B
BobCatholic
Guest
No problemo. No rush
- Status
B
bob
Guest
I DO because it has protected, taught and interpreted the scriptures under the guidance of the Holy Spirit for 1400 + years before Sola Scripturists like Martin Luther came along and 2000 + years until SS like Shibboleth and others like himâŚ
Would Christ, after promising His church that he will be with them âtill the end of timeâ, leave it to error until SS like Luther came along? Did He die for nothing till Luther came to âsave usâ from error?
Thatâs making a mockery of Christâs promise.
Come to think of it, if Christ wanted it to be Sola Scriptura instead of the the teaching authority of His Church, He would have left us a written copy of the Bible (with footnotes even) instead of the Apostles.
It is also interesting to note that the definition of Sola Scriptura has changed over the years.
First it was strictly Scripture only,
then Scripture + other sources,
then Scripture + other sources + (Protestant) tradition
Looks like the they cannot hold on to their original definition because it just cannot be supported.
Yes I made a choice, a wiser choice, a correct choice based on Christâs promise and the wisdom I know the RC teaches.
L
LaSalle
Guest
Youâre correct, proving SS wrong does not make the RCC correct. Iâve never used the untenability of SS to support the RCCâs claim, because it is totally independent.
When I support the RCC, I do so on its own merits.
But I have yet to see any defence of SS that doesnât include some referrence to the RCC and how wrong it is.
If, indeed, SS is correct and how God intended for us to use the bible, that concept should be able to stand on its own merits as well. In fact, there should also be some biblical support.
I started a whole long thread on CARM about this and I got no where. Most of the replies that did not throw up errors in the RCC simply stated biblical quotations that did not support SS. When I questioned the quotes, instead of pointing to the errors of my reply; the usual reply was âI already told you, if you donât want to listen, I canât do anything about itâ. Quite amusing actually.
Iâm not sure I follow. Actually, no. Iâm sure, I donât follow. What do you mean?
My bad. âEvilâ was a figure of speech. Iâm sorry.
L
LaSalle
Guest
Youâre correct, proving SS wrong does not make the RCC correct. Iâve never used the untenability of SS to support the RCCâs claim, because it is totally independent.
When I support the RCC, I do so on its own merits.
But I have yet to see any defence of SS that doesnât include some referrence to the RCC and how wrong it is.
If, indeed, SS is correct and how God intended for us to use the bible, that concept should be able to stand on its own merits as well. In fact, there should also be some biblical support.
I started a whole long thread on CARM about this and I got no where. Most of the replies that did not throw up errors in the RCC simply stated biblical quotations that did not support SS. When I questioned the quotes, instead of pointing to the errors of my reply; the usual reply was âI already told you, if you donât want to listen, I canât do anything about itâ. Quite amusing actually.
Iâm not sure I follow. Actually, no. Iâm sure, I donât follow. What do you mean?
My bad. âEvilâ was a figure of speech. Iâm sorry.
L
LaSalle
Guest
This is the strange position Iâve seen a few Protestants take. There are different levels of exercising oneâs free will.
I think the best way I can explain this is by saying that we choose to follow Christ the same way you do. We have decided to follow Christ by accepting His Church. Once we decide to throw our lot in with Christ, we subject ourselves entirely to Him. Whether or not weâll agree to everything the RCC teaches, we obey.
Itâs somewhat different when you throw your lot in with Christ; you say you subject yourself to Christ and the bible but only if it makes sense to you.
A good example of this is when you jump churches. Personally, how many have you been to since becoming Christian? Something the church preaches just doesnât sound to you so you move, and move and move. Maybe not you (since I do not know if you have indeed church hopped) but thatâs the basic Protestant trend.
How are you listening to the Church as told to in Matt 18:17?
F
fulloftruth
Guest
Shibboleth, you keep asking if the apostles or thier successors have ever been wrong. The answer is that in matters of faith and morals as explained as official church teaching, the pope in communion with the bishops is guarded from teaching error, so that we today 2000 years later can get the same saving Gospel as when Christ spoke and did it. Unadulterated by man, if you canât see that man adulterates scripture in every age to the twisting sands of public opinion than you are blind, you need only look at the last century and virtually every other Christian church other than Catholic has buckled under secular pressure in terms of contraception, female clergy, homosexuality, abortion. Only the whore of Babylon has stood alone for such moral truths, ironic huh.
