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[words of anti-Catholics \u201cTurretinfan\u201d will be in\u00a0blue<\/span>; Ken Temple\u2019s in green<\/span>; Ron DiGiacomo\u2019s in\u00a0purple<\/span>]<\/p>\n Turretinfan\u00a0recently wrote<\/a>:<\/p>\n Men love idols. We can see this throughout the Old Testament and New Testament. . . . The Israelites are repeatedly warned against the dangers of idolatry . . . The New Testament likewise describes the pagan fondness for idolatry . . . It\u2019s a huge temptation, and the religion of Rome is rife with it. For example, the bread and wine are worshiped as though they are God . . . It seems reasonable to conclude that people who join Rome, join it because they love its idolatry. They are not filled with a righteous indignation at this abominable practice, but instead find it alluring.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Baptist missionary pastor and fellow anti-Catholic Ken Temple\u00a0concurred in the combox<\/a>: \u201cI think you are right on in that men love their idols, but they would never admit that is idolatry. They are deceived.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n Ken also wrote<\/a>\u00a0at the notorious anti-Catholic\u00a0Boors All<\/em>\u00a0forum:<\/p>\n [T]he sinful heart of humans, as Calvin said, \u201cis an idol factory\u201d, . . . the sinful heart of man loves idols and clings to them, but the man is deceived and thinks, \u201cI am not an idolater\u201d, but in reality they are. . . . They want something they can control. Aaron said to the children of Israel, \u201cbehold (the golden calf) this is your god, who brought you up from the land of Egypt\u201d (you can see and touch and feel him now) . . . being able to feel and touch and see the relics and statues and icons and other \u201cdevotional helps\u201d is really idolatry; but the RC or former Protestant doesn\u2019t see it; he or she is deceived. Officially, they say \u201cno\u201d; but in reality, they are involved in idolatry with worshiping the bread and wine and prayers to Mary, etc.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Idolatry in its scope goes far beyond appearances and physical things as well. This is the very fact that the anti-Catholics don\u2019t grasp, even though it is made crystal-clear in the Bible. There are many idols that are immaterial: greed, pride, self-importance, desire for power or fame, etc. Anything that replaces God is an idol.<\/p>\n The incarnation\u00a0explicitly\u00a0<\/em>associates God with a physical thing: human flesh. That is the heart and origin of the sacramentalism that developed as a result of it. But God didn\u2019t completely dissociate Himself from the physical even in the Old Testament. There were still many theophanies where He took on the appearance of a man (Gen 18:1-4, 13, 17, 22; Ex 24:10-11; Jud 6:12-23; 13:21-22; Josh 5:14-15).<\/p>\n When He appeared in the pillars of fire and smoke (Ex 13:21-22), the burning bush (Ex 3:2-6, 14, 16),\u00a0the cloud and fire of Mt. Sinai (Ex 24:16-18), and the\u00a0Shekinah<\/em>\u00a0glory cloud (Ex 40:34-38),\u00a0<\/span>those things were physical. He also said that people couldn\u2019t see His face, but could see His \u201cback\u201d (Ex 33:23 [RSV]: \u201cthen I will take away my hand, and you shall see my back; but my face shall not be seen.\u201d).<\/p>\n So it wasn\u2019t absolute. Jacob wrestled with \u201ca man\u201d and then the \u201cman\u201d said: \u201cyou have striven with God and with men, and have prevailed.\u201d Afterwards, Jacob stated: \u201cI have seen God face to face, and yet my life is preserved.\u201d This is all before the incarnation: quite physical manifestations of God (Gen 32:24-30). Then in Genesis 35:9 it says that \u201cGod\u00a0appeared<\/em>\u00a0[not just spoke] to Jacob again . . .\u201d<\/p>\n Thus, the anti-Catholics are dead-wrong about God and the physical, too. Nor were all physical things forbidden even in the context of worship, since the Jews bowed before the ark of the covenant or the temple when they prayed. This is use of a physical image in the context of worship and prayer. And God was particularly present in proximity to physical objects: the mercy seat on the ark in the holy of holies in the tabernacle or temple, and the holy mountain, etc.<\/p>\n Turretinfan then chimed in<\/a>\u00a0with another astonishingly clueless remark (i.e., for someone supposedly so acquainted with the Bible, and therefore, presumably what it teaches about the definition of idolatry):<\/p>\n A. Is what they do idolatry?<\/span><\/p>\n B. Do they love what they do?<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n And\u00a0also again<\/a>:<\/p>\n Moreover, they clearly ascribe divinity to and worship as God the bread in the Eucharist (first commandment idolatry). . . . if they really loathed the idolatry of the mass, they wouldn\u2019t go to mass.