not gone back on a certain teaching.

 

[Usagi]

Both/And, JK.

That’s what makes Catholicism so formidable to argue against. The ever-present and irrefutable Both/And.

But let’s be clear: we use all of what we have been given to come to a knowledge of truth: the Scriptures, science, philosophy, etc etc.

But that’s not to say that Catholicism gets its doctrines from the Bible.

The Catholic faith existed before the Bible.

Think about your history, JK.

When was the Bible put together?

In the 4th century at the earliest.

So how could the early Christians extract doctrines from something which didn’t even exist?

So think about how silly what you keep proposing is…

I know what you are getting at, but be careful with this claim.

The Old Testament of course pre-existed the Church and was used heavily to back up its teachings about Jesus.

The New Testament was completed by the mid-second century at the latest, and there’s still a decent chance it was complete by the end of the first.

Documentation of the complete Catholic canon does not appear until the late fourth century, but the Scriptures were already widely used in the liturgy and in the writings of the Fathers before that.

Yes, the New Testament (and the Christian understanding of the Old Testament) grew out of the pre-existing Tradition and within the pre-existing Church. No early Christian would have recommended just handing someone a Gospel text or a collection of Paul’s letters and expecting them to be led by the Spirit to the Faith independent of the Christian community. But the inspired writings provide “raw data” about the lives and teachings of Jesus and the Apostles that otherwise would have been unavailable after the first generation – data that was vital in settling later matters, like the establishment of the fully developed doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation.

Catholicism looks at the Bible differently than many of the Protestant groups do – as the work of the community, reflecting its traditions, rather than as an independent source of teaching existing outside and above the community – but insisting that we do not rely on the Bible as the source and evidence for much of what we know about our spiritual ancestors and their teachings is a perilous endeavor.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Again, please understand this: we do NOT “base some beliefs” on the OT. Nor on the NT.

Our beliefs do not come from the Bible.

Please review this over and over so that you can stop making this mistake.

Again:

[SIGN1]Our beliefs do not come from the Bible.[/SIGN1]

[SIGN1]Catholicism was whole and entire before a single Bible was ever completed[/SIGN1]

Now it seems to me you’re contradicting the very Chatechism of the church here.

vatican.va/archive/ccc_css/archive/catechism/p1s1c2a3.htm

The inspired books teach the truth. “Since therefore all that the inspired authors or sacred writers affirm should be regarded as affirmed by the Holy Spirit, we must acknowledge that the books of Scripture firmly, faithfully, and without error teach that truth which God, for the sake of our salvation, wished to see confided to the Sacred Scriptures.”

Still, the Christian faith is not a “religion of the book.” Christianity is the religion of the “Word” of God, a word which is “not a written and mute word, but the Word is incarnate and living”. If the Scriptures are not to remain a dead letter, Christ, the eternal Word of the living God, must, through the Holy Spirit, “open [our] minds to understand the Scriptures.”

Now you certainly are right that there was a time when Catholics didn’t need the scriptures (because they could just ask Jesus or his disciples in person,) but I don’t think anyone can argue that this is a viable option today. Instead, as the catechism points out, the bible is the “principle source” of God’s teaching.

the books of the Old Testament bear witness to the whole divine pedagogy of God’s saving love: these writings “are a storehouse of sublime teaching on God and of sound wisdom on human life, as well as a wonderful treasury of prayers; in them, too, the mystery of our salvation is present in a hidden way…”

Early Christian catechesis made constant use of the Old Testament.

The Gospels are the heart of all the Scriptures "because they are our principal source for the life and teaching of the Incarnate Word, our Savior…

 

[PRmerger]

I know what you are getting at, but be careful with this claim.

Well, as with most things, it needs to be understood with some nuance.

The Old Testament of course pre-existed the Church and was used heavily to back up its teachings about Jesus.

The New Testament was completed by the mid-second century at the latest, and there’s still a decent chance it was complete by the end of the first.

