They all belong to their create your own religion sects. They reject the only Church founded by Jesus and not only reject it but protest its very existence and veracity. This is evidence of a lack of the indwelling of the Holy Spirit because when one accepts Christ into their lives and believed in Him and grace becomes abundant. They are so full of pride at their own creation that there is no room for God's grace. One full of grace would not lie so egregiously and certainly not about the only Church that Jesus and the disciples founded and His faithful. They literally hate what the Church teaches and St. Paul gave us insight into why that is so. He said the following:
2 Tim 4:3(KJV): For the time will come when they will not endure sound doctrine; but after their own lusts shall they heap to themselves teachers, having itching ears;
Their doctrines and beliefs are of their own creation and they seek out like minded people who believe in he same heresies. The foundation for their arrogance and pride in doing so is the heretical doctrine of Sola Scriptura and the teaching that each man is his own theologian. This has caused tens of thousands of schisms in the Body of Christ. Even the father of Protestantism Martin Luther believed that he was destined for hell for opening this Pandora's box. These are the fruits of Protestantism.
Remember the founders of Protestantism were Secular Humanists. Calvin was a Secular Humanist lawyer. What they wanted was a God that served man instead of a God that man must serve. This was definitely heterodox teaching that opened the door for all kinds of heresy. What man could imagine he could call truth instead of the orthodox teaching of the Church based solely on God's Word but not limited to the written Word but the living Word contained in its fullness in His Church.
We Catholics rarely complain about the underserved vitriol about us. I have never become angry no matter how hostile or untrue these anti-Catholics depicted the Church. Most of my fellow Catholics do not as well. We know what our Lord taught us and that is that the world would hate us as it hated Him. Jesus taught us how to react when He said that to insults we are to turn the other cheek. Why would we expect those who hate His Church and what Christ has founded to follow our Lord's teaching. They cannot even restrain themselves from bearing false witness against us. Pridefully they justify their lies as ironically doing God's work. Sin is never God's work and nothing justifies such hatred and disobedience. They do not do this because they feel persecuted but instead because of their arrogance. Certainly they believe that their own self created beliefs are of more veracity than anything Christ, the disciples or His Church could ever teach. It is the age old nemesis of man which is pride which leads to destruction. On the last day it is likely that they will hear from our Lord, "depart from me I never knew you" and they will receive their eternal reward that they have earned which is eternity in the lake of fire.
God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
30 November, 2009
29 November, 2009
Discussion of Catholic criticisms with an anonymous person
“I used to go to a Catholic church but then I have learned a great deal about how Catholicism has went away from the bible years ago and started doing its' own thing.”
Well then, since you profess to have been Catholic then it is fair to assume that you were actually too ignorant to learn anything about Catholic teaching or that you are intentionally bearing false witness which makes you guilty of mortal sin and in danger of forfeiting your salvific promise. It is obvious that you did not learn that the Bible is about the Catholic Church in the first century. We are not like Protestants, like you, who try to follow a book someone else wrote to be used in their community as a supplement to the teaching of Jesus and the disciples. It was never meant to be the regula fidei which is the role of the Church given by Christ and not our book of faith.
“Things like priests not being able to marry and they wonder why the rampant sexual scandals of Catholic priests that has given Christianity a black eye. 1 Timothy 4:3.”
Nowhere do we teach that anyone is forbidden to marry. The Church teaches the opposite and encourages marriage and procreation among all of God’s people following the first commandment. Do not quote Scriptures as your support if you cannot understand their meaning. You are obviously blind without the teaching of the Church and have no ability to understand Scriptures.
Priests choose not to marry and swear a vow of celibacy. The Church enforces their vow as a discipline. I am sure that there are fewer sexual scandals in the Catholic Church than in your church as the Catholic clergy have the lowest incidence of sexual abuse of any Christian clergy by a very wide margin. Jesus warned against those who throw the first stone and especially when the sin of your group is many times greater.
“Then the biggest offender is that of a Catholic priests doing the confessional and giving out penances as if they could forgive sins. Only Christ can forgive sins as He is the the only Way! Acts 4:12 and 1 Timothy 2:5.”
