Why Isn't Everyone Catholic?

[sambos671]

You only see it as excellent because of your bias.

2Thess2:15 is simply not a good proof text for catholic apologetics. It might hold some weight if you knew what Paul meant by “tradition”.

I haven’t been able to work my way through all of your posts but I have yet to see anywhere your church lists what Paul meant.

Arandur is certainly correct in saying that I am asking a gotcha question but it’s only mean to show you the weakness of using that verse as a prooftext.

So, since no one can define definiatively what Paul specifically meant by certain traditions we can say there is no validity to tradition as the Catholic church understands it? Is that your point? I find it a strange point to make when we compate Pauls writing against discord in Corinth or the emphasis on following those placed in charge of the churches. We can see only 35 - 40 years later, Clement’s letter to Corinth about several of the same issues Paul regarded primarily to stop the in fighting and to follow the lead of the appointed bishops of that church. Certainly we know the world in which these letters were writen in was primarily illiterate. Only the educated could both read and write so the role of bishop and descent become of primary importance to the early church as can be easily seen in study of early church history. Tradition then are the generally accepted beliefs as passed down to the bishops from their predessors. I would have to assume format of liturgical type worship which we see in the Didache and Jewish practice of the day would be included in this since its not spelled out in scripture. However, I would say its not exclusive to this. There is by necessity a built in reliance of the Church and its teaching.

 

[SemperReformada]

Another bump, for the unwilling lurkers who might be fooled by SemperReformada’s repeated and erroneous claims that questions regarding what comprises Tradition have not been addressed.

Oh, and still waiting for a response, too.

I’m not so sure why it so difficult to understand my question.

I didn’t ask what comprises tradition in the general sense.

I asked a very specific question, and have probably asked it a dozen times now.

Please list for me exactly what traditions Paul preached to the Thessalonians and please tell me how you arrived at that knowledge.

This will probably take less than a dozen senteneces to accomplish. Thus far you haven’t been able to do that and obviously you have had the time to do so.

Why don’t you just admit that you can’t? Your church, to the best of my knowledge, has never defined any word spoken by the apostles or Jesus outside of the scriptures. You aren’t going to find a listing of what Paul taught the Thessalonians.

Just admit you can’t and we will be done w/ that one topic.

 

[SemperReformada]

For anyone seeking a handy online guide to Catholic tradition, we elusive Catholics have hidden it in plain sight.

scborromeo.org/ccc.htm

Pretty sneaky, sis!

Doesn’t answer the question I asked.

 

[wisdomseeker]

I’m not so sure why it so difficult to understand my question.

I didn’t ask what comprises tradition in the general sense.

I asked a very specific question, and have probably asked it a dozen times now.

Please list for me exactly what traditions Paul preached to the Thessalonians and please tell me how you arrived at that knowledge.

This will probably take less than a dozen senteneces to accomplish. Thus far you haven’t been able to do that and obviously you have had the time to do so.

Why don’t you just admit that you can’t? Your church, to the best of my knowledge, has never defined any word spoken by the apostles or Jesus outside of the scriptures. You aren’t going to find a listing of what Paul taught the Thessalonians.

Just admit you can’t and we will be done w/ that one topic.

and so did i and you still find it difficult to answer. why is that?

**
12 Therefore I intend always to remind you of these things, though you know them and are established in the truth that you have. 13 I think it right, as long as I am in this body, to arouse you by way of reminder, 14 since I know that the putting off of my body will be soon, as our Lord Jesus Christ showed me. 15 And I will see to it that after my departure you may be able at any time to recall these things.**

 

[Teflon93]

Doesn’t answer the question I asked.

It does—you choose to ignore the evidence.

What do you believe the Catechism to be?

 

[Teflon93]

I’m not so sure why it so difficult to understand my question.

I didn’t ask what comprises tradition in the general sense.

I asked a very specific question, and have probably asked it a dozen times now.

Please list for me exactly what traditions Paul preached to the Thessalonians and please tell me how you arrived at that knowledge.

This will probably take less than a dozen senteneces to accomplish. Thus far you haven’t been able to do that and obviously you have had the time to do so.

Why don’t you just admit that you can’t? Your church, to the best of my knowledge, has never defined any word spoken by the apostles or Jesus outside of the scriptures. You aren’t going to find a listing of what Paul taught the Thessalonians.

Just admit you can’t and we will be done w/ that one topic.

Why should I admit to not being able to do what I have already done?

Shall we shout from the rooftops that you have not been able to offer an explanation for the doctrine of the Trinity, appearing in the historical record from the very birth of the Church and yet only very implicit in Scripture?

