2020-06-12T13:36:40-04:00

Whitewashing History: By William Possidento and Dave Armstrong 

[originally posted on 3-12-04; slight revisions and revised links: 6-12-20]

***

James R. White
Mary — Another Redeemer?
Minneapolis: Bethany House, 1998.

Bishop “Dr.” [???] James White’s words will be in blue; William Possidento’s and mine will be in black. The beginning and ending sections (before and after the ten asterisks) are my own writing. My abridgment of Mr. Possidento’s review is in-between the two sets of ten asterisks. For source information, see the bibliography at the end. Authors and page numbers only will be cited in the text.

***

Before we begin, let’s look at a few semi-amusing comments made by Protestants about the alleged inability or unwillingness of Catholics to reply to this book. “Bonnie,” the wife of a Lutheran pastor (LCMS) and a moderator on the large CARM Catholic Discussion board, had this to say:

Mar-04-04 05:33 PM
#127536, “Hey, TertiumQuid!”

A word with you, if you please. Remember my thread about books on the rise of Mariolatry? You said you had read them all, and critiqued them. I can’t remember, but did you say you read James White’s Book MARY-ANOTHER REDEEMER? If so, what did you think of it?

I checked Amazon, and it got bad ratings–from Catholics. They try to refute it, by quoting Bible verses taken out of context. They sound almost desperate. A non-Catholic reviewed it, quite dispassionately, and rightly said that Catholics aren’t going to like it, but doubted if any of them would be able to refute it.

“Tertium Quid” (James Swan), and also a moderator at CARM, responded:

Mar-04-04 08:47 PM
#127724, “RE: James White’s book on, POST edited per request of TQ”

I have never read any substantial criticism of it. If any of our Catholic friends here at CARM have a specific complaint about the book, I’d be interested in hearing it . . . The problem is,our Catholic friends really really really really really really dislike James White.

I responded, “Really?” and determined that I would reply to this book after chapter four (about the Immaculate Conception) was posted on the CARM Catholic board. Likewise, Robin Savage’s review of the book on amazon.com (“A look into the ultra-Marian sect”— 8-30-03) exhibits the usual anti-Catholic deluded triumphalism:

James White is hated amongst Roman Catholics because of his extensive Protestant Apologetics ministry. All of his books have been spammed by RC’s because they do not like him . . . Lots of Roman Catholics have disdain for White’s opinions; but I truely [sic] wonder how many of them can refute him.

“A reader from Boston” chimes in with further sublime observations in his (her?) review, “The Mary of Roman Catholicism: Not the Mary of the Bible” (2-27-00):

If you are a Roman Catholic, you will not like this book. You will be critical of its contents and its author. After all, the Roman Catholic mantra is: We do not worship Mary. She is not Divine. But is this true?

Kerry Gilliard’s “Well Balanced and Written” (12-7-99) shows that he is a true White devotee, oblivious to the numerous shortcomings in his scholarship, as will be demonstrated below.

James White has always been an excellent author since I’ve been reading his work and this book is no exception . . .  James White shows the origins of the doctrine, how several past Popes [and] church fathers have condemned the teaching as heretical and gives a proper biblical answer to the issue.

. . . Concerned Protestants and those Catholics who are concerned about truth should read this book . . . The level of scholarship in the book is second to none . . .

Another reviewer (11-5-98) claims that White “Documents the facts about Catholic beliefs extremely well”.

In doing some preliminary research for this paper I was excited to discover an extraordinary, copiously researched review of the book [link now defunct] by Catholic William Possidento (described as “81 pages” — and the most extensive critique of a particular example of White’s work that I have ever seen), which is no longer even online. But I found it anyway (!), by means of the Internet Archive (which allows access to older papers once on the Internet).

Rather than duplicate work which has already been accomplished more than ably and comprehensively by Mr. Possidento, I’ve decided to simply abridge his review, in order to make it more accessible to the average reader (not many will wade through an 81-page book review), and to concentrate mostly on the Immaculate Conception (and secondarily, on the doctrine of Mary Mediatrix. I have also concentrated on White’s historical arguments (rather than the biblical disputes). The many glaring errors, misrepresentations, and inadequately supported false assertions of Mr. White will be abundantly apparent, in reading this review.

I won’t be using ellipses throughout (. . .) — excepting citations within the review (they are presented in their entirety: any ellipses therein were in the original quotation). Again, this is an abridgment, and I have made format changes, such as indentation, moving of some material around, etc. Readers can consult the original at the above URL, linked above.

William Possidento’s review (especially in my abridgment) deals largely with factual errors and White’s misrepresentations of doctrinal history and development of doctrine. My portion will build a complementary argument from analogy, based upon White’s incessant use of double standards and his internal inconsistency: how he continually applies one standard to the Catholic Church and another to Protestantism (usually by ignoring the latter, so that no one will notice his clever “sleight-of-hand”).

He is very good at this sort of sophistry and selective (one might say, “cynical”) presentation of facts, but it horribly backfires on him, when he is confronted by someone who knows a bit more about comparative theology and Church history than the average reader of his papers and books. This is a classic example of his pseudo-scholarly methodology being relentlessly “exposed” for what it is. The results are (if I do say so) rather devastating with regard to Mr. White’s objectivity as a scholar and his seeming inability to grasp logical contradiction in his own positions. It is also a quintessential (sadly common) example of a profound anti-Catholic bias getting the better of a person who is otherwise is a fairly sharp and knowledgeable thinker.

* * * * * * * * * *
On 1 February 2000, James R. White e-mailed me his rejoinder, his (electronic) digital signature included, to a version of my review of his Mary-Another Redeemer? Still more, on his Alpha and Omega Ministries Web site, he described my customer comment as an incredibly poor review”, edited portions of which were amazingly” published on p. 40 of the February 2000 issue of This Rock, a magazine which Catholic Answers publishes.

Mr. White wrote on pp. 75-76 as follows:

In fact, not only is the idea of Mary as Coredemptrix or Mediatrix completely absent from the Bible and from the early Church, it does not have its origin in history but in this kind of piety or religious devotion that is focused upon Mary.

Mr. White eventually (p. 137) did report, the falsity of which I believe I will demonstrate, that:

[T]he push to define Mary as Coredemptrix flows out of the piety seen so plainly in Alphonsus Ligouri [sic] and Louis Marie Grignon de Montfort. It does not come to us from Scripture, nor does it come from history.

Mr. White, in denying the existence of such belief, even waxing emphatic with the wordscompletely absent”, will be shown to have steered his pilgrim readers into a slough of despond.

St. Irenaeus wrote, for example, of Christ as the pure one opening purely that pure womb which regenerates men unto God (Against Heresies IV,33,11) – words with which Irenaeus credited the Virgin’s womb and assigns to her a universal motherhood. Writing of the economy, that is, the plan of salvation, St. Irenaeus remarked …without Joseph’s action, Mary was the only one to cooperate in the economy… (Against Heresies III, 21,5,7 [quote from 7] in Miravalle, p. 178). Contemplate that. St. Irenaeus gave, with those words, a second century statement of belief that Mary had a unique role in the plan of salvation.

St. Irenaeus wrote of Mary c.190-200, in Proof of the Apostolic Preaching:

Adam had to be recapitulated in Christ, so that death might be swallowed up in immortality, and Eve [had to be recapitulated] in Mary, so that the Virgin, having become another virgin’s advocate, might destroy and abolish one virgin’s disobedience by the obedience of another virgin. (Proof of the Apostolic Preaching 33, Sources Chrétiennes 62 [Paris, 1941-], pp. 83-86, in Gambero, p. 54, brackets in Gambero, boldface mine)

Jaroslav Pelikan, (then) a Lutheran (he converted to the Orthodox Church in 1999), after quoting a slightly longer version of the passage immediately above from Proof of the Apostolic Preaching 33, wrote:

When it is suggested that for the development of the doctrine of Mary, such Christian writers as Irenaeus in a passage like this “are important witnesses for the state of the tradition in the late second century, if not earlier,” that raises the interesting question of whether Irenaeus had invented the concept of Mary as the Second Eve here or was drawing on a deposit of tradition that had come to him from “earlier.” It is difficult, in reading his Against Heresies and especially his Proof of the Apostolic Preaching, to avoid the impression that he cited the parallelism of Eve and Mary so matter-of-factly without arguing or having to defend the point because he could assume that his readers would willingly go along with it, or even that they were already familiar with it. One reason that this could be so might have been that, on this issue as on so many others, Irenaeus regarded himself as the guardian and the transmitter of a body of belief that had come to him from earlier generations, from the very apostles. A modern reader does need to consider the possibility, perhaps even to concede the possibility, that in so regarding himself Irenaeus may just have been right and that therefore it may already have become natural in the second half of the second century to look at Eve, the “mother of all living,” and Mary, the mother of Christ, together, understanding and interpreting each of the two most important women in human history on the basis of each other. With such moderns in mind, the parallelism was dramatically set forth by the German sculptor Toni Zanz in the metal door created in 1958 for the rebuilding of the Church of Sankt Alban in Cologne, which had been destroyed during World War II: in the lower left are Adam and Eve at the moment of the fall, in the upper right the Second Adam and the Second Eve at the moment of the crucifixion and redemption. (Pelikan, pp. 43-44, his italics)

[the citation from Pelikan by William Possidento had a typo: an added “not” which was pointed out and has now been removed. As the extraneous “not” weakened the case Pelikan was making — from a Catholic perspective — , clearly it was an inadvertent mistake, not a deliberate, dishonest addition]

Where is, and perhaps I mint a phrase here, at least with respect to capitalization, Mr. White’s anti-Irenicon? That is, where is his polemic against St. Irenaeus? More important, where is Mr. White’s anti-irenicon against the very early Church that did not rebuke St. Irenaeus but instead received and even recommended him as orthodox?

St. Irenaeus was not the earliest author to explicitly join a counterpart to St. Paul’s Adam-Christ parallel and antithesis: St. Justin Martyr was earlier and may have been the first writer to explicate the Eve-Mary parallel and antithesis, though it is strongly implicit in the Bible. His Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, c.155, preceded St. Irenaeus’s Against Heresies (180-199) and The Preaching of the Apostles (c.190-200) by several decades.

Christ became man by the virgin in order that the disobedience which proceeded from the serpent’s might receive its destruction in the same manner in which it derived its origin. For Eve, who was a virgin and undefiled, having conceived the word of the serpent, brought forth disobedience and death. But the Virgin Mary received faith and joy when the Angel Gabriel announced the good tidings to her, that the spirit of the Lord would come upon her, and the power of the highest would overshadow her; wherefore the Holy Thing begotten of her is the Son of God; and she replied, ‘Be it done unto me according to thy word’. And by her has he been born, to whom we have proved so many scriptures refer, and by whom God destroys both the serpent and those angels and men who are like him. (Dialogue with Trypho the Jew, in Quasten, Patrology, Vol. I, pp. 211-212, brackets mine)

Thus this very early martyr compared and contrasted Eve and Mary. According to St. Justin’s first sentence above, the redemption did not merely correct the fall but reversed, that is, recapitulated, it. I re-emphasize that St. Justin wrote the passage above about 155.

Tertullian was born in Carthage between 155-160. The following passage is from The Flesh of Christ, written between 208-212:

If, then, the first Adam was introduced in this way, all the more reason that the second Adam, as the apostle said, had to come forth from a virgin earth, that is, from a body not yet violated by generation, by God’s action, so that he might become the spirit who gives life. However, lest my introduction of Adam’s name appear meaningless, why did the apostle call Christ “Adam” (cf. 1 Cor 15:45), if his humanity did not have an earthly origin? But here, too, reason comes to our aid: through a contrary operation, God recovered his image and likeness, which had been stolen by the devil.

For just as the death-creating word of the devil had penetrated Eve, who was still a virgin, analogously the life-building Word of God had to enter into a Virgin, so that he who had fallen into perdition because of a woman might be led back to salvation by means of the same sex. Eve believed the serpent; Mary believed Gabriel. The fault that Eve introduced by believing, Mary, by believing, erased. (The Flesh of Christ, 17, 4-5, in Patrologiae cursus completus 2, 827-828, Series Latina [Paris: Migne, 1841-1864], in Gambero, p. 67)

Strong word erased. Some translations have blotted out in its place, another forcible expression. Observe that Tertullian also identified the idea of recapitulation. Cardinal Newman, in the nineteenth century, remarked that St. Justin, St. Irenaeus and Tertullian remind the reader of St. Paul’s antithetical sentences in tracing the analogy between Adam’s work and our Lord’s work (Newman, in Sr. E. Breen, ed., Mary-The Second Eve, p. 5). Not only do St. Justin, St. Irenaeus and Tertullian testify to the presence in the Church of the second and third centuries of belief of the Virgin Mary’s active role in the redemption, but in representing many localities in Asia, Europe and Africa, they also indicate the universality of that belief.

St. Ephrem (also spelled Ephraem) (c.306-373), wrote in Syrian of the Virgin Mary according to a prayer ascribed to him: After the Mediator thou art the mediatrix of the whole world (Oratio IV ad Deiparam, 4th Lesson of the Office of the Feast, in Ott, p. 211). In another prayer attributed to him, we read of Mary as the dispensatrix of all goods (in Most, p. 34). On the similarities and contrasts of Eve and Mary, he wrote: Mary and Eve, two people without guilt, two simple people, were identical. Later, however, one became the cause of our death, the other the cause of our life (Op. syr. II, 327, in Ott, p. 201).

St. Ambrose (c.337-397) viewed Mary’s role in redemption in the context of the Incarnation:

She was alone when the Holy Spirit came upon her and the power of the Most High overshadowed her. She was alone and she wrought the salvation of the world and conceived the redemption of all. (Ep. 49, 2, Patrologia Latina [Migne] 16, 1154, in O’Carroll, p. 20)

St. Augustine composed, from 391 until his death in 430, perhaps thousands of sermons. This one bore the idea of recapitulation:

Both the sexes should recognize their own dignity, and both should confess their sins and hope to be saved. Through woman, poison was poured upon man, in order to deceive him, but salvation was poured out upon man from a woman, that he might be reborn in grace. The woman, having become the Mother of Christ, will repair the sin she committed in deceiving the man. (Sermo, 51, 3; Patrologia Latina 38, 334-335, in Gambero, p. 230)

Each century of the first five testifies against Mr. White’s expansive claim and powerfully in favor of the Blessed Virgin Mary’s role as Co-Redeemer or Mediatrix. Mr. White also wrote (p. 142):

[A]nd any Mary who is said to be Coredemptrix on any level speaks with a voice that the sheep of Christ simply will not hear.

St. Augustine wrote:

Having excepted the Holy Virgin Mary, concerning whom, on account of the honor of the Lord I wish to have absolutely no question when treating of sins, – for how do we know what abundance of grace for the total overcoming of sin was conferred upon her who merited to conceive and bear Him in whom there was no sin? (Nature and Grace, 36,42, in Jurgens, III, p. 111).

Scholars agree that St. Augustine certainly believed in Mary’s exemption from personal sin. Some also see in this famous passage his belief in Mary’s exemption from original sin. Theirs may be a minority opinion among Augustinian scholars, but it would make St. Augustine a forerunner of God’s Immaculate Conception of Mary. Anyway, he did not teach very clearly against the Immaculate Conception. And did St. Augustine overlook the immaculate conceptions of Adam and Eve, as does Mr. White?

[T]he total overcoming of sin suggests that St. Augustine comprehended both original sin and personal sin in this passage. An extensive bibliography exists, however, on the controversy surrounding St. Augustine’s belief regarding the Immaculate Conception of Mary. Fr. Gambero in a footnote on this dispute cited only recent (since 1931) works, yet among them are documents in Latin, German, French, Spanish and Italian (Gambero,  p. 226). These included, for just two examples, the following titles: La Controverse sur l’opinion de Saint Augustin touchant la conception de la Vierge (which I translate as The Controversy on the opinion of Saint Augustine concerning the conception of the Virgin) and Augustinus amicus an adversarius Immaculatae Conceptionis? (which I very roughly render as Augustine – friend or foe of the Immaculate Conception?). Despite this dispute, Mr. White wrote (p. 40) “Augustine had taught very clearly that only Christ was [immaculately] conceived….”

Note something else fascinating. Mr. White failed to explain both in his book and, despite the prompting I made in the review, in his rejoinder, what he implicitly claimed as a teaching of St. Augustine. Why did Mr. White decline to respond to my question about Adam and Eve? In asserting that St. Augustine taught that only Christ was immaculately conceived, Mr. White seems to have implied or assented to the implication that Adam and Eve were not immaculately conceived. Yet if Adam and Eve were not immaculately conceived, and here I refer to their passive conceptions, that is, the infusion of their souls into their bodies, then how did they fall from grace?

God did not create Adam and Eve with original sin. If He did, they would not be described, among other things, as having fallen. And if not fallen, then they and their descendants would have need for neither redemption nor a redeemer. Mr. White, in his zeal to sully the Catholic dogma of God’s Immaculate Conception of Mary, implicitly denied God’s immaculate conceptions of Adam and Eve, and thus carelessly painted Jesus as the Redeemer of no one, an enormous irony. Mr. White’s assertion that only Christ was immaculately conceived is thus reduced to an absurdity.

Mr. White identifies (pp. 40-42) [St.] Thomas Aquinas among many theologians who disbelieved in the Immaculate Conception. He neglects that Aquinas believed that original sin touched Mary only an instant, placing him extremely close to the belief, and that Aquinas believed in her personal sinlessness.

St. Thomas at first pronounced in favour of the doctrine in his treatise on the Sentences (in I. Sent. c. 44, q. I ad 3), yet in his Summa Theologica he concluded against it. Much discussion has arisen as to whether St. Thomas did or did not deny that the Blessed Virgin was immaculate at the instant of her animation, and learned books have been written to vindicate him from actually having drawn the negative conclusion. Yet it is hard to say that St. Thomas did not require an instant at least, after the animation of Mary, before her sanctification. (The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume VII, Online Edition, 1999, under “Immaculate Conception”)

Aquinas accepted Mary as the Ark of the New Covenant, based on the close parallelism between the Visitation (Luke 1:39-56) and the transportation of the Ark (2 Samuel 6:1-14), and on the convergence of the Ark (Revelation 11:19) with the woman of Revelation 12. Mr. White omits that Aquinas believed in her Assumption, a belief that is particularly striking because it is usually a consequence of belief in the Immaculate Conception.

The Blessed John Duns Scotus (c.1266-1308) reconciled Mary’s purity with her need for redemption. Scotus enabled reclassification of the Virgin Mary apart from St. John the Baptist but with Adam, Eve and Jesus, all of whom were conceived immaculately.  Scotus showed in 1300 how Mary could have a Savior yet always have been immune from the stain of original sin. Rather than purifying Mary of original sin, God preserved her from it with the most perfect, the most blessed redemption, a preventive redemption – the Immaculate Conception. Mr. White acknowledged the theoretical possibility of such an immunization (pp. 36-37). Although a few expressed otherwise, most of the Fathers believed in Mary’s personal sinlessness, that is, her freedom from actual sin.

I find the absence of actual sin in Mary at least as fascinating as her Immaculate Conception, that is, the absence in her of original sin. To me, Mary’s personal sinlessness seems impossible without her immunity from original sin. I realize, however, that Aquinas, for one, seems to have felt differently than I. Whatever Aquinas felt about Mary’s status regarding original sin, he believed that Mary was personally sinless.

Mr. White (p. 40) cited p. 203 of Dr. Ott’s Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma to remark that some of the individual Greek Fathers, including Origen, taught that Mary had venial personal faults. Mr. White neglected that in the very same paragraph he cited, Dr. Ott noted that Latin Patristic authors unanimously teach the doctrine of the sinlessness of Mary (Ott, p. 203).

Thomistic and Neo-Thomistic philosophers and Dominicans affirm that St. Thomas Aquinas would have assented to the dogma of the Immaculate Conception of Mary had he encountered Scotus’s preventive redemption solution. Their lives overlapped, but Scotus was about eight when Aquinas died. Dr. Pelikan noted that by the sixteenth century even the heirs of Aquinas resorted to Scotus’s explanation to substantiate the Immaculate Conception (Pelikan, p. 198). Aquinas’s view on the Immaculate Conception which emerged from the Summa Theologica, and not the view which he expressed in Sentences, differed from the Catholic Church’s dogmatic view by as little as an instant. But he lived before the definition of the dogma and no Catholic of his time was required to believe it.

Mr. White named St. Bernard of Clairvaux (pp. 41-42) as an opponent of the institution of the Feast of the Immaculate Conception [“Bernard of Clairvaux contended that she was conceived with original sin, but purified before birth”]. St. Bernard believed that the Blessed Virgin Mary was sanctified before her birth. But St. Bernard opposed the idea of a special conception of Mary according to which, he thought, Mary herself would have been conceived virginally. The Venerable [John Henry Cardinal] Newman noted that St. Bernard understood the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception with reference to Mary’s mother, whereas we understand it to refer to Mary. By ignoring the distinction between the active and passive conceptions in the thought of the great Cistercian abbot, Mr. White again misrepresented the teaching of a most influential Catholic.

Mr. White questioned on p. 41 when the idea of the Immaculate Conception first came into play. He then answered with a passage from p. 201 in Ott to indicate the beginning of the twelfth century. But Dr. Ott on that very page indicated that the Fathers, both Greek and Latin, implicitly taught the Immaculate Conception in two fundamental notions: 1) Mary’s most perfect purity and holiness; and 2) The similarity and contrast between Mary and Eve (Ott, p. 201).

Though Mr. White pointed to Dr. Ott’s Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma to report a twelfth century emergence of the idea, Dr. Ott quoted a fourth century passage of St. Ephrem to indicate belief in the Immaculate Conception in the patristic age (a passage I reported earlier). Around 370 in the Nisibene Hymns, Ephrem wrote: Thou and thy mother are the only ones who are totally beautiful in every respect; for in thee, O Lord, there is no spot, and in thy Mother no stain (Hymn 27, v. 8, in Ott).  St. Ambrose was Bishop of Milan when between 387 and 388 he strikingly described Mary as a Virgin not only undefiled but a Virgin whom grace has made inviolate, free of every stain of sin (Jurgens, II, p. 166).

Separately I mention St. Sophronius (died 638), Patriarch of Jerusalem, one of the last of the Fathers and one of the greatest exponents of Mary’s primacy of excellence. He almost stated the Immaculate Conception in western terms:

Others before you have flourished with outstanding holiness. But to none as to you has the fullness of grace been given. None has been endowed with happiness as you, none adorned with holiness like yours, none brought to such great magnificence as yours; no one was ever possessed beforehand by purifying grace as were you . . . And this deservedly, for no one came as close to God as you did; no one was enriched with God’s gifts as you were; no one shared God’s grace as you did. (St. Sophronius, In SS Deip. Annunt. 22 Patrologia Latina 87c, 3248, in O’Carroll, p. 329, his italics and ellipsis)

Mr. White posed two questions on p. 38, the first of which was: But why did it take more than 1,800 years to define this teaching as dogma, if, in fact, it is true?” Part of the answer consists in this: the Catholic Church did not rush to define it. Although the dogma of the Immaculate Conception was not proclaimed a revealed doctrine until 8 December 1854, the Immaculate Conception had been declared a pious doctrine in the fifteenth century, only 139 years after Scotus’s breakthrough. Mr. White did not inform his readers of the Council of Basel (Basle is an older name). Dr. Pelikan again:

The thirty-sixth session of the Council of Basel, on 18 December 1439, decreed that the immaculate conception was “a pious doctrine, in conformity with the worship of the church, the Catholic faith, right reason, and Holy Scripture.” It prescribed that the doctrine “be approved, held, and professed by all Catholics,” and it forbade any preaching or teaching contrary to it. That might have seemed to settle the matter, and was probably intended to do just that – except that by the time of this session Basel was itself under a cloud because of its statements and actions on the relation of the authority of the pope to that of a general council, which were subsequently condemned and which therefore made these later sessions of the Council of Basel invalid and not entitled to the designation of “ecumenical council.” Therefore the decree on the immaculate conception was not canonically binding. (Pelikan, p. 198)

According to Mr. White (p. 41), however, S. Lewis Johnson summarized it well” (recall the discussions of Aquinas, Scotus and Bernard and read the next few paragraphs through the discussion of Trent and ask yourself just what Mr. White thought Dr. Johnson summarized well):

Anselm held that Mary was born with original sin. Bernard of Clairvaux contended that she was conceived with original sin, but purified before birth. Thomas Aquinas and the Dominicans held this view, but Duns Scotus popularized the view that Mary was conceived without original sin, and his view eventually prevailed, although Pope Sixtus VI in 1485 and the Council of Trent in 1546 left the issue of the Immaculate Conception unresolved. (S. Lewis Johnson, “Mary, the Saints, and Sacerdotalism” in John Armstrong, ed., Roman Catholicism: Evangelical Protestants Analyze What Divides and Unites Us, Chicago, Moody Press, 1994, p. 121, italics in original and White)

Several errors exist here. Mary-Another Redeemer? transmitted an error of Dr. Johnson and added one of its own: the Bishop of Rome in 1485 was not Pope Sixtus VI (read sixth) but Pope Innocent VIII (pope 1484-1492). Further, although there was a Pope Sixtus V (read fifth) (pope 1585-1590), there has not yet been a Pope Sixtus VI (read sixth) (no wonder he left the issue unresolved). Dr. Johnson had identified a Pope Sixtus IV (read fourth), but gave 1485 – he died in 1484 – as the year in which he left the issue unresolved. Mary-Another Redeemer? then misidentified Sixtus IV (read fourth) as Sixtus VI (sixth). Got that? But momentarily we shall see there is more as Pope Sixtus IV (pope 1471-1484) really did have considerable say about the Immaculate Conception. Note that the reversal of IV and VI does not adequately account for these mistakes as 1485 came one year after the end of the papacy of Pope Sixtus IV.

Moreover, Sixtus IV, a Franciscan, approved Offices and Masses in honor of the Immaculate Conception, and by the Constitution Grave nimis (1482), which he repeated in 1483, declared that the Holy Roman Church publicly and solemnly celebrates the feast of the Conception of the Immaculate and ever Virgin Mary (O’Carroll, p. 327). He also forbade charges of heresy, under the penalty of excommunication, against anyone on either side of the debate, for example, by the maculists against the immaculists, or by the immaculists against the maculists (ibid.). Thus Pope Sixtus IV resolved quite a lot.

Mr. White cannot dismiss these as mere typographic errors as he transmitted not only a mistaken date and a false name but also, more important, the wrong substance of the history. I have already discussed St. Bernard, St. Thomas Aquinas, the Dominicans and the Blessed John Duns Scotus. It is true that St. Anselm (1033-1109), the archbishop of Canterbury, believed Mary was born with original sin. But he, too, lived before Scotus’s insight and stated [i]t was fitting that this Virgin should shine with a purity than which under God no greater can be understood… (O’Carroll, p. 33).