Really, and you claim to be a Bible Christian I would wager. Do you not know that the only way that Jesus taught to be forgiven of sins was to confess to a priest. He never taught private confession at all. People like you who speak out against Christ’s teaching are ashamed to confess their sins to one another as the Bible says. Sins are not private but do harm to the entire Corpus Christi. Remember, Jesus compared us to a vine and a sin infects all Christians and if one continues in the sin the sin or sinful person must be cut away. Jesus commanded His priesthood to forgive sins. This must be a part of the Bible your heretical sect does not teach. Did you know that it is actually Jesus who forgives sin in the Sacrament of Reconciliation as the priest acts in persona Christi. How did you miss this when you were a (cough, cough, wink, wink) Catholic.
“Catholic priests commit blasphemy and to add insult to injury these who confess don't have the assurance of the salvation that Christ GAVE them!.”
Oh my goodness, are you trying to tell me that you also practice the sin of presumption. Do you really think that you somehow know who is saved and who is not? Are you so naïve that you thing that since you did a one time assent, in an emotional moment to belief, that you are owed salvation by our Lord. MY, my, how far you have departed from the truth of Scriptures. Read John 3:16 that says one must continue to believe. No one has an assurance of salvation as the teaching of Scripture is that we are to approach our salvation with fear and trembling which by the way the Bible also says is the beginning of knowledge(Proverbs).
“You adhere to an institution that has changed so much of what true Christianity is supposed to be. Yet you will hide behind the Vatican, all the catholic writings which are merely man made and go against clear scripture. “
I hear this claim often from Protestants and it always makes me smile from the apparent irony of the statement. Here you are a Protestant who proclaims your disobedience and irreconcilable hatred for the only Church Jesus and the disciples founded and instead of loyalty to His Church choose to be a part of a man-made sect in defiance of Christ. You then follow man –made doctrines which are nothing more than the food for heretical doctrines that feed your hatred for Christ’s Church which remains true to the teaching of Jesus and the disciples for all of these 2000 years. Christ’s Church has changed nothing in all these years but it is you who has departed from the faith. Jesus prophesied about people as you saying that there would be those who will no longer be able to endure sound doctrine and will gather around themselves those that satisfy their itching ears. We may not teach what you want to hear but you can be assured by our Lord that what we teach is the truth for He said that His Church will never fall into apostasy and will endure for all times as “the pillar and foundation of the truth.” Your man-made sect has no such promise.
“Then you call yourselves Father! Jesus says in Matthew 23:9, call no man father, referring to a spiritual father.”
Again with this statement you proclaim your lack of spiritual guidance. You come to your conclusion using eisegesis or a proof text methodology. You believe that the Catholic Church teaches falsely and you use this as proof of that false teaching and gloat at your supposed superiority not realizing that your scholarship is lacking and that you have erred in trying to use the Bible as an instrument to attack the very Church who wrote this, St. Matthew was a Catholic Christian. Christians should come to the Scriptures to learn instead of using them as an instrument of hate. You miss the entire meaning of what St. Matthew is trying to say which is truly not what you presume. This may help you to understand:
From the early Church we find that clergy were addressed as father. There are those with little knowledge of history or hermeneutical discipline such as understanding Scriptures within context, who believe that the Bible prohibits one from calling a priest father. The words they rely on come directly from Christ:
(Mat 23:9 DRB) And call none your father upon earth; for one is your father, who is in heaven.
Keeping the verse in context let us look at the verse preceding this verse:
(Mat 23:8 DRB) But be not you called Rabbi. For one is your master: and all you are brethren.
Rabbi means teacher and the Latin word for teacher is doctor so anyone using these terms as well are violating the literal interpretation of the text.
Let us look at the verse after verse 9:
(Mat 23:10 DRB) Neither be ye called masters: for one is your master, Christ.
There is no way that the interpretation could be correct if one reads and understands the Matthew passage in context. He is clearly teaching that one should not look to any human authority as our teacher, father, master, doctor or other titles of respect but instead give to God those things that are reserved for Him. Do you also refuse to call people doctor, teacher, professor, mister, or master? All of these are forbidden as well if we are to accept a literal understanding.
Context also requires that we investigate what the other Scriptures say as well as the understanding of these words by those who followed Christ. There are many instances where the writers of the New Testament contradict a literal understanding of not calling a man father, teacher or master. Consider the following verses:
(Act 5:34 DRB) But one in the council rising up, a Pharisee, named Gamaliel, a doctor of the law, respected by all the people, commanded the men to be put forth a little while.
(Col 4:1 DRB) Masters, do to your servants that which is just and equal: knowing that you also have a master in heaven.
(2Ti 1:11 DRB) Wherein I am appointed a preacher and an apostle and teacher of the Gentiles.