Documentation of the complete Catholic canon does not appear until the late fourth century, but the Scriptures were already widely used in the liturgy and in the writings of the Fathers before that.

Yes, the New Testament (and the Christian understanding of the Old Testament) grew out of the pre-existing Tradition and within the pre-existing Church. No early Christian would have recommended just handing someone a Gospel text or a collection of Paul’s letters and expecting them to be led by the Spirit to the Faith independent of the Christian community.

Again, the Christian faith was whole and entire before a single word of the NT was ever put to papyrus.

But the inspired writings provide “raw data” about the lives and teachings of Jesus and the Apostles that otherwise would have been unavailable after the first generation – data that was vital in settling later matters, like the establishment of the fully developed doctrines of the Trinity and the Incarnation.

Catholicism looks at the Bible differently than many of the Protestant groups do – as the work of the community, reflecting its traditions, rather than as an independent source of teaching existing outside and above the community – but insisting that we do not rely on the Bible as the source and evidence for much of what we know about our spiritual ancestors and their teachings is a perilous endeavor.

No one is saying we don’t rely on the Bible as evidence for what we know about our spiritual ancestors.

 

[PRmerger]

Now you certainly are right that there was a time when Catholics didn’t need the scriptures (because they could just ask Jesus or his disciples in person,) but I don’t think anyone can argue that this is a viable option today. Instead, as the catechism points out, the bible is the “principle source” of God’s teaching.

No, JK. The Scriptures are to be revered and are the principal source of our knowledge of Christ, but we do not extract our doctrines from the pages of a book, no matter how holy.

If you look at this Holy Book, it tells us that the faith was given, ONCE FOR ALL, to the saints. (see Jude 1:3)

And that means, logically, that our teachings came from Christ, through His Church, and the ancient texts which supported these teachings became part of our Bible.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

If you look at this Holy Book, it tells us that the faith was given, ONCE FOR ALL, to the saints. (see Jude 1:3)

And that means, logically, that our teachings came from Christ, through His Church, and the ancient texts which supported these teachings became part of our Bible.

The church doesn’t base its beliefs on the bible because the bible says that we should listen to the saints, some of whom wrote down their teachings in the bible…

I’m not saying the church bases ALL its teachings EXCLUSIVELY on the bible, I never have been. But church teachings and the bible are so heavily interconnected that even in defending the idea that church teachings are independent from the bible you invoked… the bible.

 

[PRmerger]

The church doesn’t base its beliefs on the bible because the bible says that we should listen to the saints, some of whom wrote down their teachings in the bible…

No. The Church doesn’t base its beliefs on the Bible, and the Bible confirms this.

I’m not saying the church bases ALL its teachings EXCLUSIVELY on the bible, I never have been. But church teachings and the bible are so heavily interconnected that even in defending the idea that church teachings are independent from the bible you invoked… the bible.

Interconnected, yes.

But you should never say this (below) again, if you want to sound informed about Catholicism.

1a. Someone points out that some key part of the old testament is factually inaccurate, and so doesn’t serve as a reliable basis for religious belief X.

We do not distill our beliefs from a book, no matter how holy.

Islam, Protestantism, yes.

"Still, the Christian faith is not a "religion of the book."–Catechism of the Catholic Church

 

[JapaneseKappa]

We do not distill our beliefs from a book, no matter how holy.

Islam, Protestantism, yes.

"Still, the Christian faith is not a "religion of the book."–Catechism of the Catholic Church

So what would you say is the basis for the Church’s belief:
crisismagazine.com/2014/did-adam-and-eve-really-exist

First, Church teaching about Adam and Eve has not, and cannot, change. The fact remains that a literal Adam and Eve are unchanging Catholic doctrine… In paragraphs 396-406, the Catechism of the Catholic Church, speaks of Adam and Eve as a single mating pair who “committed a personal sin” (CCC, 404).

If not the bible?

 

[Wesrock]

So what would you say is the basis for the Church’s belief:
crisismagazine.com/2014/did-adam-and-eve-really-exist

If not the bible?