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n And again<\/a>\u00a0(now asking fellow Calvinist \u2014 but not fellow anti-Catholic \u2014 \u201cPilgrimsarbour\u201d questions):<\/p>\n So, let me ask you this more narrowly:<\/span><\/p>\n A. Is it the sin of idolatry to worship a piece of bread as though it is God?<\/span><\/p>\n B. Do Romanists do that?<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n I have refuted the idolatry argument before, many times. Here is my argument in a nutshell (and I think it is a very strong, in fact, compelling one):<\/p>\n<\/div>\n 1) Idolatry is by definition an internal phenomenon: God has been replaced with something else in one\u2019s heart and allegiance.<\/p>\n 2) Catholics are not replacing God with anything else at the Mass, since we believe that the bread and wine are no longer there.<\/p>\n 3) We are worshiping God at Mass, not bread and wine, by the very\u00a0definition<\/i>\u00a0of transubstantiation (itself a doctrine so maligned and despised by many non-Catholic Christians).<\/p>\n 4) If\u00a0anyone<\/i>\u00a0(I speak rhetorically) is confusing bread and wine with God, it is Lutheranism, since they think that both are literally present together after consecration. But they, too, would say they worship God, not bread and wine, and thus, are unfairly accused of idolatry (though Calvin accused Luther and Lutherans of precisely that).<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n Turretinfan and Ken want to have it both ways. It\u2019s a sleight-of-hand, and intellectually dishonest (as a result of their anti-Catholic bias, of course). Martin Luther is not accused of idolatry by these guys (even though their hero Calvin accused him of it) for believing in the Real Presence (consubstantiation). Only Catholics receive this criticism.\u00a0Luther expressly condoned crucifixes, images, and statues, but I don\u2019t see these two guy excoriating\u00a0him<\/em>\u00a0in lengthy posts decrying how \u201cidolatrous\u201d the founder of Protestantism (their own brand of Christianity) was.<\/p>\n Lutherans and high-church Anglicans (and some Methodists and a few groups such as Church of Christ) are not accused by these same hard-line Calvinists of making an idol of water because they all believe that the water of baptism truly regenerates: actually\u00a0does<\/em>\u00a0something in baptism. Granted, no one is saying that anyone consciously worships water, but it is analogous insofar as a physical item is believed to convey the grace of God in some fashion (in other words, the traditional definition of sacrament: physical means to obtain grace, which regenerating baptism holds in common with the Eucharist).<\/p>\n Folks who argue in this fashion neglect premise #1 above, which is fundamental to any discussion of idolatry. Because Protestants don\u2019t believe in transubstantiation, then for them, of course, bread and wine are all that is present. But\u00a0we<\/strong><\/em>\u00a0don\u2019t believe that. Therefore, though it is thought that we are utterly mistaken as to the fact of what takes place or doesn\u2019t at Mass, it doesn\u2019t follow that it is\u00a0idolatry<\/i>, since that is an interior matter, and\u00a0we<\/em><\/strong> think the elements\u00a0change<\/em>. That is why we are not<\/em><\/strong> by any stretch of the imagination\u00a0worshiping bread and wine<\/em>, which would be at once an absurd, outrageous, ridiculous, and idolatrous thing.<\/p>\n Turretinfan can\u2019t use his opinion of what takes place at Mass and then in effect accuse us of believing as he does, and then accuse us of idolatry. This is a dishonest bait-and-switch, but since it is a dumb argument used now for almost 500 years, no one ever stops to consider how fundamentally silly and illogical it is. There are only so many logical possibilities:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n 1) The bread and wine\u00a0remain<\/em>\u00a0that after the consecration at Mass (Protestant position).<\/p>\n 2) The bread and wine are\u00a0transformed<\/em>\u00a0into the literal Body and Blood of Christ after consecration (Catholic transubstantiation).<\/p>\n 3) Catholics (supposedly) believe that the bread and wine remain after consecration and then proceed to idolatrously worship mere created elements as if they were God.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/blockquote>\n We believe that their reverence is good in and of itself, even if there is a theological \/ metaphysical mistake entailed. We think they are \u201cwrong for the right reasons\u201d and that their reverence is good (while they are mistaken on actual facts). But Catholics are accorded no such good faith by the tiny fringe wing of anti-Catholic Protestants.