Let us examine the statements of St. Stephen to see if he understood Christ to be speaking literally….In is soliloquy (Acts Chapter 7) before the Sanhedrin before his stoning to martyrdom he used the term father in referring to Abraham Isaac and Jacob as fathers and also to his Israelite ancestors as fathers.
St. John the beloved disciple also did not understand Christ to be teaching literally as we can see in the following verses:
(1Jn 2:13 DRB) I write unto you, fathers, because you have known him who is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:14 DRB) I write unto you, babes, because you have known the Father. I write unto you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:15 DRB) Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.
(1Jn 2:16 DRB) For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life, which is not of the Father but is of the world.
St. Paul also had a different understanding of Christ’s words than the literalists:
(1Co 4:14 DRB) I write not these things to confound you: but I admonish you as my dearest children.
(1Co 4:15 DRB) For if you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, by the gospel, I have begotten you.
(1Co 4:16 DRB) Wherefore, I beseech you, be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ.
St. Paul was speaking of the fact that he is called to shepherd the flock as are all priests. We not only give birth to the Christian through Baptism but also nourish the faithful with the Holy Eucharist and God’s Word. We care for them and bind their spiritual wounds through the delivery of the Sacraments. It is no wonder that we are called father as we care for our Church family as a father cares for his own family.
“Basically your greatest sin is that you have camouflaged the gospel in ornate human mumbo jumbo making it impossible for these who trust you to escape because they are snake fascinated with all the ornamentalism, the flashy and colorful priestly robes, the religiousness of it all.”
We go to Mass to worship Christ and in our worship Christ is present and not just spiritually as He is when all Christians gather in His name but truly, actually and substantially in His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. Mass is truly heaven on earth and you speak of it as one who is full of jealousy. I am sure that Protestants would worship differently as well if Jesus was among them in the same sense. I do understand having been a protestant minister for 25 years that you do not even desire Him or the great feast He provides that gives the grace to endure in faith but for those of us who do recognize His presence we feel humbled that we are not able to create an atmosphere worthy of the Lord of Lords and Savior of mankind. If at your worship you were truly at the foot of the cross sharing in the very moment of Christ’s sacrifice you would have a different reverence for the moment and a different devotion towards our Lord. We do not have a flashy preacher in the pulpit preaching the Word of God but instead the Word and the Lamb of God is truly with us. Nothing is too good for our Lord and everything we could do is not enough to show our humble thanks for what He has done for us. It is “mumbo jumbo” for those in their carnal senses just as Jesus said but for those of us in the spiritual sense we are experiencing heaven on earth.
“Although I believe a few who go to Catholic churche might be saved...why? Because they actually know the true gospel yet still attend mass and so on.”
Truly some were saved, some are being saved and some will be saved at their death but we all are sanctified and justified by God’s grace by faith. It is not in spite of our obedience to Christ that we are saved but our obedience is proof of our salvation by His grace. May the Lord have mercy on you and may you be saved through His Church by extraordinary grace or by coming home into the fullness of truth. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
Well then, since you profess to have been Catholic then it is fair to assume that you were actually too ignorant to learn anything about Catholic teaching or that you are intentionally bearing false witness which makes you guilty of mortal sin and in danger of forfeiting your salvific promise. It is obvious that you did not learn that the Bible is about the Catholic Church in the first century. We are not like Protestants, like you, who try to follow a book someone else wrote to be used in their community as a supplement to the teaching of Jesus and the disciples. It was never meant to be the regula fidei which is the role of the Church given by Christ and not our book of faith.
“Things like priests not being able to marry and they wonder why the rampant sexual scandals of Catholic priests that has given Christianity a black eye. 1 Timothy 4:3.”
Nowhere do we teach that anyone is forbidden to marry. The Church teaches the opposite and encourages marriage and procreation among all of God’s people following the first commandment. Do not quote Scriptures as your support if you cannot understand their meaning. You are obviously blind without the teaching of the Church and have no ability to understand Scriptures.
Priests choose not to marry and swear a vow of celibacy. The Church enforces their vow as a discipline. I am sure that there are fewer sexual scandals in the Catholic Church than in your church as the Catholic clergy have the lowest incidence of sexual abuse of any Christian clergy by a very wide margin. Jesus warned against those who throw the first stone and especially when the sin of your group is many times greater.
“Then the biggest offender is that of a Catholic priests doing the confessional and giving out penances as if they could forgive sins. Only Christ can forgive sins as He is the the only Way! Acts 4:12 and 1 Timothy 2:5.”
