Roman Catholicism , cult or not?

riverm,

Let me try once more to explain to you why Gods truth regarding what we call "sola scriptura" works so beautifully.

Using the arminians and calvinists as one example, they have some different convictions...as God clearly tells us will happen...regarding how some aspects of Gods salvation works itself out.

But, both of them are turning to the same...unchanging...truth standard...as the source of their convictions.

By argueing their convictions...a very healthy thing to do...they hold each other accountable to the same unchanging standard of truth.

Gods scriptures.

Because of the arminians vigorously sharing their convictions, from the scriptures, they serve to prevent the calvinists from going too far, and becoming extreme and out of balance.

Likewise, Because of the calvinists vigorously sharing their convictions, from the scriptures, they serve to prevent the arminians from going too far, and becoming extreme and out of balance.

The same could be said regarding the fundamentalists vs the pentecostals...as one other example.

All of these folks are brothers and sisters and are members of Christs one body here on earth. There are not in the least bit enemies, but rather family members. Brothers and sisters.

Their differing convictions are ordained of God...Romans 14 and others...and because of the sola scriptura approach God has placed into His one body a wonderful "checks and balances" system.

Its a beautiful thing.

And as a result you can read the history books and find that there have always been pockets of true believers all through the centuries, and they bear a striking resemblance to evangelicalism and penetecostalism of today.

And that is no surprise...for they all were turning to the same unchanging truth standard.

(At least until they were killed by the Catholic Church.)

Now, on the other hand, in the dysfunctional world of the Catholic Church, there is absolutly no "checks and balances" system in place. Nobody can hold their teaching up against the word of God and hold them accountable to Gods unchanging truth standard.

They are commanded to never do that! The hierarchy is answerable to nobody, and can never be corrected or held accountable to Gods truth standard.

And as a result?...in cotrast to the non-catholics through the centures...one finds the Catholic "development of doctrine" to be an absolute mess. What the Catholics were commanded to believe in the 4th century was different than what they were to believe in the 6th. It was different in the 10th and then different in the 12th, 15th, 18th and 20th centuries.

But the thing that is constant through the centuries is that the Catholic Church has no checks and balances system in place, and nobody can hold them accountable to Gods truth standard.

So...what do we find?

Its no suprise. Idolatry, heresy, blashphemy, paganisn, and superstition has been multiplying exponentially...completly unchecked and unhindered...for literaly centuries.

No "checks and balances" system.

No accountability.

No unchanging truth standard.

No sola scriptura.

How I wish you guys could get a grip on this. It is essential. It is primary. It is Gods "checks and balances system"

Ignoring it leads to complete chaos and an overflow of falseness and idolatries.

Very sadly,

Mike

 

Welcome to the board, my raskolnik (if I may call you that!) brother in the Lord!

 

No.

They have absolutly (((zero))) soteriological merit whatsoever.

We are justified in God sight through faith alone in Christ. Romans teaches it. Galaciens teaches it. Ephesians teaches it. Jesus taught it. And James teaches it.

</font>[/QUOTE]Then why does James say that they do and that faith, divorced from those works, is dead and non-salvific?

 

I am familiar with Brethren Meetings; my wife's family are Exclusive Brethren of the Raven-Taylor-Frost variety. I would describe your Meeting as Open Brethren.

Incidentally, I would say that the Brethren use 'tradition' in the same way as RCs, the difference being that their tradition goes back to the 1820s as opposed to the RCs which goes back to the 1st century AD. My in-laws' shelves are stacked full of books by the Brethren equivalent of the Early Church Fathers (although of course they would vehemently deny the comparison!), often known by their initials: John Nelson Darby ('JND'), Frederick Raven ('FER'), Mr Coates ('CAC'), and James Taylor Senior ('JTS') (it all went horribly wrong with the latter's son of course but that's another story). This tradition doesn't quite amount to "all Scripture must be interpreted according to the teaching of these Brothers" but it does create the presuppositions with which Brethren approach and interpret Scripture.

 

Let me try once more to explain to you why Gods truth regarding what we call "sola scriptura" works so beautifully.

