Why don't Protestants learn Catholic Church history?

[GKC]

That’s setting an incredibly low bar for belonging to protestantism.

A compromise question: do you consider Anglo-Papalists to be Anglican or RC?

 

[Little_Sheep]

They are inside the barque of Peter. They might not like being in it, but they are inside.

The early Protestants did not do what lapsed Catholics or rebellious Catholics do. Keep that firmly in mind. The early Protestants said, We have no Pope. Not, he is wrong, no. He does not exist, they said.

They said that the man claiming to be the Pope is unauthorized and should not exist.

In so saying, they broke their branches off of the True Vine of Jesus Christ. They weren’t simply going in a different direction as the Jesuits or the Carmelites did. No. They were completely reinventing everything, from the ground up.

Your history began with King Henry VIII when he made himself Pope of the English Church.

I so appreciate your response! I understand what they said and believed at that point in history. I disagree that this belief lopped us from the Vine. Visit TEC today and you will see that it is in no way, shape or form “reinvented from the ground up.”

I am a catechist in TEC, guiding a Level 1 atrium via Catechesis of the Good Shepherd (a ministry formed and founded by Catholics). My church shares our atrium with a Catholic group that uses it on a different day of the week. The atrium is filled with handcrafted religious items that invite the 3-6 year old child to enter into the fullness of God’s revelation, and meaningful teachings that invite the child into the faith and into a deeper relationship with God and with His son, the Good Shepherd.

My point in revealing this fact is this: very very little has to be changed in the atrium for it to welcome young seekers of God, whether they are Episcopalian or Catholic. We are more alike than you choose to see.

Did we (TEC) go in a different direction? In fact, we did. Does that matter? For some, perhaps, but clearly not for me. My experience is that some Catholics seek different directions as well.

 

[Little_Sheep]

That’s setting an incredibly low bar for belonging to protestantism.

A compromise question: do you consider Anglo-Papalists to be Anglican or RC?

Low bar…hardly, my friend. It’s simply a fair question to which you gave a slick “answer.”

I consider them to be both, just as I consider TEC to be Catholic, but not Roman Catholic.

 

[benhur]

But I believe there is both Christ and error in all of our churches, no matter their denomination.

Hi LS,

I think in such disputes this scripture may apply,

“yea, let God be true, but every man a liar;” Rom3:4

God’s promises are not altered by our errors, even factionalism. In fact, they magnify His grace and righteousness. Despite our bickering and errors, we will all be presented as a spotless Bride. The unified saints will go marching in.

Blessings

 

[GKC]

CS Lewis would pen, “the unhistorical, without knowing it, are usually enslaved to a fairly recent past”. I think the context was a written in context of papal history, or at least I found it in a history book on the pope written by a Jesuit.

**I do not think you need fear that the study of a dead period, however prolonged and however sympathetic, need prove an indulgence in nostalgia or an enslavement to the past. In the individual fife, as the psychologists have taught us, it is not the remembered but the forgotten past that enslaves us. I think the same is true of society. To study the past does indeed liberate us from the present, from the idols of our own market-place. But I think it liberates us from the past too. I think no class of men are less enslaved to the past than historians. The unhistorical are usually, without knowing it, enslaved to a fairly recent past. Dante read Virgil. Certain other medieval authors evolved the legend of Virgil as a great magician. It was the more recent past, the whole quality of mind evolved during a few preceding centuries, which impelled them to do so. Dante was freer; he also knew more of the past. And you will be no freer by coming to misinterpret Old Western Culture as quickly and deeply as those medievals misinterpreted Classical Antiquity; or even as the Romantics misinterpreted the Middle Ages.Such misinterpretation has already begun. To arrest its growth while arrest is still possible is surely a proper task for a university. **

De Descriptione Temporum

Lewis’ Inaugural lecture at Cambridge, given by Lewis on 11/29/54, in

SELECTED LITERARY ESSAYS (ed. Hooper), chap. 1, page 12 ( Cambridge University Press, 1979 tpb ed).

Naught to do with the Pope.