Really, and you claim to be a Bible Christian I would wager. Do you not know that the only way that Jesus taught to be forgiven of sins was to confess to a priest. He never taught private confession at all. People like you who speak out against Christ’s teaching are ashamed to confess their sins to one another as the Bible says. Sins are not private but do harm to the entire Corpus Christi. Remember, Jesus compared us to a vine and a sin infects all Christians and if one continues in the sin the sin or sinful person must be cut away. Jesus commanded His priesthood to forgive sins. This must be a part of the Bible your heretical sect does not teach. Did you know that it is actually Jesus who forgives sin in the Sacrament of Reconciliation as the priest acts in persona Christi. How did you miss this when you were a (cough, cough, wink, wink) Catholic.
“Catholic priests commit blasphemy and to add insult to injury these who confess don't have the assurance of the salvation that Christ GAVE them!.”
Oh my goodness, are you trying to tell me that you also practice the sin of presumption. Do you really think that you somehow know who is saved and who is not? Are you so naïve that you thing that since you did a one time assent, in an emotional moment to belief, that you are owed salvation by our Lord. MY, my, how far you have departed from the truth of Scriptures. Read John 3:16 that says one must continue to believe. No one has an assurance of salvation as the teaching of Scripture is that we are to approach our salvation with fear and trembling which by the way the Bible also says is the beginning of knowledge(Proverbs).
“You adhere to an institution that has changed so much of what true Christianity is supposed to be. Yet you will hide behind the Vatican, all the catholic writings which are merely man made and go against clear scripture. “
I hear this claim often from Protestants and it always makes me smile from the apparent irony of the statement. Here you are a Protestant who proclaims your disobedience and irreconcilable hatred for the only Church Jesus and the disciples founded and instead of loyalty to His Church choose to be a part of a man-made sect in defiance of Christ. You then follow man –made doctrines which are nothing more than the food for heretical doctrines that feed your hatred for Christ’s Church which remains true to the teaching of Jesus and the disciples for all of these 2000 years. Christ’s Church has changed nothing in all these years but it is you who has departed from the faith. Jesus prophesied about people as you saying that there would be those who will no longer be able to endure sound doctrine and will gather around themselves those that satisfy their itching ears. We may not teach what you want to hear but you can be assured by our Lord that what we teach is the truth for He said that His Church will never fall into apostasy and will endure for all times as “the pillar and foundation of the truth.” Your man-made sect has no such promise.
“Then you call yourselves Father! Jesus says in Matthew 23:9, call no man father, referring to a spiritual father.”
Again with this statement you proclaim your lack of spiritual guidance. You come to your conclusion using eisegesis or a proof text methodology. You believe that the Catholic Church teaches falsely and you use this as proof of that false teaching and gloat at your supposed superiority not realizing that your scholarship is lacking and that you have erred in trying to use the Bible as an instrument to attack the very Church who wrote this, St. Matthew was a Catholic Christian. Christians should come to the Scriptures to learn instead of using them as an instrument of hate. You miss the entire meaning of what St. Matthew is trying to say which is truly not what you presume. This may help you to understand:
From the early Church we find that clergy were addressed as father. There are those with little knowledge of history or hermeneutical discipline such as understanding Scriptures within context, who believe that the Bible prohibits one from calling a priest father. The words they rely on come directly from Christ:
(Mat 23:9 DRB) And call none your father upon earth; for one is your father, who is in heaven.
Keeping the verse in context let us look at the verse preceding this verse:
(Mat 23:8 DRB) But be not you called Rabbi. For one is your master: and all you are brethren.
Rabbi means teacher and the Latin word for teacher is doctor so anyone using these terms as well are violating the literal interpretation of the text.
Let us look at the verse after verse 9:
(Mat 23:10 DRB) Neither be ye called masters: for one is your master, Christ.
There is no way that the interpretation could be correct if one reads and understands the Matthew passage in context. He is clearly teaching that one should not look to any human authority as our teacher, father, master, doctor or other titles of respect but instead give to God those things that are reserved for Him. Do you also refuse to call people doctor, teacher, professor, mister, or master? All of these are forbidden as well if we are to accept a literal understanding.
Context also requires that we investigate what the other Scriptures say as well as the understanding of these words by those who followed Christ. There are many instances where the writers of the New Testament contradict a literal understanding of not calling a man father, teacher or master. Consider the following verses:
(Act 5:34 DRB) But one in the council rising up, a Pharisee, named Gamaliel, a doctor of the law, respected by all the people, commanded the men to be put forth a little while.
