Catholics are Arminians

Yer right whetstone. peace webdog

 

Peace back to you, KJ

Scott, explain how arminianism is works based? I would think perseverance of the saints to be more works based than anything!

 

Beware: Catholics are Trinitarians, too. Cain't be true if the Mackerel Snappers believe it!

(Reckon them United Pentecostals are onto something?)

 

Well first let me give you Webster's for "work":

Arminianism teaches that a person's choice to be saved is independent and primary to their receiving grace and being born again. They object when calvinists suggest that all such choices are predicated on God's election and regeneration of that person.

By definition, when someone uses their own faculties to achieve something- it is work.

I know that arminians try to evade, deny definitions, and play semantical games in an effort to prove that 'belief' or 'faith' are not actually works. However if they emanate primarily from a decision whose prime cause was a human thought then it is by definition work.

 

Perseverance of the saints is simply a way of restating the promise that He who began a good work in us will finish it.

 

Well first let me give you Webster's for "work":

Arminianism teaches that a person's choice to be saved is independent and primary to their receiving grace and being born again. They object when calvinists suggest that all such choices are predicated on God's election and regeneration of that person.

By definition, when someone uses their own faculties to achieve something- it is work.

I know that arminians try to evade, deny definitions, and play semantical games in an effort to prove that 'belief' or 'faith' are not actually works. However if they emanate primarily from a decision whose prime cause was a human thought then it is by definition work. </font>[/QUOTE]The Bible says we are saved by faith and not works. How then is faith a work? Oh wait, it is a gift to the elect...God gives us a work to use...as,um...a work....um...no...wait we can't be saved by works...um...then what...it's "special" fait apart from our "works" faith...no....huh? Do you see how utterly ridiculous this theory is? If faith is a work, we can't be saved then by faith, even if it's given to us because it would be a work and the Bible SPECIFICALLY states we are not saved by works! Conclusion? Faith is not a work, period.

Do you live in a house with a furnace? You obviously have faith in the designer of the furnace, the installer and in the furnace itself to keep you and your family safe from carbon monoxide poisoning. You probably even have a carbon monoxide detector giving you faith in it's design, and function. What are you "working" on then in keeping your family safe? Nothing. You have faith in the appliances and everything involved, not working for anything...faith.

 

Perseverance of the saints is simply a way of restating the promise that He who began a good work in us will finish it. </font>[/QUOTE]The definition sounds more to me like "maintaining" one's salvation more than anything. We are saved by grace, period. No persevering needed...although faith without works is dead, I believe in a "real" eternal life, and even if one falls away and they are killed in that state, if they were saved, they will spend eternity with Christ.

 

&lt;&lt;Well first let me give you Webster's for "work":
quote:
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1 : activity in which one exerts strength or faculties to do or perform something: a : sustained physical or mental effort to overcome obstacles and achieve an objective or result b : the labor, task, or duty that is one's accustomed means of livelihood c : a specific task, duty, function, or assignment often being a part or phase of some larger activity
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Arminianism teaches that a person's choice to be saved is independent and primary to their receiving grace and being born again. They object when calvinists suggest that all such choices are predicated on God's election and regeneration of that person.&gt;&gt;

Your "by definition" falls flat on it's face because we cannot use our "physical or mental effort to overcome" hell, nor do we believe that. If I were to give you a choice between a cookie and a brownie, and you choose the brownie, how did you "work" to get the brownie? You didn't, you chose it...you didn't "earn" it or "work" for it.

 

I love how Calvinists are so quick to say what Arminians believe or teach...

 

LOL clever whatever They are though. They complain about Arminians thinking they know what Calvinists believe, at the same time they go around thinking they know what Arminians believe. I am right on the money...and no apology is necessary nor forthcoming.

 

Now you are complaining about us complaining about what you were complaining about.

 

KJ says:

They complain about Arminians thinking they know what Calvinists believe, at the same time they go around thinking they know what Arminians believe. I am right on the money...
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HN says:

Well that's a given since Arminians believe what Calvinist don't.

 

LOL whatever...I never said I wasn't complaining. I was just doing what many Calvinists do.

No need to attempt to mock me with the multiple 's though...I mean if you're up for a mocking battle...take your best shot...

 

I just thought it was really funny. I did not mean to offend. Sorry about that - I just tried to edit them but it is too late.

 

Now you guys always say you never know what a woman is thinking so what if a woman is one of the above?


Now see, I DO have a good reason for none of you understanding me and it has nothing to do with me not having an honorary doctorate or 14 letters behind my name. btw.... does this post make me look fat?

 

LOL Diane

Hey whatever...no problem. I thought you were mocking me. With the multiple laughing faces I didn't realize you just thought it was funny. I really have to learn to give people the benefit of the doubt on here though.

 

I don't think Catholics fit in either category but the title of this post is ironic as Calvinists typically have an easier time embracing Catholic teaching on this matter the arminians.

We are all predestined to Grace(some more than others) with the free will to fall from that grace,

Here is a link giving a Catholic prospective on TULIP
http://www.cin.org/users/james/files/tulip.htm

 

This may help y'all's discussion:

In Reformed theology, we draw a distinction between a credible profession of faith and a saving profession of faith. Explanation:

http://www.opc.org/new_horizons/NH01/05d.html

For purposes of church membership, cooperation with other denominational entities, etc., since we cannot know of a certainty who is or isn't saved, we only require a credible profession of faith.

For example:

A Catholic that affirms the current dogmas of Rome cannot offer a credible profession of faith to a consistent Protestant. E.g. A Catholic qua Catholic cannot offer a credible profession of faith. But whether a Catholic can offer a saving profession of faith is a different question. The answer varies on a case-by-case basis. It is easier to say who isn't saved than to say who is.