Shall we ignore the seven sacraments of the Church, themselves present from Pentecost onward, and yet only outlined in the broadest form in Scripture? How are we to explain different, geographically-separated, and often viciously persecuted Christian sects maintaining the same sacraments?

Shall we likewise ignore the sacred liturgy, preserved despite persecution and the endless attacks of heretic after heretic from the earliest times (cf. Justin Martyr) to this very day?

So I ask you again—where did these things come from?

 

[Teflon93]

And even more to the point:

Given St Paul’s warning to Timothy, where do Protestants get the authority to reject St Paul’s explicit warning to hew not just to written but to unwritten tradition?

In other words, where in Scripture—Protestants being allegedly bound to it—does Scripture contradict St Paul on the point of needing to be obedient to the unwritten as well as the written Tradition of the Church?

 

[sambos671]

I’m not so sure why it so difficult to understand my question.

I didn’t ask what comprises tradition in the general sense.

I asked a very specific question, and have probably asked it a dozen times now.

Please list for me exactly what traditions Paul preached to the Thessalonians and please tell me how you arrived at that knowledge.

This will probably take less than a dozen senteneces to accomplish. Thus far you haven’t been able to do that and obviously you have had the time to do so.

Why don’t you just admit that you can’t? Your church, to the best of my knowledge, has never defined any word spoken by the apostles or Jesus outside of the scriptures. You aren’t going to find a listing of what Paul taught the Thessalonians.

Just admit you can’t and we will be done w/ that one topic.

I think I spelled it out in post 200.

 

[Teflon93]

And isn’t it funny how SemperReformada has plenty of time to ask questions and none to answer?

To whit:

Do you, SemperReformada, believe that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one in being?

Do you, SemperReformada, believe that St Paul and Timothy knew what St Paul meant by unwritten tradition?

Do you, SemperReformada, disagree with St John Chrysostom, St Basil the Great, and the other ECFs who emphasize, again and again, that Christians must hold fast to the traditions of the Church, written and unwritten?

And all three questions may be answered with one word each.

Shouldn’t take but a moment; we’ve been waiting days now.

 

[sambos671]

And isn’t it funny how SemperReformada has plenty of time to ask questions and none to answer?

To whit:

Do you, SemperReformada, believe that Father, Son, and Holy Spirit are one in being?

Do you, SemperReformada, believe that St Paul and Timothy knew what St Paul meant by unwritten tradition?

Do you, SemperReformada, disagree with St John Chrysostom, St Basil the Great, and the other ECFs who emphasize, again and again, that Christians must hold fast to the traditions of the Church, written and unwritten?

And all three questions may be answered with one word each.

Shouldn’t take but a moment; we’ve been waiting days now.

Its an attempt to change the playing field. If he can have you accept what his premise is then he’s good to go. The problem is with the premise to begin with.

 

[Teflon93]

I think I spelled it out in post 200.

No, you tackled a related argument and placed St Paul in his proper context in so doing.

SemperReformada claims to want a list, and yet when provided a slew of examples, simply ignores it.

And in the process misses St Paul’s whole point to Timothy, I might add.

If only St Paul had had Internet access, Protestantism never would have been, one presumes.

 

[Teflon93]

Its an attempt to change the playing field. If he can have you accept what his premise is then he’s good to go. The problem is with the premise to begin with.

He’s not even good to go then.

The Protestant must account for their rejection of Sacred Tradition.

As noted above, and as ignored by SemperReformada, the Protestant is in quite a pickle because, contrary to the false doctrine of sola scriptura, the Protestant actually accepts from the Catholic Church heaping helpings of Sacred Tradition not explicitly found within Scripture.

And, as at least Martin Luther was sufficiently honest to note—they of course accept the Bible from us too.

This paradox—whereby the Protestants adopt as the sole rule of their faith that subset of Sacred Tradition which was canonized in Scripture and that subset which some found unobjectionable in the early 16th century while rejecting on their own authority the rest—is why SemperReformada finds it so difficult to do anything but obfuscate.

 

[sambos671]

No, you tackled a related argument and placed St Paul in his proper context in so doing.

SemperReformada claims to want a list, and yet when provided a slew of examples, simply ignores it.

And in the process misses St Paul’s whole point to Timothy, I might add.

If only St Paul had had Internet access, Protestantism never would have been, one presumes.

I often think protestants believe that every Christian in the NT had a pocket Gideons and critically viewed Sacred Scripture in todays modern context.

 

[sambos671]

He’s not even good to go then.

The Protestant must account for their rejection of Sacred Tradition.

As noted above, and as ignored by SemperReformada, the Protestant is in quite a pickle because, contrary to the false doctrine of sola scriptura, the Protestant actually accepts from the Catholic Church heaping helpings of Sacred Tradition not explicitly found within Scripture.