Regarding the Council of Trent, directly concerning the Immaculate Conception, the most agreed upon was:

This holy Synod declares, nevertheless, that it is not its intention to include in this decree, where original sin is treated of, the blessed and immaculate Virgin Mary, Mother of God… (O’Carroll, Theotokos, p. 345)

Only a very few of the Fathers of the Council of Trent (1545-1563) opposed a decree that would have prohibited anyone from holding a position contrary to the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception, which had long been celebrated and honoured by a solemn rite in nearly all Churches. Perhaps I can speak of an entire council holding to inopportunism: the vast majority of the Council Fathers believed in the Immaculate Conception but thought a dogmatic definition should await a different moment.

The Council of Trent did affirm Mary’s personal sinlessness:

[If anyone holds] that throughout his whole life he can avoid all sins, even venial sins, except by a special privilege of God, as the Church holds in regard to the Blessed Virgin: let him be anathema. (Enchiridion Symbolorum, Denziger-Bannwart, ed. 33, A. Schonmetzer, S.J., 1573, in O’Carroll, p. 345, his brackets)

While assailing the flowery, poetic, expressions of Saint Alphonsus Liguori (1696-1787), Mr. White (I think it unlikely that an editor would have changed the proper spelling) misspelled the saint’s name, rendering it Ligouri” throughout Mary-Another Redeemer? (for example, pp. 60, 61, 66, 71, 82, 87, 96, 109, 112, 128, 131, 134, 137, 154 and 156). Why did the misspelling elude the book’s editor? This is a small but fluorescent error highlighting Mr. White’s inattentiveness to detail.

Mr. White committed another error betraying his disregard for detail. In endnote 4 on p. 155, he (I think it doubtful that an editor would have corrupted the proper title) incorrectly identified a work (which I have cited frequently in this counter-reply) of Fr. O’Carroll as Mariology: A Theological Encyclopedia of the Blessed Virgin Mary” whereas the correct title is Theotokos: A Theological Encyclopedia of the Blessed Virgin Mary. This is another small error, orders of magnitude smaller than the implicit claim that Adam and Eve were not immaculately conceived (again the reference is to their passive conceptions). Tiny, too, compared with the sweeping assertion about the complete absence from the Bible and the early Church of the idea of Mary as Co-Redeemer or Mediatrix.

As seen earlier – and although Mr. White reported the idea “completely absent” – St. Ephrem of Syria in the fourth century and Antipater of Bostra in the fifth, for two examples of early Churchmen noted for their orthodoxy, used Mediatress. Again, as noted earlier, St. Ephrem, in the fourth century, is also believed to have called Mary the dispensatrix of all goods; Theodotus of Ancyra in the first half of the fifth century called the Virgin Mary the dispensatrix of good things.

And replying to Catholic commentators that the Virgin Mary uniquely mediated between Jesus and mankind at the wedding at Cana (John 2:1-12), Mr. White objected (p. 103) that “[c]ertainly one searches in vain in the Scriptures or the early church for such an understanding of the text.” Oh? Observe that Mr. White not only denied such belief in the Scriptures or the early Church but again waxed emphatic with [c]ertainly. Mr. White went far beyond saying that some in the early Church testified against belief in Mary’s mediation at the wedding at Cana. Mr. White, instead, insisted upon the vanity of searching for belief in the Fathers that Mary mediated at the wedding.

I found the passage below of St. John Chrysostom, written c.391, that rebuts Mr. White’s vain statement:

Why then after He had said, Mine hour is not yet come, and given her a denial, did He what His mother desired? Chiefly it was, that they who opposed Him, and thought that He was subject to the hour, might have sufficient proof that He was subject to no hour; for had He been so, how could He, before the proper hour was come, have done what He did? And in the next place, He did it to honor His mother, that He might not seem entirely to contradict and shame her that bare Him in the presence of so many; and also, that He might not be thought to want power, for she brought the servants to Him. (St. John Chrysostom, Homilies on the Gospel According to St. John, Homily XXII)

Chrysostom wrote not only that Mary had desired the miracle from her Son, but also that she brought the servants to Him. Thus the golden mouthed saint indicated his belief that Mary not only prompted the miracle of her Son, but also mediated between the servants and her Son at the wedding.

Mary-Another Redeemer? is a pathetic survey, with gross errors in research and logic, of “Marian” teachings. I am hopeful that Mr. White will recognize and publicly acknowledge his many errors and very significant omissions, perhaps during his many presentations against Catholicism or his many debates against Catholic apologists, though some may find such hope ludicrous. Many non-Christians could summon themselves to express regret for their errors and omissions; perhaps Mr. White could find such redeeming qualities in himself.

Mary-Another Redeemer? was not so much written as it was filled in with a number two pencil so that the optical scanner (that is, the book’s reader) was programmed to accept as correct answers what the pencil-wielding Mr. White had already determined. We saw that St. Thomas Aquinas pronounced both for and against the Immaculate Conception (and perhaps for the doctrine again about one year before his death). Yet Mr. White asked only a true or false question, whether St. Thomas denied the Immaculate Conception, and would accept only the answer indicating St. Thomas’s denial of the doctrine.

In the case of St. Bernard and the Immaculate Conception, Mr. White posed the wrong question. Instead of asking if St. Bernard opposed belief in some kind of virginal conception by Mary’s mother, Mr. White asked if St. Bernard opposed the Immaculate Conception, and would accept only an answer in the affirmative. In the question of whether the idea of Mary as Coredemptrix or Mediatrix exists in the Bible or was held by the early Church, though the answer is overwhelmingly attested to, Mr. White, the test administrator cum test-taker on our behalf, filled in the wrong bubble. And so on. Mary-Another Redeemer? was not nearly so much written by an expositor of the truth as it was by an advocate of poorly informed and fiercely, even defiantly, maintained viewpoints.

Mr. White, in his rejoinder, misinformed his readers when he asserted that modern promoters of the possible dogma of Mary as Co-Redeemer do not even attempt to directly link the possible dogma to the passage from St. Irenaeus [“. . . even the promoters of the dogma do not attempt to make the direct connection of the passage of Irenaeus, so clearly is the idea of ‘co-redemptrix’ absent from any semi-unbiased reading of the text”].But Pope John Paul II, widely believed to be promoting the possible dogma, did see in those very words of Irenaeus a direct statement of Mary’s role as Co-Redeemer:

At the end of the second century, St. Irenaeus, a disciple of Polycarp, already pointed out Mary’s contribution to the work of salvation. He understood the value of Mary’s consent at the time of the Annunciation, recognizing in the Virgin of Nazareth’s obedience to and faith in the angel’s message the perfect antithesis of Eve’s disobedience and disbelief, with a beneficial effect on humanity’s destiny. In fact, just as Eve caused death, so Mary, with her “yes,” became “a cause of salvation” for herself and for all mankind (cf. Adv. Haer., III, 22, 4; SC 211, 441). (Pope John Paul II in L’Osservatore Romano, 26 October 1995, p. 4, in  Miravalle, p. 129, italics in Miravalle but not in L’Osservatore Romano)

Regarding John 19:26-27, Mr. White, in an endnote on p. 155 about Mary as the “Mother of the Church,” remarked that the passage “in its original context, does not begin to suggest such a far-reaching concept.” Origen (c.185-253/254) and St. Ambrose (c.337-397), however, did so interpret the words of the dying Christ. In a commentary on John’s Gospel written starting in 226, Origen wrote:

The first-fruits of all the Scriptures are the Gospels, and the first-fruit of the Gospels is the Gospel that John has given us. No one can understand the meaning of this Gospel unless he has rested upon the breast of Jesus and from Jesus has received Mary as his mother. (Origen, In Johannis Evangelium, praef. 6; Patrologia Graeca 14:34ab, in Laurentin, pp. 72-73, italics mine)

St. Ambrose wrote:

May the Christ from the height of the cross say also to each of you: There is your mother. May he say also to the Church: There is your son. Then we will begin to be children of the Church when we see the Christ triumphant on the cross. (St. Ambrose, In Lucam VII, 5 (Patrologia Latina 15, 1787), in de la Potterie,  p. 260, his italics)

Further, Mr. White failed to relate in his endnote (and I believe anywhere else except obliquely in endnote 3 on pp. 154-155 in the quotation from Irenaeus) that the Fathers emphasized the view of Mary as the New Eve.

If Mr. White argued in his rejoinder that, in the famously controverted passage from St. Augustine’s Nature and Grace, 36,42, Augustine meant that Mary was not immaculately conceived, that is, that she was tinged with original sin, then Mr. White’s argument is an example of ignoratio elenchi – arguing for one thing (that Augustine did not imply that Mary was immaculately conceived) as if it proved another (that Augustine implied that Mary was not immaculately conceived).

St. Augustine’s belief in the mode of the transmission of original sin has been long abandoned, but it did impede for centuries the development of the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. His opinion on the Immaculate Conception, whatever it was, was based on this mistaken understanding. Thus his opinion on the Immaculate Conception is largely beside the point. Mr. White told nothing of this to his readers, however.

Mr. White left many indications that he himself had not understood St. Bernard’s concerns. Mr. White appears to have not availed himself of the many references that indicated that St. Bernard was opposed to the idea that Mary’s mother had a virginal conception of Mary but was unopposed to the idea of an immaculate infusion of Mary’s soul into the bodily matter formed from the sexual union of her parents.

Mr. White (p. 41) quoted Dr. Johnson to report that the Council of Trent in 1546 also left the issue of the Immaculate Conception unresolved. While it is true that the Council of Trent did not dogmatize the Immaculate Conception, Dr. Johnson and Mr. White omitted at least three significant points: i) the Council of Trent specifically exempted the Virgin Mary from its declarations on original sin; ii) the vast majority of the Council Fathers believed in the Immaculate Conception but thought a dogmatic definition inopportune, that is, that such definition should await a different moment; and iii) the Council of Trent affirmed Mary’s personal sinlessness.

Whether Mary gave birth to other children is an issue emblematic of Mr. White’s lopsided methodology. As a Reformed Baptist whose theology is under the sway of the Reformers in general and Jean Calvin in particular, Mr. White, who argued (pp. 29-34) that Mary gave birth to other children after Jesus, did not explain how his faith came to reverse the unanimous belief of Luther, Zwingli and Calvin, and the nearly unanimous teaching of the Church Fathers, regarding belief in Mary’s perpetual virginity. Yet Mr. White took pains, though not enough judging from the gaffes in his presentations, to contrast the teachings of St. Thomas Aquinas, St. Bernard and others with subsequent teachings of the Catholic Church. Mr. White did not examine his own teachings the way he scrutinized, albeit very sloppily, Catholic teachings.

* * * * * * * * * *
Mr. White devoted many pages to St. Alphonsus Liguori’s (constantly spelled “Ligouri”) book, The Glories of Mary. I thoroughly refuted a similar example of gross misinterpretation and selective citation of that book: St. Alphonsus de Liguori: Mary-Worshiper & Idolater? Needless to say, no counter-reply was ever offered. This person, who originally approached me with his challenges, seemingly vanished from the face of the earth after my paper was published. But (let’s be charitable) maybe he is doing tons of research and preparing a comprehensive refutation . . .

White wrote, in his chapter four (where all the quotes in this section come from), devoted to the Immaculate Conception:

But just how serious this dogma is can be seen from what came immediately after the definition:

Hence, if anyone shall dare—which God forbid!—to think otherwise than as has been defined by us, let him know and understand that he is condemned by his own judgment; that he has suffered shipwreck in the faith; that he has separated from the unity of the Church; and that, furthermore, by his own action he incurs the penalties established by law if he should dare to express in words or writing or by any other outward means the errors he think in his heart.

Here, with infallible and binding authority, the Pope forbids anyone from even thinking otherwise than he has defined concerning the Immaculate Conception. If you are led to a different conclusion by the study of the Bible, or the study of history, you are to submit your mind and your heart to the ultimate authority of the Papacy, and reject even those conclusions derived from the Word itself.

Mr. White acts as if this were the most novel and outrageous thing in the world: to require some tenet of faith to be held by the faithful, as if Protestants don’t do this, too. Of course, they do (all the time). Passing over the multitude of statements from Luther and Calvin, anathematizing all who disagree (fellow Protestants and Catholics alike) with their own judgments (on entirely arbitrary grounds), we will examine a few of the Reformed creeds and confessions and discover that they take  exactly the same stance. The good Calvinist has to submit his “mind and heart to the ultimate authority of the creeds and confessions of Calvinism.” I don’t see how this state of affairs is all that different, in terms of being bound to some authority which offers an interpretation of the Bible and Christian doctrine.

Mr. White is a Calvinist (Reformed Baptist). One of the classic expositions of Calvinism was that set out by the Synod of Dort (1618-1619). We find statements from that synod such as the following, directed towards those who don’t accept the five points of Calvinism, or “TULIP” (which acronym derives from this very synod):

T = Total Depravity
U = Unconditional Election
L = Limited Atonement
I = Irresistible Grace
P = Perseverance of the Saints

Article 6: God’s Eternal Decision

The fact that some receive from God the gift of faith within time, and that others do not, stems from his eternal decision. For all his works are known to God from eternity (Acts 15:18; Eph. 1:11). In accordance with this decision he graciously softens the hearts, however hard, of his chosen ones and inclines them to believe, but by his just judgment he leaves in their wickedness and hardness of heart those who have not been chosen . . . This is the well-known decision of election and reprobation revealed in God’s Word. This decision the wicked, impure, and unstable distort to their own ruin, . . .

In it’s “Conclusion: Rejection of False Accusations,” the Synod declares, against Protestant Arminian Christians:

. . . the Synod earnestly warns the false accusers themselves to consider how heavy a judgment of God awaits those who give false testimony against so many churches and their confessions, trouble the consciences of the weak, and seek to prejudice the minds of many against the fellowship of true believers.

Note that this is entirely a dispute amongst Protestants. The great majority of Protestants today are Arminian, not Calvinist. They are all condemned by the rhetoric at Dort, and essentially read out of the Christian faith. I have dealt with this inconsistency and hidden assumption in Mr. White’s work in great detail, and shown how — by his own stated assumptions — people like Martin Luther, C. S. Lewis, and John Wesley were not, and could not be Christians. That is what his logic entails. Catholics, of course, do not deny that Protestants are Christians, or that they can be saved.

So Catholic dogmatic authority asserts that a person who rejects the Immaculate Conception has been “condemned by his own judgment” and has “suffered shipwreck in the faith.” Calvinist dogmatic authority asserts that people who reject predestination to hell of the reprobate and other tenets of five-point Calvinism (which multiple millions of Protestants reject — including even Martin Luther himself), are “wicked, impure, and unstable” and do so “to their own ruin.” They are “false accusers” who will be subject to a “heavy judgment of God” if they continue in their ways. What’s the difference? In both cases, a teaching which is disagreed with by many many different kinds of Christians is made obligatory on followers of the professed faith, under penalty of the shipwreck of their faith or souls.

That’s not all. We have the habitual “anathematizing” treatment of the Catholic Church in other Protestant creeds and confessions, reading those who adhere to its doctrine out of the faith. For example, the Westminster Confession of 1646:

CHAPTER XXV. Of the Church

VI. There is no other head of the Church but the Lord Jesus Christ: nor can the Pope of Rome in any sense be head thereof; but is that Antichrist, that man of sin and son of perdition, that exalteth himself in the Church against Christ, and all that is called God.

Likewise, the Second Helvetic Confession (1566):

CHAPTER XVII  Of The Catholic and Holy Church of God,
and of The One Only Head of The Church

. . . The Roman head does indeed preserve his tyranny and the corruption that has been brought into the Church, and meanwhile he hinders, resists, and with all the strength he can muster cuts off the proper reformation of the Church.

And the Belgic Confession (1561):

Article 29: The Marks of the True Church

. . . As for the false church, it assigns more authority to itself and its ordinances than to the Word of God; it does not want to subject itself to the yoke of Christ; it does not administer the sacraments as Christ commanded in his Word; it rather adds to them or subtracts from them as it pleases; it bases itself on men, more than on Jesus Christ; it persecutes those who live holy lives according to the Word of God and who rebuke it for its faults, greed, and idolatry. These two churches are easy to recognize and thus to distinguish from each other.

So how are these two stances all that different, authority-wise? The Catholic position was that if someone didn’t follow the pope’s teaching with regard to the Immaculate Conception, they were in big spiritual trouble. The anti-Catholic Calvinist position (thankfully, not all Calvinists are anti-Catholic, by any means) is that if someone follows any of the pope’s teachings, or those of the Catholic Church, he is following antichrist, a man who “hinders” and “resists” all proper reformation of the Church, denigrating the Bible, not subjecting himself to Christ, follows men more than Christ, is an idolater, etc.

If he doesn’t accept a doctrine like double predestination (where the damned, or reprobate, never had any choice but to be damned from eternity), he is “wicked” and “impure” and under a heavy “judgment of God.” How is one worse than the other? But of course Mr. White will never point this out. His goal is to make the Catholic Church look utterly unreasonable, arrogant, and outrageous, while the Protestant sects who make exactly the same kind of statements — about doctrines which are highly-controversial — get a pass.

Coming up to our present time, and the ecumenical joint statement, Evangelicals and Catholics Together(ECT), we again find a vigorous anti-Catholic opposition. For example, prominent anti-Catholic Michael Horton (chairman of the Council of the Alliance of Confessing Evangelicals, and associate professor of historical theology at Westminster Theological Seminary in California), in his critical review of ECT [link defunct], writes (and surely Mr. White would agree):

If Rome continues to uphold the Decrees and Canons of the Council of Trent, all individual members of that body who follow those decrees (which, in Roman Catholic ecclesiology must include every faithful son or daughter) continue to stand in opposition to the unchanging Gospel of Christ. If they stray from the official teaching of Rome, either from ignorance or in opposition to those statements, they may be regarded as brothers and sisters in Christ.

. . . the Roman See persists in its denial of the message that makes the church’s existence both possible and necessary.

. . . We deny that this catholic consensus is sufficient for recognizing the Roman church as a true visible expression of Christ’s body.

. . . We affirm that individual Roman Catholics, who for various reasons do not self-consciously give their assent to the precise definitions of the Roman Magisterium regarding justification, the sole mediation of Christ, the monergistic character of the new birth, and similar evangelical issues, are our brothers and sisters despite Rome’s official position.

[again, this is the condescending notion that a Catholic has to be a lousy, disobedient, dissenting Catholic in order to be a Christian]

Mr. James White makes many similar utterances, too numerous to recount. Here is one of the more striking ones:

The issue isn’t the Pope, the issue is the system he represents. The question, at the bottom of the issue, is, “Does Rome promote, or stand against, Christ’s work in this world?” The answer, in light of the “gospel” taught by Rome, is clear in my mind: she stands against the work of Christ. Hence, if we wish to use the term “antichrist,” it is the system that partakes of that spirit due to her opposition to the free grace of Christ. (statement on his own sola Scriptura Internet list: 8-16-96)

Now, again, I ask: why is it unacceptable for the Catholic Church to require its members to believe in the Immaculate Conception (where other Christians vigorously disagree), and give stern warnings for failure to do so, but it is perfectly acceptable for anti-Catholic to make far more extreme statements denigrating the Catholic Church altogether and some one billion Catholics? In each case, others who disagree and the relative state of their souls or “correct belief” are discussed, but the anti-Catholic statements are infinitely more sweeping and condescending. Therefore, what Mr. White proves, when this further relevant examination is brought to the table, is the existence of his own glaring double standards (as so often in his anti-Catholic polemics). His rhetoric backfires on him.

This double standard and historical / theological obfuscation is continued by Mr. White when he states:

But why did it take more than 1,800 years to define this teaching as dogma, if, in fact, it is true?

The doctrine developed, just as all doctrines do. This was shown in William Possidento’s review. In this way, it is little different from all other doctrines. It just developed a bit more slowly. Its essence — Mary’s sinlessness –, appeared very early on and became the consensus of the Fathers. That’s much more than can be said for many doctrines that Mr. White accepts (and here we are deep into “double standard” ground once again). White’s lack of consistency and historical fairness and objectivity can be analyzed on many levels:

1. With regard to doctrines that are utterly unknown in Scripture, and which required nearly four centuries to be resolved by the Church and Tradition (canon of Scripture: finalized in 397)

2. With regard to doctrines which Protestants and Catholics both accept, but which took many centuries (often four or more) to develop fully (the Two Natures of Christ and fine points of trinitarianism — Chalcedon in 451, original sin).

3. With regard to doctrines which were virtually nonexistent throughout all previous Christian history, but nevertheless were adopted (as novelties, or corruptions) by early Protestants as not only dogma, but indeed, “pillars” of their faith, and the basis upon much Protestant theology and epistemology is based (sola fide — including the notion of imputed or extrinsic justification — and sola Scriptura).

4. With regard to doctrines that developed very rapidly and were virtually unanimous in the Fathers, which were retained by some early Protestants (Luther) but rejected by others, such as Calvin and Zwingli (real presence in the Eucharist, baptismal regeneration).

5. With regard to doctrines that developed rapidly and were retained by all the Protestant “Reformers” but denied by most Protestants today (perpetual virginity of Mary).

6. With regard to doctrines that developed slowly and were retained by some Protestant “Reformers” but denied by virtually all Protestants today (Immaculate Conception, which Luther accepted, and the Assumption, which Bullinger accepted).

All of these factors embroil Mr. White in internal incoherence, inconsistency, and self-contradiction, insofar as he wishes to talk about the alleged outrageousness of a development taking 1800 years, while ignoring all these anomalies in the Protestant position(s), historically considered, and treated in the same fashion as White treats Catholicism. I shall explain each very briefly (as I have written about all of these things elsewhere):

The doctrinal development of Christology and trinitarianism is well-known, and not a matter of controversy, so I will pass over that for the sake of space. The history of the doctrine of original sin, however, is much less well-known. John Henry Cardinal Newman noted that the doctrine of original sin had far less warrant in the Fathers than purgatory did. I wrote in a paper about development of doctrine:

[Newman] Some notion of suffering, or disadvantage, or punishment after this life, in the case of the faithful departed, or other vague forms of the doctrine of Purgatory, has in its favour almost a consensus of the first four ages of the Church.

Newman then recounts no less than sixteen Fathers who hold the view in some form. But in comparing this consensus to the doctrine of original sin, we find a disjunction:

No one will say that there is a testimony of the Fathers, equally strong, for the doctrine of Original Sin.

In spite of the forcible teaching of St. Paul on the subject, the doctrine of Original Sin appears neither in the Apostles’ nor the Nicene Creed.

(Newman, 21-23)

This is a crucial distinction. It is a serious problem for Protestantism that it by and large inconsistently rejects doctrines which have a consensus in the early Church, such as purgatory, the (still developing) papacy, bishops, the Real Presence, regenerative infant baptism, apostolic succession, and intercession of the saints, while accepting others with far less explicit early sanction, such as original sin.

2. The utter absence of the two Protestant “pillars”: sola fide and sola Scriptura, prior to the 16th century, seems not to trouble Mr. White at all (all the while, he complains against the “late” arrival of the Immaculate Conception). Respected Anglican scholar and Church historian Alister McGrath holds that imputed justification (a bedrock Reformed doctrine) indeed began with Martin Luther. He calls it a “theological novum” and states that it “marks a complete break with the tradition up to this point” and that the Protestants had  introduced a “notional distinction” between justification and sanctification which was brand new (see McGrath, II, 2 ff., cf. I, 182 ff.).

Protestant apologist Norman Geisler concurs with this general historical judgment:

. . . these valuable insights into the doctrine of justification had been largely lost throughout much of Christian history, and it was the Reformers who recovered this biblical truth . . .

During the patristic, and especially the later medieval periods, forensic justification was largely lost . . .

. . . one can be saved without believing that imputed righteousness (or forensic justification) is an essential part of the true gospel. Otherwise, few people were saved between the time of the apostle Paul and the Reformation, since scarcely anyone taught imputed righteousness (or forensic justification) during that period! (Geisler and Mackenzie, 247-248, 503)

The newness of the sola Scriptura is very well-known. Statements of reputable Protestant historians which deny an understanding of sola Scriptura in the Fathers are numerous. For example, patristics expert J. N. D. Kelly:

It should be unnecessary to accumulate further evidence. Throughout the whole period Scripture and tradition ranked as complementary authorities, media different in form but coincident in content. To inquire which counted as superior or more ultimate is to pose the question in misleading terms. If Scripture was abundantly sufficient in principle, tradition was recognized as the surest clue to its interpretation, for in tradition the Church retained, as a legacy from the apostles which was embedded in all the organs of her institutional life, an unerring grasp of the real purport and meaning of the revelation to which Scripture and tradition alike bore witness. (Kelly, 47-48)

3. As for the real presence in the Eucharist and baptismal regeneration, both doctrines which were virtually unanimously held by the Fathers, and by Martin Luther, but rejected by John Calvin and James White, the scholarly consensus is equally clear:

The doctrine of the sacrament of the Eucharist was not a subject of theological controversy . . . . till the time of Paschasius Radbert, in the ninth century . . .

In general, this period, . . . was already very strongly inclined toward the doctrine of transubstantiation, and toward the Greek and Roman sacrifice of the mass, which are inseparable in so far as a real sacrifice requires the real presence of the victim. (Schaff, III, 492, 500)

For further documentation, seePatristic Eucharistic Doctrine: Nine Protestant Scholars.

J. N. D. Kelly wrote about the view on baptism in the Church in the first two centuries:

It was always held to convey the remission of sins . . . the theory that it mediated the Holy Spirit was fairly general . . . The early view, therefore, like the Pauline, would seem to be that baptism itself is the vehicle for conveying the Spirit to believers; in all this period we nowhere come across any clear pointers to the existence of a separate rite, such as unction or the laying on of hands, appropriated to this purpose. (Kelly, 194-195)

4. The first Protestant leaders and forerunners of the movement (aka “Reformers”) unanimously held to the perpetual virginity of Mary

5. Martin Luther believed in the Immaculate Conception in a slightly revised form. This is the opinion of many Protestant and Lutheran scholars, including contributors to the 55-volume set of Luther’s Works.

Heinrich Bullinger (1504-1575), successor to Zwingli and author of the Second Helvetic Confession, wrote:

Elijah was transported body and soul in a chariot of fire; he was not buried in any Church bearing his name, but mounted up to heaven, so that . . .we might know what immortality and recompense God prepares for his faithful prophets and for his most outstanding and incomparable creatures . . . It is for this reason, we believe, that the pure and immaculate embodiment of the Mother of God, the Virgin Mary, the Temple of the Holy Spirit, that is to say her saintly body, was carried up to heaven by the angels. (De origine erroris, 16, written in 1568; in Thurian, 197-198)

Zurich during Zwingli’s tenure continued to observe the Feast of the Assumption on August 15th (Acts of the Council in March 1526 and March 1530; see Thurian, 186). So this belief was not unknown in early Protestantism, either. Luther still accepted it in a non-dogmatic fashion, as late as 15 August 1522 (on which date he preached a sermon about Mary’s Assumption), but later seems to have discarded belief in it. The point is that many early Protestants accepted Marian beliefs which Mr. White cavalierly assumes are completely unbiblical and even absent in history.