 

[Little_Sheep]

Hi LS,

I think in such disputes this scripture may apply,

“yea, let God be true, but every man a liar;” Rom3:4

God’s promises are not altered by our errors. In fact, they magnify His grace and righteousness. Despite our bickering and errors, we will all be presented as a spotless Bride. The unified saints will go marching in.

Blessings

Thank you, BH.

That is a beautiful piece of Scripture and not one I had at my tongue.

I agree with you to the mystery and beyond that “God’s promises are not altered by our errors.” Ever.

 

[benhur]

**I do not think you need fear that the study of a dead period, however prolonged and however sympathetic, need prove an indulgence in nostalgia or an enslavement to the past. In the individual fife, as the psychologists have taught us, it is not the remembered but the forgotten past that enslaves us. I think the same is true of society. To study the past does indeed liberate us from the present, from the idols of our own market-place. But I think it liberates us from the past too. I think no class of men are less enslaved to the past than historians. The unhistorical are usually, without knowing it, enslaved to a fairly recent past. Dante read Virgil. Certain other medieval authors evolved the legend of Virgil as a great magician. It was the more recent past, the whole quality of mind evolved during a few preceding centuries, which impelled them to do so. Dante was freer; he also knew more of the past. And you will be no freer by coming to misinterpret Old Western Culture as quickly and deeply as those medievals misinterpreted Classical Antiquity; or even as the Romantics misinterpreted the Middle Ages.Such misinterpretation has already begun. To arrest its growth while arrest is still possible is surely a proper task for a university. **

De Descriptione Temporum

Lewis’ Inaugural lecture at Cambridge, given by Lewis on 11/29/54, in

SELECTED LITERARY ESSAYS (ed. Hooper), chap. 1, page 12 ( Cambridge University Press, 1979 tpb ed).

Naught to do with the Pope.

Hi G’

I do recall someone on CAF is very,very knowledgeable of Lewis, and have had past postings with them. Perhaps it was you . I am bad with remembering names though, and who said what. So thanks. and by the way, I absolutely understood little of your Lewis post/quote. Maybe after reading it fifty times. Humbling, and just when i thought I had some wit.

Blessings

 

[GKC]

Hi G’

I do recall someone on CAF is very,very knowledgeable of Lewis, and have had past postings with them. Perhaps it was you . I am bad with remembering names though, and who said what. So thanks. and by the way, I absolutely understood little of your Lewis post/quote. Maybe after reading it fifty times. Humbling, and just when i thought I had some wit.

Blessings

It possibly was me. Lewis is one of my long (50 years plus) hobbies. And I have posted on him many times.

He’s saying something a little bit like what the oft discussed Newman quote was suggesting, without referring to religion in particular. It is good and liberating to be deep in history.

True.

 

[benhur]

Thank you, BH.

That is a beautiful piece of Scripture and not one I had at my tongue.

I agree with you to the mystery and beyond that “God’s promises are not altered by our errors.” Ever.

Hi LS,’

Thank .It’s encouraging and glad to meet you. Welcome.

While I believe in certain dispensations, and changing of covenants and testaments, God is still the same yesterday, today, and tomorrow.

Judaism was not perfect, infallible, and even had some bad doctrine and practices ( leaven), with factions. Yet God was faithful, and she delivered perfectly, giving us the Messiah. So much so, that despite ‘error’, imperfection, factions, Christ proclaims, “Salvation is of the Jews”.

Is it not the same with the church age ?

Blessings

 

[Peter_J]

Low bar…hardly, my friend.

Really? You don’t think that saying that *Catholics who don’t accept everything the Catholic Church believes automatically become Protestants *would be “setting an incredibly low bar for belonging to protestantism”?

(Not trying to be redundant, just want to make sure we aren’t simply misunderstanding each other.)

 

[benhur]

It possibly was me. Lewis is one of my long (50 years plus) hobbies. And I have posted on him many times.

He’s saying something a little bit like what the oft discussed Newman quote was suggesting, without referring to religion in particular. It is good and liberating to be deep in history.

True.

I think twas you .

And that since the beginning, in the garden. Satan with his, “Hath not God (really) said…?.” was the first historical revisionist, and the long enslavement began.

Blessings

 

[GKC]

I think twas you .