Just want to pipe in that this is not inherently unreconcilable with the current scientific concensus on the evolution of man being from a population of thousands.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

Just want to pipe in that this is not inherently unreconcilable with the current scientific concensus on the evolution of man being from a population of thousands.

In the article I cited:

Today, many think that Pope Pius XII’s encyclical Humani generis did not definitively exclude theological polygenism. What they fail to notice, though, is that the Holy Father clearly insists that Scripture and the Magisterium affirm that original sin “proceeds from a sin truly committed by one Adam [ab uno Adamo]” and that this sin is transmitted to all true human beings through generation (para. 37). This proves that denial of a literal Adam (and his spouse, Eve) as the sole first genuinely human parents of all true human beings is not theologically tenable.

 

[thinkandmull]

I lost track of where this forum was going. However, Jimmy Akin claimed in the This Rock magazine that it is a philosophical absurdity for a mind to be merged into a computer. What if it was done though? Would this disprove Catholicism? On the History channel on Wednesday’s night they are having a show about it. People want to live forever in computers. The church says that the soul is the form of the body. But what if the body died and the soul became trapped in a computer before it went to judgment?

 

[JapaneseKappa]

I lost track of where this forum was going. However, Jimmy Akin claimed in the This Rock magazine that it is a philosophical absurdity for a mind to be merged into a computer. What if it was done though? Would this disprove Catholicism? On the History channel on Wednesday’s night they are having a show about it. People want to live forever in computers. The church says that the soul is the form of the body. But what if the body died and the soul became trapped in a computer before it went to judgment?

The only other natural-world claim I can think of is the existence of a soul. But I suspect that even if a natural basis for things like intellect and emotions was discovered, the cry would go out:

The church never issued a formal doctrine on exactly which functions the soul is responsible for. Even though all mental processes are now explained via natural phenomena, the soul still exists!

I think a mind → machine transfer would just be a demonstration of the natural basis for intellect/emotion/etc. I think the response would be the same; although the church would probably declare the transfer to be a violence to the human person and therefore immoral for Catholics to undergo.

 

[oyaji]

Science will never ever ever prove the God does not exist…or exist. And it reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of science, and God, to say that science has ANYTHING to say about the existence or non-existence of God.

 

[PRmerger]

Science will never ever ever prove the God does not exist…or exist. And it reveals a fundamental misunderstanding of science, and God, to say that science has ANYTHING to say about the existence or non-existence of God.

But science could prove that Jesus is not divine.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

Does anyone have information on which scientists or groups are anti-Christian and want to do something scientific that destroys the faith? Can we ever trust them on scientific accomplishments?

Science and philosophy are two different realms of thought with very different standards of proof or evidence, or even intuition, imagination, and inspiration.

I don’t know of any scientific groups that are bent on destroying faith. There are certainly as many or more scientists with faith than without it, though the ones without it tend to be more theatrical in their opposition to it, such a Richard Dawkins is. But I think a great many scientists see no opposition between faith and science if they are not victims of scientism, which is the view that only scientism can be trusted to find truth.

 

[Charlemagne_III]

But science could prove that Jesus is not divine.

I think not.

 

[JapaneseKappa]

I think not.

I don’t think so either, except in the sense that science could “prove” Jesus didn’t exist in the first place. (Can’t be divine if you don’t exist.)

(yes, science can’t prove nonexistence)
(I mean “prove” in the sense of “find strong evidence against his existence.”)

 

[goout]

I don’t think so either, except in the sense that science could “prove” Jesus didn’t exist in the first place. (Can’t be divine if you don’t exist.)

(yes, science can’t prove nonexistence)
(I mean “prove” in the sense of “find strong evidence against his existence.”)

And that’s it in a nutshell.
Science does wonderfully what it does, and at the same time it can’t tell us much about being, meaning, identity, purpose.
It’s great, and it’s limited. What’s beyond those limitations?