White asks in his book, concerning the Immaculate Conception:

Is there anything in Scripture that even remotely suggests this concept?

Well, yes, there is more evidence than there is for the canon of Scripture (absolutely none) — which all Protestants accept — and for sola Scriptura (arguably none at all). I’ve offered plenty of biblical support:

Blessed Virgin Mary & God’s Special Presence in Scripture [1994; from first draft of A Biblical Defense of Catholicism]

“All Have Sinned” vs. a Sinless, Immaculate Mary? [1996; revised and posted at National Catholic Register on 12-11-17]

Luke 1:28 (“Full of Grace”) & Immaculate Conception [2004]

The Bible: Mary Was Without Sin [4-1-09]

Mary: Ark of the New Covenant (Biblical Evidences) [7-9-09]

Mary’s Immaculate Conception: A Biblical Argument [2010]

Annunciation: Was Mary Already Sublimely Graced? [10-8-11]

Scripture, Through an Angel, Reveals That Mary Was Sinless [National Catholic Register, 4-30-17]

White writes:

Roman Catholic theologian Ludwig Ott faces reality when addressing this topic: “The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception of Mary is not explicitly revealed in Scripture.”

As we have seen, neither is the canon of the Bible. It can’t be found in Scripture by any conceivable argument or exegesis. Does White “face” that “reality”? And does he see that this argument from doctrines thought to be actually or allegedly “non-biblical” or “non-explicitly-biblical” will backfire on him? Sola Scriptura itself is arguably completely absent. Even many advocates of it will admit that it is, at least, not explicitly taught in Scripture, and needs to be deduced and arrived at through a bit of work and cross-referencing.

Ott likewise cites the main passage used in defense of nearly every Marian doctrine: Luke 1:28. All Roman Catholic theologians and apologists must press this verse into service at this point. But as we have seen, the passage does not even begin to bear the massive weight placed upon it by Roman dogma. The greeting of an angel that emphasizes the blessedness of Gods gracious choice of Mary as the mother of the Messiah is hardly sufficient basis for everything Rome wishes to pile upon it. And one thing is for certain: the early Fathers likewise failed to see the significance in the passage assigned by later centuries.

Why, then, does Martin Luther use this very verse for the same reason, in a sermon of 1527?:

. . . as the rest of mankind are, both in soul and in body, conceived in sin, whilst Christ is conceived without sin, as well in body as in soul, so the Virgin Mary was conceived, according to the body, indeed without grace, but according to the soul, full of grace. This is signified by those words which the angel Gabriel said to her, ‘Blessed art thou amongst women’ [Luke 1:28]. For it could not be said to her, ‘Blessed art thou,’ if at any time she had been obnoxious to the curse. Again, it was just and meet that that person should be preserved from original sin from whom Christ received the flesh by which He overcame all sins. And that, indeed, is properly called blessed which is endowed with divine grace, that is, which is free from sin. (from Martini Lutheri PostillaeIn die Conceptionis Mariae Matris Dei, pp. 360-361. Argentorati: apud Georgium Ulricum Adlanum, anno xxx, in Ullathorne, 132-134)

White trips himself up once again, in asserting that he is “certain” that the Fathers didn’t see any particular  significance for Mariology in Luke 1:28. Now, of course they did not see the complete, fully-developed doctrine of the Immaculate Conception. But at least three saw a sinless Mary (and/or Mary as the New Eve) in this verse:

“Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you” (Lk. 1:28). This is she who was prefigured by Eve and who symbolically received the title of mother of the living (cf. Gen. 3:20).

. . . Eve became for men the cause of death, because through her death entered into the world. Mary, however, was the cause of life, because life has come to us through her. (St. Epiphanius [d. 403], Adversus haereses, 78, 17-19; PG 42, 728 B – 729 C; in Gambero, 128-129)

No wonder that the angel said to her, “Rejoice, O full of grace!” (Lk 1:28). With these words he took from her the burden of that sorrow which, from the beginning of creation, had been imposed on birth because of sin. (St. Gregory of Nyssa [d.c. 395], On the Song of Songs 13; PG 44, 1052 D – 1053 B; in Gambero, 159)

“Hail, O full of grace, the Lord is with you, you are blessed” (Lk 1:28), O most beautiful and most noble among women. The Lord is with you, O all-holy one, glorious and good. The Lord is with you, O worthy of praise, O incomparable, O more than glorious, all splendor, worthy of God, worthy of all blessedness . . . spouse of God, divinely nourished treasure. To you I announce neither a conception in wickedness nor a birth in sin; instead, I bring the joy that puts an end to Eve’s sorrow . . . Through you, Eve’s odious condition is ended; through you, abjection has been destroyed; through you, error is dissolved; through you, sorrow is abolished; through you, condemnation has been erased. Through you, Eve has been redeemed. (Theodotus of Ancyra [d.c. 445], On the Mother of God and the Nativity; PO 19, 330-31′ in Gambero, 271)

I disproved this claim by walking across my own library to get one single book. Note that all these men died before the doctrine of the Two Natures of Christ, or the Hypostatic Union, was defined at the Council of Chalcedon in 451. St. Gregory died even before the canon of Scripture was finalized. If Christology and the canon of Scripture can take that long to develop, why not Mariology? But we see how developed it was, even at this early stage.

And again, Mr. White makes a false claim:

Leo I, the great bishop of Rome from 440 to 461 A.D., rejected the idea that anyone but Christ was sinless.

How, then, will Mr. White can explain the following thought from this eminent saint?:

For the uncorrupt nature of Him that was born had to guard the primal virginity of the Mother, and the infused power of the Divine Spirit had to preserve in spotlessness and holiness that sanctuary which He had chosen for Himself . . . (Sermon XXII: On the Feast of the Nativity, Part II; emphasis added)

It seems that Mr. White has failed to do his proper homework once again. 

Bibliography of Books Referred To
***
Breen, Eileen, editor, Mary-The Second Eve: from the Writings of John Henry Newman, Rockford, IL: Tan Books and Publishers, Inc., 1982.

*

Gambero, Luigi, Mary and the Fathers of the Church: The Blessed Virgin Mary in Patristic Thought, translated by Thomas Buffer, San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 1999.

Geisler, Norman L. and Ralph E. MacKenzie, Roman Catholics and Evangelicals: Agreements and Differences, Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 1995.

Jurgens, William A., editor and translator, The Faith of the Early Fathers, Collegeville Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1970.

Kelly, J.N.D., Early Christian Doctrines, San Francisco: Harper & Row, 1978 edition.

Laurentin, René, A Short Treatise on the Virgin Mary, Washington, New Jersey: AMI Press, 1991.

McGrath, Alister, Iustitia Dei: A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification. Two volumes, Cambridge University Press, 1986.

Miravalle, Mark I., editor, Mary: Coredemptrix, Mediatrix, Advocate – Theological Foundations, Towards a Papal Definition?, Santa Barbara, CA: Queenship Publishing, 1995.

Most, William G., Mary in Our Life, New York: P.J. Kenedy & Sons, 1954.

Newman, John Henry, Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine;  edition published by the University of Notre Dame Press, 1989, from the 1878 edition of the original work of 1845.

O’Carroll, Michael, Theotokos: A Theological Encyclopedia of the Blessed Virgin Mary, Wilmington, DE: M. Glazier, 1982.

Ott, Ludwig, Fundamentals of Catholic Dogma, Rockford, IL: Tan Books and Publishers, Inc., fourth edition, 1974.

Pelikan, Jaroslav, Mary Through the Centuries: Her Place in the History of Culture, New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press, 1996.

de la Potterie, Ignace, S.J., Mary in the Mystery of the Covenant, Staten Island, New York: Alba House, 1992.

Quasten, Johannes, Patrology, four volumes, Allen, Texas: Christian Classics, 1949.

Schaff, Philip, History of the Christian Church, vol. 3, A.D. 311-600, revised 5th edition, Grand Rapids, MI: Eerdmans, reprinted in 1974, originally 1910.

Thurian, Max, Mary: Mother  of  all  Christians,  translated by Neville B. Cryer, New York: Herder & Herder, 1963.

Ullathorne, William, The Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God, revised by Canon Iles, Westminster: Art & Book Co., 1905.

***

Photo credit: Cover of James White’s book, from its Amazon page.

***

2020-05-15T11:29:07-04:00

Steve Hays of Tribalblogue is an anti-Catholic polemicist and sophist. I’ll be responding to the relevant portions of Steve’s article, “Ten objections to sola scriptura-1” (4-22-04, Tribalblogue). His words will be in blue.

*****

Over the years, Catholic apologetics has raised a number of objections to sola Scriptura. Let’s run through the major objections and rebut them one by one.

And let’s decisively refute his supposed rebuttals . . .

1. It’s a recipe for chaos:

Catholic apologists often point to the proliferation of Protestant denominations as proof that the right of private judgment is infeasible (cf. Vatican I, preamble).

This is self-evident. The New Testament everywhere casually assumes one institutionally and doctrinally united and visible Church: not thousands of competing and endlessly contradicting denominations: in effect, theological relativism and ecclesiological chaos.

This objection rests on two or three related assumptions: (i) this is an intolerable state of affairs which God would not allow to go unchecked;

Not without recourse: which there is in Catholicism.

(ii) God has made provision for some instrumentality that would guard against such disunity,

It’s called the Catholic Church.

and (iii) the Roman Church does not suffer from this internal strife since it is the repository of this unifying instrumentality. That is perhaps the major objection to the right of private judgment, and therefore calls for the most detailed reply:

It doesn’t suffer such strife in its actual theology “on the books” (magisterium: compiled in Denzinger and on a more popular level, Ludwig Ott and in the Catholic Catechism) but it does among renegades within the fold who are self-aware dissidents / heterodox / theological liberals, who care little about the dogmas and doctrines already there, which bind the Catholic faithful. Therefore, institutionally it is unified in a way that cannot be said of any other Christian communion. And in the end that is all we can sensibly go by in comparing competing Christian views.

(a) The Catholic apologist is taking his own denomination as the standard of comparison, and then pointing as accusing finger at the “schismatics.” While this is a natural starting-point for him, it assumes the very claim at issue. I, as a Protestant, do not regard the Roman Church as the yardstick. Otherwise I would be Catholic! Rather, I regard the Roman Church as just one more denomination, and hardly the best.

Not at all. We are examining what the Bible says (it teaches one unified set of doctrinal truths and one body, the Church) and looking around to see which institution out there best harmonizes with the biblical description. It’s no contest. To even claim that any Protestant denomination fits this bill is to utter something that is a laughable farce as soon as it is suggested. Nor does the merely “invisible / mystical Church” canard work for a second.

(b) God put up with a wide diversity of sects and schools of thought in 1C Judaism. We read of Pharisees, Sadducees, Samaritans, Essenes, Zealots, Therapeutae, Jewish Gnostics, Jewish Platonists, Qumranic separatists, as well as the Rabbinical parties of Hillel and Shamai. Doubtless there were many additional groups that our partial and partisan sources have failed to preserve for posterity. Yet God never saw fit to install an infallible Jewish Magisterium in order to prevent this plurality of viewpoints. 

Actually, He did in various ways: in the Torah, the oral law also given to Moses, in the priests & Levite teachers, the prophets, and at length the scribes, Pharisees (Moses’ Seat), and rabbis. All of these — to varying degrees — had profound guiding authority (with the prophets being infallible). Conversely, in no way did the Old Testament Jews hold to sola Scriptura at any time, as I  have demonstrated in many ways.

So the objection is based on nothing more than a seat-of-the-pants hunch about what God is prepared to permit. It doesn’t appeal to any of God’s revealed purposes—the disclosure of his decretive or preceptive will in Scripture. It doesn’t bother to anticipate any concrete counter-examples. Far from there being a presumption in favor of the Catholic claim, the precedent of God’s former dealings with his people goes against that expectation. If we find all this diversity and dissension under the OT dispensation, why assume that the NT economy must operate according to a contrary set of priorities? Wouldn’t the Catholic rationale apply with equal force to OT church? If Christians require the services of a living Magisterium, wouldn’t the Old Covenant community be under the same necessity? Yet it’s clear from the Gospels that none of the rival parties spoke for God in any definitive sense. The priesthood was the only faction with any institutional standing under the Mosaic Covenant, and its members were frequently and fundamentally mistaken in their construal of its ethical obligations, such as the matter of putting to death their prophesied Messiah. So much for a divine teaching office to ensure unity and fidelity.

Sheer nonsense. This is just a bunch of words jumbled together. I have made scores and scores of biblical arguments related to this whole question of authority: in papers collected on my Bible and Tradition page, and Church page. I demonstrate that denominationalism is most unbiblical in papers collected on my Calvinism & General Protestantism page. We’ll clearly see which side of this debate is more biblical — i.e., in harmony with the Bible –, as this proceeds. No one could possibly miss it.

One of the problems with these utopian scenarios is that they’re premature, reflected a realized eschatology. Utopia awaits heaven and the final state. So much of Catholic apologetics has this armchair quality to it. It makes such large assumptions about what God would never allow to happen. Get up of your chair and take a look out the window! When I observe at the world around me I see that God allows quite a lot. If you want to know what God would allow, you should start with what he has allowed. We can only anticipate the future on the basis of what God has said and done in the past.

More empty words. Sure, God allows (permits) a lot. This doesn’t prove that it is His will. The fact remains that the Catholic Church is doctrinally unified, and uniquely so among any Christian claimant.

As a rule, you can’t disprove a position just because you don’t like the consequences. I’m struck by how many otherwise intelligent, educated people take this solipsistic approach to truth-claims. Most people don’t like cancer, but that doesn’t make it go away. Rather, our attitude should be to study what God has said and done, and then find the wisdom in it. A “dire” consequence may disclose a deeper wisdom in God’s plan for the world.

(c) By excommunicating dissident members, an organization can enforce as much internal unity as it pleases since—by definition—the only people left are likeminded types. So the Catholic appeal is circular. The Magisterium has not succeeded in preventing internal dissension. But its solution has been to externalize some of its internal dissension by exiling certain factions while defining other schools of thought as falling within the bounds of Catholic tradition—even though there’s no real harmony between the respective parties (e.g. Thomists and Molinists), not to mention varieties within a given school. (E.g. versions of Thomism: traditional [Bañez, Scheeben]; transcendental [Marechal, Rahner]; existential [Maritain, Gilson, Rahner], analytical [Geach, Kenny).] So the unity of faith maintained by the Magisterium is a diplomatic and definitional fiction.

Catholicism is not pragmatism: it is taking the Bible as well as the deposit of faith (sacred tradition) seriously. The Bible says there is one truth; so do we, and claim that we are in possession of it in its fullness, guided and protected by God (which factor alone makes it possible: not fallen human beings). Now, one may dispute the claim in many ways, but at least we assert what is clearly the biblical demand and requirement for the one true Church.

In the Church there are many doctrines and dogmas that Catholics must believe; others where diversity of thought is permitted within a wider category that must be believed. Steve brings up Molinists and Thomists. Both parties believe (as they must) in the predestination of the elect. They disagree in speculations about how God predestines. And this is permitted because it is one of the deepest mysteries in theology, and the Church has not yet claimed to know definitively which option is true or truer.

I am not denying the right of a denomination to set doctrinal standards and enforce them. But when the Roman Church draws invidious comparisons between its superior unity and the “scandal” or “tragedy” of Protestant sectarianism, this is an illusion fostered by the way in which the Roman Church has chosen to draw the boundaries in the first place. By setting itself up as the point of reference, by glossing over internal divisions and by classifying anything that falls outside its chosen touchstone as beyond the pale it can—no doubt— present an impressively self-serving contrast. By casting the terms of the debate it has rigged the outcome in its favor. It is only because the Catholic apologist is conditioned by this provincial mindset that he finds such an appeal persuasive.

This is the sophistical game that Steve always plays, but it’s simply not true. It’s a caricature of the Catholic view. Our standard is the Bible and what was taught with great consensus by the Church fathers.

(d) Furthermore, Paul indicates that God deliberately allows for a competition of viewpoints so that the position he himself approves of will emerge by process of comparison and contrast (1 Cor 11:19). One of the unintended services rendered by infidels is in forcing believers to become more thoughtful about their faith. If Voltaire didn’t exist, we’d have to invent him! So the true Church refines its theological understanding by having to fend off infidels from within and without.

Whaddya know: a rare (albeit failed and fallacious) attempted scriptural argument!

1 Corinthians 11:19 (RSV) for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized.

This is a semi-sarcastic remark. Paul makes it very clear that all factionalism and divisiveness and sectarianism is wrong and evil:

Romans 16:17-18 I appeal to you, brethren, to take note of those who create dissensions and difficulties, in opposition to the doctrine which you have been taught; avoid them. [18] For such persons do not serve our Lord Christ, but their own appetites, and by fair and flattering words they deceive the hearts of the simple-minded.
*
1 Corinthians 1:10-13 I appeal to you, brethren, by the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, that all of you agree and that there be no dissensions among you, but that you be united in the same mind and the same judgment. [11] For it has been reported to me by Chlo’e’s people that there is quarreling among you, my brethren. [12] What I mean is that each one of you says, “I belong to Paul,” or “I belong to Apol’los,” or “I belong to Cephas,” or “I belong to Christ.” [13] Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul? (cf. 2 Cor 12:20; Phil 2:2)
*
1 Corinthians 3:3-4 for you are still of the flesh. For while there is jealousy and strife among you, are you not of the flesh, and behaving like ordinary men? [4] For when one says, “I belong to Paul,” and another, “I belong to Apol’los,” are you not merely men? (cf. Rom 13:13; Jas 3:16)
*
1 Corinthians 5:11 But rather I wrote to you not to associate with any one who bears the name of brother if he is guilty of immorality or greed, or is an idolater, reviler, drunkard, or robber — not even to eat with such a one.
*
1 Corinthians 11:18-19 For, in the first place, when you assemble as a church, I hear that there are divisions among you; and I partly believe it, [19] for there must be factions among you in order that those who are genuine among you may be recognized.
*
1 Corinthians 12:25 that there may be no discord in the body, but that the members may have the same care for one another.
*
Galatians 5:19-21 Now the works of the flesh are plain: fornication, impurity, licentiousness, [20] idolatry, sorcery, enmity, strife, jealousy, anger, selfishness, dissensionparty spirit, [21] envy, drunkenness, carousing, and the like. I warn you, as I warned you before, that those who do such things shall not inherit the kingdom of God.
*
1 Timothy 6:3-5 If any one teaches otherwise and does not agree with the sound words of our Lord Jesus Christ and the teaching which accords with godliness, [4] he is puffed up with conceit, he knows nothing; he has a morbid craving for controversy and for disputes about words, which produce envy, dissension, slander, base suspicions, [5] and wrangling among men who are depraved in mind and bereft of the truth, imagining that godliness is a means of gain.
*
Titus 3:9-11 But avoid stupid controversies, genealogies, dissensions, and quarrels over the law, for they are unprofitable and futile. [10] As for a man who is factious, after admonishing him once or twice, have nothing more to do with him, [11] knowing that such a person is perverted and sinful; he is self-condemned.

In 1 Corinthians 11:19 Paul is noting that on the human level, the factionalism that sadly occurs will at least have the good effect of making the genuine, orthodox believers evident, and the rebellious heterodox also evident as wolves in sheep’s clothing. He’s not sanctioning it in the least: which is merely Steve’s wishful thinking in trying to shore up a radically unbiblical denominational sectarianism which is precisely the opposite of what the Apostle Paul always calls for and commands. Hence, we see Protestant commentators agree with my take:

The meaning is, not that divisions are inseparable from the nature of the Christian religion, not that it is the design and wish of the Author of Christianity that they should exist, and not that they are physically impossible, for then they could not be the subject of blame; but that such is human nature, such are the corrupt passions of men, the propensity to ambition and strifes, that they are to be expected, and they serve the purpose of showing who are, and who are not, the true friends of God. (Albert Barnes)

But observe what Paul says — there must be, for he intimates by this expression, that this state of matters does not happen by chance, but by the sure providence of God, because he has it in view to try his people, as gold in the furnace, and if it is agreeable to the mind of God, it is, consequently, expedient. At the same time, however, we must not enter into thorny disputes, or rather into labyrinths as to a fatal necessity. We know that there never will be a time when there will not be many reprobates. We know that they are governed by the spirit of Satan, and are effectually drawn away to what is evil. We know that Satan, in his activity, leaves no stone unturned with the view of breaking up the unity of the Church. From this — not from fate — comes that necessity of which Paul makes mention. (651) We know, also, that the Lord, by his admirable wisdom, turns Satan’s deadly machinations so as to promote the salvation of believers. (652) Hence comes that design of which he speaks — that the good may shine forth more conspicuously; for we ought not to ascribe this advantage to heresies, which, being evil, can produce nothing but what is evil, but to God, who, by his infinite goodness, changes the nature of things, so that those things are salutary to the elect, which Satan had contrived for their ruin. (John Calvin)

Those who are heretics were often never in the fold to begin with, and this is my point. Jesus talked about the wheat and the tares that grow up together (Mt 13:29-30), and the wolves in sheeps’ clothing (Mt 7:15), echoed by Paul (Acts 20:29). And St. John states: “They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out, that it might be plain that they all are not of us” (1 Jn 2:19). Thus, we observe such people in the Catholic Church, as well as among Protestants.

It’s determined (on a human, theological level) who is truly — consistently — part of the Church by seeing whether they agree with the Church’s creeds and confessions. That’s the best we can do. Even John Calvin conceded that we can’t know for sure who is among the elect. But we can know who is teaching falsely, by the standard of the Catholic magisterium, guided by the Bible and protected by the Holy Spirit.

(e) I don’t regard the “scandal” of denominationalism as all that scandalous. Granted that all Christians belong to the same family, but in the interests of domestic tranquility many parents have found it necessary to put the boys in separate bedrooms. I’m not endorsing all these denominations. I’d prefer to see everyone in the Calvinist camp. But even Christians who share an identical creed may have differing priorities when it comes to the work and worship of the Church. If all the Reformed bodies were to merge, the style, staffing, message, administration, fellowship and outreach would remain much the same at the level of the local church. They’d just take down the sign outside and put up a new one.

Every Protestant is forced to say this, to rationalize the state of affairs in their general camp, even though the very notion of denominations is fundamentally opposed to scriptural teaching.

(f) It’s my impression that denominationalism owes less to the Reformation than to nationalism and liberalism. There were many nominal Christians as well as closet heretics, atheists and dissenters in the Medieval Church, but when the Church still enjoyed a measure of temporal power and could enforce the party line on pain of torture, death, dispossession or exile, there was naturally an impressive show of outward conformity. But with the rise of nation-states, monarchs resented a rival power-center meddling in their internal affairs. So this nostalgia for the golden age of undivided Christendom— which Luther supposedly wrecked—rests on an ironically profane foundation.

No doubt. It doesn’t make the grotesquely unbiblical sectarianism it any more biblical or any less opposed to the Bible, and is no excuse in the final analysis.

I don’t see that the Roman Church’s rate of retention or recruitment during the modern era is markedly superior to that of the Protestant “sects.” Once it lost its power to coerce dissidents into submission, the Magisterium found that it was limited to the same sanction as its Protestant counterparts— excommunication. (This was also the primary sanction for the OT Church—to be “cut off” from the covenant community.) No more than the Protestant branches does it enjoy absolute sway over its membership. It can’t prevent members from breaking away and forming their own churches. And to a great extent it staves off further schism in its ranks by exceedingly indulgent terms of membership.

This has nothing directly to do with whether denominationalism is God’s will and biblically permitted. It’s simply noting how all Christian communions have ways and means to try to retain their members.

It opposes abortion but never excommunicates Catholic politicians who are complicit in our public policy. It opposes divorce, yet annulments are freely granted to the rich and famous. It opposes homosexuality but then opposes those who oppose homosexual “rights” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, ¶2357-2358). It opposes the death penalty, but has never excommunicated a Mafia Don.

This is merely talking about real or alleged hypocritical or inconsistent policies and applications in the Catholic Church. It has no bearing on whether denominations cause chaos or not (remember Steve’s actual topic, way back when?). They clearly do.

Given a choice I much prefer a plethora of smaller denominations, some good and some bad, to one big bad church. At least with the Protestant tradition you have an avenue of escape. Far better that than a system that generates the Catholic sex scandal. Once you’re committed to your church as the one and only true church, you’ll put up with anything, however horrendous. And that is the history of Roman Catholicism.

This is simply not biblical. The biblical teaching on sinners in the Church is that they do exist, and we should always expect them. We should not even be surprised by horrendous sins like the sex scandal or almost universal acceptance of legal childkilling in the Protestant denominations — and increasingly, even same-sex unions. Paul excoriated the Galatians and Corinthians for their sins, but still called them “churches”; so did Jesus in rebuking the seven “churches” of Revelation.

(g) Likewise, many new denominations are formed as a result of the liberalization of preexisting denominations. Liberals rarely if ever form their own denomination. How could they? Barren theology begets no life. Rather, their modus operandi is to infiltrate and infect a preexisting church and thereby drive out the true believers. Were it not for liberal parasitism, there would be far fewer breakaway denominations.

But that doesn’t represent a novel disagreement. It is only because the faithful continue to believe what they have always believed that they find it necessary to split with a preexisting denomination which has been overrun by a liberal faction that no longer believes the same thing. Schism is as much a mark of doctrinal continuity as it is of superficial disunity. They leave a church because it first left them. Anyone who knows his church history will instantly recognize how true that is.

This is true. The difference is that such liberalism never causes the Catholic Church to change its teaching, so the faithful, genuine Catholics can always stay, whereas in Protestantism, it does often succeed in corrupting whole denominations (thus the faithful “traditional / honest Protestants” are forced to leave and start another). That’s the difference between divine protection and lack of same.

(h) If denominationalism is such a problem, then the Roman Church is a very large part of the problem since—from my standpoint—it’s just one more denomination. The very phenomenon of the Protestant split to which Catholic apologist points only proves that a Magisterium was unable to prevent dissention and schism.

It’s spelled “dissension.” No group: Protestant or Catholic can prevent individuals from going astray and rejecting various teachings. That’s not the issue. The real issue is: how does a Christian communion maintain its orthodoxy and teachings that it has required from the beginning?

The relation between Catholic and Protestant is often represented as analogous to the relation between the trunk and its branches. But both Catholicism and Protestantism represent offshoots of the Latin Church. Trent is not just a linear continuation of the Medieval Church. The Western Church before Trent was more pluralistic in doctrine than the Roman Church between Trent and Vatican I. For example, the Augustinian tradition, though always a minority report, had enjoyed an honored and distinguished representation in the Medieval Church. Luther himself, as we all know, had belonged to a religious order based on that tradition. But in censuring the Protestants, Trent dismantled some cornerstones of Augustinian soteriology (e.g. total depravity, the efficacy and particularism of grace).