From Steve Hays: "To be a Christian is to be, among other things, a Christian believer. One must believe certain things, and not believe certain other, contrary things. On the one hand, some dogmas are damnable dogmas. On the other hand, the Bible lays out certain saving articles of faith. This is God's criterion, not mine. I didn't invent it. By the same token, how God applies that criterion in any individual case is up to God, not to me. I'm not the judge, God is the Judge. To take a concrete example, Scripture teaches sola fide (faith alone) (Romans; Galatians). I'm saved by faith in Christ. And I'm saved by the sole and sufficient merit of Christ.

But in Catholic dogma, one is saved by the merit of Christ plus the merit of the saints plus one's own congruent merit. And this results in a divided faith." This, folks, is where Catholics say one thing and then do another. They say that Christ is the only way of salvation, but their Catechism and their doctrine states categorically that salvation is by grace through faith and the merit of Christ, and the saints, and your own.

That is why a Catholic cannot give me a credible profession of faith. . I'm more prone to give a Catholic church member a pass on the credible profession of faith than I am a Catholic bishop or the Pope or some of their lay apologists (Art Sippo, Dave Armstrong, Sungenis, etc.), given what I know you have to accept, since half my family is Catholic.


Any of the following creeds/confessions could supply the basis for a credible profession of faith:

1. The Thirty-Nine Articles of the Christian Relgion

2. The Formula of Concord

3. The Baptist Faith & Message (any version)(http://www.sbc.net/bfm/bfm2000.asp)

4. The C&MA statement of faith
(http://www.cmalliance.org/whoweare/doctrine.jsp)

5. The JFJ statement of faith (http://www.jewsforjesus.org/about/statementoffaith)

6. The EFCA statement of faith (http://www.efca.org/about/doctrine/)

7. The Campus Crusade statement of faith (http://www.ccci.org/statement_of_faith.html)

8. The AG statement of faith (http://www.ag.org/top/beliefs/truths.cfm)

These are all broadly evangelical affirmations of faith. Notice, not all are Reformed. By contrast, Trent or Vatican II does not supply the basis for a credible profession of faith. Still, it is possible for a Catholic to be saved, unlike a Muslim or Mormon or other suchlike.

Regarding Arminianism and Calvinists talking about what the others teach:

Let's contextualize this. The 5 Points of Calvinism stand in direct contradiction to the Five Points of the Remonstrants. Read the Remonstrance and the Opinions sometime, folks. Calvinists are saying nothing about Arminans that Arminians have not readily admitted. The Five Points of Calvinism are simply the written response to the Five Points of Arminianism...so Calvinists knew full well what the Arminians were teaching from the beginning. We know what they believe, because the codified version of what we believe soteriologically was written in response to their codification.

Likewise, Dort also recognized that Arminianism is simply Roman Catholicism without the sacramentalism. That's the cardinal difference...the means of grace itself.

Both are committed to libertarian free will, a premise that Arminians frequently admit comes from outside of Scripture (Walls and Dongell, Why I Am Not A Calvinist). Both repudiate any form of eternal security. Catholicism calls having assurance of your salvation the sin of presumption in the Council of Trent. (Ironic, considering the Pope got a free pass to heaven, but I digress....)

Classic Arminianism waffles on the total depravity issue. Wesley taught it as stridently as any Calvinist, and the Remonstrants were inconsistent with it in the Opinions. Rome repudiates it completely. Election is conditional. What passes for predestination is just election based on foreseen faith and merit. The scope of the atonement is general, and, in current Roman soteriology Muslims may be able to enter heaven apart from faith in Christ. Grace can be resisted. On these essentials, Rome and the Remonstants are as one.

On the means by which they are dispensed, they differ. Arminians tend to shy away from sacramentalism. Catholics do not. Catholics affirm baptismal regeneration/efficacy. Arminians, with a few exceptions, do not. Arminians repudiate the sacrifice of the Mass. Catholics do not. Arminians' faith is undivided in practice, though, debatably, not in principle (because you have to admit you chose Christ because you were more spiritual, intellectual, or better equipped than your unregenerate friend). With regard to Christ's merit via His active and passive obedience and the atonement, that alone is the merit for our salvation. The Arminian's faith is undivided. A Catholic faith that buys the full run of Rome's dogma's is divided between three types of merit, including his/her own. Trent anathematizes my own faith as well. The Remostrance does not.

Regarding perseverance of the saints:

Perseverance of the saints means that you can't lose your salvation, and it also means all those who are truly saved also persevere in their faith and Christian lives to some degree. We distinguish between apostasy and backsliding. Backsliding happens when a person falls into sin, repudiates evangelical doctrine for a time, or loses spirituality of mind. (R.B.C. Howell said it well.) All Christians may backslide. Apostasy encompasses all three evils. Perseverance of the saints means that God preserves the elect from apostasy, but not from backsliding. Backsliding happens, and it is even a means to our growth. We learn from our mistakes, even if it means lapsing into sin. God preserves our faith in Christ because it is a gift from Him to us that He won't take away. If we repudiate the gospel itself and don't return to it, we have apostatized.

Arminians believe in perseverance but not preservation. The folks that believe in eternal security believe in preservation, not perseverance. Most of the time Arminans argue against "eternal security/"OSAS," not perseverance of the saints. Most eternal security folks argue against perseverance as Arminians teach it, not perseverance of the saints. Perseverance of the saints is both/and, not either/or. The saints persevere and they are preserved. Arminians teach one half. Eternal security folks teach the other.