Using the arminians and calvinists as one example, they have some different convictions...as God clearly tells us will happen...regarding how some aspects of Gods salvation works itself out.

But, both of them are turning to the same...unchanging...truth standard...as the source of their convictions.

By argueing their convictions...a very healthy thing to do...they hold each other accountable to the same unchanging standard of truth.

Gods scriptures.

Because of the arminians vigorously sharing their convictions, from the scriptures, they serve to prevent the calvinists from going too far, and becoming extreme and out of balance.

Likewise, Because of the calvinists vigorously sharing their convictions, from the scriptures, they serve to prevent the arminians from going too far, and becoming extreme and out of balance.

The same could be said regarding the fundamentalists vs the pentecostals...as one other example.

All of these folks are brothers and sisters and are members of Christs one body here on earth. There are not in the least bit enemies, but rather family members. Brothers and sisters.

Their differing convictions are ordained of God...Romans 14 and others...and because of the sola scriptura approach God has placed into His one body a wonderful "checks and balances" system.

Its a beautiful thing.

</font>[/QUOTE]Erm...except it's a bit different from how you describe it, isn't it, Mike? Far from being 'checks and balances' these various sects anathematise each other vigorously in terms that make those of Trent seem mealy-mouthed in comparison, don't they? (Except you didn't read my link to the Synod of Dort, did you? That's a perfect example of what I'm taking about.) These are not 'checks and balances', these are mutually exclusive soteriological positions (monergist - v- synergist) which strike at the heart of Who God Is: the Calvinist God loves selectively and the Calvinist Jesus has only died for some people selectively, whereas the Arminian God loves all and the Arminian Jesus has died for all; here you have two different Gods and two different Jesus's.

I'd say that was a considerably greater problem than whether we are saved by 'faith alone' or 'faith+the Spirit working through us'. And guess what the cause of that problem is: step forward sola Scriptura!

 

Actually I was not familiar with Raven or Taylor, Coates. The representative writers may be JND, CH McIntosh for his commentary on Pentateuch, Harry Ironside, Erich Sauer, William McDonald who is still alive in US, John Richie and son. There are some famous hymn writers like Joseph Scrivener who wrote " What a friend we have in Jesus" and James Deck who wrote many worship songs. PB respects the importance of Lord's Supper, Head Covering, Plural Eldership, calling Brothers and Sisters, Baptism by immersion. However, those traditions are found in the Bible easily and if they find anything wrong with a view to Bible, they are ready to correct them. Relatively they are focused on Dispensationalism which I disagree. A certain mild (or relative) dispensationalism may be quite true according to the Bible, while absolute dispensationalism mislead to the wrong interpretation of eschatology etc.
Importance is to check their acutal lives through the testimony and such can be found from Robert Chapman.

 

The 'Brethren ECFs' to whom I referred above are all, with the exception of JND initially, are Exclusives; if you're Open, you probably won't have heard of them, and I suspect the names you quoted are the OBs' equivalents.

 

William McDonald, yes OB.
But the others were mostly before the split or without specific bias.

This has some lists:

http://www.bruederbewegung.de/personen/biografisches.html

 

I just remembered - J B Stoney ('JBS') was another of these blokes.

 

Matt Black,

I said...

And you said...

Sometimes people go to far, I admit. But those cases are the minority.

(and when brothers and sisters do get a bit too vitriolic regarding those they disagree with, we dont round them up and give them a dose of the old torture chamber, or round them all up and murder them by the thousands as the Catholic Church spent several hundred years doing)

No I didnt., but if you want me to I'll go back and try and find it. What page was it on?)

They disagree. There is no problem with that. God told us to expect it. "Let your brother be fully convinced in his own mind, who are you to judge anothers servant."

I know people on both sides of that issue, and they are in relationship with the same Jesus, they both proclaim the same Jesus, they both acknowledge justification through faith alone, they both articulate the triune nature of God the same way, they both turn only to the scriptures alone as their truth source, they both hold to the same moral teachings found in the scriptures, and they both consider the others to be brothers and sisters in the faith.

Hogwash. Both the arminians and the calvinists are proclaiming the same Jesus and the same gospel. The saving gospel. When I was lost I encountered arminians, calvinists, fundamentalists, and pentecostals who all shared the gospel with me.