Orders such as the Augustinians did not and do not represent doctrinal chaos or dissent or private judgment, as is constant in Protestantism. It’s simply a different style or emphasis of how to live the Catholic life. All Catholics were required to believe certain things, and converts went through an arduous catechetical process before they could be baptized and received into the Church.

(i) There are Protestant denominations (Lutheran and Reformed) that have retained a far more substantive degree of continuity with Reformation theology in its classic creedal expositions (e.g. The Westminster Confession of Faith; The Three Forms of Unity; The Book of Concord) than Vatican II and post-Vatican II theology can honestly claim in relation to Trent. So it’s very misleading to say that Protestants have gone every which way while Rome has stayed the course.

This is sheer nonsense. Vatican II is in complete conformity with the teachings of Trent, and further develop them. Steve simply exhibits his ignorance (a not uncommon thing with him, when writing about Catholicism).

Certainly we see many modern Protestant denominations that are unrecognizable in relation to the theology of the Protestant Reformers. But, of course, one could say the same thing about many Catholic scholars and theologians in relation to Trent. The difference is that Catholics who still believe in Trent are excommunicated (e.g. Lefevbre)

Trent never sanctioned forming a breakaway group and ordaining priests against the wishes of the pope. If Steve thinks otherwise, he’s welcome to cite passage and verse . . .

whereas there is a continuous tradition of unreconstructed Reformed and Lutheran theology extending from the Reformation down to the present day.

Yeah, there are a few million of such folks. Big wow. That is hardly suggestive of being the “one true Church.”

(j) So the right of private judgment did not set a domino effect into motion. And it doesn’t mean that everyone is entitled to his own opinion. Rather, it was set over against blind faith in a self-appointed authority.

Catholic faith is neither blind, nor “self-appointed.” Jesus started the Catholic Church in commissioning Peter. If someone wants self-appointed, that is Martin Luther, who began the “Reformation” sitting on the toilet and figuring out that he was saved by grace: something the Catholic Church had always taught from the beginning and stressed / reaffirmed at the second council of Orange in 529: almost a thousand years before Luther decided to dissent on at least 50 matters of Catholic doctrine and practice (before he was even excommunicated: in 1520). He had no authority to do so. He simply assumed it without reason.

The principle at stake was that only God’s word enjoys dogmatic authority,

. . . which the Bible never ever teaches , therefore it is merely an arbitrary tradition of men, that Jesus and Paul condemn.. . .

and the sense of Scripture has to be established by verifiable methods. It doesn’t cut it to say that Mother Church knows best.

. . . even though the Bible asserts that very thing, notably in 1 Timothy 3:15 and Matthew 16:18-19 and the Jerusalem Council, among other passages.

Instead, a Bible scholar or theologian should be willing and able to take a layman through the process of reasoning by which he arrived at his interpretation so that the layman can follow the argument and see the conclusion for himself. Invoking sacred tradition is no substitute for responsible exegesis.

We don’t teach anything different. All we require are interpretations that don’t contradict received teachings. The Catholic exegete is otherwise as free as an Protestant, and the Church has only definitively interpreted nine passages.

The right of private judgment is the very opposite of individual autonomy—it’s all about accountability. To be sure, this principle can be abused by the willful. But abusing God’s word carries its own inevitable penalty.

Yes it does. And Steve has been doing it over and over in this paper and hundreds of others that he has written.

(k) Theologians like Brunner have contributed to the confusion by pretending that it was inconsistent of Protestants to liberate themselves from the tyranny of the papacy—only to turn around and elevate the Bible to the role of a “paper pope.” This little jingle is very quotable, but it distorts the motives of the Protestant Reformers. Luther and Calvin were concerned with fidelity, not freedom. They were fighting for the freedom to serve God according to his Word. The magisterial Reformation (as opposed to the Radical Reformation) was never an attack on external authority, per se. Rather, it was an issue of submission to a properly constituted authority—God speaking in his word.

It was an essentially / fundamentally inconsistent and self-defeating rule of faith (sola Scriptura) because the Bible itself teaches an authoritative, infallible Church and an apostolic infallible tradition as well as an inspired, infallible Bible: the first two of which sola Scriptura and hence almost all Protestants, reject.

Related to Brunner’s charge is the accusation that conservative Protestants are guilty of “bibliolatry.” This is a clever attempt to put conservatives on the defensive. But it’s a self-defeating allegation. Idolatry is a Biblical category, and therefore presupposes Biblical authority and Scriptural definition. So it is nonsensical to claim that allegiance to Scripture conflicts with Scripture. Bible-believing Christians simply pattern their attitude towards Scripture on the attitude modeled by Christ and his Apostles (Cf. B.B. Warfield, Revelation & Inspiration [Baker 2003], Works, vol. 1.) When, conversely, the liberal denies the absolute authority of Scripture, he is absolutizing his own powers of judgment. As such, he’s guilty of auto-idolatry.

Interesting, but not germane to this discussion, so I’ll pass . . .

(l) Every denomination doesn’t represent a different interpretation of Scripture. And every difference doesn’t represent a disagreement. Many of the different denominations are due to different nationalities. When they all troop over to America it presents quite a spectacle of diversity, but they didn’t all arise due to differences of interpretation.

And as I’ve argued elsewhere, the superficially vast range of doctrinal and denominational diversity is reducible to how you answer four basic questions: (i) Is the Bible the only rule of faith? (ii) Does man have freewill? (iii) How is the OT fulfilled in the NT? (iv) Are the sacraments a means of grace?

There are literally scores of contradictions between denominations, and this means that error necessarily exists somewhere: either one in the case of two contradicting, or both. Falsehood is of the devil, the father of lies. It helps no one. Protestantism institutionalizes it. St. Paul always claimed that he was passing on “the truth”: a unified set of doctrinal teachings. Protestants can’t do that, because if their endless internal contradictions. At best they can only say, “our little sect has all the truth, and those guys don’t.” Then of course the obvious question is “why believe you over against them?

(m) Moreover, these don’t all present a contrast to Catholicism. There are charismatic Catholics. There are Arminian elements in Catholic theology. There are Anglican and Lutheran elements in Catholic theology. There are liberal elements in Catholic theology. So some of these interpretations agree with Catholicism rather than representing schismatic aberrations. Of course, I might view these points of commonality as common errors. But the Roman Church can’t stigmatize them save on pain of self-incrimination.

Required, dogmatic Catholic theology is a unified set of teachings. Charismatic Catholics have been sanctioned by the magisterium, since we believe that all of the gifts and miracles are still operative today (which is the biblical position). It’s people like Steve and his buddy Calvinists who believe in cessation of gifts and miracles: a thing never remotely seen in the New Testament. “Liberal elements” exist among individual dissidents but not in our official theology. This is what Steve can’t grasp and perhaps never will. It’s some sort of intransigent blind spot.

Quantity makes quality possible. Out of the diversity of denominations it is possible to find a number of good churches. Better to have a lot of lifeboats, some of which are seaworthy, and others leaky and listing, than to be trapped aboard a burning and sinking ship.

We’ve discussed the fatal internal difficulties of Protestantism. Steve hasn’t proven that the Catholic ship is sinking. He merely assumes it. As Chesterton observed (paraphrase): “at least five times the faith has gone to the dogs, and in all five cases the dog died.” Steve is one of a long line who seem to feel quite “certain” that the demise of the catholic Church is right around the corner. He’ll die not seeing this happen, just as all the other “prophets” did.

(n) Appeal is sometimes made to Jn 10:16 and 17:20-21. But the unity envisioned here is ethnic and diachronic rather than institutional and synchronic, as the Gentiles are inducted into the covenant community (cf. 10:16a) and the faith is passed on from one generation to the next (17:20).

I wrote way back in 1996 about the meaning and application of John 17 and Jesus’ prayer of unity:

I agree that love is the primary thrust here. But I will not discount the implicit doctrinal oneness, . . . In John 17:22 Jesus prays that the disciples would be “one, as we are one.” And in John 17:23, He desires that they (and us) be “completely one” (NRSV). KJV, NKJV: “perfect in one.” RSV, NEB, REB: “perfectly one.” NIV: “complete unity.” NASB: “perfected in unity.” Now, it is pretty difficult to maintain that this entails no doctrinal agreement (and “perfect” agreement at that). And, reflecting on John 17:22, I don’t think the Father and the Son differ on how one is saved, on the true nature of the Eucharist or the Church, etc. So how can Protestants claim this “perfect” oneness, “as we [the Holy Trinity] are one”? Or even any remote approximation?

(o) The right of private judgment has undoubted generated a great diversity of theological opinion, which is—in turn—reflected in a diversity of denominations. But we’ve always had this. It’s easy to forget about Donatists and Montanists, Novatianists and Waldensians, to name a few pre-Reformation movements, because they were on the losing side of the debate and tended to dissipate over time. So it’s not as if sola scriptura in-traduced a radically destabilizing dynamic into an otherwise cohesive church.

All those groups chose to separate from the Church. And most heresies and schisms appealed to Scripture Alone (just as Protestants) precisely (again, just like Protestants) because they knew quite well that they couldn’t appeal to historical precedent and received tradition (being novelties and innovative teachings). And that’s simply not biblical. They all played games with existing categories and definitions and received beliefs.

Remember, too, that in Reformed theology, all this diversity is a providential diversity. Catholic apologists have traditionally treated the Reformation as if it were a runaway train. But in the plan of God, everything that happens is either good in itself or a means to an ulterior good. There is wheat among the tares. The field exists for the sake of the wheat, not the tares. But in this dispensation you cannot weed out all the tares without uprooting the wheat in the process (cf. Mt 13:24-30). We don’t judge the condition of the field by the presence or even prevalence of the tares. What matters is the state of the wheat.

The problem with this analysis is that the “tares” in the biblical analogy / parable are stray individuals, not entire denominations. I can’t stress it enough: the Bible knows nothing of any legitimate sense of denominationalism. It’s always condemned as factionalism or sectarianism or divisiveness or a force against “the truth / [apostolic] tradition / gospel / word of God.”

(p) Related to (o), critics of the Reformation often appeal to the Vincentian canon as some sort of living ideal which the Reformation violated. This appeal assumes a continuity and commonality of belief throughout the history of the Church, up until the Reformation. But isn’t that an illusion?

No; not for the most part. In the orthodox Catholic Church there was great unity of doctrine.

What was the express creed of your average medieval peasant? Or, for that matter, of the village priest?

That’s ultimately irrelevant. They may or may not have been properly educated, and may or may not have been orthodox and devout. All that matters (in these sorts of discussions) is what the Catholic Church officially taught.

It is natural to form our impression of the Middle Ages from Medieval writers. But that is hardly representative of popular belief. At a time when illiteracy and folk religion were the rule, it isn’t very authentic or meaningful to speak of a core creed shared by the masses. An Athanasius or Aquinas, A Kempis or Dante by no means stands for a popular consensus.

No one is saying that they did. When we refer to unanimous consent, it is referring to the Church fathers, and even this phrase (in Latin) did not mean “absolutely every” but rather, “overwhelming consensus.”

Such an identification leaves the laity entirely out of view, and a large chunk of the lower clergy as well. If anything, it was the Reformation, with its emphasis on Bible literacy, which brought the masses on board. There can be no majority report when the majority is too illiterate and ignorant to exercise explicit faith.

Reports of a very frustrated older Luther (already almost 30 years into his revolt) do not suggest that the “Reformation” was doing all that well in educating the masses, in his own home town:

As things are run in Wittenberg, perhaps the people there will acquire not only the dance of St. Vitus or St. John, but the dance of the beggars or the dance of Beelzebub, since they have started to bare women and maidens in front and back, and there is no one who punishes or objects. In addition the Word of God is being mocked [there]. Away from this Sodom! . . . I am tired of this city and do not wish to return, May God help me with this.

The day after tomorrow I shall drive to Merseburg, for Sovereign George has very urgently asked that I do so. Thus I shall be on the move, and will rather eat the bread of a beggar than torture and upset my poor old [age] and final days with the filth at Wittenberg which destroys my hard and faithful work. . . . I am unable any longer to endure my anger [about] and dislike [of this city].

With this I commend you to God. Amen. (Luther’s Letter to His Wife Katie Regarding the State of Wittenberg: 28 July 1545, in  Luther’s Works, Vol. 50, 273-278)

Catholic Luther biographer Hartmann Grisar (Luther, Vol. 3p. 206) recorded a similar sentiment:

“I confess of myself,” he says in a sermon in 1532, “and doubtless others must admit the same [of themselves], that I lack the diligence and earnestness of which really I ought to have much more than formerly; that I am much more careless than I was under the Papacy; and that now, under the Evangel, there is nowhere the same zeal to be found as before.” This he declares to be due to the devil and to people’s carelessness, but not to his teaching. (Werke, Erl. ed., 18 2 , p. 353).

There are many more such statements. And we could look at how early Protestantism persecuted others just as much — if not more — than Catholicism; the 742 Catholic martyrs of King Henry VIII and Queen Elizabeth, Luther‘s and Calvin‘s advocacy of the death penalty for Anabaptists, the outright theft of thousands of Catholic churches, its hostility towards art, and its iconoclasm, antipathy towards higher education, and towards science, etc., etc. ad nauseam.

***

Photo credit: TheDigitalArtist (8-2-15) [PixabayPixabay License]

***

2020-02-06T13:04:43-04:00

This is one of a series of extensive excerpts (with my occasional commentary) from The Catholic Controversy (1596): a classic of Catholic apologetics (originally a collection of pamphlets), written by St. Francis de Sales (1567-1622): a Doctor of the Church [see all the installments by searching “Salesian Apologetics #” on my blog sidebar search function]. Any comments of mine (apart from lists of related links) will be in blue. The rest is from the online, public domain text (3rd revised edition, New York: Benziger Brothers, 1909; translated by Henry Benedict Mackey, O.S.B.).

What I present is an edited abridgment, designed for modern readers: so I will dispense with the constant tedious use of ellipses (“. . .”). I will cite the section of the book used, so that anyone who desires it may consult the full text and/or particular contexts, patristic references (which I omit), etc. I will follow the custom of my paperback TAN Books edition: of italicizing scriptural passages.

*****

Part I, Chapter 9: That the Church cannot perish 

Are you ignorant that Our Lord has purchased the Church with His own Blood ? [Acts 20:28] — and who can take it from him ? Think you that he is weaker than his adversary ? Ah ! I pray you, speak honourably of this captain. And who then shall snatch his Church out of his hands ? Perhaps you will say he is one who can keep it, but who will not. It is then his Providence, his goodness, his truth that you attack. The goodness of God has given gifts to men as he ascends to heaven . . . apostles, prophets, evangelists, pastors, doctors — for the perfection of the saints in the work of the ministry unto the edification of the body of Christ (Eph. iv. 12).

Was the perfection of the saints already accomplished eleven or twelve hundred years ago ? Had the edification of the mystical body of our Lord, that is, the Church, been completed ? Either cease to call yourselves edifiers or answer no : — and if it has not been completed, as in fact it has not, even yet, why wrong you thus the goodness of God, saying that he has taken back and carried away from men what he had given them ? It is one of the qualities of the goodness of God that, as S. Paul says (Rom. xi. 29) his gifts are without repentance : that is to say, he does not give in order to take away.

His divine Providence, as soon as it had created man, the heavens, the earth, and the things that are in heaven and on earth, preserved them and perpetually preserves them, in such a way that the species of each tiniest bird is not yet extinct. What then shall we say of the Church ? All this world cost him at the dearest but a simple word : he spoke and all were made (Ps. cxlviii. 5) ; and he preserves it with a perpetual and infallible Providence. How, I ask you, should he have abandoned the Church, which cost him all his blood, so many toils and travails ? He has drawn Israel out of Egypt, out of the desert, out of the Red Sea, out of so many calamities and captivities; — and we are to believe that he has let Christianity be engulfed in infidelity !

It is of the Church that the Psalmist sings : God hath founded it for ever (xlvii. 9) ; In his days shall justice spring up, and abundance of peace, till the moon be taken away for ever (Ixxi. 7). What peace, what justice, except in the Church ? His throne (he is speaking in the person of the eternal Father, of the Church, which is the throne of the Messiah, David’s son) shall he as the sun before me, and as the moon perfect for ever, and a faithful witness in heaven (Ixxxviii. 38). And: I will make his seed to endure for evermore; and his throne as the days of heaven (30) ; — that is, as long as heaven shall endure. Daniel (ii. 44) calls it: A kingdom which shall not he destroyed for ever. The angel says to Our Lady that of his kingdom there shall be no end (Luke i. 33), and he is speaking of the Church, as we prove elsewhere. Did not Isaias prophesy ([Is] Ixi. 8) : I will make a perpetual covenant with them ?

Is it not Our Lord who, speaking of his Church, says that the gates of hell shall not prevail against it [Mt 16:18]? How shall this promise be verified if the Church has been abolished a thousand years or more ? Or do we really wish to violate the sound rule of Gamaliel, who speaking of the rising Church used this argument : If this design or work be of men, it will fall to nothing ; but if it be of God, you are not able to destroy it (Acts v. 38, 39) ? Is not the Church the work of God ? — and how then shall we say that it has come to nothing ?

If this fair tree of the Church had been planted by man’s hand I would easily acknowledge that it could be rooted up, but having been planted by so good a hand as is that of our Lord, I could not offer better counsel to those who hear people crying at every turn that the Church had perished than what our Lord said : Let these blind people alone, for every plant which God hath not planted shall he rooted up (Matt. XV. 13, 14).

“O impudent cry ! ” says S. Augustine against the Donatists, ” the Church is not, because you are not in it ! ” ” No, no,” says S. Bernard, ” the floods came, and the winds blew, and they heat upon that house, and it fell not ; for it was founded upon a rock (Matt. vii. 25), and the rock was Christ (I Cor. x. 4).”

I will conclude this proof with S. Augustine, and say to your ministers :

What do you bring us new ? Shall it be necessary to sow again the good seed, whereas from the time of its sowing it is to grow till the harvest ? If you say that what the Apostles sowed has everywhere perished, we answer to you : read this to us from the Holy Scriptures : this you shall never do without having first shown us that this is false which is written, saying, that the seed which was sown in the beginning should grow till the time of the harvest. The good seed is the children of the kingdom, the cockle is the wicked, the harvest is the end of the world (Matt. xiii.). Say not then that the good seed is destroyed or choked, for it grows even to the consummation of the world.

Part I, Chapter 10: The counter- arguments of our adversaries, and the answers thereto.

(i.) Was not the Church everywhere destroyed when Adam and Eve sinned ? Answer : Adam and Eve were not the Church, but the commencement of the Church. And it is not true that the Church was ruined then, or yet that it had been, because they did not sin in doctrine or belief but in act.

(2.) Did not Aaron the High Priest adore the golden calf with all his people ? Answer : Aaron was not as yet High Priest, nor head of the people, but became so afterwards. And it is not true that all the people worshipped idols : — for were not the children of Levi men of God, who joined themselves to Moses ?

(3.) Elias [Elijah] lamented that he was alone in Israel (3 K. [1 Kings] xix. 14). Answer: Elias was not the only good man in Israel, for there were seven thousand men who had not given themselves up to idolatry, and what the Prophet says here is only to express better the justice of his complaint. It is not true again that if all Israel had failed, the Church would have there- by ceased to exist, for Israel was not the whole Church. Indeed it was already separated therefrom by the schism of Jeroboam ; and the kingdom of Juda was the better and principal part ; and it is Israel, not Juda, of which Azarias predicted (II Par. [2 Chronicles] xv. 3), that it should be without priest and sacrifice.

(4.) Isaias says (i. 6) that from head to foot there is no soundness. Answer : these are forms of speaking, and of vehemently detesting the vice of a people. And although the Prophets, pastors and preachers use these general modes of expression, we are not to understand them of each particular person, but only of a large proportion ; as appears by the example of Elias who complained that he was alone, notwithstanding that there were yet seven thousand faithful. S. Paul complains to the Philippians (ii. 21) that all seek their own interest and advantage ; still at the end of the Epistle he acknowledges that there were many good people with him and with them. Who knows not the complaint of David (Ps. xiii. 3), that there is none that doth good, no, not one ? — and who knows not on the other hand that there were many good people in his day ? These forms of speech are frequent, but we must not draw a particular conclusion about each individual. Further, — such things do not prove that faith had failed in the Church, nor that the Church was dead : for it does not follow that if a body is everywhere diseased it is therefore dead. Thus, without doubt, are to be understood all similar things which are found in the threats and rebukes of the Prophets.

(5.) Jeremias tells us (vii. 4) not to trust in lying words, saying : the Temple of the Lord, the Temple of the Lord. Answer : who maintains that under pretence of the Church we are to trust to a lie ? Yea, on the contrary, he who rests on the judgment of the Church rests on the pillar and ground of truth [1 Tim 3:15]; he who trusts to the infallibility of the Church trusts to no lie, unless that is a lie which is written : the gates of hell shall not prevail against it [Mt 16:18]. We place our trust then in the Holy Word, which promises perpetuity to the Church.

(6.) Is it not written that the revolt and separation must come (2 Thess. ii. 3), and that the sacrifice shall cease (Dan. xii. 11), and that the Son of Man shall hardly find faith on earth at his second visible return (Luke xviii. 8), when he will come to judge ? Answer : all these passages are understood of the affliction which antichrist will cause in the Church, during the three and a half years that he shall reign mightily ; but in spite of this the Church during even these three years shall not fail, and shall be fed and preserved amid the deserts and solitudes whither it shall retire, as the Scripture says (Apoc. xii.).

***

Related Reading:

“Could the Catholic Church Go Off the Rails?” (Indefectibility) [1997]

Indefectibility of Holy Mother Church: Believe It Or Not [2002]

Indefectibility: Does God Protect His Church from Doctrinal Error? [11-1-05; abridged and reformulated a bit on 2-14-17]

“The Gates of Hell Shall Not Prevail” Against the Church [11-11-08]

Indefectibility of the One True Church (vs. Calvin #9) [5-16-09]

Indefectibility & Apostolic Succession (vs. Calvin #10) [5-18-09]

Sunny Optimism Regarding God’s Guidance of His Church Now and Always (Including Liturgical Discussion) [7-22-11]

Dialogue with a Lutheran on Ecclesiology & Old Testament Indefectibility Analogies [11-22-11]

St. Francis de Sales: Bible vs. Total Depravity (+ Biblical Evidence for the Indefectibility of the Church, from the Psalms)  [11-24-11]

The Bible on the Indefectibility of the Church [2013]

Michael Voris’ Ultra-Pessimistic Views Regarding the Church [7-3-13]

Critique of Three Michael Voris Statements Regarding the State of the Church [7-3-13]

Indefectibility, Fear, & the Synod on the Family [9-30-15]

Quasi-Defectibility and Phil Lawler vs. Pope Francis (see also more documentation of Lawler’s reactionary leanings, on the Facebook thread) [12-28-17]

***

Unfortunately, Money Trees Do Not Exist: If you have been aided in any way by my work, or think it is valuable and worthwhile, please strongly consider financially supporting it (even $10 / month — a mere 33 cents a day — would be very helpful). I have been a full-time Catholic apologist since Dec. 2001, and have been writing Christian apologetics since 1981 (see my Resume). My work has been proven (by God’s grace alone) to be fruitful, in terms of changing lives (see the tangible evidences from unsolicited “testimonies”). I have to pay my bills like all of you: and have a (homeschooling) wife and two children still at home to provide for, and a mortgage to pay.
*
My book royalties from three bestsellers in the field (published in 2003-2007) have been decreasing, as has my overall income, making it increasingly difficult to make ends meet.  I provide over 2700 free articles here, for the purpose of your edification and education, and have written 50 books. It’ll literally be a struggle to survive financially until Dec. 2020, when both my wife and I will be receiving Social Security. If you cannot contribute, I ask for your prayers (and “likes” and links and shares). Thanks!
*
See my information on how to donate (including 100% tax-deductible donations). It’s very simple to contribute to my apostolate via PayPal, if a tax deduction is not needed (my “business name” there is called “Catholic Used Book Service,” from my old bookselling days 17 or so years ago, but send to my email: [email protected]). Another easy way to send and receive money (with a bank account or a mobile phone) is through Zelle. Again, just send to my e-mail address. May God abundantly bless you.
*

***

Photo credit: St. Francis de Sales [Bosco Austalasia / Salesian Journeying with the young]

***

2021-11-22T13:56:28-04:00

Abp. Viganò is supposedly the “point man” over against Pope Francis? No thank you. I was willing to hear him out, but now it is manifest that he is yet another hysterical radical Catholic reactionary and conspiracy theorist, who comes very close to denying the indefectibility of the Church: just as we have come to expect from many of the Holy Father’s critics. The big danger now is schism, not syncretism. We have bishops like Viganò and Schneider disseminating ideas like those found in absurd anti-Catholic Jack Chick tracts.

The papal (and Church) critics from within are getting more and more extreme, and are clearly imploding (slowly but surely). This will cause conscientious Catholics who might have been inclined to dislike or diss the pope, to think twice about the sort of men they prefer (to the extent that they submit to anyone) to the Holy Father and the true Mind of Holy Mother Church. I’ve been consistently warning Catholics about this for about five years now.

Sensible, rational Catholics will start to see, I think, how the factions are lining up, and they will have to be for the Church (not just the pope) or against her (and him). In a large sense that’s good. It clarifies things and exhibits a stark contrast which will make it easier for the observant, devout, committed Catholic to see nonsense, hysteria, and quasi-schismatic folly for what it is.

Joshua 24:15 (RSV) [A]s for me and my house, we will serve the LORD. (

Here are some remarkable excerpts from Abp. Viganò’s “Letter #62”: “Set out into the deep”):

The building of the House of the Abramitic Family seems to be a Babelic enterprise, concocted by the enemies of God, of the Catholic Church and of the only true religion capable of saving man and the whole creation from destruction, both now and in eternity, and definitively. The foundations of this “House,” destined to give way and collapse, arise where, by the hands of the builders themselves, the One Cornerstone is about to be incredibly removed: Jesus Christ, Savior and Lord, on whom is built the House of God. “Therefore,” warns the Apostle Paul, “let everyone be careful how he builds. Indeed, no one can lay a foundation other than the one already found there, which is Jesus Christ” (1 Cor 3:10).

In the garden of Abu Dhabi the temple of the world syncretistic Neo-Religion is about to rise with its anti-Christian dogmas. Not even the most hopeful of the Freemasons would have imagined so much!

Pope Bergoglio thus proceeds to further implement the apostasy of Abu Dhabi, the fruit of pantheistic and agnostic neo-modernism that tyrannizes the Roman Church, germinated by the [Vatican II] conciliar document Nostra Aetate. We are compelled to recognize it: the poisoned fruits of the “Conciliar springtime” are before the eyes of anyone who does not allow himself to be blinded by the dominant Lie.