B
BobCatholic
Guest
I assume youâre joking with this term
S
Shibboleth
Guest
These instances frustrate me.
I do not now nor have I ever considered the Catholic Church the Whore of Babylon. You are generalizing me with a group of individuals that I have little agreement with⌠In fact, I agree more with the Catholic Faith than almost any other Protestant faith outside of Lutheranism.
In terms of contraception I have little qualms but apparently neither do a large portion of supposedly practicing Catholics. I do not agree with homosexual intercourse occurring because they are having sexual relations outside of wedlock⌠but go to a Church on any given Sunday and the pews will be full of individuals that are practicing fornication - 1 Corinthians speaks equally about such behavior. I think that a homosexual that remains celibate should be allowed to be a priest. We all have our burdens to overcome. Past Popes were not capable of remaining celibate but they still functioned in their job.
And yes I am blind⌠I am not so conceited as to think otherwise. I am conceited in completely different ways.
K
Kinsman
Guest
I find it amazing how Romanist, in trying to totally discredit âsola Scriptura,â actually donât care if they risk discrediting all of Godâs written Word just to prove their own religious views. I am aghast that the above statement would hold any credibility at all, to anyone?
The whole Old Testament is about revealing God as Creator and Redeemer through His dealings with national Israel and the Hebrew prophets. It was written over a period of many centuries by various men with totally different backgrounds and during different generations. Yet with remarkable continuity. God Himself didnât just hand the Jews a Book Heâd written. Thatâs not the way He ordained His written Word to come into existence. He, the Holy Spirit employed chosen men for this task, and Godly men everywhere very well understood those writings to be not the word of man, but the actual written Word of God.
It was no different with the forming of the New Testament. The Old Testament writings anticipated the coming Messiah and Savior, and with the incarnation of God the Son new revelation was required to reveal Him and explain Him to subsequent generations. And God again used men to communicate, in writing, as a permanent record, what believers down through the generations needed to know about the faith that saves and the One who saved them. These all important truths were not entrusted to oral traditions, which undoubtedly in time would be corrupted by men, but by inspired (Gr. âGod-breathedâ) writings, hard-copied, so that all subsequent generations would know the essentials of the faith and the eternal inheritance thatâs theirs through faith in the Person and work of Jesus Christ on their behalf.
Godâs written Word testifies of itself that *"All Scripture is inspired by God *(Gr. theopneustos = âGod breathedâ) and profitable for teaching, for reproof, correction, for training in righteousness; that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work" (2 Tim. 3:16).
Since ALL Scripture is God-breathed, then the Bible, by default, is the highest authority on this earth. Even God Himself, in the Person of Jesus Christ, engaged Scripture as a defense against the temptations of Satan.
Careful, people, that in your zeal to defend your peculiar religious traditions, you actually find yourselves dishonoring, discrediting and depreciating Godâs Holy, written Word. One day you MUST stand before the judgment seat of Christ and you WILL give an account . How do I know? Itâs written (2 Cor. 5:10)!
B
bob
Guest
On the contrary, Catholics hold the Scriptures in high regard. According to the Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation - Dei Verbum (Vatican II, Nov 1965):
âBut in order to keep the Gospel forever whole and alive within the Church, the Apostles left bishops as their successors, âhanding overâ to them âthe authority to teach in their own place.â This sacred tradition, therefore, and Sacred Scripture of both the Old and New Testaments are like a mirror in which the pilgrim Church on earth looks at God, from whom she has received everything, until she is brought finally to see Him as He is, face to face (see 1 John 3:2).â
Dei Verbum Chap II v 7.
This document followed the footsteps of the Council of Trent(1545 - 1564) and of the First Vatican Council (1869).
The Catholic Church does not and has never rejected Scriptures over Tradition. We compliled, protected, intepreted, translated and copied the Scriptures long before Sola Scripturists like Luther (1400 + years) came on the sceneâŚ
:yup:
B
bob
Guest
Unfortunately, that cannot be helped as most non-Catholic Christians labelled us as such.