<\/p>\n We must stick to the biblical definitions of things. The same is done to the gospel itself in anti-Catholic circles. It is redefined in a non-biblical fashion (by being arbitrarily collapsed into Faith Alone or TULIP) and then it is stated that we deny it. But if it is defined\u00a0as the Bible itself defines it<\/i>, then clearly Catholics accept the biblical gospel just as much as Protestants do. The same applies to idolatry, and what it actually is, according to the Bible.<\/p>\n In conclusion, I would reiterate that the very\u00a0last\u00a0thing that any Catholic who knows his faith believes is that bread and wine are God. Transubstantiation (Catholic infallible, binding dogma) means that only the\u00a0appearance<\/em>\u00a0(or \u201caccidents\u201d) of bread and wine remain after consecration, but not the\u00a0substance\u00a0<\/em>of bread and wine. This is a completely different notion from idolatry as defined and condemned in Holy Scripture.<\/p>\n The idolaters described there actually believed that\u00a0inanimate created objects were gods\u00a0<\/em>other than the one God of Israel: creator of heaven and earth. And they worshiped the created matter as God (or gods):<\/p>\n Genesis 31:34-35<\/strong> (RSV)\u00a0<\/strong>Now Rachel had\u00a0taken the household\u00a0<\/b>gods and put them in the camel\u2019s saddle, and sat upon them. Laban felt all about the tent, but did not find them. [35] And she said to her father, \u201cLet not my lord be angry that I cannot rise before you, for the way of women is upon me.\u201d\u00a0So he searched, but did not find the household gods. (cf. 31:19, 30, 32)<\/p>\n Genesis 35:4\u00a0<\/strong>So they gave to Jacob all\u00a0the foreign gods that they had, and the rings that were in their ears; and\u00a0Jacob hid them under the oak\u00a0which was near Shechem.<\/p>\n (Jacob had just wrestled with a being described as \u201cGod\u201d \u2014 as reported in Gen 32:24-30; and in Genesis 35:9 it says that \u201cGod\u00a0appeared\u00a0[not just spoke] to Jacob again . . .\u201d so the objection is not to any visible representation of God whatever, but to making an idol of wood or stone and ridiculously pretending that it was God and worshiping it)<\/p>\n Exodus 20:23<\/strong>\u00a0You shall not make gods of silver\u00a0to be with me,\u00a0nor shall you make for yourselves gods of gold.<\/p>\n Exodus 32:1<\/strong>\u00a0When the people saw that Moses delayed to come down from the mountain, the people gathered themselves together to Aaron, and said to him, \u201cUp,\u00a0make us gods, who shall go before us; . . .<\/p>\n (again, in contrast, God did not absolutely prohibit an image of Himself, since He Himself appeared in the pillar of fire and cloud and the burning bush and in theophanies as a man, and eventually in becoming a man Himself in the incarnation)<\/p>\n Exodus 32:31<\/strong>\u00a0So Moses returned to the LORD and said, \u201cAlas, this people have sinned a great sin;\u00a0they have made for themselves gods of gold.<\/p>\n Exodus 34:17\u00a0<\/strong>You shall make for yourself\u00a0no molten\u00a0gods.<\/p>\n Leviticus 19:4<\/strong>\u00a0Do not\u00a0turn to idols\u00a0or make for yourselves\u00a0molten gods: I am the LORD your God.<\/p>\n Deuteronomy 4:28<\/strong>\u00a0And there you will serve\u00a0gods of wood and stone, the work of men\u2019s hands, that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell.<\/p>\n Deuteronomy 7:25<\/strong>\u00a0The\u00a0graven images of their gods\u00a0you shall burn with fire . . .<\/p>\n Deuteronomy 12:3<\/strong>\u00a0. . . you shall hew down the\u00a0graven images of their gods, . . .<\/p>\n Deuteronomy 28:36<\/strong>\u00a0. . . there you shall serve other\u00a0gods, of wood and stone. (cf. 28:64)<\/p>\n 2 Kings 17:29<\/strong>\u00a0But\u00a0every nation still made gods of its own, and put them in the shrines . . .<\/p>\n 2 Kings 19:18<\/strong>\u00a0and have cast their gods into the fire; for\u00a0they were no gods, but the work of men\u2019s hands, wood and stone; therefore they were destroyed. (cf. 22:17)<\/p>\n 1 Chronicles 16:26<\/strong>\u00a0For\u00a0all the gods of the peoples are idols; but the LORD made the heavens. (cf. Ps 96:5)<\/p>\n 2 Chronicles 13:8<\/strong>\u00a0. . . the\u00a0golden calves\u00a0which Jerobo\u2019am\u00a0made you for gods.<\/p>\n 2 Chronicles 24:18<\/strong>\u00a0And they forsook the house of the LORD, the God of their fathers, and\u00a0served the Ashe\u2019rim and the idols. . . .<\/p>\n 2 Chronicles 33:15\u00a0<\/strong>And he\u00a0took away the foreign gods and the\u00a0idol\u00a0from the house of the LORD, . . .<\/p>\n Isaiah 42:17<\/strong>\u00a0They shall be turned back and utterly put to shame, who trust in graven images,\u00a0who say to molten images, \u201cYou are our gods.