Pius XI had alerted and warned us. But the teachings that preceded Vatican II have been thrown to the winds, as intolerant and obsolete. The comparison between the pre-conciliar Magisterium and the new teachings of Nostra aetate and Dignitatis humanae — to mention only those — manifest a terrible discontinuity, which must be acknowledged and which must be amended as soon as possible. Adjuvante Deo (“with God’s help”). (my colored bolding and italics)

Meanwhile, just thirteen days ago, it was announced that Bishop Athanasius Schneider: one of the pope’s most prominent critics, has rejected (at least in part: but this is very typical of the conciliar critics) the supreme authority of the Second Vatican Ecumenical Council (convened and ratified by two saint-popes, and enthusiastically endorsed by Pope St. John Paul II and Pope Benedict XVI and Pope Francis) as well.

This comes as no surprise to me at all. As I have been arguing for many years now, those with the reactionary mindset habitually bash popes, Vatican II, the ordinary form Mass, and usually also legitimate ecumenism. And so it has come to pass with Bp. Schneider, with regard to at least three of these four things. Sometimes there are nuances and degrees and “saving qualifications,” especially as a person first moves into reactionary thinking, but the movement in the same direction is almost inevitable once the trend begins.

I was recently asked in person by a friend at a group discussion at my house, if I thought Cdl. Burke and Bp. Schneider were reactionaries. I said I would have to see what they thought about Vatican II and the Pauline Mass. I already knew they were habitual pope-bashers. And then, lo and behold, there I was a mere two days later, having discovered this article in the notoriously reactionary and extreme Lifesite News“Bishop Schneider: Pachamama idolatry during Amazon Synod has its roots in Vatican II Council” (11-8-19). No one could make these things up. This is now fashionable and chic among the reactionary crowd, and many traditionalists as well: to bash an ecumenical council.

The good bishop, states (all quotes from the article now):

Here, Bishop Schneider refers to the Council’s claim that “we adore, together with the Muslims, the one God.”

In the Council’s Dogmatic Constitution Lumen Gentium (16), the Council Fathers state: “But the plan of salvation also includes those who acknowledge the Creator. In the first place amongst these there are the Muslims, who, professing to hold the faith of Abraham, along with us adore the one and merciful God, who on the last day will judge mankind.”

Bishop Schneider also refers to the attendant idea that “man is the center and the culmination of all that is on earth.”

Furthermore, Bishop Schneider also refers to the Council’s teaching on the “freedom of religion,” the “natural right” implanted in human nature by God to choose one’s own religion. While it is true, he adds, that one should not be “forced,” this new teaching also means that one “has the liberty to choose a religion.”

Here, Schneider points to the contradictions in the conciliar texts. At one place, in its document Dignitatis Humanae, the Council teaches “every person has the obligation to seek the truth, and this is the Catholic Church,” Schneider says, “but then further down it says that you have freedom of religion rooted in your nature.” This teaching is “not clear,” it is “ambiguous,” as the prelate explains, and the consequences after the Council were “that almost all Catholic seminaries and theological faculties, and the episcopate and even the Holy See” promoted “a right of every person to choose his own religion.” . . .

“This is already rooted here [in the Vatican Council],” Bishop Schneider states. “If you have a right by God given to you, by nature, also to be able to choose acts of idolatry – like the Pachamama – when it is rooted in your dignity of man even to choose a Pachamama religion: this is the last consequence of this expression of the Council text,” he explains. The expression of the text was “ambiguous” and needed to be “formulated in a different way” to “avoid these applications in the life of the Church, which we also had in the Assisi meeting of Pope John Paul II in 1986 and the other meetings, where even idolatrous religions were invited to pray in their own manner – that is to say in their idolatrous manner – for peace.” . . .

He says that what we have now in Rome, the formal performance of idolatrous acts in the Catholic Church, in the heart of the Catholic Church of St. Peter, is the triumph of the evil.” (my colored bolding and italics)

Bishop Schneider showed some signs of this negative direction in an interview dated 7-21-17 at the reactionary site Rorate Caeli:

Some of the new statements of Vatican II (e.g. collegiality, religious liberty, ecumenical and inter-religious dialogue, the attitude towards the world) have not a definitive character, and being apparently or truly non-concordant with the traditional and constant statements of the Magisterium, they must be complemented by more exact explications and by more precise supplements of a doctrinal character. A blind application of the principle of the “hermeneutics of continuity” does not help either, since thereby are created forced interpretations, which are not convincing and which are not helpful to arrive at a clearer understanding of the immutable truths of the Catholic faith and of its concrete application.

***

See also further Facebook discussions on Abp. Viganò and Bp. Schneider.

***

Related Reading:

*
*
*
Dialogue on Vatican II: Its Relative Worth, Interpretation, and Application (with Patti Sheffield vs. Traditionalist David Palm) [9-15-13]
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
Series: Vs. Paolo Pasqualucci Re Vatican II
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
***
*
Practical Matters: Perhaps some of my 3,900+ free online articles (the most comprehensive “one-stop” Catholic apologetics site) or fifty books have helped you (by God’s grace) to decide to become Catholic or to return to the Church, or better understand some doctrines and why we believe them.
*
Or you may believe my work is worthy to support for the purpose of apologetics and evangelism in general. If so, please seriously consider a much-needed financial contribution. I’m always in need of more funds: especially monthly support. “The laborer is worthy of his wages” (1 Tim 5:18, NKJV). 1 December 2021 was my 20th anniversary as a full-time Catholic apologist, and February 2022 marked the 25th anniversary of my blog.
*
PayPal donations are the easiest: just send to my email address: [email protected]. You’ll see the term “Catholic Used Book Service”, which is my old side-business. To learn about the different methods of contributing, including 100% tax deduction, etc., see my page: About Catholic Apologist Dave Armstrong / Donation InformationThanks a million from the bottom of my heart!*
*
***

(slightly revised on 11-25-19)

Photo credit: Ipankonin (1-25-08). Reverse of the Great Seal of the United States. [Wikimedia CommonsCreative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported,  2.5 Generic2.0 Generic and 1.0 Generic licenses]

***

2019-11-13T14:57:03-04:00

Reformed Baptist anti-Catholic apologist Bishop “Dr.” [???] James White opined in his article, “Roman Unity: If it Promotes Mother Rome, It’s All Good” (1-6-10, complete):

My first moderated, public debate was on the subject of Roman Catholicism. It took place in August of 1990. Since I have a few decades of experience now, I find myself shaking my head in disbelief at one particular fact over and over again: Rome’s apologists just don’t seem driven to work hard in their field. Further, they clearly observe the “throw everything including the kitchen sink in defense of Rome, no matter how objectively bad it is on a scholarly level.”

Illustration: today Patrick Madrid took a shot at “Calvinists” in general on his blog. For someone who has yet, to my knowledge, to engage a Calvinist on the relevant subjects (of course I would, Patrick, let’s set it up!) in debate, I find his surface-level retorts somewhat amusing. But what is amazing are the three links he provides for, what he calls, “quite able” refutations of Calvinism. Two are ancient articles Jimmy Akin wrote years and years ago, neither of which provide much in the way of substance. And the third is to Dave Armstrong’s series on Calvin! Now, with all due respect to ol’ Dave Armstrong, he is one of the clearest examples of why past canon law prohibited laymen from engaging in public disputation in defense of Rome. Serious readers in the field realize that while Dave may stumble over a thoughtful argument once in a while, it is always to be found somewhere else. He simply does not produce original argumentation of any kind, and clearly does not understand the responses that have been offered to him over and over again. So, we find Madrid once again pulling out of mothballs surface-level materials that are nearly two decades old, and promoting Dave Armstrong as “quite able” refutations of Reformed theology. One is truly left wondering if these men really think this kind of material has real weight and meaning, or if they are just too bored to do serious work in the field. I will leave it to the reader to decide.

And I’ll be happy to let readers decide who has written many refutations of Calvinism and who has utterly ignored this in-depth examination. First of all, there is my point-by-point reply to almost all of Book IV of John Calvin’s Institutes of the Christian Religion, in my 388-page book, Biblical Catholic Answers for John Calvin. It was published two months after White wrote his post.

What Pat Madrid linked to was an even more extensive series of direct, exhaustive replies to Calvin (a literally complete reply to all of Book IV), which were recently revised and re-typeset, and appear in no less than 55 lengthy, “meaty” installments: listed on my extensive John Calvin: Catholic Appraisal web page. I had done those in 2009, in “honor” of Calvin’s 500th birthday.

Moreover, I also wrote the books A Biblical Critique of Calvinism and Biblical Catholic Salvation: “Faith Working Through Love”. The latter includes 115 pages (seven chapters) devoted specifically to a critique of Calvinism and “TULIP”.

Moreover, I have more arguments against Calvinism listed on my Calvinism and General Protestantism and Salvation and Justification web pages. Furthermore, several of my papers dealing with Calvinist soteriological error were directed specifically towards James White. For example:

*
*
*
I just put another paper of this sort up yesterday (which will, of course, be ignored by White, as always. You can bet the farm on that):
*
*
Needless to say (for anyone who has followed my interactions with Bishop White, which have taken place off-and-on since April 1995), he has utterly ignored all of these articles and books. He uses as his tired and ridiculous excuse for this complete forfeit of any serious dialogue, the claim that I supposedlysimply [do] not produce original argumentation of any kind, and clearly [do] not understand the responses that have been offered to [me] over and over again.” Right. No one buys this hogwash except his own rabid followers.
*
It’s manifest that it is sophistical nonsense, by the fact that White challenged me to formal oral debate no less than three times: in 1995, 2001, and 2007 (apparently, these urges of his come around in six-year cycles). Each time, I carefully explained why I oppose oral debates. I do written debates (White does, too: just not with me). White has been running from those critiques from me (including an entire, almost 400-page book), literally for 24 1/2 years: since May 1995, when he fled in terror from our initial — and to this date, only, in-depth — debate. It takes up over a hundred pages in my book devoted to the good bishop.
*
The portion from pages 76-117 document the final installment that I wrote on 15 May 1995 on an electric typewriter and mailed (“snail mail”) to White (it makes up about 40% of the entire volume of the debate, including both our contributions). He utterly ignored it, and sent me a letter almost six months later, stating, “I have never figured out how to answer letters that are filled with whining, crying, complaining, and general substanceless meandering.” Readers can see for themselves whether this last installment (read it online) is of the nature that White claims it to be. I’ve had the entire debate on my website for over 22 years (initially with his express permission). White has never linked to it or posted it on his page. What does that suggest as to who is most confident of his performance?
*
The record is documented and quite clear (see my web page devoted to Bishop White). See, for example, our one and only live chat, about Mary, in December 2000, where he also split early, just as it was getting good and interesting. Some years later, I did an extensive analysis of his outrageous, intellectually dishonest methods of sophistry, with which he unsuccessfully tried to trap me in that exchange. Again, needless to say.
*
White has never, for almost 19 years now, put up any part of that debate on his web page, either. But it’s been on mine all that time. And that was much closer to his favorite medium: the live oral debate. I had no notes or preparation because I didn’t know it was gonna happen. It was spontaneous, after an earlier Calvinist polemicist had forfeited and left a live planned debate that I had with him, in White’s chat room.
*
Now, if White wants folks to believe that he chooses and challenges people to orally debate whom he regards as absolute imbeciles, ignoramuses, and idiots: incapable of forming even a single coherent theological sentence (if he thinks they are that stupid and gullible), then, feel free! If you believe that pitiful line, I have some oceanfront property in Kansas to sell you. He ignores my refutations because he is unable to answer them, pure and simple. No amount of flatulent, desperate rhetoric and polemics and empty insults from him can change that obvious fact. And no other explanation adequately explains the public record, that is on my blog (and not on his) for all to see.
***
Unfortunately, Money Trees Do Not ExistIf you have been aided in any way by my work, or think it is valuable and worthwhile, please strongly consider financially supporting it (even $10 / month — a mere 33 cents a day — would be very helpful). I have been a full-time Catholic apologist since Dec. 2001, and have been writing Christian apologetics since 1981 (see my Resume). My work has been proven (by God’s grace alone) to be fruitful, in terms of changing lives (see the tangible evidences from unsolicited “testimonies”). I have to pay my bills like all of you: and have a (homeschooling) wife and three children still at home to provide for, and a mortgage to pay.
*
My book royalties from three bestsellers in the field (published in 2003-2007) have been decreasing, as has my overall income, making it increasingly difficult to make ends meet.  I provide over 2600 free articles here, for the purpose of your edification and education, and have written 50 books. It’ll literally be a struggle to survive financially until Dec. 2020, when both my wife and I will be receiving Social Security. If you cannot contribute, I ask for your prayers (and “likes” and links and shares). Thanks!
*
See my information on how to donate (including 100% tax-deductible donations). It’s very simple to contribute to my apostolate via PayPal, if a tax deduction is not needed (my “business name” there is called “Catholic Used Book Service,” from my old bookselling days 17 or so years ago, but send to my email: [email protected]). Another easy way to send and receive money (with a bank account or a mobile phone) is through Zelle. Again, just send to my e-mail address. May God abundantly bless you.
***
Photo credit: Norman Rockwell’s No Swimming: used for the cover of The Saturday Evening Post, published 4 June 1921 [Wikimedia Commons / public domain]
***
2019-07-10T12:15:40-04:00

Introduction added on 3-16-11:
***

This was dug deep out of the Armstrong Archives, after someone asked about it today. It was uploaded from a debate on a public discussion list, dominated by evangelical Protestants, on 11 January 1999. I found it on Internet Archive and then after glancing through it decided to restore it to my blog. I’m not sure why this was removed.

I don’t even bother debating anti-Catholic Protestants (as this person was) anymore. If you read this, you’ll see why. I don’t have the patience of Job! I spent several years debating these guys (it’s always — always — the same), and then (in 2007) figured that I had more than adequately done my “apologetic duty” and decided that sanity was also an important thing to preserve. :-)

I have expanded some of the original links to other papers of mine (and most of the new links were written since the original dialogue). Matthew Bell’s words will be in blue.

* * * * *

 

Please tell me what other religious groups you classify as “heresy” or “cultic” which are trinitarian, believe in the Incarnation, bodily Resurrection of Christ, the Atonement, the Second Coming, formally canonized the Holy Scripture, believe in salvation by grace alone (i.e., we are not Semi-Pelagians), heaven, hell, baptism, the Virgin Birth, the infallibility of Scripture, angels, the devil, creation, etc., etc. And which produced great saints and scholars like Augustine, Jerome, Anselm, Aquinas et al – many of whom Protestants acknowledge – somewhat curiously and inconsistently – as even their own forebears?
 
Other groups which would embrace most, if not all of the above would be The Family, The Christians, Word of Lifers, Zerrubabel, The London (Boston) Church of Christ, and possibly more.
*
Okay, fair enough; please define “Christian,” then, and who fits into that category, according to you.
*
A Christian is an individual whose life has been transformed by the Grace of God from a hellbound sinner, to a heavenbound saint, this being made possible and accomplished by and through the Person of Jesus Christ and his efficacious sacrifice.
*
How do you know when you have found such an individual?
*
The effect of this transformation will lead to that individual’s life being in conformity to the Scriptures in both doctrine and practice as the Holy Spirit leads and enables them.
*
What doctrine? Which doctrines? What practices? This gets back to what I was driving at. You make a statement like this, but if there is no specific content to back it up, then it is literally meaningless. New Testament Christianity has content.
*
You meet an individual, engage them in conversation, the result of which they claim to be a Christian, yet speak of Jesus being a created being, or modern-day prophets giving new Scriptures. Immediately you have ascertained that the individuals doctrine does not conform to the Bible, hence their is a problem with their claim to be a Christian which needs to be further explored. A simple process where the Scriptures are the authority by which a person’s claims are measured by.
*
Well, I agree with all this, but I don’t believe these things, so you have to explain why I am out of the circle.
*
Who fits into that category is judged by the Scriptures and not by men, least of all me.
*
Good, then you can’t know that I am not a Christian, and ought to extend to me the right hand of fellowship, no?
*
Incorrect, you have made the claim to be a Christian, you have demonstrated your beliefs (doctrine) on this list and via your website. Those beliefs are not in accordance with the Bible,
*
But the same thing holds for other Protestants with whom you disagree (as I will demonstrate below), because you are obviously the final arbiter in your mind – which is why I have referred to you as “your own pope.” This is what the absurdity of your position comes down to: whoever disagrees with you is not a Christian. Why? Because they disagree with you (i.e., the one with the correct biblical interpretation). This is both circular and extremely arrogant. You might as well claim to be a prophet, with this tunnel-vision attitude. I don’t even need to explore the historical absurdities which your position entails, because it is already evidently self-refuting.
*
I don’t need to answer the why, because the statement it is based upon is false. Nothing could be further from the truth. I run CCBE (an email list – Christians Combatting Biblical Errancy (sorry for the plug :0). On that list there are many Christians with whom I would disagree with some of their positions on some issues and vice versa. Do I say they are not Christians? No, I do not.
*
Then you have yet to explain why I am not a Christian, in your eyes. You have to explain why Catholics are out on certain issues, whereas other Protestants who agree with us on those issues are still in.
 
I do not consider the consensus minimal enough to include yourself. How many differences on primary doctrinal matters does it take to make the difference between acceptance and rejection of as group as Christian?
*
This is your problem, not mine. I define a Christian (doctrinally) as anyone who subscribes to the Nicene Creed.
 
I don’t accept you as a brother in Christ because of the doctrine you hold as being Scriptural truth.
*
Which are those?
*
If it contained nothing but the above creeds then that would be a different matter. It does not, and what you believe as well as those creeds is what makes the difference.
*
But the creeds are minimalistic in the first place. All groups presumably add on their own things. Sola Scriptura isn’t in the creeds. Sola fide isn’t in there. A host of other Protestant distinctives aren’t there (denominationalism, symbolic baptism and Eucharist, assurance of salvation, TULIP, congregationalism, etc.). I can say the same about you and read you out of the faith on the same basis.
*
How do you interpret “the communion of saints” from the Apostles’ Creed? Or “the holy Catholic Church”? Or the “one holy catholic and apostolic Church” of the Nicene Creed? Or “baptism for the forgiveness of sins” (baptismal regeneration) from same? It seems that you have more difficulty believing these Creeds than I do. Yet you claim you are “in” and I am “out” on this basis. Your criteria for who is a Christian have more holes in ’em than a pin cushion.
*
I do not accept the creeds because of who wrote them, but what is written in them, the which I recognise as being Biblical based truth. One must evaluate a group on the whole package, not just on the common denominators.
*
Fair enough. Please explain, then, the following clauses, so I can know exactly where you agree and disagree with the Creeds.
*
hence judgement needs to be reserved on considering you a brother in Christ until further dialogue has occurred to explore those doctrines which you hold.
*
I’m happy to both talk about and defend my views from Scripture (as everyone here already knows, I’m sure).
 