(Col 4:1 DRB) Masters, do to your servants that which is just and equal: knowing that you also have a master in heaven.
(2Ti 1:11 DRB) Wherein I am appointed a preacher and an apostle and teacher of the Gentiles.
Let us examine the statements of St. Stephen to see if he understood Christ to be speaking literally….In is soliloquy (Acts Chapter 7) before the Sanhedrin before his stoning to martyrdom he used the term father in referring to Abraham Isaac and Jacob as fathers and also to his Israelite ancestors as fathers.
St. John the beloved disciple also did not understand Christ to be teaching literally as we can see in the following verses:
(1Jn 2:13 DRB) I write unto you, fathers, because you have known him who is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:14 DRB) I write unto you, babes, because you have known the Father. I write unto you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:15 DRB) Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.
(1Jn 2:16 DRB) For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life, which is not of the Father but is of the world.
St. Paul also had a different understanding of Christ’s words than the literalists:
(1Co 4:14 DRB) I write not these things to confound you: but I admonish you as my dearest children.
(1Co 4:15 DRB) For if you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, by the gospel, I have begotten you.
(1Co 4:16 DRB) Wherefore, I beseech you, be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ.
St. Paul was speaking of the fact that he is called to shepherd the flock as are all priests. We not only give birth to the Christian through Baptism but also nourish the faithful with the Holy Eucharist and God’s Word. We care for them and bind their spiritual wounds through the delivery of the Sacraments. It is no wonder that we are called father as we care for our Church family as a father cares for his own family.
“Basically your greatest sin is that you have camouflaged the gospel in ornate human mumbo jumbo making it impossible for these who trust you to escape because they are snake fascinated with all the ornamentalism, the flashy and colorful priestly robes, the religiousness of it all.”
We go to Mass to worship Christ and in our worship Christ is present and not just spiritually as He is when all Christians gather in His name but truly, actually and substantially in His Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity. Mass is truly heaven on earth and you speak of it as one who is full of jealousy. I am sure that Protestants would worship differently as well if Jesus was among them in the same sense. I do understand having been a protestant minister for 25 years that you do not even desire Him or the great feast He provides that gives the grace to endure in faith but for those of us who do recognize His presence we feel humbled that we are not able to create an atmosphere worthy of the Lord of Lords and Savior of mankind. If at your worship you were truly at the foot of the cross sharing in the very moment of Christ’s sacrifice you would have a different reverence for the moment and a different devotion towards our Lord. We do not have a flashy preacher in the pulpit preaching the Word of God but instead the Word and the Lamb of God is truly with us. Nothing is too good for our Lord and everything we could do is not enough to show our humble thanks for what He has done for us. It is “mumbo jumbo” for those in their carnal senses just as Jesus said but for those of us in the spiritual sense we are experiencing heaven on earth.
“Although I believe a few who go to Catholic churche might be saved...why? Because they actually know the true gospel yet still attend mass and so on.”
Truly some were saved, some are being saved and some will be saved at their death but we all are sanctified and justified by God’s grace by faith. It is not in spite of our obedience to Christ that we are saved but our obedience is proof of our salvation by His grace. May the Lord have mercy on you and may you be saved through His Church by extraordinary grace or by coming home into the fullness of truth. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
25 November, 2009
Catholic teaching discussed with "Sagittarius"
(Sagitarius) All of my answers have been taken directly from your Catechism. They are 100% true about the Catholic Church and thus I have not lied.
(Cristoiglesia) Well, let us see if you understand or applied the Catechism correctly…..
(Sagitarius) - The Catholics believe in purgatory - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical, there is no halfway point, only heaven or hell.
(Cristoiglesia) Of course Purgatory is a doctrine of the Church. Where you err and bear false witness is when you suggest that Catholic teaching is that Purgatory is a “halfway point”. Here is some information you need to know about purgatory:
There is a common Protestant misunderstanding of purgatory. At least one protestant minister, John Wesley, spoke of perfectionism in this life, possible but rare. He is one of the few to proclaim that one can be sanctified in this life and he left the Moravian Church over this issue after a rebuke by Count Zinzendorf for this teaching.