\u201d<\/p>\n Isaiah 44:17<\/strong>\u00a0And the rest of it\u00a0he makes into a god, his idol; and falls down to it and worships it; he prays to it\u00a0and says, \u201cDeliver me, for thou art my god!\u201d<\/p>\n Wisdom 15:15<\/strong>\u00a0For they\u00a0thought that all their heathen idols were gods, . . .<\/p>\n Acts 7:40-41<\/strong>\u00a0saying to Aaron, `Make for us gods to go before us; as for this Moses who led us out from the land of Egypt, we do not know what has become of him.\u2019 [41] And they made a calf in those days, and\u00a0offered a sacrifice to the idol and rejoiced in the works of their hands.<\/p>\n [see also 2 Chron 32:19; 34:25; Is 21:9; 37:19; Jer 1:16; 2:28; 16:20; Dan 3:12, 14, 18; 5:4, 23; Nah 1:14; Acts 19:26]<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Thus we see that scriptural idolatry (where it concerns physical idols) is a process whereby a man fashions an item out of physical materials and actually believes it to be a god: and a god other than the one true God revealed in Holy Scripture.<\/p>\n In the Catholic view, on the other hand, no man has the power in and of himself to transform bread and wine to being no longer bread and wine, but rather, the God of Israel, the God of the covenant and the Old Testament, of Abraham and Moses and David and the prophets performs that miracle. God sanctioned that state of affairs when He held bread and wine in His hands and said to His disciples at the Last Supper, \u201cThis is My Body\u201d.<\/p>\n Turretinfan and Ken Temple can argue with our Lord Jesus Christ if they wish, and contend that they know better than God Himself how He ought to present Himself to His worshipers. They can also be like the disciples described in the John 6 discourse who forsook Jesus because they couldn\u2019t accept the fact that He said they had to eat His flesh and drink His blood in order to be saved and have life in them.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Jesus said that is the way it was: that bread and wine would somehow become His Body and Blood, and this would be for the salvation of the recipients. Turretinfan and Ken Temple think Jesus was lying and that they know better than our Lord. Readers may make their choice.<\/p>\n Is to knowingly kneel before a statue-likeness of Jesus while praying to God through the true Jesus a violation the Second Commandment? I\u2019m sure you will say that such a practice is not necessarily sin, given that it\u2019s a common practice in Romanist rituals. However, would it have been acceptable for a Jew to kneel before a statue of Messiah prior to the incarnation while praying to God? If that would have been sin, then why may a Romanist do the same thing today?<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n The Jews were permitted to fashion the ark of the covenant (Ex 25: 8 ff.) and bow down before it and pray (Josh 7:6-8) and worship (1 Chron 16:4), on the grounds that God was present above the mercy seat on top (Ex 25:22; 30:6; Lev 16:2; Num 7:89). Is that \u201cidolatry\u201d too?<\/p>\n It even contained manna inside of it (Heb 9:2-4), and bread and wine were priestly offerings (Gen 14:18; Lev 23:3; Num 15:5, 7, 10). Not all that different . . . The Jews also bowed towards the temple when they prayed and worshiped (2 Chron 7:3; Ps 5:7; 138:2), which is some physical object thought to be particularly holy precisely because God was \u201cspecially present\u201d inside of it.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Turretinfan wrote above:<\/p>\n Of course, they don\u2019t use the word \u201cidolatry\u201d to describe their own practices, but they make and bow down to statues (2nd commandment idolatry) . . .<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Joshua 7:6-7<\/b>\u00a0Then Joshua rent his clothes, and fell to the earth upon his face before the ark of the LORD until the evening, he and the elders of Israel; and they put dust upon their heads. [7] And Joshua said, \u201cAlas, O Lord GOD, why hast thou brought this people over the Jordan at all, to give us into the hands of the Amorites, to destroy us? Would that we had been content to dwell beyond the Jordan!<\/p><\/blockquote>\n The Jews bowed before the ark: a thing they had made, and prayed and worshiped. That was also bowing before a statue, since there were the two cherubim on top. It\u2019s even bowing before statues of mere\u00a0creatures<\/i>, not even a representation of the uncreated God. The ark was also, of course, the reason why the temple was so holy and why the Jews worshiped and prayed while bowing before\u00a0it<\/i>. They didn\u2019t have to\u00a0see<\/i>\u00a0the ark itself. They knew it was in the temple, and that was the basis of the sense of a special presence of God there. It\u2019s a holy place: another quite biblical notion that most Protestants have rejected.