An individual could be saved and be a Christian whilst being a Roman Catholic, a Mormon, a JW etc etc.
*
Can a person who denies the Trinity be saved? This is the very doctrine of God . . . The Athanasian Creed would suggest otherwise.
*
The result of that salvation would be a departure from those organisations as the error of them became apparent to the same individual through the convicting power of the Holy Spirit and the Providential working of God in their life.
Which denomination is the true one? If I leave Catholicism, where do I go? And tell me what makes you the authority on these matters anyway?
*
I am not the authority, the Scriptures are.
 *
As authoritatively interpreted by whom? You? What if someone disagrees?
 *
As authoritatively interpreted by the consensus of the priesthood of all believers. Any church, whether it be the Roman Catholic, Protestant denomination, Jehovah’s Witnesses exists only because a number of people believe that within such is a right interpretation and application of the Bible.
 *
What is this right application and interpretation? The only “consensus” which has been achieved already is minimal enough to include Catholics – because Protestants disagree amongst themselves on virtually all points other than those which are held in common with us.
 *
They judge both you and me, in faith, doctrine and practice.
 *
Agreed. But we have to know what the Bible teaches.
 *
Every Christian through the priesthood of all believers has the right to apply Scripture and its authority to another individual or organisation.
 *
Okay, so how do we decide who is right when it is applied in contradictory ways? Do you acknowledge any corporate Christian authority higher than yourself? Or is it just you and the Holy Spirit?
 *
I acknowledge both the creeds of the one true catholic church.
 *
Which creeds are those?
 *
The Apostles, Nicene & Athanasian.
 *
The latter two creeds were put forth by Catholics (the Nicene, in an Ecumenical Council presided over by a pope), and I as a Catholic accept them. How is it, then, that you don’t accept me as a brother in Christ? And of course the people who wrote these creeds believed in a host of things which you despise: Real Presence, episcopacy, baptismal regeneration, prayers for the dead, Tradition, apostolic succession, infused justification, veneration of Mary and the saints, penance, purgatory, confession, etc., etc. Your position is completely incoherent.
 *
and the Scriptures on which they are based as higher than any individual or organisation. I am bound by the authority of the Scriptures as you are. The Holy Spirit is the guide of the Christian’s life. That guidance however, will always be in accordance with God’s revealed word.
 *
I agree with all this, but I still want to know who is the authoritative interpreter of Scripture.
 *
The Scriptures are the God-given authority by which all men are judged. What will become obvious to all as they follow this dialogue is that your confidence is ultimately in the arm of flesh whereas mine is in God’s revealed word.
 *
Please elaborate. I would say — if anything — quite the contrary (though I am very reluctant to make judgments of someone’s heart, as you are). You seem to think you have the proper interpretation of Scripture all locked up, so in the final analysis you are trusting in yourself, and you are flesh.
*
I, on the other hand, bow to the authority and omniscience and omnipotence of God, whom I believe has guided the Fathers and the universal Church for 2000 years, in order to determine and proclaim and preserve the truths of Christianity. That is anything but reliance on man. It is having so much faith in God that I believe He can preserve His truths by both written Revelation and in His Church (which, e.g., was necessary to determine the Canon of that same Revelation.
 *
Are you suggesting that as long as one embraces all the above it matters not what other doctrines a church espouses?
 *
I’m suggesting that one must have a working definition of “Christian” to make any sensible, believable analysis as you attempt to make here, and such a definition, it seems to me, will have to be “minimalistic” to some extent, else many many groups even among Protestants would necessarily be excluded from it. This is your problem.
 *
You have to somehow come up with a self-generated authority to proclaim who is and isn’t in the fold. That makes you a “Super-Pope,” as you are exercising far more authority than the pope does – and arbitrarily and inconsistently at that. Your opinion is hopelessly incoherent, self-defeating and self-refuting.
 *
That those other doctrines cannot indirectly impact on those which are fundamental?
 *
Yes (theology being inherently inter-connected), but note that even you freely acknowledge certain doctrines as “fundamental” – which is my point. But which are those? And by what authority do you determine that? By what method?
 *
I determine such from the Scriptures.
 *
Great. Now give me a list of them so I will know what I have to believe to rise to the level of “Christian.” That would be the only charitable thing for you to do, right? You claim possession of Christian truth in a way which excludes many others, so it is only fair to let us in on this truth — in some detail, not cryptic utterances and fashionable evangelical lingo.
 *
Herewith a summary of primary doctrines:
 *
1. The Scriptures of the Old and New Testament were given by inspiration of God and as such are the sole divine authority and rule for Christian faith and practice.
 *
Catholics believe in the material, but not formal sufficiency of Scripture. I believe that all theological truths are present in Scripture either explicitly or implicitly, or clearly deduced from other more clearly-presented biblical truths. We believe this because we believe it is what the Bible itself teaches about authority, and what the Christian Church held for 1500 years before Luther came onto the scene and introduced unapostolic novelties.
 *
Orthodox, Anglicans, and Methodists and Lutherans (the latter two only to some extent) agree with us on this, and there are many varying interpretations of sola Scriptura – not all of which thumb their nose at 1500 years of Church history as you seem to do.
 *
2. That there is but one living and true God, who is infinitely perfect, the Creator, Preserver and Governor of all things and who is the only proper object of religious worship.
 *
This is Catholic belief.
 *
3. That there are three Persons in the Godhead – the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, undivided in essence and co-equal in power and glory.
 *
This is Catholic belief.
 *
4. That in the person of Jesus Christ the Divine and human natures are united, so that he is truly and properly God and truly and properly man. This same Jesus is the One Mediator between men and God.
 *
This is Catholic belief.
 *
I disagree with you, unless you are prepared to state that you do not make any approach to God through Mary, or the saints?
 *
Sure we do; we ask others to pray for us just as you do. Have you never asked someone to pray for you? They are acting as a mediator. So your position is self-refuting once again.
 *
Read it again. ONE MEDIATOR. Not two, not three, not countless, ONE. I need go through no-one to have access to Jesus. He needs no appeasing.
 *
Agreed, But why, then, do you ask others to pray for you, and pray for them? Why don’t you tell them that they can and should go to Jesus and to leave you alone, so you can have more time to offer adequate and reasonable answers to my posts?
 *
5. That our first parents were created in a state of innocency, but by their disobedience they lost their purity and happiness, and that in consequence of their fall all men have become sinners, totally depraved, and as such are justly exposed to the wrath of God.
 *
We believe in total inability to save oneself, but not total depravity, and are joined in this by Arminian, non-Calvinist Protestants.
 *
The above point is a doctrinal statement of an Arminian church, of which I was a part of since my childhood until the age of 28 (I am now 31). Total depravity is not particular to Calvinism.
 *
Please define it then in a non-Calvinist manner, if you would. Does it wipe out free will? Does it involve double predestination?
  *
6. That Jesus Christ, by his suffering and death has made an atonement for the whole world so that whosoever will may be saved.
  *
This is Catholic belief. But it would seem to be inconsistent with your view unless you believe in Universal Atonement.
  *
7. That repentance towards God, faith in Jesus Christ and regeneration by the Holy Spirit are necessary to salvation.
  *
This is Catholic belief.
  *
8. That we are justified by grace, through faith in out Lord Jesus Christ and that he that believeth hath the witness in himself.
  *
This is Catholic belief. We would, however, deny “faith alone” as an unbiblical and novel idea, introduced in the 16th century.
  *
One is saved by grace through faith, the which produces works. Works are the product of salvation by grace through faith, not the means to being saved. Such is thoroughly Scriptural, an immediate example being Ephesians 2:8,9.
*
No one believed this till the 16th century. Does that mean no one was a Christian till then?
 *
9. That it is the privilege of all believers to be wholly sanctified, and that their whole spirit, soul and body may be preserved blameless unto the coming of the Lord Jesus Christ.
 *
Interesting. So you are in the Wesleyan strain of thought on this? This is close to our belief, but in conflict with “faith alone,” strictly applied.
 *
There are no doubt many more, but there is sufficient in the above to outline those primary doctrines you requested.
 *
OK, so anyone who denies any of these is not a Christian?
 *
No, anyone who denies these must demonstrate to me from Scripture why they are erroneous. If such is done, and I am convinced by the Scriptures that they are correct then I will forego that doctrine. If am not convinced then I would seek to convince them from Scripture that their position was the one that required change.
 *
I have certainly attempted to do that. Whether or not you are willing to interact exegetically with my arguments remains to be seen. But if your scenario is true, then Anglicans and Orthodox, and all Arminians who deny total depravity (including many Baptists, and Methodists, virtually all pentecostals and charismatics, Lutherans, and many non-denominational evangelicals) are not Christian.
 *
Are you willing to face up to this? It follows inexorably from your position (if a denial of any of the above propositions makes one a heretic/apostate). If one can deny one or more of your criteria and still remain a Christian, then you need to rectify your position to incorporate that new understanding.
*
The only thing that inexorably follows from the above is that where there is disagreement on any of those points discussion and examination of the Scriptures needs to be applied to resolve the matter.
 *
I agree, from a methodological perspective.
 *
The teaching which ‘we guys’ hold to are firmly based on the Scriptures, not Roman Catholicism which has corrupted the same.
 *
Not when you contradict each other. A contradiction shows that falsehood must be present. A falsehood is a corruption, which is a lie, which is of the devil, the father of lies.
 *
I haven’t seen any convincing evidence from you that I have presented any contradictory doctrines. Until you do the above is meaningless rhetoric.
 *
Not you — Protestants as a whole. Your task is to show me why I should believe you and not the others. Okay, so assuming you both give your Scriptures — one still has to decide. The whole thing reduces to relativism and 500,000 popes, because in the end the individual is king. This is what private judgment is all about. The only problem is that it is not the scriptural outlook.
 *
Can you show me where I have distorted the Marian doctrines, or put up a strawman version of them which I can triumphantly shoot down? Who are ‘people like me’?
 *
I don’t have time to go over past letters. What I’m interested in is definition of “Christian” (who is one and who isn’t), and comparative exegesis.
 *
The authors of those Scriptures, inspired by God and specifically the teaching of Jesus is the source of our faith.
 *
Of course it is.
 *
We shall see how the RC teaching on Mary impacts on the nature of God as we proceed.
 *
The Marian doctrines in no way impinge upon the uniqueness and sole glory of God. The only way they could possibly do that is when people like you distort them, and put up a straw man version of the doctrines which you can then “triumphantly” shoot down. As some here may be aware, the declaration of the Theotokos (“Mother of God”) in 431 at the Council of Ephesus was made precisely to safeguard the divinity of Christ, over against the Nestorian heresy. That was its whole purpose and historical context.
 *
All the “Reformers” accepted this title for Mary because they understood at least that much of history. Today many Protestants – being woefully ignorant of Church history — reject it, and often don’t even have a basic understanding of what the term means. In like fashion, the Immaculate Conception has to do with Christ’s Incarnation and Virgin Birth, and the Assumption with His Resurrection and its implications for believers (i.e., those who are saved in the end shall also be resurrected). Hence, Mariology is always Christocentric and never opposed to Christ or God the Father.
 *
If they specifically teach what the nature of God is, then all are bound by such teaching.
 *
Well, the nature of God is not in dispute between Catholics and Protestants. You guys inherited your doctrine (like the Bible) from us, and the stream can’t rise higher than its source.
 *
If they give a commandment then all are bound by such in a contextual setting. If they forbid something then again such is fundamental.
 *
But this does not tell me which doctrines are correct and which false.
 *
Those matters which are primary and which are secondary have been generally established by the church long ago, their thoughts of course being based on the Scriptures.
 *
Which church? When? Don’t be so vague!
 *
The church since its foundation in Matthew 16. No one particular denomination.
 *
That Church was headed by Peter (Mt 16:18-19). And we know there is only one Church today which claims to have a leader who is the successor of Peter, the “Rock” upon whom Christ built His Church.
 *
That Church was and is headed by Christ (Ephesians 5:23). The passage you quoted above is far from a given, as you well known being understood differently by Protestants, the Rock being the confession of Peter, not Peter himself.
 *
The growing consensus among conservative Protestant commentators (e.g., R.T. France, D.A. Carson) is that the “rock” was Peter, not his confession, or Jesus.
 *
Luther was a RC, steeped in that religion’s beliefs. The process of unlearning such is not instantaneous,
 *
The usual reply . . .
 *
hence I am more interested in what he believed at the close of his life that immediately following his departure from the church.
 *
He held to consubstantiation (and adoration of the consecrated host), the Immaculate Conception, and baptismal regeneration till the end of his life. He allowed those who believed in transubstantiation to be in his party, but denied that those who believed in a symbolic Eucharist (e.g., Zwingli) were in the Church at all. So is he out of the fold?
 *
Would you have any evidence that he held the above at the close of his life other than your assertion?
 *
I already presented that in my posted articles about Luther. They are in the archives, or else visit my “Church” page. Now, assuming he did believe these things, does that put him out?
 *
Also Luther being wrong does not equate with Christianity being wrong.
 *
I didn’t say it did. Again, I am trying to demonstrate that your own dogmatic positions lead to Luther not being a Christian. Now we shall see if you are honest and courageous (and consistent) enough to admit that.
 *
It is a non-sequitur to state that because Luther held to such and such (if he did?) a position till his death that he was not a Christian. What is more accurate is that at his death Luther had unlearned such and such and had not at that time foregone other matters. When you provide evidence of what he believed at the close of his life I will be in a better position to comment.
 *
I already did, so I await your answer.
 *
Does Mariolatory not impact on the trinity?
 *
It certainly would. Of course our view is not at all “mariolatry,” any more than yours is “bibliolatry.”
 *
Does the Immaculate Conception not impact on the Virgin Birth?
 *
Somewhat, yes, but indirectly. Luther believed in it (with a few qualifications). Does that mean he went to hell, or at least that he wasn’t a Christian in your view?
 *
Whether the RC church is guilty of Mariolatry will become evident to all as we proceed through the discussion.
 *
Indeed. And your evasiveness may be as well, if you proceed the way you have been thus far.
 *
A doctrine is not judged by whether Luther believed in it or he didn’t.
 *
I didn’t say it was. I am trying to show you that the logic of your own position would render Luther an infidel just as you think I am. But obviously you didn’t grasp my reasoning. I trust that others did.
 *
It is judged by whether it is Scripturally based. If you haven’t already presented the information and references to substantiate that Luther did believe such throughout his Christian life then I would ask you to provide them for examination.
 *
I have done so:
*
Martin Luther’s “Immaculate Purification” View of Mary [National Catholic Register, 12-31-16]
 *
Does penances, masses for the dead, the confessional not impact on salvation by grace alone?
 *
No, not if the latter concept is rightly understood in the non-Pelagian sense.
 *
And so I could go on. A church is to be judged by its whole doctrine, not only by the fundamentals.
 *
I would agree, but that is a different question from who is a Christian, a believer, a follower of Christ, a disciple, and in the Body of Christ, in the Church, etc. I fight against falsehood wherever I find it (from a Catholic point of view), but I don’t claim that someone is out of the fold because of one or two false beliefs (say, e.g., the annihilationism, soul sleep, and Sabbatarianism of the 7th-Day Adventists which go contrary to “orthodox” Protestantism). I would classify them as “aberrational” but not “cultic,” just as Walter Martin does.
 *
I care little for what Walter Martin, or Martin Luther or any other individual classifies such and such. The Scriptures are what determine a matter for me, nothing else.
 *
That’s because you have obviously made yourself your own pope, and a super-pope at that. The Holy Spirit teaches you, but you deny that He has taught thousands of other followers of Christ throughout history, so that you can learn something from them. You don’t even care about the views of the founder of your own brand of Christianity (or more likely, you don’t realize that so many of your views can be directly traced to him).
 *
Au contraire. It is because I hold Scripture as the ultimate authority in all matters of faith and practice. Not a pope, not a priest, not a scholar, not a minister, not a commentator but the Scriptures.
 *
This is unbiblical. The Bible has Apostles and Bishops (even popes), and Councils (Acts 15) who (and which) are authoritative interpreters of the Scripture.
 *
The Bible has no popes, not even one.
 *
 *
Bishops yes, but what those were and how they compare to Roman Catholic bishops is another matter.
 *
Oh, so you do have a bishop? What is his name? And I still don’t know what your denomination is. Are you scared to tell me?
 *
How many Apostles does the Roman Catholic church have. 12?
 *
We believe the apostolic age ended with the first century, but that bishops are the successors to the apostles.
 *
As for councils, again one much compare what a biblical council (if such existed) comprised of and compare it with a Roman Catholic council.
 *
Fair enough. So you accept this as valid. When, then, was the last council of your church?
 *
And nowhere is sola Scriptura taught in its pages (I have many debates on this on my website – all attempts to prove sola Scriptura in the Bible have failed miserably). Even you acknowledge the Nicene Creed (and implicitly, the Canon of Scripture, which came about as a result of councils and popes).
 *
You could never be more wrong. No men decided which books were inspired and which were not.
 *
I agree.
 *
They merely officially recognised those which were already known and accepted as Scripture.
 *
I have said this many times. But it was still an historical process, and that’s what I was saying.
 *
In any event, you can’t escape human ecclesiastical authority or Church history, much as you would like to, and convenient as that would be for you. You can if you give up reason and Scripture as well as Tradition, but I would hope you would be reluctant to do that.
 *
Scripture I stand upon, tradition I am indifferent to, reason is a gift of God I do not disparage.
 *
You can’t escape Tradition. The sooner you face up to this, the sooner your view will become coherent and not self-defeating. You play word games with the Canon, and you won’t acknowledge your pedigree from Luther and his revolutionary cohorts. But this is just self-delusion. Someone else on this list has correctly pointed out that no one’s views are arrived at in a vacuum. Someone said that the most dangerous presuppositions are the unrecognized ones (but we all have ’em). But so much Protestant “Church history” consists of Paul (maybe Augustine), Luther, and Billy Graham . . .
 *
The Scriptures are the final arbiter of what is to be accepted and rejected.
 *
So you are saying it doesn’t have to be interpreted, and is totally clear to every plowboy?
 *
The understanding of believers, guided and enlightened by the Holy Spirit are its interpreter. It resides nowhere in one man.
 *
So you again confirm that you are your own Super-Pope.
 *
Sure there is much to learn from other who have preceded me, and those presently alive, but those must be firmly checked with the Scriptures before being accepted as being sound.
 *
Okay, but you are still the final arbiter of what that Scripture teaches, right? If not, who fills this function for you?
 *
Another aspect which should be considered is the practice of the church. Right doctrine and right practice is what is being sought.
 *
Yes; we are very strong in our views against, e.g., divorce, abortion, homosexuality, feminism, assisted suicide, and euthanasia. Would you say that is “right practice?” How good is the overall Protestant record on these issues?
 *
Yes, no doubt that Roman Catholicism is to be commended for its strong stance on these issues, the same way the JW’s are to be.
 *
[falling off my chair . . . ]
 *
Of course a stance is not always the practice as we shall see as the discussion develops.
 *
Official teaching and hypocrisy and failure of proponents of a religion to live up to said religion’s teachings are two entirely different things.
 *
Good to see you quickly recognise the failure of the majority of RC’s to live up to the official standards, including past popes and present priests.
 *
Oh, but that is true for Protestants as well. You demonstrate that very well yourself. :-) I have recently expanded a paper on this aspect which proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that such a state of affairs (while sad and always to be fought) is “biblical” and to be expected at all times: Sins and Sinners in the Catholic Church (see the last section where I delve into biblical proofs, using the example of the Corinthians, Galatians, and the seven churches of Revelation).
 *
I would dare say nearly every individual on this list would be in agreement with the primary doctrines of the Christian church.
 *
If by this you mean your list of nine criteria above, then anyone who is an Arminian or a non-Calvinist would disagree (with your #5). I would suspect that is the majority here. But your list is also unclear and inconsistent, in its mixing of total depravity, (apparently) universal atonement, and progressive sanctification. This is not Reformation (classic) Calvinism. And — the more I come to understand your views — I think you will be seen to be in a very tiny minority of professed Christians.
 *
And let’s not forget the differences on baptism – which virtually all Christians would regard as a “central” doctrine (not to mention Holy Communion), and required as a rite for all Christians (whether regarded as sacramental and/or regenerative or not). There are at least five major camps on baptism, and I’m positive many would be represented on this list.
 *
So list them and see how much disagreement there is on the list which would be the cause of rejection by others of an individuals salvation.
 *
I’m not talking about salvation at the moment, but simply Christian truth. The five views are:
 *
1) infant regenerative baptism; 2) Infant non-regenerative baptism; 3) Adult regenerative baptism; 4) Adult non-regenerative baptism; 5) no baptism.
 *
There are few disagreements I would have with any member on this list on primary doctrine.
 *
See my last comment.
 *
On secondary doctrine, even where we disagreed it would be insufficiently important that we could not embrace each other as brothers and sisters in Christ.
 *
Who decides which are the secondary doctrines? And on what basis?
 *
Primary doctrine must be agreed upon for their to be fellowship. Secondary doctrine is those on which there can be various positions without affecting that fellowship.
 *
All you have done is state it! I asked you to explain how it is decided, and by whom. I assume that you have some reasons for your beliefs? If you don’t, then just say so, and I will drop the discussion as meaningless.
 *
Scripture makes no such distinction. For Paul, the apostolic doctrine is to be taken whole and entire, without compromise (see. e.g., 2 Thess 3:6; Gal 1:9,12).
 *
So what was the ‘tradition which he received of us’??
 *
Catholic Tradition. Now please answer the biblical argument I made about no “secondary” doctrine.
 *
Jesus said to teach “everything” that He commanded them, not just the “central” doctrines (Mt 28:20), and to be “one” as He and the Father were one (Jn 17:22).
 *
Who said that only the central doctrines were to be taught? The whole of Scripture is to be taught, not just the Gospel. The church of Christ is one, as he is with the Father.
 *
Yet you allow relativism on these “secondary” doctrines. This is the difficulty you have.
 *
Did the Father and the Son have any doctrinal disagreements?
 *
Are the Father and Son sinless, perfect and divine, and men sinful, imperfect and human?
 *
That’s irrelevant. Are you saying that Jesus prayed for something which He regarded as impossible of fulfillment from the get-go? That would be absurd.
 *
This primary/secondary dichotomy is simply a desperate attempt to produce a cardboard, unbiblical notion of “unity” which even itself is ultimately a myth in Protestant ranks. It takes someone like me to point out that the stated “unity” is largely illusory. The fish doesn’t know it is in water . . .
 *
So far you have pointed out nothing of any substance at all, except perhaps the size of your ego. Learn some humility.
 *
Oh? So you can make any criticism at all of my Church, up to and including the claim that I am not a Christian, yet when I vigorously critique your views, suddenly, it is an ego problem, and lack of humility. Very curious . . .
 *
Protestantism no longer equates with Christian. Much of what calls itself Christian has fallen into heresy. Christ’s church is not a denomination.
 *
Fine, but please give me all the beliefs of this “Christ’s church,” and who holds to them besides you.
 *
My definition of heresy is holding doctrines and/or practices which are contrary to the Scriptures.
 *
What is contrary to the Scriptures? Who determines that, and how? And where do they obtain their authority? What denomination are you? Or are you a denomination of one?
 *
These are simpleton questions.
 *
If so, at least they are vastly superior to your non-answers and constant recourse to obscurantism and evasion.
 *
You want to know what is contrary to the Scriptures read them and it will be clear to you.
 *
If that were the case, all Christians of good will would come to agreement, but they obviously don’t, so this is a manifest falsehood.
 *
Who determines such, the Scriptures themselves, which carry God’s authority.
 *
All agree with that, of course. Now tell me what all these true scriptural beliefs are. Or are you just bluffing, and you don’t really know yourself?
 *
No, you do not agree with that, as you consider tradition having near, if not the same equal authority.
 *
But that’s a different proposition from a denial of Scriptural authority. Our Tradition must always be in accord with Scripture, and cannot contradict it. Nor is it higher than Scripture. We argue that Scripture itself is only a part of the larger Christian apostolic Tradition, and that it itself plainly teaches that. Tradition and Scripture are two sides of the single apostolic Revelation – God’s Word. In any event, your characterization of my belief is false and misleading (as well as arrogant).
 *
Is all your tradition drawn from Scripture?
 *
It is all harmonious with it, and it is all found there in kernel form or more explicitly (material sufficiency of Scripture). It cannot all be found there whole and entire, as the Protestant inconsistently and unrealistically expects. But that is sola Scriptura, which we reject.
 *
You consider that a man can speak on the same level as those who wrote those Scriptures. Own your own doctrine.
 *
This is a lie, too. I have already carefully explained twice that infallibility is a far lesser charism than inspiration. You missed the point both times. Perhaps now with the third assertion you will get it.
 *
I belong to the church established by Jesus Christ Himself in Matthew 16, with many others.
 *
That Church had a pope and bishops. Do you have those? Where do you worship? Does this supreme entity have a name?????
 *
Care to show a pope in the Scripture?
 *
That’s another major discussion. I am already involved in enough discussions as it is, wouldn’t you agree? Now please answer my simple question (“where do you worship?”), if you would?
 *
I worship according to John 4:24 and am presently not affiliated with any denomination.
 *
So you are not under anyone’s authority but your own . . . just as I suspected . . . So obviously you have no bishop, as you don’t even have a pastor. All quite unbiblical, of course.
 *
Or perhaps you would rather discuss what comprised a Biblical bishop in contrast to a RC bishop?
 *
So you do acknowledge that bishops are a biblical entity. Do you have one, then? What is his name? If not, why? Why would you be so unbiblical?
 *
When you enter a dialog on what comprises a Biblical bishop then you will have your above question answered.
 *
That isn’t required, as we both agree that bishops are biblical. But you don’t have one, so you are being unbiblical regardless of different definitions of a bishop.
 *
The name of the church is the church of Christ, with Him at its head, not a sinful man.
 *
So you’re in the Church of Christ denomination?
 *
God has determined it through the canon of Scripture. The authority is God Himself who gave us those Scriptures.
 *
Of course. Who can disagree with that??!! :-) Now what do Christians do when they find that they have profound disagreements? How do we know who is right? Do we just conclude that the other guy is an incorrigible compulsive sinner, in bad faith, insincere, ignorant, rebellious, etc.?
 *
What they should do is determine the matter from the Scriptures. There are few profound matter on which two brothers in Christ cannot determine through being open to the authority of God’s word.
 *
Why, then, 23,000 denominations? [I later renounced this number, and 33,000] Sin is the only answer? I agree it is an answer, but it can’t possibly be the only one. Because if that were so, everyone who disagrees with your super-papal and infallible interpretation would have to be a sinner or willfully ignorant because they couldn’t arrive at the clear truth you see so well.
 *
Another strawman. How many of that 23,000 (I won’t ask you to substantiate and name them), would I not agree on or they not agree with me on primary doctrine?
 *
As a rough guess, I would say they might split into at least 50 “major” competing camps with regard to conflicting doctrines which you regard as “primary,” some of which you have described. How many would not recognise the others as legitimate Christian denominations? In any event, denominationalism (and non-episcopalian church government) can’t possibly be defended biblically. And we are so often chided as “unbiblical”?
 *
I am not interested in guesses. You made the accusation, now substantiate or retract it. List the 50 major competing camps.
 *
That doesn’t matter. What matters is that Protestants endorse relativism in doctrine, and have no way of resolving that dilemma according to their own formal principles.
 *
So you don’t recognise that there were in the Bible Jewish congregation and Gentiles congretations? You don’t agree that Paul and Mark (Barbabbas) agreed to part company etc etc.
 *
They were all under the authority of the Council of Jerusalem (Acts 15), presided over by Peter, the leader of the Apostles.
 *
No, we take it to the Scriptures and through the study of which, accompanied by prayer seek a resolution.
 *
Protestants have been doing that for 480 years, yet they become more divided, rather than unified. Why is that? You would think some progress would be made in all that time.
 *
What we do not do, is submit our wills to a hierarchy of self professed ‘priests’.
 *
That’s right. Far better to submit to one’s own infallible self, as you do! And if someone disagrees, so much the worse for them! What do they know, anyway!!??
 *
My opinion of what is right and what is wrong is worthless in itself. It is the authority of God’s word which is binding, not the thoughts of men.
 *
You offer platitudes and truisms without content. I want specifics. Your slogans do not solve the problem of “orthodoxy” in the least. They apparently do in your head, but not according to common sense and logic.
 *
I have little time for offering platitudes, much for the truth. If you do not agree with such then offer refutations, not complaints.
 *
Then give me your list of the correct, biblical Christian doctrines, and the list of unbiblical ones. Do me (and everyone here) a favor, and share this wonderful wisdom you have acquired.
 *
The first sign of a cult is when it claims to be the sole repository of truth.
 *
Where does the truth reside, other than between your ears then? You sound pretty infallible to me.
 *
The truth resides in the Scriptures.
 *
I should have known better than to ask you that . . . Sorry . . . It must be nice to reside in an intellectual world where the answer to all the excruciating difficulties that Christians (of all sorts) agonize over can be found in one-line platitudes and slogans, which sound nice, but offer little solution to real, concrete problems.
 *
To all: personally, I prefer to either argue the Scriptures (some real, honest-to-God comparative exegesis), or else history with someone who has some respect for Church history, and who acknowledges that it has some relevance to the seeking of Christian truth. It is pointless to argue history with someone who could care less about it, which is what we have here.
 *
And you have seen the futile result of that: a sort of “ring around the rosey” which never arrives at any conclusion. It inevitably ends up back at the same platitude with which we began (“the truth resides in the Scriptures”). I guess that one sentence solves all doctrinal disputes, then . . . SIGH. This circular outlook is what I critiqued in my Fictional Dialogue on Sola Scriptura (“Bible Alone”).
 *
On primary doctrine I would have few problems with many of those 23,000 denominations and vice versa.
 *
This is untrue, and is based anyway on a fallacious and unbiblical notion that certain “secondary” doctrines don’t matter, and that God allows doctrinal relativism and ecclesiological chaos, and that it is okay, and even to be sought after.
 *
The living Mormon prophet is considered infallible when he speak on matter of doctrine and as prophet. What he decrees in that capacity is as binding on Mormons as is the Scriptures. Recognise the scenario?
 *
No: 1) Popes are not prophets, nor are they inspired; 2) Mormons can’t trace their doctrines back to the Apostles like we can; 3) Mormons aren’t trinitarian, last time I checked. They are polytheists. We are trinitarian and monotheist.
 *
This is a ridiculous analogy.
 *
Scripture is the final arbiter, not me, nor my interpretation of such. Any position I currently hold to, I would disown in a second if it was shown to be contrary to Scripture.
 *
Precisely. If you decide it is contrary to Scripture – acting as your own Super-Pope – then you ditch it. It is irrelevant to you if the entire Christian Church for 1500 years believed something contrary to your current beliefs. That doesn’t matter, but if you get it in your head that a doctrine is “unbiblical,” then it goes. You are even blissfully unaware that you interpret things, just like everyone else does.
 *
You are completely blind to your own presuppositions. That means you can be led into any error by someone clever enough who can quote a lot of Scripture. Without the historical background and Tradition, you are prey to any false teacher who seems to possess an air of plausibility (for they all cite Scripture very well).
 *
Hardly the act of a super-pope, but then I am not so arrogant as to consider myself as infallible!!
 *
Nooooo, of course not. You just can’t explain yourself with recourse to any authority besides your own super-papal authority. A slight problem in your epistemology, , if I do say so.
 *
Three of those [primary doctrines] which have become apparent from the above discussion are:
 *
1. Scripture as the sole authority for Christians in all matters of faith and practice.
 *
Orthodox, Anglicans, and at least some Lutherans and Methodists (and perhaps other Wesleyans and holiness groups) would also deny sola Scriptura (the Methodists, e.g., speak of “Bible, Tradition, Reason, and Experience”). It would also mean that there were virtually no Christians until the 16th century! I asked you to state one way or the other whether these groups are “out” of Christianity, by that same criterion (this would include people like John Wesley, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Dorothy Sayers, and C. S. Lewis). You have persistently refused to do so. So it seems that you would like to hold one definition of “Christianity” for the Catholic Church, and another for all the Protestant denominations. This is neither fair nor logical.
 *
2. Salvation by faith alone, and not by works.
 *
Salvation by works is Pelagianism. The Catholic Church has long since condemned both Pelagianism and Semi-Pelagianism. We do not believe in “salvation by works.” Salvation is entirely derived from the grace of God. Pelagianism is a heresy (and charges that we believe this are lies). We do believe that faith and works cannot be separated – as James clearly teaches. This is a thoroughly biblical doctrine. Even Reformed Christians believe that a true faith will inevitably show forth works as its proof of genuineness. In a practical sense, this is almost identical to our view. Again, Orthodox, Anglicans, and Methodists would all be non-Christian, too, by this criterion.
 *
3. One mediator, between God and man.
 *
That is Catholic belief. This Person is Jesus. Paul says this clearly.
 *
Is it your consideration that a church can reject these three matters and still be considered a Christian denomination?
 *
That’s what I want to know from you, concerning Orthodox, Anglicans, and Methodists.
 *
‘The Family (ex-Children of God) subscribe to the Nicene creed, do you consider that they are Christians? Just in case you are not familir with the group, they practice ‘sharing’ in their communes, being sexual relationships between consenting adults who are not married to each other?
 *
This raises an interesting and worthwhile question, and I will have to ponder it. Yet if you start introducing moral criteria in order to be a Christian, then many Protestant denominations have compromised on such issues as abortion, divorce, homosexuality, feminism, and contraception, euthanasia (and yes, fornication and things like masturbation, too). That would take out virtually all Protestant denominations, so I wouldn’t be too quick to apply this criteria strictly.
 *
But how can a church be another denomination if it considers itself as the sole repository of truth?
 *
We have never claimed that. I would like to see you document that statement (or are you just using language very loosely?). We are formally committed to ecumenism, acknowledge the validity of Protestant baptism and marriage, and many other aspects of Protestantism as wonderful and beneficial things (e.g., love of the Bible, personal relationship with Jesus, the impetus for evangelism, much apologetics, the great mass of common theological belief, ethical similarities, etc.). It is highly ironic and hypocritical for you – a person who doesn’t even consider myself or my Church Christian – to spread an outrageous falsehood about the Catholic Church: that we exclude all other Christians!
 *
and the one true and apostolic and authoritative church on the earth?
 *
That’s not true, either. We acknowledge the apostolicity of the Orthodox (in fact, are seeking reunion with them), and some Anglican priests, and — I believe — some other traditional groups which are neither Orthodox nor Catholic. We would say that Protestant churches speak with authority insofar as they speak truth, and are in line with what we feel is apostolic and biblical truth (no different than what many Protestants believe about us). And our claiming to be the One Church does not at all mean that all others are going to hell, etc. We also have a highly nuanced theology of the “Mystical Body of Christ.”
 *
What would such make your church?
 *
A*rrogant and sectarian, is what! This would apply to a group such as the Church of Christ.
So that there is error in Mormonism, or the Jehovah Witnesses and other such groups is ok by you, they are also just another Christian denomination? Or are you setting levels of acceptable and non-acceptable errors on primary doctrine?
 *
You need to deal with the Protestant groups I cited. If C.S. Lewis, Wesley and Bonhoeffer are not Christians, then I am proud to be in their heathen company.
 *
That there are differences between denominations is self-evident. The question is at what point do such (if any) move beyond denominational differences into severe doctrinal dispute leading to the declaration that one or the other group is no longer part of the Christian body of orthodox denominations but a cult or a heresy. That is the judgement call that has to be made and not shirked from.
 *
Yes, and I wish you would live up to your own admonitions and answer my questions. And if you can’t answer them, then why do you speak so dogmatically and unflinchingly?
 *
The same could be said of any cult. Most ‘Christian’ cults have their roots in orthodoxy, from which they deviate.
 *
But what is “orthodoxy,” according to you? Who determines it? The individual with his Bible and the Holy Spirit? And if everyone else disagrees, so much the worse for them?
 *
The above definition is no more than a polite way of saying of saying ‘cult’. Also Hank Hanegraaf, CRI [Christian Research Institute, founded by evangelical countercult expert Dr. Walter Martin], nor any other person/organisation is the determiner of what is a legitimate denomination, the Scriptures are. Its verdict on Roman Catholicism is a thumbs down ;).
 *
An example of my very last sentence. You are right, on your own authority, because you know what the Bible teaches . . .
 *
I consider both him, and CRI to have produced much that is good and beneficial to the Christian church, but at the end of the day, their pronouncements like yours and mine must be evaluated from the Scriptures.
 *
Then the least you can do is support your view in a consistent, thorough fashion – apply one standard in its application, if you wish to disagree with as solid of an evangelical organization as CRI.
 *
The Scriptural definition I view and use of what constitutes a cult is 2Corinthians 11:3-15. In v4 we are presented with 3 precise criteria for determining a cult.
 *
1. Preacheth another Jesus.(Question to be asked – who is your Jesus?). 2. Receiveth another spirit. (Question to be asked – in what spirit so they come to me?). 3. Has another gospel. (Question to be asked – what is your gospel?).
 *
Failure to meet the Scriptural standard on any of these three matters constitutes a cult.
 *
Agreed. It is in your application of your principles that you render your own views entirely incoherent and absurd, as I have argued.
 *
Most cults fall on all three points. So ask yourself the question, does Roman Catholicism have another Jesus,
 *
Please explain. Our “Jesus” is identical to yours. Protestantism retained Catholic Christology in practically all particulars.
 *
a different spirit,
 *
The pneumatology is also identical, for all intents and purposes.
 *
or another gospel?
 *
When the gospel is rightly defined (from the Bible), we are agreed upon that, too. See my papers:
*
*
In the answer to these three question is the definition of whether Roman Catholicism is a denomination or a cult.
 *
So you say. Now go on to the next stage and defend your wild assertions. There are several people here who disagree with you, not just me, so in many respects this debate goes beyond merely a Catholic vs. Protestant thing. It is a general Christian and ecumenical matter. It is also a matter of honest, consistent scholarship.
 *
***
Photo credit: 2016 [Picryl / public domain]
***
2019-03-28T13:33:29-04:00

I have long noted as regards deconversion stories from Christian to atheist, that, very often, these accounts of an exodus out of Christianity have the following characteristics:

1) an initial fundamentalist belief, which is thought to be the sum total of Christianity (as if there are no other more thoughtful and nuanced species of it).