And that since the beginning, in the garden. Satan with his, “Hath not God (really) said…?.” was the first historical revisionist, and the long enslavement began.

Blessings

Which is a good thing to know.

 

[Little_Sheep]

Really? You don’t think that saying that *Catholics who don’t accept everything the Catholic Church believes automatically become Protestants *would be “setting an incredibly low bar for belonging to protestantism”?

(Not trying to be redundant, just want to make sure we aren’t simply misunderstanding each other.)

I really don’t (but I respect your incredulity).

 

[Peter_J]

I really don’t (but I respect your incredulity).

So noted.

Conversely, I guess you know my take on that as well.

 

[Sy_Noe]

The Protestant leaders departed from and cut themselves away from the Catholic Church. Their organizations were not approved by the Catholic Church.

Indeed, the founders of the Chuch of Scotland smashed the heads off of the statues of the Apostles at St. Andrew’s to signify that they were breaking away from the Apostolic Tradition and creating something new.

They certainly had no notions of being any kind of continuation of Christ’s Church, or successors to Apostolic authority. They were very much aware that they were starting a new religion that had no connections to the historical person of Jesus Christ.

Or as I’ve seen it explained by a Protestant, they didn’t start completely from scratch, hence did not break away, but only did a cleaning.

Also long before the Reformation, Paul spoke of errors in Corinth. Yet still in 1 Cor 1:2, he tells us they are a church of God.

 

[Sy_Noe]

Well, logically, if Protestant Churches come the Catholic Church and the Catholic Church was the first Church Christ founded, then Protestant Churches were founded by Christ. The lineage is pretty irrefutable.

Now, I understand that Catholics might not see it that way. But I believe there is both Christ and error in all of our churches, no matter their denomination. A lot of different things go into where and how an individual Christian worships, so I don’t think there has to be a one-size-fits all Church or a one true church. Christ’s short life changed the world. It changes us and changes us still. That’s what truly matters. His people are His church.

I loved this and it reminded me of Paul saying the church at Corinth was a church of God (1 Cor 1:2) although in error.

And Protestant churches as I understand it, did not start from scratch. It was more a cleansing not that they broke away. So they remain part of His body and part of the vine. Branches of the same trunk.

I realize this is not Catholic understanding however.

 

[Peter_J]

I loved this and it reminded me of Paul saying the church at Corinth was a church of God (1 Cor 1:2) although in error.

And Protestant churches as I understand it, did not start from scratch. It was more a cleansing not that they broke away. So they remain part of His body and part of the vine. Branches of the same trunk.

I realize this is not Catholic understanding however.

Well, I understand that Protestants don’t believe that only the Catholic Church was started by Christ. I was only saying that the proposed logic,

Well, logically, if Protestant Churches come the Catholic Church and the Catholic Church was the first Church Christ founded, then Protestant Churches were founded by Christ. The lineage is pretty irrefutable.

doesn’t make sense to me. (I’m waiting to see if another Protestant poster will chime in to say “That is/isn’t how I see it”. But to be fair, I assume that every Protestant poster doesn’t read every single Protestant post. I know I don’t read every single Catholic post – indeed I think part of my head would explode if someone told me I had to do that. )

 

[Peter_J]

P.S. Also, when I hear Protestants say that the Roman Catholic Church is the original church, I tend to go a little .

Seems a bit like just telling us what we want to hear, no?

P.P.S. Well, if not that, then it’s showing their own bias, inasmuch as Protestantism is a break-away from Catholicism, not from Orthodoxy.

 

[jmcrae]

So noted.

Conversely, I guess you know my take on that as well.

Wait - are you sure? Because that’s even worse than what I’m saying. Do you really mean to say that Protestantism is nothing more than disobedience and unbelief? That it has no positive merits whatsoever?

 

[Peter_J]

Wait - are you sure? Because that’s even worse than what I’m saying. Do you really mean to say that Protestantism is nothing more than disobedience and unbelief? That it has no positive merits whatsoever?

I mean that saying that *Catholics who don’t accept everything the Catholic Church believes automatically become Protestants *is setting an incredibly low bar for belonging to protestantism. But I’m not sure what you are responding to.