People in purgatory are already justified by receiving the supernatural eternal life into our souls through Baptism making us a part of the Body of Christ. Those in purgatory have accepted Christ by faith and have not rejected Him by unrepentant mortal sin. It is a place where one is purified by fire (Mal 3:2). Imagine the joy of being in purgatory and knowing that you are there because you have passed judgment and are assured of being in the presence of God in heaven. Purgatory is not an eternal destination, there are only two, heaven or hell.
We should not think of purgatory as some kind of legal punishment for past sins as it would be under the old law. Those in purgatory are already new creatures changed by Christ’s grace, they are the adopted children and part of God’s family in purgatory one receives final discipline and cleansing preparing one for the perfection of heaven. Catholics believe that sanctification is a process and is not completed when one comes to belief. So purgatory is not a suggestion that Christ’s atonement is insufficient but that we have not yet completed our sanctification through the grace of Christ.
Cleansing or sanctification is a gradual process and we must endure to the end to be saved.
(Mat 10:22 DRB) And you shall be hated by all men for my name's sake: but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved.
(Mat 24:13 DRB) But he that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved.
(Mar 13:13 DRB) And you shall be hated by all men for my name's sake. But he that shall endure unto the end, he shall be saved.
Catholic soteriology recognizes that for some of us the process was not completed at death or that we died with unrepentant sin.
(Heb 9:27 DRB) And as it is appointed unto men once to die, and after this the judgment:
The judgment is our eternal destiny and for those whose name is in the Lamb’s Book of Life, heaven is assured. But we know that one must be free of sin to be in God’s presence.
(1Ti 6:14 DRB) That thou keep the commandment without spot, blameless, unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ,
It may be that one is not prepared to be in our Lord’s presence as we may still be with spiritual shortcomings or temporal effects of forgiven sins on our soul making it necessary for some form of purification to enter heaven in God’s presence. Since this is a process of purgation it is called purgatory and it is in keeping with prophecy of the prophet Habakkuk who said that only that which is holy may enter heaven.
(Hab 1:13 DRB) Thy eyes are too pure to behold evil, and thou canst not look on iniquity. Why lookest thou upon them that do unjust things, and holdest thy peace when the wicked devoureth the man that is more just than himself?
St. Paul also taught of a process of purgation which may involve suffering on the soul of Christians and in his first letter to the Corinthian Church he describes the process of purgation after death.
(1Co 3:10 DRB) According to the grace of God that is given to me, as a wise architect, I have laid the foundation: and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon.
(1Co 3:11 DRB) For other foundation no man can lay, but that which is laid: which is Christ Jesus.
(1Co 3:12 DRB) Now, if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble:
(1Co 3:13 DRB) Every man's work shall be manifest. For the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire. And the fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is.
(1Co 3:14 DRB) If any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward.
(1Co 3:15 DRB) If any mans work burn, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire.
St. Paul speaks metaphorically that the results of sin that remain on one’s soul is like “wood, hay and straw” and are burned away in the process of final purification to be received in the presence of the Lord. St. Paul also speaks of one’s works as “gold, silver and precious stones” which are refined and retained.
This passage reminds me of what Christ said in the following indicating that some sins may be forgiven after death.
(Mat 12:32 DRB) And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but he that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him neither in this world, nor in the world to come.
Purgatory is also related to the parable of the unforgiving servant which is as follows…
(Mat 18:32 DRB) Then his lord called him: and said to him: Thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all the debt, because thou besoughtest me:
(Mat 18:33 DRB) Shouldst not thou then have had compassion also on thy fellow servant, even as I had compassion on thee?
(Mat 18:34 DRB) And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers until he paid all the debt.
After telling the parable Christ emphasizes His message lest it be misunderstood with this warning……..
(Mat 18:35 DRB) So also shall my heavenly Father do to you, if you forgive not every one his brother from your hearts.
Christ was warning us of the danger of a hard heart or anger making us unwilling to forgive others. We should acknowledge that these are the signs and example of a defective soul in need of purgation so that he that is imperfect may be in the presence of God and dwell in glory. (See CCC 1030-1032)
As you can see Purgatory has a great deal of biblical support to come to the sound theological conclusion that Purgatory is a necessary part of God’s salvific plan. It is a process rather than a halfway point and those going through purgation are already judged worthy of heaven and are being prepared to enter God’s presence. So, by your misunderstanding and erroneous assumptions you are indeed guilty of bearing false witness.
(Sagittarius) - That during the Holy Eucharist the wafer and wine are literally turned into the body and blood of Christ (a continuing sacrifice) - Other Christians say this is not Biblical. The one sacrifice of Christ was sufficient.