Having followed this thread for a while I can see that you are an enquirer in Christianity after having rejected agnosticism.
I wish you the best in your search for Truth.
So perhaps in the meantime we can label you a quasi-Protestant in order not to âlump you with the restâ?
I donât think that the Catholic church has any objections to that.
The Catholic Church condemns the sin but not the sinner. A celibate homosexual is not a sinner.
R
RNRobert
Guest
As Bob has pointed out, Catholics have a great love for Scripture (heck, it was the Catholic Church that preserved them for over a millenium so Luther could âdiscoverâ them). The point I was trying to make was that the church was in existence for at least a DECADE before a single word of the New Testament was written, so it is to the CHURCH we must go to for itâs interpretation.
Tell you what, Kinsman. If the Catholic Church is wrong, then please tell me which of the 30,000+ (and counting) âsola scripturaâ churches is correct in itâs interpretation.
F
ferdgoodfellow
Guest
Shib, Ken (paradox) and other SS proponents,
In stumbling around here and elsewhere I have come to some conclusions which i want to test:
In stumbling around here and elsewhere I have come to some conclusions which i want to test:
- The classical version of SS, while granting extra-biblical sources some authority, will always subordinate such to Scripture. This means that they try to not accept any teaching based on an extra-biblical authority if it contradicts Scripture or is not sufficiently based on Scripture. What is âsufficientâ is not well defined. Be that as it may, it would be impossible to construct the body of dogmatic teachings within any Prot denom without extra-biblical sources.
- If we were to press any given Prot tradition to articlulate and explicate every one of its nonnegotiable beliefs, they would discover that to some extent they have included some beliefs as dogma which are not self-evident and for which there are plausible alternatives. But, and this critical, a decision was made to take a certain interpretational path and exclude others. IOW, a teaching authority made a judgment call.
- Each Prot, if he is true to SS, is prepared to jump ship if he feels that the leadership of his group is teaching something non-biblical in his individual judgment (however informed).
- Prots have dogma, but not in the same sense as Cats. If something is proposed as an absolutely non-negotiable belief withing a given Prot tradition, there still is something provisional about it given that other Prot traditions often take contrary positions and that no Prot believes that ihis church authority can ever be infallible. But some right-thinking Prot (confesional) traditons will not reinvent every wheel. Some will accept traditions such as the Nicene creed. Ostensibly this choice is made cuz the Nicene creed is âbiblicalâ, but in effect they are accepting a certain portion of the historical Cat teaching and taking it as a given.
- Yet, this is not a problem because he believes that as long as he adhere to sola fide, he will have the essentials for salvation even if his chosen magisterium lead him astray in other areas.
K
Kinsman
Guest
RNRobert said:
Neither is this an argument of any substance, but again an attempt to elevate the words of men above the written Word of God, even at the great risk of depreciating it just for the sake of oneâs own religious beliefs. Yet itâs remarkable that this person makes direct reference to the events that occurred at the first Feast of Pentecost after Christâs bodily resurrection - and where does he find this accurate account? Where else but in the second chapter of Acts, the Scriptures. Preserved, so that we, 2000 years later, may know for certain what happened and what was first presented and taught to those Jews in Jerusalem after the Spiritâs descent. Only through Scripture are we able to be taken back to that momentous occasion in order to learn and understand what was preached and taught at that time in history by the power of the Holy Spirit. The same Holy Spirit who subsequently recorded, through the agency of men, His Scriptures. Easy fellas, youâre trampling on Holy ground.
R
RNRobert
Guest
Trampling on Holy ground!? The Church existed for at least a DECADE before any of the NT was written. The NT as written was never intended to be an exhaustive catechism, with sections under âBâ for baptism and âMâ for Mary. It was written to Christians who had already been taught by WORD OF MOUTH, and the various letters were basically to correct errors or clarify a situation. Even after all the books of the NT were written, It was the CHURCH that collated them and preserved them. My beef is with those who make the Scripture the be-all and end-all of faith, which it cannot be. The Scriptures are inerrant, but they cannot interpret themselves.