2) rejection of various straw men, which do not represent the most informed versions of Christianity; “throwing the baby out with the bathwater.”

3) highlighting of terrible, hypocritical Christians, rather than the best examples.

4) acceptance of the notion that atheism is the only alternative to rejection of (what amounts to) straw men and lousy, inadequate versions of Christianity.

I have observed these motifs in these stories over and over and over, as I have critiqued a great number of them (word-search “Deconversion” on my Atheism web page). As long as atheists keep writing their stories, and implying that they can offer profound and supposedly solid, unanswerable reasons for leaving Christianity, we Christians (especially apologists like me) can just as easily critique them and show how and why the reasoning is fallacious and unsuccessful in establishing atheism or the falsity of Christianity.

Goose and gander. Yet, I often meet with great hostility when I do so (atheist author and “debater” John Loftus being the most outrageous and hilarious example): as if it were the rudest thing in the world and essentially improper and unethical to examine a public attack on Christianity.

I ran across a deconversion story by one Don R., on the Patheos website, Recovering from Religion: Ex-Communications. It is entitled, “My Escape from the Belly of the Beast” (9-24-18). It exhibits all of these typical traits. Don’s words will be in blue. I will go right to examples of fallacious thinking, false dilemmas, needless exaggerations and category mistakes, false dichotomies, factual error, etc.

*****

[W]e were brought up in a very strict fundamental Christian household.

As so very often in these stories . . . Fundamentalism is a small minority and fringe portion of evangelical Protestantism, which is one portion of Protestant Christianity, which is  itself a minority of all Christians. Thus, to reject fundamentalism is not at all to reject all of Christianity (not even all of evangelicalism or Protestantism).

It is a rejection of what is in many respects the very worst and insubstantial and least intellectually respectable form of Christianity. Yet we’ll see that Don never seriously considers any other form of Christianity before departing. Those of us who never grew up as fundamentalists never cease to marvel at these sorts of “tunnel vision” dynamics.

You see, our father was a pedophile and was molesting my sister and I for years. Our stepmother had very little use for us, . . . 

I am very sorry to hear about this tragic situation. But this is the motif of the “lousy, hypocritical” Christians: often (in these stories) subtly implying that a huge number or even a majority or most Christians are this way (not just pedophilia, but any serious sin), which is not true. Christianity has its “bad apples” just like any large social group does.

But it’s not fair to judge a religion based on its worst practitioners, or in some cases: literal “wolves in sheep’s clothing”: folks who never were Christians at all and only claimed to be (the ones that Jesus condemned because they say “Lord, Lord” but refuse to do what He commands them to do).

Our stepmother remained very religious (to this day she is fanatical in her beliefs) . . . 

Again, if this is true fanaticism, rather than what Don thinks is fanatical simply because it is Christian, then it is an example of the extremes of Christianity. In other words, to reject true fanaticism is to reject a distortion and corruption of Christianity (which I have always done, myself), rather than the thing itself.

From early teens to mid-twenties, I still held a belief in god, but I just didn’t want to be around any of his people.

One can see why. If he had actually met some good, loving, Christlike Christians, then things might very well have been much different, right? If the terrible Christians drive one away, then it stands to reason that good examples of Christians would draw one in. Don does talk about his increasing church involvement as being “rewarding and fulfilling” and states that he “really loved the feeling of community.” So he must have found some (good) Christians that he enjoyed being around. Glad to hear it!

When people would come to me with their hard questions, I would share my process with them and help them come to “correct” answers, always based on the infallibility of the bible and the pure goodness of god. And every time I did that, there was a little voice saying “that doesn’t make sense”, which I ignored… because it felt so good to know that I was helping people be stronger in their faith.

This is rather subjective. We could simply reply that he wasn’t very good at apologetics and didn’t provide (or find in research) the best answer that could be given; therefore, he felt a nagging doubt. It doesn’t prove that there were no solid, plausible answers to be had.

I remember when I realized that even the people I believed were fully dedicated to god had their own doubts. 

Everyone has doubts and befuddlement about various doctrines and beliefs: whether concerning Christianity or anything else. The question is whether they add up to outright unbelief, or are simply areas that require further thought and study.

Eddie (not his real name) was every bit as passionate about god as I was, and we had many nights of great discussions. I knew that he was fully committed and sought god with all his heart. So, when I found out that he believed in theistic evolution (the theory that god used evolution to create the earth), I was stunned.

Why? There have been Christians who were theistic evolutionists right from the beginning of Darwin’s theory in 1859; for example, the botanist Asa Gray. Darwin wrote to Gray in 1881, “there is hardly any one in the world whose approbation I value more highly than I do yours.” Darwin conceded to Gray that his theories were “not at all necessarily atheistical.” This was also the position of Darwin’s good friend Thomas Henry Huxley: himself an agnostic, but without insisting that the only form of evolutionism must be materialistic (i.e., atheistic). Darwin, after all, had developed his theory while he was still a Christian or at least theist. That is beyond question.

You see, I believed in a literal interpretation of the bible, and to hear that someone who was as fully devoted as I was could believe in evolution was really difficult.

Exactly. This is fundamentalism. But an informed, educated approach to the Bible understands that the Bible has many literary genres and modes of expression, and is not always to be taken literally (though many times it is). To hold that it must always be interpreted literally is simply “Bible ignorance.”

I had just assumed that god made everything clear to those who diligently sought him, so how could we believe two very different things about the creation of the world?

They could and did because Christianity has enough latitude to  allow different views on the particulars of scientific matters. The Bible isn;t a scientific textbook. Good, orthodox Christians believed that the creation story was not necessarily literal (literally, six 24-hour days) at least as far back as St. Augustine (354-430).

This was the first of several times that my beliefs were shaken by things like this.

There was no need for such a crisis at all, if he had simply realized that he was in a fundamentalist fish tank and couldn’t imagine any other Christian paradigm. So because of that he gets “shaken” and this is included in his story of why he eventually forsook Christianity. It’s not an adequate reason at all.

Earlier in his story he noted how “Many evenings I would read Christian authors and study apologetics. I had 2 large bookcases filled with religious books and had read every page.” So we’re to believe that he had never encountered a good Christian or Christian book who believed (or which explained) that God used evolution as His method of creation? That’s hard to believe. What: did he only read fundamentalist apologetics?

There would be two writers that I deeply respected who held opposite beliefs on the role of women in the church. There were very different views on the “once saved always saved” or can you lose your salvation issue.

Yes, Christians differ on many issues. But disagreement doesn’t prove that no one got it right, or that there is no one correct position. If, for example, one person believes that the earth is flat and a second believes it is shaped like an egg, this doesn’t disprove that it is actually a sphere. All it proves (by strict logic) is that they can’t both be right. But they may both be wrong, with the actual truth found elsewhere.

But we can say concerning the “losing salvation” issue, that the vast majority of Christians (Catholics, Orthodox, Lutherans, Methodists, Anglicans, many Arminian denominations, pentecostals, a good proportion of Baptists, etc.), have believed that one can lose salvation or fall from grace or the Christian faith.  It’s mostly Calvinists / Presbyterians and fundamentalists who disagree.

On most issues we can look to determine whether a large majority of the sum of all Christians accepts a thing, while a much smaller minority does not. And that should tell us something. But internal Christian disagreement is no compelling reason to become an atheist. All it proves is that Christians disagree and often are shortsighted (and too often, plain stupid), just as any group of people do.

Science is largely the same as theology in this “sociological” respect. Fifty years ago, things like the Big Bang Theory or plate tectonics were not as firmly established as they are today, with the vast majority of scientists agreeing. Some still disagree, but the likelihood or plausibility is that a view taken by almost all scientists will turn out to be the actual fact of the matter.

But I couldn’t understand why the deeply faithful would come to opposite decisions about the biggies. . . . I just couldn’t ever fathom why there would be such discord among the “true believers”.

For the same reason that scientists and philosophers have massive disagreements amongst themselves, and especially through time: over hundreds of years. There can be many reasons (good and bad) for why folks disagree with and contradict each other. But to add these up and conclude, “I reject the entire system as rubbish” is quite a jump and a stretch, and exceedingly difficult on an epistemological level.

One week, he began a 4 part series on the story of Noah and the flood. He came at it from a totally different perspective than I had ever heard or thought of before, and I was enthralled. On the 4th Sunday, he mentioned that there were different interpretations of the story within the church, and he brought up the fact that the flood story actually appeared in earlier writings that were not biblical at all. I was stunned. Could it be true that the bible borrowed the flood story from earlier secular writings (hint: Epic of Gilgamesh)? It was just a fable?

Huh? The reasoning here is very convoluted. How is it that simply because another culture also had a story of a massive Flood, therefore, somehow it becomes a “fable”? Isn’t it much more likely and plausible that an event of such shattering magnitude would be recorded by someone besides the Hebrews? Therefore, the mere presence of a similar story elsewhere is no disproof of the biblical account at all.

Pagan or heathen parallels or precursors do not necessarily “disprove” the biblical account. Thus, The Catholic Encyclopedia (1913) notes how such parallel stories of the Flood, confirm, rather than disconfirm, the historicity and trustworthiness of the Bible:

The historicity of the Biblical Flood account is confirmed by the tradition existing in all places and at all times as to the occurrence of a similar catastrophe. F. von Schwarz . . .  enumerates sixty-three such Flood stories which are in his opinion independent of the Biblical account. R. Andree . . .  discusses eighty-eight different Flood stories, and considers sixty-two of them as independent of the Chaldee and Hebrew tradition. Moreover, these stories extend through all the races of the earth excepting the African; these are excepted, not because it is certain that they do not possess any Flood traditions, but because their traditions have not as yet been sufficiently investigated. Lenormant pronounces the Flood story as the most universal tradition in the history of primitive man, and Franz Delitzsch was of opinion that we might as well consider the history of Alexander the Great a myth, as to call the Flood tradition a fable. It would, indeed, be a greater miracle than that of the Deluge itself, if the various and different conditions surrounding the several nations of the earth had produced among them a tradition substantially identical. Opposite causes would have produced the same effect.

I was deeply shaken to realize that the bible was not the historically accurate document I was always told and completely believed it was.

I don’t know why. It certainly wasn’t because of the above things mentioned, because that conclusion simply doesn’t follow.

How much was allegory? How much was literal? How much was parable? How could you tell which was which?

Obviously by searching related cross-references, studying biblical commentaries, and especially by researching biblical genre, literary types, the nature of different books (Psalms and Proverbs are poetry, etc.), and ancient near eastern culture and ways of thinking. Apparently, it never occurred to Don to do that (tons of books about these things) — otherwise he wouldn’t have asked this rhetorical question — , and this is usually the case in a fundamentalist paradigm.

Is god a god of confusion?

No, but human beings often bring about confusion by ignorance, stubbornness, pride, self-interest, etc. So we wind up with lots of disagreements. Catholicism offers one self-consistent, historically continuous view of Christianity, which is why I am a Catholic. No form of Protestantism possesses these traits.

I began to look for what set Christianity apart from all the other false religions in the world. I knew that they all had holy books, and the bible was very suspect at this point, so that wasn’t it. 

Again, nothing presented in this account proves that the Bible isn’t what it claims to be.

There were several times in my life where I KNEW that god had spoken to me. Times of deep struggle and fear that he had comforted me. Surely that must be unique to the Christian religion. Nope. People all over the world had their own profound experiences that proved their god to them. 

Why must Christian religious experience be unique? The Apostle Paul Romans 2 teaches that people can possibly be saved, who have never even heard the Christian message. Jesus talked to a pagan Roman centurion and concluded that He had rarely seen such faith in Israel. So this man had religious faith, yet wasn’t an observant Jew. Truth is truth, and God can reach men in many different ways, including religious experiences.

It’s simply silly and shallow thought, to think that because non-Christians have also had spiritual experiences, therefore our own personal spiritual experiences that we “KNEW” actually happened, somehow get nullified as pipe dreams and self-delusion. That doesn’t follow. It’s lousy “reasoning.”

Nor does atheism at all follow from this: “lots of people have had spiritual experiences; therefore there is no God”? What?! How does that follow? I must confess to being mystified as to how that “logical chain” works. If atheists think it does, then they must explain it to me.

I begged god for some kind of sign that he was real, and I really expected him to answer, because he would know that my very faith was at stake. Nothing…

Very often, God will not comply with such a request, because He knows it is a cop-out: “show me some huge miraculous sign to prove that you exist!” People know enough to believe God exists, simply by looking at His creation (as it states in Romans 1).

I had to learn I was not the complete piece of trash that my religion had taught me I was . . . 

That’s what fundamentalists and Calvinists believe (total depravity and a completely fallen, corrupt human nature), but not what the vast majority of Christians have believed (fallen, subject to concupiscence, but still capable of good and freely receiving God’s grace). So once again, Don rejected a straw man that only a tiny number of Christians believe.

If he truly wants to see a worldview that results in human “trash,” he has to look at hundreds of millions of aborted babies: killed by Christians who no longer follow the historic teachings of their own group, secularists, atheists, and all who have started to believe that an innocent, helpless human being can be utterly worthless, so as to be torn to shreds and murdered (all the way up to full term at nine months, and now even after birth) for the “sin” of existing because of someone else’s actions.

That is acomplete piece of trash”: not the biblical and Christian teaching on original sin, as taught by the great majority of Christians.

***

Photo credit: ||read|| (5-28-09) [Flickr / CC BY 2.0 license]

***

2019-02-26T16:19:38-04:00

“SolusChristus”: a Calvinist, responded underneath my (former) blog article, 25 Biblical Passages Against Limited Atonement. His words will be in blue.

*****

Many of these are not even support for universal atonement, but actually support Monergism (or Calvinism) such as the first one Luke 19:10 Christ has come to seek and save that which is lost. It shows that Christ has the ability to save whomever He wills, therefore possibly promoting limited atonement since salvation is up to Christ Himself and not man. But personally I wouldn’t use this passage for limited atonement.

I agree. Catholics (in case you aren’t aware) hold to sola gratia, too. Whoever is saved only is so because of God’s grace: which is expressly stated by the Council of Trent (the contrary being the heresy of Pelagianism).

Some of the passages in my paper are much better than others; I freely grant or concede; and perhaps (in hindsight) it would have even been better for some to be removed because of relative weakness and vulnerability to your critique. In fact, on reflection, I have decided that the overall argument I made there is too weak for me to continue to have the paper on my blog, so I have removed it.

But some of the passages included in it are not so easily dismissed (at least not on the grounds you are using here), and I notice that you pass over those.

And where there is the term “world” is used Christ doesn’t save EVERYONE in the world, since that is what you are reading into these texts. Such as John 6:33 Christ gives life to the world. Do you truly believe Christ gives life to the world? If so, universalism is on the cards.

I’m not a universalist at all, and in fact made the same argument you are making against texts such as these supposedly suggesting or proving universalism, in defending Pope St. John Paul II against this charge: from a Catholic reactionary / fundamentalist (see the listing of Bible passages near the end).

But I am sure you will say, it’s up to man to choose, but we see that nowhere in the text.

Man chooses the free gift of salvation: made entirely possible by God’s grace. He does this just as a prisoner accepts the pardon of a governor. The prisoner didn’t create it or make it possible in any way. He merely accepts the “grace” or “mercy” or “forgiveness” in gratitude. As for the Bible stating that men do exactly this (make a decision whereby they accept and work with God’s grace, we find many passages:

1 Corinthians 9:24 (RSV) Do you not know that in a race all the runners compete, but only one receives the prize? So run that you may obtain it.

Philippians 2:12-13 . . . work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; [13] for God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his good pleasure.

Philippians 3:8-14 Indeed I count everything as loss because of the surpassing worth of knowing Christ Jesus my Lord. For his sake I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them as refuse, in order that I may gain Christ [9] and be found in him, not having a righteousness of my own, based on law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness from God that depends on faith; [10] that I may know him and the power of his resurrection, and may share his sufferings, becoming like him in his death, [11] that if possible I may attain the resurrection from the dead. [12] Not that I have already obtained this or am already perfect; but I press on to make it my own, because Christ Jesus has made me his own. [13] Brethren, I do not consider that I have made it my own; but one thing I do, forgetting what lies behind and straining forward to what lies ahead, [14] I press on toward the goal for the prize of the upward call of God in Christ Jesus.

1 Timothy 2:15 Yet woman will be saved through bearing children, if she continues in faith and love and holiness, with modesty.

1 Timothy 4:16 Take heed to yourself and to your teaching; hold to that, for by so doing you will save both yourself and your hearers.

2 Timothy 3:15 . . . the sacred writings which are able to instruct you for salvation through faith in Christ Jesus. [we do the work of reading Scripture and this in turn can save us, so we helped save ourselves by reading it]

1 Peter 2:2 Like newborn babes, long for the pure spiritual milk, that by it you may grow up to salvation;

See also:

St. Paul on Grace, Faith, & Works (50 Passages)

Final Judgment & Works (Not Faith): 50 Passages

*
*

*

The term is used as Christ has already given life to the world. The consistent interpretation to use is as St. Augustine used for 1 John 2:2 that the term “world” is referring to the elect is who Christ saves and dies for. In the Gospel of John the term world has many meanings, such as in John 12:19 it states that the whole world has gone after Christ, well no… the Chinese, the Aussies etc.. didn’t go after Jesus, it’s a figure of speech.

That is just one example of assuming the term world always means world. This goes the same with the term “all”. The Gospel writers didn’t mean all literally, like in the Gospel of Luke 2:1 that the “all the world should be registered” but once again, did the Chinese or the Indians get registered? No. What is Luke saying here? That the all the Roman empire world was registered. So the term “all” in Greek can mean all kinds of people Jews and Gentiles, or all of the elect since in John 6:44 no one comes to the Father unless the one who sent Him draws Him, so it is clear from Holy Scripture God elects and draws sinners to Himself, making the doctrine of limited atonement all the more possible and believable which that is the case for me.

So, in conclusion we must understand the context of the terms being used “all” and “world”.

I also agree that “all ” doesn’t always literally mean “everyone without exception.” Catholics hear the argument that Mary can’t be immaculately conceived and without actual sin because the Bible says, “all have sinned.” In defending our view, I make exactly the same argument you just made: “All Have Sinned” vs. a Sinless, Immaculate Mary?

So I largely agree with these reasons of yours and have conceded as much. But this doesn’t refute all of my examples from the now-discontinued article. I will point out ones that this legitimate criticism doesn’t affect; and perhaps you would be so kind as to provide a further counter-reply. I’d like to see what you say, because you have argued well so far; just incompletely and selectively.

John 12:31-33 “Now is the judgment of this world, now shall the ruler of this world be cast out; [32] and I, when I am lifted up from the earth, will draw all men to myself.” [33] He said this to show by what death he was to die.

If in fact limited atonement is true, and Jesus died only for the elect, how is it that the Bible says He drew “all men” to Himself on the cross. Wouldn’t that be a false statement? In what sense was He drawing the reprobate / damned to Himself on the cross?

Romans 11:32 For God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all.

But doesn’t limited atonement hold that He either doesn’t show mercy to the non-elect reprobate, or far less mercy than to the elect (i.e., mercy that is not efficient unto salvation)?

1 Timothy 2:3-6 This is good, and it is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, [4] who desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus, [6] who gave himself as a ransom for all, the testimony to which was borne at the proper time.

I think this is the single best “killer passage” against limited atonement. It’s all there: if God desires all men to be saved, then clearly there are none that He desires (predestines from all eternity) to not be saved. That is utterly contrary to limited atonement. Likewise, Paul says Jesus was a ransom “for all”: not just the elect. I don’t think we can discount the instances of “all” in this passage in the way that you have for many others. If your view was correct, it sure seems like the Bible would flat-out state it: “God desires the elect to be saved” / “who gave himself as a ransom for the elect.” But it doesn’t state those things. It expresses precisely what one would expect if universal atonement were true and limited atonement false.

Hebrews 2:9 But we see Jesus, who for a little while was made lower than the angels, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for every one.

This shows that His atoning, redemptive death on the cross was for “every one”: not just the elect. How could it be any clearer or more decisive than that?

2 Peter 2:1, 15 But false prophets also arose among the people, just as there will be false teachers among you, who will secretly bring in destructive heresies, even denying the Master who bought them, bringing upon themselves swift destruction.. . . [15] Forsaking the right way they have gone astray . . .

As I stated in my other article: If these are people who never were saved (as a Calvinist would say), then how can it be stated that Jesus “bought them”? Believers in Limited Atonement think that Jesus only “buys” those who are indeed saved and of the elect. See my related papers:

*

Limited Atonement, Free Will, & Failed Prayers of Jesus

Dialogue: Double Predestination, Total Depravity, & Limited Atonement

Gospel = Total Depravity, Limited Atonement, Irresistible Grace?

Limited Atonement Refuted? (John 12:32)

*

My book, Biblical Catholic Salvation: “Faith Working Through Love” (2010), contains 115 pages (seven chapters) devoted specifically to a critique of Calvinism and “TULIP”. The chapter against limited atonement is twelve pages and contains many more biblical passages that refute it:

The following passages show that Jesus died for all men; His atonement applied to all men, and that God desires that all be saved, even though some (in their free will) accept His work on their behalf and others reject it:

Psalm 86:5 For thou, O Lord, art good and forgiving, abounding in steadfast love to all who call on thee.

Isaiah 55:1 Ho, every one who thirsts, come to the waters; . . . (cf. 45:22; Joel 2:32)

Matthew 11:28 Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest.

Luke 19:10 For the Son of man came to seek and to save the lost.

John 3:14-16 “And as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of man be lifted up, [15] that whoever believes in him may have eternal life.” [16] For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Acts 2:21 And it shall be that whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. (cf. Rom 10:13)

Romans 5:6 While we were still weak, at the right time Christ died for the ungodly.

Romans 5:15 But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass [original sin], much more have the grace of God and the free gift in the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. [universal atonement] (cf. 5:17, 20-21)

Romans 11:32 For God has consigned all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all.

2 Corinthians 5:14-15, 19 For the love of Christ controls us, because we are convinced that one has died for all; therefore all have died. [15] And he died for all, that those who live might live no longer for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised.. . .

2 Peter 3:9 The Lord is not slow about his promise as some count slowness, but is forbearing toward you, not wishing that any should perish, but that all should reach repentance.

Revelation 22:17 The Spirit and the Bride say, “Come.” And let him who hears say, “Come.” And let him who is thirsty come, let him who desires take the water of life without price.

Saying that Christ died for the Church (as Paul does in Ephesians) is not at all contradictory to saying that He died for all men, or for the world. But to maintain that He died only for the Church or only for the elect (limited atonement) does indeed contradict the passages above.

Therefore, since inspired Scripture aids in interpreting itself through cross-referencing, and doesn’t contradict itself, limited atonement is disproven from Holy Scripture.

***

Photo credit: Alem Sánchez [Pexels.com / Pexels license]

***

2019-02-18T12:38:00-04:00

This exchange came about in a Facebook discussion of my blog article, Faith & Works: Oil & Water or Two Sides of a Coin? Rev Ken Howes (Missouri Synod) is a friend of mine. We have engaged in several enjoyable and constructive dialogues and have great respect for each other. I would contend that such friendship (or at least respect: whether friends or not) is absolutely necessary for any truly good and instructive dialogue to take place.

Pastor Howes  has a law degree from Valparaiso University and a Master of Divinity degree from Trinity Theological Seminary, and is working on an STM degree with the Institute of Lutheran Theology: in the area of systematic and historical theology. His words will be in blue.

*****

It’s not “either or” It is “both and”. The only question is the order in which they come.

Lutherans are often accused of antinomianism (a disregard for Law). That allegation is not true as to most Lutherans. But there are Lutherans who go there. I would say they’re not very good Lutherans, but they’re awfully influential in ELCA.

Faith does indeed produce works. We differ on the relationship between works and salvation. The saved will do good works; good works are the mark of the saved. But salvation itself is not the fruit of those works. We’d say you have the right cart and the right horse, but have put the cart before the horse.