I heard the same gospel from all of them.

Proclaiming that one is justified through works is a false gospel.

Sola scriptura is the solution, not the problem.

Again...the evidence:

Sola scriptura...error is kept in check through Gods checks and balances system.

Catholic Church...1600 or so years of blasphemy, idolatry, false teaching, superstition and paganism flowing freely, unchecked, for century after century.

God bless,

Mike

 

You have the same problem raging right within the Catholic Church Matt. Are you a Calvinist or an Arminian? Care to elaborate? Before you do let me give you some background and relevant quotes:

Calvinism did not originate with John Calvin. It came from the Catholic superstar "St Augustine." Here is what Calvin said about Augustine:

And Augustine's belief concerning the Catholic Church:

Calvinism is Augustinianism. Do you believe in all the tenets of Calvin as he did? He got them from Augustine, one of the foremonst Catholic theologians and leaders--an extreme "Calvinist." Do all Catholics believe this way? I am fairly sure that you have the same problem in the Catholic Church, but most Catholics don't know what they believe on such an issue because they don't think issues through. They sit there in the pews mindlessly taking in whatever the little homilies the priest gives them (which isn't much).
DHK

 

And you said...

Sometimes people go to far, I admit. But those cases are the minority.

(and when brothers and sisters do get a bit too vitriolic regarding those they disagree with, we dont round them up and give them a dose of the old torture chamber, or round them all up and murder them by the thousands as the Catholic Church spent several hundred years doing)

No I didnt., but if you want me to I'll go back and try and find it. What page was it on?) </font>[/QUOTE]I honestly can't remember so here it is again: Canons of Dort

They disagree. There is no problem with that. God told us to expect it. "Let your brother be fully convinced in his own mind, who are you to judge anothers servant."

I know people on both sides of that issue, and they are in relationship with the same Jesus, they both proclaim the same Jesus, they both acknowledge justification through faith alone, they both articulate the triune nature of God the same way, they both turn only to the scriptures alone as their truth source, they both hold to the same moral teachings found in the scriptures, and they both consider the others to be brothers and sisters in the faith.</font>[/QUOTE]I don't see how this can be since they hold to contradictory theologies as referred to in my earlier post from which you quote. Why do you think the Calvinism/ Arminianism forum here was closed?

Hogwash. Both the arminians and the calvinists are proclaiming the same Jesus and the same gospel. The saving gospel. </font>[/QUOTE]Bzzzt! Wrong! Nice try but incorrect,as demonstrated by my previous post.

Indeed. But I don't think anyone here is proclaiming that.

Sola scriptura is the solution, not the problem.

Again...the evidence:

Sola scriptura...error is kept in check through Gods checks and balances system.

Catholic Church...1600 or so years of blasphemy, idolatry, false teaching, superstition and paganism flowing freely, unchecked, for century after century.

</font>[/QUOTE]Only according to your personal interpretation of Scripture.

 

DHK, you asked me whether I am Calvinist or Arminian. To my mind, that's far too much of a Western rationalist/ modernist question and it seeks to pin God down into little boxes. Suffice it to say that I believe that God's sovereignty is far more powerful than that of Man (infinite being -v- finite being etc) and that both faith and the post-faith works to which I and the Catholics refer are primarily the initiative and 'works' of the Holy Spirit. Nevertheless I am synergist rather than monergist. I tend to leave it at that rather than vainly try to plumb the depths of this soteriological mystery further.

You mention Augustine. Don't forget that Augustine was struggling with the error of Pelagianism - salvation by works - and that he and the Catholic Church condemned this and indeed semi-Pelagianism (ironic, considering that the Catholic Church has condemned the very thing you and others accuse it of teaching, wouldn't you say?). In reacting to Pelagius, he did sometimes overreact and stray into what amounted to monergism; but even he acknowledged the role of the human will in saving faith, something which both Calvin (and certainly his successor Beza) and to a lesser extent Luther neglected to glean from Augustine's teachings. For this reason - and, I suspect, his over-rationalised soteriology - he is virtually ignored by the Eastern Church and therefore is not regarded as an ECF by the whole Church.