And, as at least Martin Luther was sufficiently honest to note—they of course accept the Bible from us too.

This paradox—whereby the Protestants adopt as the sole rule of their faith that subset of Sacred Tradition which was canonized in Scripture and that subset which some found unobjectionable in the early 16th century while rejecting on their own authority the rest—is why SemperReformada finds it so difficult to do anything but obfuscate.

This is absolutely true when we think of the Trinity and the interactions of the persons within the Trinity. They have a very western Catholic view of that rather than an Orthodox view. Which I find strange because you would think that the Orthodox view would be just as valid starting from ground zero in the protestant relm.

 

[Teflon93]

Here’s the other problem Protestants have to contend with:

Date Event
~33 AD The Holy Spirit descends upon the Church at
Pentecost.
325 AD Council of Nicea; Nicene Creed formulated.
393 AD Council of Hippo; canon of The Holy Bible defined.
??? AD Catholic Church loses “binding and loosing” authority
1521 AD Martin Luther excommunicated
1522 AD Protestantism begins with foundation of Lutheran
Church (1st Protestant church)

Since Christ specifically promised that he founded his Church on rock and that the gates of hell would not prevail against her (Matthew 16:18), one must account for any gap in the life of that Church. Since Protestants accept the Creed and the Holy Bible, we presume that that gap could not have begun any earlier than 393 A.D. It could not have ended any earlier than 1522 A.D. as there was no Protestant church for the “true” church to abide in until that time.

If the Church lost its way too late, the Protestant has to explain the rejection of Church tradition post-Hippo but prior to this late date. If too early, the Protestant has to explain how this does not constitute the gates of hell prevailing against the Church.

Thus, Protestants fudge the whole business.

History is a harsh mistress…

 

[Teflon93]

I often think protestants believe that every Christian in the NT had a pocket Gideons and critically viewed Sacred Scripture in todays modern context.

Or that every Christian was literate, especially before that wonderful Catholic Johannes Gutenberg invented his printing press.

 

[Teflon93]

This is absolutely true when we think of the Trinity and the interactions of the persons within the Trinity. They have a very western Catholic view of that rather than an Orthodox view. Which I find strange because you would think that the Orthodox view would be just as valid starting from ground zero in the protestant relm.

EXACTLY.

 

[Cinette]

I may have missed it, you did post quite a bit of information but I have seen no post detailing what Paul mean by tradition and how you arrived at that knowledge.

I have seen posts discussing “tradition” but is not an answer to my question.

What “apostolic traditions” did Paul include under the label of tradition in 2Thess2:15? Please catalog or index them for our review.

I am only interested in what Paul meant by tradition in 2Thess2:15. Since so many Catholics use that verse as a proof text it seems reasonable to me that they should be able to precisely identify what Paul meant. Apparently they can’t.

I believe that Paul was referring to Oral Tradition - the Oral Word which he also expressed in his letters. At the time there was no written Bible (scripture). When Jesus said to go and preach the good news he was talking about his teachings which were by word of mouth. Jesus never wrote anything down remember.

I think that it may be safe to say that the Apostles were probably illiterate. Paul was a different story.

Have you never heard of the difference between Oral Tradition (capital T) which is what the Apostles followed and "traditions of man (small t)??

Cinette

 

[Teflon93]

This is absolutely true when we think of the Trinity and the interactions of the persons within the Trinity. They have a very western Catholic view of that rather than an Orthodox view. Which I find strange because you would think that the Orthodox view would be just as valid starting from ground zero in the protestant relm.

And before anyone objects to my timeline excluding the Orthodox schism, it would be an odd thing indeed for the Protestant to claim the Church lost her way in 1054 and not become Orthodox.

One funny thing around the Apologetics forum is to see the shifting alliance between Orthodox and Protestant on the matter of papal authority. All the Catholic need do is to toss in the hand grenade of apostolic succession and watch hilarity ensue, the Orthodox being for it, the Protestant against it, of course).

 

[Teflon93]

I believe that Paul was referring to Oral Tradition - the Oral Word which he also expressed in his letters. At the time there was no written Bible (scripture). When Jesus said to go and preach the good news he was talking about his teachings which were by word of mouth. Jesus never wrote anything down remember.

I think that it may be safe to say that the Apostles were probably illiterate. Paul was a different story.

Have you never heard of the difference between Oral Tradition (capital T) which is what the Apostles followed and "traditions of man (small t)??

Cinette

And yet St Paul went beyond the Gospel. His epistles were not simply concerned with the biography of Christ, but with the life of the Church.

And need we mention St Paul’s warning to the Corinthians concerning the Eucharist?