Since you have been a Baptist, have you . . .

JackRUS,

Your performance in this debate has improved immensely and you are now quoting reputable Roman Catholic sources. As you have yourself illustrated in this tread, it is not difficult to find teachings within the Roman Catholic Church that are based upon interpretations of Scripture that are decidedly different than the interpretations of the same Scriptures held by the large majority of Baptists. Generally speaking I agree more closely with the Baptist interpretations than I do with the Roman Catholic interpretations, but there are some notable exceptions.

Their interpretation of James seems to me to be much closer to the truth than any of the very many “Baptist” interpretations of James, some of which come close to the insane. I would encourage you to study the many interpretation of James 2:14-26 that have been put forth by Baptist writers, read several of the leading Roman Catholics writers on James 2:14-26, and several of the leading writers representing other denominations on James 2:14-26, and then pray that the Holy Spirit will make known to you what was in the mind of James when he wrote what he did.

Then do the same thing with 1 Peter 3:18-22. If you will do that with 1 Peter 3:18-22, you will find that although there is a huge amount of disagreement concerning the first portion of this passage, there is very broad agreement regarding 1 Peter 3:21. Nearly all scholars of 1 Peter, regardless of their denominational affiliation, interpret this passage very literally, as does the Roman Catholic Church, to be speaking of water baptism, and the passage expressly says, “baptism now saves you.” They may not agree with Peter, but they do agree that 1 Peter 3:21, as we presently have it in the New Testament, expressly states the Roman Catholic position and expressly refutes the position of most Baptists, although that, of course, is slowly changing.

I have found that not very many Baptists are fully aware of how the Roman Catholic and the mainline Protestant churches apply their interpretation of the passage in the day to day life of the church. If they did, their feelings against the Roman Catholic Church and the mainline Protestant churches would not be so hostile.

One of the reasons why I am a Baptist is that I disagree to a substantial extent with how the Roman Catholic Church and the mainline Protestant churches apply the teaching found in 1 Peter 3:21, but I can not find fault with their interpretation of it without doing violence to the text. The text says what it says, and we need to be honest with ourselves and admit that it says what it says and then figure out what to do with it.

 

Yes, it does, and from the Protestant perspective the writer here used a poor choice of words. In other Roman Catholic writings we find this expressed much more clearly and accurately. A much more accurate wording reflecting official Church documents would be to say that the Sacraments are the channel through which God confers His grace upon His Church. You may not like that wording either, but it much more accurately reflects official Church documents. And, of courses, it also reflects the position of some of the mainline Protestant churches, although most of them would disagree as to what is and what is not a sacrament.

All of the serious charges that are brought against the Roman Catholic Church could also be brought against the mainline Protestant denominations. Indeed, I spent several months studying one independent fundamentalist Baptist Church in a large city and the pastor of that church seriously questioned from the pulpit the possibility that there were any other churches in the city in which the people were saved. He even implied from the pulpit that the members of the other independent fundamentalist Baptist Churches in that city were not saved—and this pastor’s church was the largest independent fundamentalist Baptist Church in the city and its member worshiped their church and the King James translation of the Bible but mostly left Jesus out of the picture. The pastor even preached Old Testament history rather than the gospel from the pulpit. He had absolutely no formal education in the Bible and I don’t believe that he knew enough about the Bible to preach an evangelistic sermon from the New Testament. And upon entering a home of one of the members, the woman of the house told me, whom she knew nothing about, that I was welcome as long as I was “carrying a King James Bible.” Whether or not I was a Christian, in her mind, was irrelevant.

Therefore, when we begin to point fingers at the Roman Catholic Church, we need to be very careful lest that finger in principle is also pointed at many other Christian denominations. And if we take the finger pointing to an extreme, as do some independent fundamentalist Baptist Churches, we will find ourselves pointing at every other church in the city and become so lost in our finger pointing that we will distance ourselves so far from our Savior that we will no longer be a part of His Church.

 

1 Peter does not just imply that baptism saves—it expressly states that is does! Virtually all Petrine scholars agree about this. Indeed, I don’t know of any who don’t. The question is—what do we do with that statement? Various scholars, churches, and denominations do various things with it.

The official Roman Catholic manner of dealing with this is to teach that water Baptism is the channel through which salvation is normatively conferred upon the individual. They do NOT teach that it is an absolute requirement for salvation—see, for example, their teaching of “Baptism by Desire.” All the teachings in the Bible need to be studied in the context of the whole Bible. Likewise, all of the teachings of the Roman Catholic Church need to be studied in the context of all that it teaches. Anti-Catholic websites deliberately misrepresent what the Roman Catholic Church teaches by either misquoting their writings or taking them out of the context of the whole.

Unlike all of the mainline Protestant denominations and the Roman Catholic Church, Baptists refuse to interpret the Scriptures literally when it come to water baptism because, when one interprets them literally, one finds himself to be in perfect harmony with the view of the Roman Catholic Church on this issue.

I know from my own personal experience as a Christian that water baptism can and very often does follow one’s being justified by faith in Christ. But being justified is not the same as being saved in the Biblical sense for we find in the New Testament the verb translated “saved” being used in past, present, and future tenses—much to the dismay of many Baptists. Many of them respond to this by teaching that salvation is made up of three distinct steps, justification, sanctification, and glorification—which is, of course, essentially the Roman Catholic view.

The Roman Catholic Church is a human institution attempting to faithfully interpret and teach the Bible. Because it is a human institution, and because it is a very old institution that has been through some very dark times spiritually, it is faced with reconciling current scholarship with what it has taught in the past—and on some issues that is quite a challenge. Like all other Christian denominations and organizations it is constantly under attack by Satan, and very many unwary, poorly educated Christians are falling prey to Satan and are being used to destroy what Christ has died for.

 

The Roman Catholic Church is a human institution attempting to faithfully interpret and teach the Bible. Because it is a human institution, and because it is a very old institution that has been through some very dark times spiritually, it is faced with reconciling current scholarship with what it has taught in the past—and on some issues that is quite a challenge. Like all other Christian denominations and organizations it is constantly under attack by Satan, and very many unwary, poorly educated Christians are falling prey to Satan and are being used to destroy what Christ has died for.