(Cristoiglesia) Catholic Christian would agree that one sacrifice is sufficient for the atonement of mankind and that is why the Eucharist is a continuation of that one sacrifice and not a re-sacrifice as you suggest. See John Chapter 6 to see if the Eucharist is biblical or not and read the colloquy of our Lord at Capernaum.
Catholics see the Scriptures written about the Eucharist as literal teaching by Jesus and have interpreted Jesus’ words as literal since before the NT Scriptures were written as recorded in Scripture. Catholics find no reason to interpret Jesus’ teaching to be anything but literal from a hermeneutical, historical or theological perspective.
Some Protestants, on the other hand, are very much like the proto-Protestants who were former disciples and left Jesus after His teaching in John 6, about the commandment to eat His Body and drink His Blood. They remain in the carnal sense and deny the miracle of the Eucharist. They believe that instead of being present at the one sacrifice of Christ, that what Jesus instituted is a symbolic ordinance instead.
So, what we are speaking of is two totally different practices. The first identical to what the apostles taught and put into practice which is the real presence and the second a modernist interpretation of a man Ulrich Zwingli which is a symbolic ordinance. The first is actually Christ on the Cross where the worshippers are at the foot of the cross; the second is just a remembering of what Christ did as recorded in the Bible. When a Catholic Christian remembers Christ’s sacrifice it is from being there, when a Protestant remembers Christ’s sacrifice it is recalling what is written in Scriptures about the event. Certainly, one should be able to understand the level of passion one would have after being at the foot of the cross compared to the level of one just remembering what is written in a book. So even though some do not take it lightly, even though they do not believe, it cannot be the same passion for an exercise or ordinance in supposed obedience, as the Protestant act can be described; to the Catholic practice of being present with the living corporeal Christ at the cross and eating His real body and Blood as He commanded.
You are bearing false witness by suggesting that Christ’s one sacrifice is not sufficient in Catholic teaching. The opposite is true.
(Sagittarius) - That priests are the direct route to God and sins can be forgiven by them - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical, only the Lord can forgive sin.
(Cristoiglesia) Again you misunderstand Catholic teaching because it is Christ who forgives as the priest acts in persona Cristi. Actually, going directly to God for forgiveness is not biblical.
Christ instituted the sacraments purposefully. The sacrament called reconciliation or penance is what we call our actions when we go to confession. Going to confession and confessing to a priest is the normative way of reconciling oneself back into God's family when we have committed a mortal sin. It is the biblical way corresponding to Jesus' teaching as recorded by the apostle John in John 20: 22-23. What we learn from John is the authority given to the priests is not only to forgive sins but also to retain sins. Jesus commanded the authority to be used. It is the duty given by Jesus for the priest to measure the contrition of the penitent and act accordingly.
However, one must repent and pray sincerely to God as an act of contrition before one enters the confessional. The priest represents Jesus by acting in persona Christi and for the entire family of God represented by the Church militant who is harmed by the sin of another. No sin is private but all sin affects others. Jesus described this relationship as a vine with Him as the vine and we as the branches (John 15:5). If one member of the branch is sick then all
the branches are affected and suffer as a result. Because of our familial relationship with each other Jesus created a means of confession so that all those affected in His family are represented by the priest as is God. The acts of sin and forgiveness are not private matters.
Here you are guilty of bearing false witness by suggesting that the Church teaches that anyone but Jesus forgives sin.
(Sagittarius) - The sins are divided into mortal and venial sin - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical. All sin is equal in God's eyes.
(Cristoiglesia) It seems that you are one of those rare Protestants that believe that all sins are equal in the eyes of God. They truly believe that the Bible teaches that a child being jealous of another’s toy is the same as one murdering another. Such teaching is not supported in the Scriptures. Here is what the Bible says:
Luke 12:47 (KJV) And that servant, which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.
12:48 But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.
1 John 5:16 (KJV) If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.
5:17 All unrighteousness is sin: andthere is a sin not unto death. (See also Lev 5:17 and Luke 23:34)
John 19:11 (KJV) Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin.
(Sagittarius) - Catholics worship/pray to Mary - This is not Christian, no one but the Lord is worthy of worship.