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n We don\u2019t think a plaster statue of Jesus is God anymore than the Jews thought the ark or the cherubim on top of it were God (only anti-Catholic Protestants are dumb enough to think that any informed Catholic believes such a ridiculous thing), but they sure used those physical things in worship, didn\u2019t they? And according to your clueless reasoning that is \u201cidolatry.\u201d<\/p>\n So, being able to feel and touch and see the relics and statues and icons and other \u201cdevotional helps\u201d is really idolatry; but the RC or former Protestant doesn\u2019t see it; he or she is deceived.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n He\u2019s taking it beyond just representations of God, because that is the extreme, empty-headed iconoclastic position. Catholics and Orthodox don\u2019t regard relics and icons as equivalent to God. This is why the early Calvinists smashed\u00a0all\u00a0<\/b><\/i>images: stained glass, organs, crucifixes, even bare crosses.<\/p>\n Of course, the wise sages at\u00a0Boors All<\/i>\u00a0deleted all this. Turretinfan made more missing-the-point arguments and concluded:<\/p>\n I\u2019ve already pointed out that only the most stupid idolaters think the idol is the thing being worshiped. They all claim to be worshiping something by means of the image, except in the most extreme cases. Of course,\u00a0then again, those in the Roman Communion really do worship the bread, thinking it is God.<\/span><\/p><\/blockquote>\n Please<\/i>\u00a0pray and do penance for these poor, deluded souls over there . . .<\/p>\n<\/div>\n [from the combox] Idolatry goes beyond appearances and physical things. This is the very fact that the anti-Catholics don\u2019t grasp, even though it is made crystal-clear in the Bible.<\/p>\n There are many idols that are immaterial: greed, pride, self-importance, desire for power or fame, etc. Anything that replaces God is an idol.<\/p>\n God didn\u2019t completely dissociate Himself from the physical even in the Old Testament. There were still theophanies where He took on the appearance of a man. When He appeared in the pillars of fire and smoke and burning bush, those things are physical. He also said that people couldn\u2019t see His face, but could see His \u201chind parts\u201d. So it wasn\u2019t absolute.<\/p>\n Anti-Catholics are wrong about that, too. Nor were all physical things forbidden even in the context of worship<\/a>, since the Jews bowed before the ark of the covenant or the temple when they prayed. This is use of a physical image inn the context of worship and prayer. And God was particularly present in proximity to physical objects: the mercy seat on the ark in the holy of holies in the tabernacle or temple, and the holy mountain, etc.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n Related reading:<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n\n\n
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\nSee how it works? #3 is a polemically self-serving but ultimately dishonest mixing of #1 and #2: The Protestant belief as to what happens at a Catholic Mass is smuggled into the worship scenario with a Catholic,\u00a0as if the Catholic believes the same (internally) as the Protestant<\/i>. The Catholic is then accused of gross idolatry: bread- and wine-worship. It would clearly be idolatry if that\u00a0actually was our belief<\/i>, but since it clearly is not, idolatry is not taking place at all, even by Protestant criteria, because\u00a0we are consciously worshiping God<\/i><\/b>.By the same token, Catholics deny Anglican and Lutheran consecration (folks who also believe in the Real Presence in some sense). It doesn\u2019t follow that we accuse them of idolatry in every service (whereas the Lutheran confessions ludicrously call the Mass \u201cBaal-worship\u201d), because no consecration has occurred in fact (as we would say, because of a lack of proper ordination, based on apostolic succession).\n<\/div>\n\n* * *<\/div>\nRabid anti-Catholic Ron DiGiacomo made a similar argument in the same thread:<\/div>\nHere was my reply:<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\nKen Temple had written (cited above):<\/div>\n<\/div>\n***<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n<\/div>\n***<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\nIs the Mass Equivalent to OT Golden Calf Worship?<\/a>\u00a0[1996]<\/div>\n*<\/div>\nWhy Transubstantiation Isn\u2019t Idolatry At All<\/a>\u00a0[11-22-96]<\/div>\n*<\/div>\nDialogue: Is the Mass Similar to Jeroboam\u2019s Idolatry?<\/a>\u00a0[8-7-04]<\/div>\n*<\/div>\nTen Commandments: Changed by Catholics to Uphold Idolatry?<\/a>\u00a0[9-4-04]<\/div>\n*<\/div>\n<\/div>\nCatholic Mass: Can\u2019t Possibly be Idolatrous<\/a>\u00a0[12-15-08]<\/div>\n