R
RNRobert
Guest
Kinsman:
I used to be a âBible-Onlyâ Christian just like you. I had the exact same âI have the Bible, therefore I know betterâ arrogance that you manifest on this forum. But the problem I had was, WHOSE INTERPRETATION CAN YOU TRUST? There are thousands of Bible-only churches in existence, but none of them can agree on what the Bible teaches and they refuse to worship in the same place. I chose the Catholic Church because not only is she the oldest church in existence, she is the one that determined the New Testament canon and preserved it. I felt that for Luther, Calvin & Co. to come 1500+ years after the fact and decide that they âknewâ better than the Catholic Church was ludicrous. To reiterate my position: the CHURCH before the BIBLE, not the other way around.
I used to be a âBible-Onlyâ Christian just like you. I had the exact same âI have the Bible, therefore I know betterâ arrogance that you manifest on this forum. But the problem I had was, WHOSE INTERPRETATION CAN YOU TRUST? There are thousands of Bible-only churches in existence, but none of them can agree on what the Bible teaches and they refuse to worship in the same place. I chose the Catholic Church because not only is she the oldest church in existence, she is the one that determined the New Testament canon and preserved it. I felt that for Luther, Calvin & Co. to come 1500+ years after the fact and decide that they âknewâ better than the Catholic Church was ludicrous. To reiterate my position: the CHURCH before the BIBLE, not the other way around.
B
BobCatholic
Guest
Versus sola scripturists who confuse Scripture with their intepretation of Scripture, thinking both are the same.
Theyâll say âThe Bible says Aâ with the interpretation that it means B, thinking both are exactly the same thing.
Good examples: Matthew 1:25 âuntilâ means âafterwards this changedâ though Scripture doesnât say this.
John 6 must be symbolic because Jesus said it was. However He never actually said this, it is INTERPRETED.
But hey. Iâm sure you can find me the Scriptural basis for the answers to my infamous 4 questions? Wanna take them on in another thread?
Are you up to the Challenge?
B
BobCatholic
Guest
Whatâs a Romanist? Such name calling is not good. I
That is because Sola Scriptura is a man-made tradition that actually makes null the Word of God. It is necessary to discredit Sola Scriptura in order to DEFEND scripture.
God used Godly men to write the Scriptures, passed the scriptures on, copy the scriptures (both OT and NT), translate the scriptures. lay down their lives to protect the scriptures, make great sacrifices of all kinds, just to make sure that today, you are able to get the same scriptures that were around when the early church was. The faith (in scripture) was protected this way.
HOWEVER, for some reason, you believe that when it comes to the Apostolic Interpretation of Scripture, the Apostles passed it on to people, and then it was lost. Game Over. God protected the Scriptures but for some reason didnât protect the Apostolic Interpretation of Scripture from being passed on using the same exact Godly men.
I donât buy that for a second. God is consistent.
But for some reason, the Apostolic Interpretation of Scripture, which allows us to 100% know what the Scriptures actually MEAN (whether we should take this passage literally, symbolically, spiritually, or whatever, what the meaning is, etc.) was NOT entrusted. Allrightey. Youâre making God out to be inconsistent.
If youâre talking about the episode in the desert, look closer.
The devil interpreted scripture to mean one thing. Christ said âNO, it means THISâ for His interpretation was also just as equally authoritative. Yes, He cited Scripture as an authority - and what youâre missing - His interpretation of Scripture - which He considered authoritative too.
So what you are saying, is that you do not hold to ANY non-blibical doctrines? And if you do, theyâre not infallible?
S
SPOKENWORD
Guest
Without the word of God the church would not exist. I believe in my oppinion you are in
error.
B
BobCatholic
Guest
Yes, the Word of God (Jesus Christ) created the Church.Without the word of God the church would not exist. I believe in my oppinion you are in
After the Resurrection and before Pentecost, where was the NT? Not yet written, passed on orally. After Pentecost? Still passed on orally. Until it was finally written down, where was the NT? Thatâs right, passed on orally. But look what was first? The Church came first, THEN the NT!
Church â> NT Scripture
thatâs the historically accurate story.
Of course, you can show me the Bible verses that show the NT having been finished by the time Pentecost came.
- Status