Let me ask you, then: how come in 50 passages I have found having to do with the final judgment or entrance into heaven, works are mentioned in all 50 of them as key factors. Faith alone is never mentioned. Faith was mentioned in one of the fifty, but alongside works.

[note: I would say that this suggests our view of sola gratia, with synergy and merit: not Semi-Pelagianism]

Is that not the very opposite of what we would expect to find in the Bible if the Lutheran sola fide were true in the sense that you believe it?

Another favorite (and I believe, devastating) argument that I make is from the rich young ruler. He asks Jesus how he may attain eternal life (salvation). Jesus asks him if he kept the commandments (yes; this is works); then He tells him to perform another work: sell all that he has. Jesus says not a thing about faith in Him alone.

You prove only that the specific phrase “faith alone” does not appear in those passages. I could play the same game and ask why John 3:16 does not say, “For God so loved the world that whosoever does good works should not perish but have everlasting life.” Or why John 11:25 doesn’t say, “I am the resurrection and the life; he that believeth in me and doth good works, though he die, yet shall he live; and he that liveth, believeth in me and doth good works shall never die.” The fact is that faith is a prerequisite to salvation; good works are a mark of salvation. Salvation doesn’t occur without both, one as the way by which one is saved and the other as the consequence of that salvation. Those who believed in him also did good works. At the same time, it is also true that those who believe in him are still sinners and still do that which they hate (Rom. 7).

It’s not just that “faith alone” doesn’t appear (the only time it does appear in Scripture, it is condemned: in James), it’s that faith scarcely appears at all in the 50 passages. Heres a summary:

1) “faithful” (2) and “faithful servant” (2) appears in Matthew 25:14-30 in the midst of various works.

2) “work of faith” appears in 2 Thessalonians 1:7-12.

3) the “faithless” will end up ” in the lake that burns with fire and sulphur” in Revelation 21:8.

That’s it! This is hardly a ringing endorsement of the overwhelming centrality of faith alone as the means of salvation.

We totally agree on grace alone and we agree that faith is a necessary and key ingredient in salvation, but deny faith alone. John 3:16 doesn’t teach faith alone, because “believe” includes the notion of works in it. I wrote about this in some depth in my first book: A Biblical Defense of Catholicism:

John 3:36 [RSV]: “He who believes in the Son has eternal life; he who does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God rests upon him.”

The Greek word for “believes” is pistuo, and the Greek for “does not obey” is apitheo. There is a parallelism in this verse, whereby belief and obedience are essentially identical. When all is said and done, believing in Christ is obeying him. This ought to be kept in mind by Protestant evangelists and pastors who urge penitents to “believe in Christ,” “accept Christ,” etc. To disobey Christ is to be subject to the wrath of God. Thus, again, we are faced with the inescapable necessity of good works — wrought by God’s grace, and done in the spirit of charity — for the purpose and end of ultimate salvation, holiness, and communion with God.

St. Peter, in 1 Peter 2:7, uses the same parallelism, with the same two identical Greek words (believe/disobedient in KJV). St. Paul uses apitheo with regard to disobedience to parents in Romans 1:30 and 2 Timothy 3:2, and in a more general sense (describing sinners) in Titus 1:16 and 3:3. Obviously, no one disbelieves in the existence of his parents. St. Paul is speaking of disobeying parents’ commands. In the same sense, such disobedience (not mere lack of faith) is said to be the basis of the loss of eternal life in John 3:36.

To speculate further, if it be granted that pistuo (“believe”) is roughly identical to “obeying,” as it indisputably is in John 3:36, by simple deduction, then its use elsewhere is also much more commensurate with the Catholic view of infused justification rather than the more abstract, extrinsic, and forensic Protestant view; for example, the “classic” Protestant evangelistic verse John 3:16, Jesus’ constant demand to believe in him in John 5 through 10, and St. Paul’s oft-cited salvific exhortations in Romans 1:16, 4:24, 9:33, and 10:9, generally thought to be irrefutable proofs of the Protestant viewpoint on saving faith.

John 6:27-29: “Do not labor for the food which perishes, but for the food which endures to eternal life, which the Son of man will give to you; for on him has God the Father set his seal. Then said they to him, ‘What must we do, to be doing the works of God?’ Jesus answered them, ‘This is the work of God, that you believe in him whom he has sent.’ ”

In verses 28 and 29, working and belief in Christ are equated, much like obedience and belief in John 3:36. In the marvelous phrase “doing the works of God,” we see that our works and God’s are intertwined if indeed we are doing his will. This is the Catholic viewpoint: an organic connection of both faith with works, and God’s unmerited grace coupled with our cooperation and obedience. Our Lord constantly alludes to the related ideas of reward and merit, which are complementary: Matthew 5:11-12, 6:3, 18, 10:42, 12:36-37, 25:14-30; Luke 6:35, 38; 12:33. St. Paul, using the same word for “works” (ergon), speaks in Acts 26:20 of the process of repenting, turning to God, and doing deeds worthy of their repentance. In other words, they will thus prove their repentance by their deeds.

We really don’t disagree about what constitutes the life of a Christian. In the long run, I’m not sure how critical the order in which we put them is. You agree with us that grace, delivered through faith, comes first (CCC, sec. 2010). We put all works after, not before, justification, but we do not thereby minimize the role of works in the Christian life.

I’ve often made the same point. At the same time I have to critique faith alone as a most unbiblical concept. But grace alone and faith and works are eminently biblical.

Whether faith alone is biblical depends on whether it’s taken as a license to antinomianism. If that, then I agree with you. Works are part of the Christian’s life. But “if it is by works, then it is no more grace.” So works follow justification; they do not precede it. But that should not be taken, and I agree that it sometimes is, to mean that “as long as I believe, it’s all OK.”

It comes down to the “third use of the Law.” The regenerate person wants to live a God-pleasing life. For him, the Law provides a guide: “This is God-pleasing; this is not.”

The danger for the Lutheran is antinomianism; the danger for the Catholic is semi-Pelagianism. Correct Lutheran teaching is not antinomianism; correct Catholic teaching is not semi-Pelagianism. But you can find both–even some antinomianism among Catholics and some semi-Pelagianism among Lutherans.

Look at all the supposedly Catholic congressmen and governors who think abortion is just fine; and you can find some pietistic Lutherans who get so wrapped up in “personal holiness” that they become semi-Pelagian.

I agree that many who distort a given communion’s teaching are found in any group. The devil does that . . .

works follow justification; they do not precede it.

You keep telling me that but I’m interested in biblical passages that you think establish that belief. I’ve given plenty of Bible to support Catholic beliefs.

I’m not accusing Lutherans of antinomianism. I’m simply saying that “faith alone” (even rightly understood) and the separation of sanctification from justification is unbiblical, and I think I have more than proven it with scores and scores of Bible passages. I understand the Lutheran (and general Protestant) position (used to hold it myself), as shown by this article: Martin Luther: Good Works Prove Authentic Faith.

John 3:16; 11:25-26; Rom. 3:28; 4:2-4; 5:1-2,9,15-16; 7:24-25; 10:9; 11:6 Eph. 2:8-9. There are more; but those will do for now. Our justification is by grace through faith. Being justified, we are then raised to new life in Christ, in which our lives are marked by living in the Spirit rather than the flesh (Rom. 6; Eph. 2:10).

Thank you. I will look those over.

I asked for biblical passages that suggested your statement: “works follow justification; they do not precede it.” Now I’ll comment on the ones you produced, looking for mentions of works in context.

John 3:16 (RSV) For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life.

Works are mentioned in 3:21: “But he who does what is true comes to the light, that it may be clearly seen that his deeds have been wrought in God.” This shows that the good deeds (enabled and “wrought in” and by God) were present before the person went to the light (Jesus), which is the opposite order to what you claim: people believe in Jesus, and then good works follow in gratefulness, etc. To me, this indicates Catholic synergy and merit, not faith alone.

John 11:25-26 Jesus said to her, “I am the resurrection and the life; he who believes in me, though he die, yet shall he live, [26] and whoever lives and believes in me shall never die. Do you believe this?”

I don’t see works in context. On the other hand, “believes” is pisteuo: which I analyzed in my comment above from my book, as having works contained within its definition and biblical application. Therefore, this asserts the Catholic view of faith and works together in justification — not faith alone. They’re together, as opposed to it being a sequence of “believe in faith / do good works as a result.”

Romans 3:28 For we hold that a man is justified by faith apart from works of law.

First of all, Paul made it crystal clear that he had a quite positive view of works in the scheme of salvation in Romans 2:5-13. But here Paul is referring to Jewish reliance on the specific works of the law, not to works in general, as N. T. Wright and others have explained at length. Protestants often misinterpret Paul in this way. The “new perspective on Paul” (Wikipedia article) replies as follows:

Paul was not addressing good works in general, but instead questioning only observances such as circumcision, dietary laws, and Sabbath laws, which were the ‘boundary markers’ that set the Jews apart from the other nations. . . .

In 1963 the Lutheran theologian Krister Stendahl published a paper arguing that the typical Lutheran view of the Apostle Paul’s theology did not fit with statements in Paul’s writings, and in fact was based more on mistaken assumptions about Paul’s beliefs than careful interpretation of his writings. Stendahl warned against imposing modern Western ideas on the Bible, and especially on the works of Paul. In 1977 E. P. Sanders published Paul and Palestinian Judaism. In this work he studies Jewish literature and Paul’s writings arguing that the traditional Lutheran understanding of the theology of Judaism and Paul was fundamentally incorrect. . . .

Paul’s letters contain a substantial amount of criticism of “works of the law”. The radical difference in these two interpretations of what Paul meant by “works of the law” is the most consistent distinguishing feature between the two perspectives. The historic Lutheran and Reformed perspectives interpret this phrase as referring to human effort to do good works in order to meet God’s standards (Works Righteousness). In this view, Paul is arguing against the idea that humans can merit salvation from God by their good works alone (note that the “new” perspective agrees that we cannot merit salvation; the issue is what exactly Paul is addressing).

By contrast, new-perspective scholars see Paul as talking about “badges of covenant membership” or criticizing Gentile believers who had begun to rely on the Torah to reckon Jewish kinship. It is argued that in Paul’s time, Israelites were being faced with a choice of whether to continue to follow their ancestral customs, the Torah (“the ancestral customs”), or to follow the Roman Empire’s trend to adopt Greek customs . . . The new-perspective view is that Paul’s writings discuss the comparative merits of following ancient Israelite or ancient Greek customs. Paul is interpreted as being critical of a common Jewish view that following traditional Israelite customs makes a person better off before God, pointing out that Abraham was righteous before the Torah was given. Paul identifies customs he is concerned about as circumcision, dietary laws, and observance of special days.”

*****

Romans 4:2-4 For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. [3] For what does the scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” [4] Now to one who works, his wages are not reckoned as a gift but as his due.

Regular contributor to my blog, “Adomnan” offered some very helpful commentary on Romans 4:5:

. . . “the one who does not work but believes — I would translate “believes” rather than “trusts” here — him who justifies the ungodly” is not a generalization about all who believe, but refers specifically to Abraham. Paul sees Abraham at this point as typical of all Gentiles who believe, or perhaps as their exemplar or “father.” However, Abraham is the sole person being spoken of.

[Dave’s note: “trusts” in RSV for Romans 4:5 is pisteuo (Strong’s word #4100), which is translated in the KJV “believe” or “believer” (1) or “believing” (1) 238 times out of 246 total appearances, or 97% of the time (“trust” also a few times) ]

When Paul says that Abraham “does not work,” he isn’t saying that Abraham has not done good works. In fact, Abraham had been justified since he responded to God’s self-revelation in Ur and had done many good works worthy of being reckoned as righteous. Romans 4:5 is describing but one instance of a good work (an act of faith) that was reckoned as righteous.

In context, “does not work” means “is not doing the works of the Law:” that is, Abraham has not yet been circumcised and is still a Gentile. He does not do works of Jewish Law, works of Torah.

In Greek the phrase “the one who does not work” could be translated — clumsily — as “the non-working one,” non-working not in the sense of not doing good works but in the sense of not doing works of Torah. Paul’s use of the definite pronoun suggests he has a definite person in mind (Abraham).

In the second part, “believes on him who justifies the ungodly,” the word “ungodly,” in context, does not mean wicked. Abraham was not wicked at this stage in his life. He was already justified. It means “Gentile.” “Ungodly” in Greek is asebes, a word that refers to the sphere of religious observance, and not to evil in a wider moral sense. Essentially, it means “non-observant” of the Jewish Law, or “impious” from the point of view of the Jewish Law (which would be the point of view of the Judaizers). We have no adequate word to render this concept in modern English, but “Gentile” comes closest.

Paul is saying that someone — Abraham in this case — could be “impious” from the point of view of the Jewish Law (i.e., a Gentile), but righteous from the point of view of God. “Justifies the ungodly” thus amounts to “regards the Gentile Abraham as righteous.”

In sum, Paul is saying that God reckoned righteousness to Abraham (not for the first time!) while he was still a Gentile. And this is the same point that Paul makes throughout Romans 3 and 4; i.e., Gentiles don’t have to become Jews to be judged righteous by God. They only have to respond to God’s revelation with faith, as Abraham did while still as Gentile.

Or, to paraphrase all of Romans 4:5: “And to Abraham before he had done any works of Torah but still believed in Him who regards the Gentile as righteous, his belief was credited as an act of righteousness.”

[Dave]: Abraham’s justification is also discussed in James 2, and there it is explicitly tied in with works, thus providing a perfect complementary (very “Catholic”) balance with Romans 4.

For much more on this issue and similar passages, see: Justification is Not by Faith Alone, and is Ongoing (Romans 4, James 2, and Abraham’s Multiple Justifications).

Romans 5:1-2, 9, 15-16 Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. [2] Through him we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in our hope of sharing the glory of God. . . . [9] Since, therefore, we are now justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. . . . [15] But the free gift is not like the trespass. For if many died through one man’s trespass, much more have the grace of God and the free gift in the grace of that one man Jesus Christ abounded for many. [16] And the free gift is not like the effect of that one man’s sin. For the judgment following one trespass brought condemnation, but the free gift following many trespasses brings justification.

I don’t see anything about works in context, so I fail to see how these passages support your statement: “works follow justification; they do not precede it.”

Romans 7:24-25 Wretched man that I am! Who will deliver me from this body of death? [25] Thanks be to God through Jesus Christ our Lord! So then, I of myself serve the law of God with my mind, but with my flesh I serve the law of sin.

Again, when I look for works in context, so that this can be evidence for your assertion, I found these:

Romans 8:13 for if you live according to the flesh you will die, but if by the Spirit you put to death the deeds of the body you will live.

That is: “don’t do these bad deeds. If you don’t [implied, I think: “do good works”], you’ll be saved.” That’s works and merit as part and parcel of the equation (like the sheep and the goats passage), not exercised faith alone, guaranteeing salvation, followed by grateful good works of the already saved person.

Romans 8:17 and if children, then heirs, heirs of God and fellow heirs with Christ, provided we suffer with him in order that we may also be glorified with him.

Salvation is contingent (“provided we . . .”) on suffering with Jesus. Thus, it’s something beyond faith. It’s a meritorious work, through which (along with grace and faith) we will be saved. Thoroughly Catholic and unProtestant . . .

Romans 10:9 because, if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

Where is the notion of works following (the point at hand)? I don’t see it. Maybe I missed it.

Romans 11:6 But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace.

I think this is “works” in the sense described by the New Perspective on Paul: not all works (which Paul espouses in several places: notably Romans 2).
In any event, context again lacks a passage saying that good works would follow in gratefulness for an achieved salvation.

Ephesians 2:8-10 For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God —
[9] not because of works, lest any man should boast. [10] For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.

This shows Paul using “works” in both senses. 2:8 is simply grace alone, where we have no disagreement. 2:9 shows that we’re not saved by the Mosaic Law, but by Christ and grace. 2:10 shows how good works are part of this faith. There is no clear indication of the chronological order you speak of: [salvific] faith [with assurance], then good works in Christ.

I’ve shown in many papers against total depravity that the Bible definitely refers to good works and good men before regeneration or justification.

Lastly, I don’t see the proposition we are debating in Romans 6, either. Perhaps you can show me where you think it is.

In each case, justification happens on the basis of faith. Works are not the basis of justification. But the justified do good works. Romans 6 describes the new life to which we are raised. When we have been raised to the new life, we are already justified.

I suppose one could take that view, from a Protestant paradigm. But it seems odd to me that — like sola Scriptura, perspicuity, and so many other Protestant distinctives — it is not clearly laid out. It seems to me that it would be if in fact it were true.

This is the biblical problem I have with these things, whereas I can find tons of Scripture for virtually all Catholic teachings, save for some that are mostly implicit, like the Marian doctrines.

I don’t find this strict separation, as I showed in 50 passages from Paul, subtitled, “St. Paul’s Teaching on the Organic Relationship of Grace, Faith and Works, and Obedience”. See also:

Bible on Participation in Our Own Salvation . . . Always Enabled by God’s Grace

New Testament on Sanctification by Our Own Actions

St. Paul vs. John Calvin: “Doers of the Law” Will be Justified

Very extensive presentation of your case. You’re basically refuting a case I wasn’t making. To your credit you do it very well. I agree entirely that we uphold the Law and keep it as a guide to our conduct, both as to what we should and as to what we should not do.

Alright, brother. :-) I was directly responding to your own statement of belief, but whatever. Thanks, as always, for the engaging and stimulating discussion.

***

Photo credit: statue of Martin Luther (1483-1546): founder of Protestantism and Lutheranism [Max PixelCreative Commons Zero – CC0 license]

***

2019-01-31T14:14:09-04:00

This is an installment of a series of replies (see the Introduction and Master List) to much of Book IV (Of the Holy Catholic Church) of Institutes of the Christian Religion, by early Protestant leader John Calvin (1509-1564). I utilize the public domain translation of Henry Beveridge, dated 1845, from the 1559 edition in Latin; available online. Calvin’s words will be in blue. All biblical citations (in my portions) will be from RSV unless otherwise noted.

Related reading from yours truly:

Biblical Catholic Answers for John Calvin (2010 book: 388 pages)

A Biblical Critique of Calvinism (2012 book: 178 pages)

Biblical Catholic Salvation: “Faith Working Through Love” (2010 book: 187 pages; includes biblical critiques of all five points of “TULIP”)

*****

IV, 15:10-11

***

Book IV

CHAPTER 15

OF BAPTISM.

10. Objection of those who imagine that there is some kind of perfect renovation after baptism. Original depravity remains after baptism. Its existence in infants. The elect after baptism are righteous in this life only by imputation.
*

It is now clear how false the doctrine is which some long ago taught, and others still persist in, that by baptism we are exempted and set free from original sin, and from the corruption which was propagated by Adam to all his posterity, and that we are restored to the same righteousness and purity of nature which Adam would have had if he had maintained the integrity in which he was created. This class of teachers never understand what is meant by original sin, original righteousness, or the grace of baptism. 

Calvin’s roster of the ignorant contains many great figures who do not hold to his novel views of baptism and its effects:

St. Irenaeus

‘And [Naaman] dipped himself . . . seven times in the Jordan’ [2 Kgs. 5:14]. It was not for nothing that Naaman of old, when suffering from leprosy, was purified upon his being baptized, but [this served] as an indication to us. For as we are lepers in sin, we are made clean, by means of the sacred water and the invocation of the Lord, from our old transgressions, being spiritually regenerated as newborn babes, even as the Lord has declared: ‘Except a man be born again through water and the Spirit, he shall not enter into the kingdom of heaven’. (Fragment 34 [A.D. 190])

St. Clement of Alexandria

When we are baptized, we are enlightened. Being enlightened, we are adopted as sons. Adopted as sons, we are made perfect. Made perfect, we become immortal . . . ‘and sons of the Most High’ [Ps. 82:6]. This work is variously called grace, illumination, perfection, and washing. It is a washing by which we are cleansed of sins, a gift of grace by which the punishments due our sins are remitted, an illumination by which we behold that holy light of salvation. (The Instructor of Children 1:6:26:1 [A.D. 191])

St. Cyprian of Carthage

While I was lying in darkness . . . I thought it indeed difficult and hard to believe . . . that divine mercy was promised for my salvation, so that anyone might be born again and quickened unto a new life by the laver of the saving water, he might put off what he had been before, and, although the structure of the body remained, he might change himself in soul and mind. . . . But afterwards, when the stain of my past life had been washed away by means of the water of rebirth, a light from above poured itself upon my chastened and now pure heart; afterwards, through the Spirit which is breathed from heaven, a second birth made of me a new man. (To Donatus 3–4 [A.D. 246])

St. Cyril of Jerusalem

If any man does not receive baptism, he does not have salvation. The only exception is the martyrs, who, even without water, will receive baptism, for the Savior calls martyrdom a baptism [Mark 10:38]. . . . Bearing your sins, you go down into the water; but the calling down of grace seals your soul and does not permit that you afterwards be swallowed up by the fearsome dragon. You go down dead in your sins, and you come up made alive in righteousness. (Catechetical Lectures 3:10, 12 [A.D. 350])

St. Ephraem

The baptized when they come up are sanctified;–the sealed when they go down are pardoned.—They who come up have put on glory;–they who go down have cast off sin. (Hymns for the Feast of the Epiphany, 6:9 [ante A.D. 373] )

St. Basil the Great

For prisoners, baptism is ransom, forgiveness of debts, the death of sin, regeneration of the soul, a resplendent garment, an unbreakable seal, a chariot to heaven, a royal protector, a gift of adoption. (Sermons on Moral and Practical Subjects 13:5 [A.D. 379])

St. Gregory of Nazianz 

Such is the grace and power of baptism; not an overwhelming of the world as of old, but a purification of the sins of each individual, and a complete cleansing from all the bruises and stains of sin. And since we are double-made, I mean of body and soul, and the one part is visible, the other invisible, so the cleansing also is twofold, by water and the Spirit; the one received visibly in the body, the other concurring with it invisibly and apart from the body; the one typical, the other real and cleansing the depths. (Oration on Holy Baptism 7–8 [A.D. 388])

St. Ambrose of Milan

The Lord was baptized, not to be cleansed himself but to cleanse the waters, so that those waters, cleansed by the flesh of Christ which knew no sin, might have the power of baptism. Whoever comes, therefore, to the washing of Christ lays aside his sins. (Commentary on Luke 2:83 [A.D. 389])

St. Augustine

Baptism washes away all, absolutely all, our sins, whether of deed, word, or thought, whether sins original or added, whether knowingly or unknowingly contracted. (Against Two Letters of the Pelagians 3:3:5 [A.D. 420])

This is the meaning of the great sacrament of baptism, which is celebrated among us: all who attain to this grace die thereby to sin—as he himself [Jesus] is said to have died to sin because he died in the flesh (that is, ‘in the likeness of sin’)—and they are thereby alive by being reborn in the baptismal font, just as he rose again from the sepulcher. This is the case no matter what the age of the body. For whether it be a newborn infant or a decrepit old man—since no one should be barred from baptism—just so, there is no one who does not die to sin in baptism. Infants die to original sin only; adults, to all those sins which they have added, through their evil living, to the burden they brought with them at birth. (Handbook on Faith, Hope, and Love 13[41] [A.D. 421])

Now, it has been previously shown (Book 2 chap. 1 sec. 8), that original sin is the depravity and corruption of our nature, which first makes us liable to the wrath of God, and then produces in us works which Scripture terms the works of the flesh (Gal. 5:19). The two things, therefore, must be distinctly observed—viz. that we are vitiated and perverted in all parts of our nature, and then, on account of this corruption, are justly held to be condemned and convicted before God, to whom nothing is acceptable but purity, innocence, and righteousness. And hence, even infants bring their condemnation with them from their mother’s womb; for although they have not yet brought forth the fruits of their unrighteousness, they have its seed included in them. Nay, their whole nature is, as it were, a seed of sin, and, therefore, cannot but be odious and abominable to God. 

Calvin’s faulty, excessive view of total depravity has been examined in these papers of mine:

*
*
Total Depravity & the Evil of the Non-Elect (vs. John Calvin) [10-12-12]
*
*
Believers become assured by baptism, that this condemnation is entirely withdrawn from them, since (as has been said) the Lord by this sign promises that a full and entire remission has been made, both of the guilt which was imputed to us, and the penalty incurred by the guilt. 
*
These statements are not too far from Catholicism.
*They also apprehend righteousness, but such righteousness as the people of God can obtain in this life—viz. by imputation only, God, in his mercy, regarding them as righteous and innocent.The falsity of imputation only with regard to removal of sin, is refuted by innumerable Scripture passages:
11. Original corruption trying to the pious during the whole course of their lives. They do not, on this account, seek a licence for sin. They rather walk more cautiously and safely in the ways of the Lord.
*

Another point is, that this corruption never ceases in us, but constantly produces new fruits—viz. those works of the flesh which we previously described, just as a burning furnace perpetually sends forth flame and sparks, or a fountain is ever pouring out water. For concupiscence never wholly dies or is extinguished in men, until, freed by death from the body of death, they have altogether laid aside their own nature (Book 3 chap. 3 sec. 10-13). 

Catholics agree that concupiscence continues in us, but not that our entire human nature is corrupted.

Baptism, indeed, tells us that our Pharaoh is drowned and sin mortified; not so, however, as no longer to exist, or give no trouble, but only so as not to have dominion. For as long as we live shut up in this prison of the body, the remains of sin dwell in us, but if we faithfully hold the promise which God has given us in baptism, they will neither rule nor reign. But let no man deceive himself, let no man look complacently on his disease, when he hears that sin always dwells in us. When we say so, it is not in order that those who are otherwise too prone to sin may sleep securely in their sins, but only that those who are tried and stung by the flesh may not faint and despond. Let them rather reflect that they are still on the way, and think that they have made great progress when they feel that their concupiscence is somewhat diminished from day to day, until they shall have reached the point at which they aim—viz. the final death of the flesh; a death which shall be completed at the termination of this mortal life. Meanwhile, let them cease not to contend strenuously, and animate themselves to further progress, and press on to complete victory. Their efforts should be stimulated by the consideration, that after a lengthened struggle much still remains to be done. We ought to hold that we are baptised for the mortification of our flesh, which is begun in baptism, is prosecuted every day, and will be finished when we depart from this life to go to the Lord.

This is a good section that Catholics can agree with. Calvin agrees that the Christian life is one of day-by-day struggle and vigilance in the avoidance of sin by God’s grace. His practical piety and spirituality is much better (and far more biblical) than his abstract, flawed soteriology (and this is common ground where Catholics and Calvinists can wholeheartedly agree). I have noted and rejoiced elsewhere that Calvin strongly urges good works as the proof of a lively and authentic faith.

***

(originally 11-17-09)

Photo credit: Historical mixed media figure of John Calvin produced by artist/historian George S. Stuart and photographed by Peter d’Aprix: from the George S. Stuart Gallery of Historical Figures archive [Wikimedia Commons / Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license]

***

Follow Us!



Browse Our Archives