That's what I think. If you want to know what the Catholic Church teaches on this issue, here are a couple of quotes from the Catechism:

Man's freedomand Grace and Justification. From the latter, the following is noteworthy:-

The italicised quotes in particular indicate that, whilst the Catholic Church acknowledges the leading role of the Holy Spirit in both salvation and sanctification, it regards both in a synergistic rather than Calvinist manner.

 

One thing I would add on Sola Scriptura is that Bible has all the answers to our questions and to encourgement of our faith. If not, we don't need to know any more than that.

Another thing about the faith alone, Sola Fide is that it doesn't mean that we don't behave properly according to the commandments, but that the works and the good behavior follows the faith, Sola Fide. Once we have the true faith in Jesus, our lives are changed, and therefore fruits follow the faith. If there is no change of life and works even after so-called salvation by faith, such person must examine himself or herself to see whether such person was really saved, as we read 2 Cor 13:5. So, Epistle James and Romans are 2 different sides of one paper. The starting point of the changes come from the faith. Some people misunderstand themselves are saved and therefore it is high time to pursue the good works now, but their faith was merely based on the mental understanding or human recognition without the involvement of Holy Spirit. My life was like that even though I had been attending the churches and was baptized, before I was actually born again. After the Salvation, there has been the Sprining Well in my heart all the time. This question remains not only in RC but also in many of Protestants.
So, I return to the words in Matt 11:25-30.

 

You're pretty much on all fours with the Catholics there...

Yeah right, like no other denomination has skeletons in the cupboard - SBC, slavery and the KKK, anyone?

Er...which bit is the red herring?

[Did my best to correct DHK's code]

 

Er...which bit is the red herring?

[Did my best to correct DHK's code] </font>[/QUOTE]In discussing doctrine such as sola scriptura you referred to historical events. That has nothing to do with doctrine but rather to the RCC's sordid past which pales in compariston to the events (confined to America) that you brought up. Here is only one page in the history of the RCC as documented in the book "A Woman Rides the Beast," by Dave Hunt:

Of course the first thing you will do will complain about the bias of the author, and try to discredit him. I know that. It is the typical Catholic approach. So I will already state it before you start. That is why I included the foot-notes at the bottom of the quote, all of which are from reliable historians and/or sources.
DHK

 

I’m familiar with Hunt’s material, I was a fundamentalist for almost 30 years and whatever Hunt said was the Gospel. Thing I learned is that one can manipulate and write any material that will portray the subject in any light. I learned that just this past election.

Also, if the no. 34 of the references is the “Durant” that authored the “History of Civilization”, he also wrote some pretty negative things about Christianity in general, like how the early Christians or Catholics developed the idea of the Christian “Trinity” from Pagan Egypt…..and I’m sure you don’t believe that…

Sadly,
Tommy

 

I wouldn't expect a secular historian to get all of his facts right about Christian theology. That's asking a bit much isn't it? Even the Oneness Pentecostals don't have their facts right about the trinity. However, about the events of history, what happened, their chronology, etc. I have no doubt that they are fairly accurate. Because they reflect badly on the Catholic Church is their own doing. The facts of history don't lie. The Catholics love revisionism.
DHK

 

I wouldn't expect a secular historian to get all of his facts right about Christian theology. That's asking a bit much isn't it? Even the Oneness Pentecostals don't have their facts right about the trinity. However, about the events of history, what happened, their chronology, etc. I have no doubt that they are fairly accurate. Because they reflect badly on the Catholic Church is their own doing. The facts of history don't lie. The Catholics love revisionism.
DHK </font>[/QUOTE]We’ll I haven’t researched the other references, they could all be secular as well, but what makes a secular historian that has access to the same data as anyone else less accurate? Durant is wrong concerning his research about the “Trinity” developed from pagan Egypt, but right about all things Catholic, and I’m not saying that the Catholic Church has been innocent of all charges…Christ said He would protect the Church…that didn’t mean that He’d protect the Church from weeds growing in her…

Just looks bad when you discredit Durant on his research pertaining to certain aspects of the brand of Christianity you practice and hail him as accurate when he rants about the RCC.