(Cristoiglesia)Catholics would agree with you that worshipping anything or anyone but God is not a Christian teaching. That is why the Church teaches against idolatry. This is from the Catechism:
Idolatry
2112 The first commandment condemns polytheism. It requires man neither to believe in, nor to venerate, other divinities than the one true God. Scripture constantly recalls this rejection of "idols, [of] silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see." These empty idols make their worshippers empty: "Those who make them are like them; so are all who trust in them."42 God, however, is the "living God"43 who gives life and intervenes in history.
2113 Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc. Jesus says, "You cannot serve God and mammon."44 Many martyrs died for not adoring "the Beast"45 refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God.46
2114 Human life finds its unity in the adoration of the one God. The commandment to worship the Lord alone integrates man and saves him from an endless disintegration. Idolatry is a perversion of man's innate religious sense. An idolater is someone who "transfers his indestructible notion of God to anything other than God."47
When we “pray” to the blessed mother of God, the word pray should be understood in the archaic sense of simply “ask”.
We are instructed in Scripture to have a prayer life for others as it is part of God’s commandment to love one another.
(2Co 5:8 DRB) But we are confident and have a good will to be absent rather from the body and to be present with the Lord.
The Catholic Church does not teach that it is absolutely necessary for one to ask for the intercession of saints for salvation. The Church does teach that prayer to God is necessary for salvation for all believers. For a Catholic it would be wrong to ignore the liturgical worship offered to God at feast days for the saints and the prayers asking for their intercession.
The Communion of Saints is a dogma of the ancient Church and is recorded in the apostles Creed. It simply states that the faithful because of their relationship with Christ are alive even after the death of their flesh and worship with us. To us the Church is made up of the Church militant who represents all those believers living out their hope in the flesh.
(Phi 2:12 DRB) Wherefore, my dearly beloved, (as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only but much more now in my absence) with fear and trembling work out your salvation.
(Phi 2:13 DRB) For it is God who worketh in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to his good will.
It consists of the Church Suffering who are those who are temporarily in need of further purgation from sin so that they may enjoy the presence of God.
(2Ma 12:46 DRB) It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.
Lastly, the Communion of the Saints consists of those who have won the race:
(Phi 3:14 DRB) I press towards the mark, to the prize of the supernal vocation of God in Christ Jesus.
Their immortal souls are in heaven in God’s presence:
(Rev 5:8 DRB) And when he had opened the book, the four living creatures and the four and twenty ancients fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints.
The universal stream connecting all of God’s creation is His love, which we take on in our baptism into our journey towards sanctification. This is not an emotional but a desire placed in us by the Spirit of God that endures as a desire for those other than ourselves and this love extends even to our enemies. This is truly a love that comes only from God and is a foreign concept and nonsense to those who have not received God’s salvific grace. This desire within our souls does not end with the death of our flesh but continues into eternity where the saints through their intercession in prayer encourage us in our race and assist us to endure unto our union with God.
I think that some people of faith, who do not understand the Communion of Saints, somehow believe that asking saints to pray for us is detracting from our love or our trust in God. In truth it is impossible, if we truly love as God commands and has given us the grace to understand, not to pray to those whom we love and in turn we expect them to return that same love to us by praying for us and presenting our prayers to God. You may want to Google “Communion of Saints” for a more complete understanding of the Church militant, suffering and triumphant.
So, here again you have misunderstood Catholic teaching and in doing so you were bearing false witness.
(Sagittarius) - They believe in the immaculate conception, that Mary was free from original sin - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical, Mary was a sinner just like everyone else and needed to be saved by Christ.
(Cristoiglesia) Praise God that your position on the sinlessness of the blessed mother of God is a minority position among Christians because such a belief is a direct attack on the divinity of our Lord.
We are all born with original sin which was caused by our original parents bringing sin and death into the world. We have inherited that sin nature from the original fall from grace.
As was prophesied in the Old Testament a virgin will bear a son called Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14). That Son is to become the Lamb of God and a replacement for the Paschal Lamb of Passover which is emblematic of Christ as the feast of the New Covenant. This prophecy is important in that it illustrates the necessity of the perfect sacrifice. Not one of a perfection of the flesh as the Paschal Lamb refers but the perfection of the soul which requires a divine nature as no human alone could fulfill the perfection required by the Father but only the God-man in Jesus. Being fully God, He could not dwell and be nurtured in a vessel containing sin nor could the Lamb of God inherit the original sin of our original parents. So, out of necessity and in preparation to the blessed mother’s obedience she was saved by Christ at her conception. The blessed mother was in such a state of grace before conceiving and nurturing the unborn Jesus that she is described as being “full of Grace”. Of course being full of God’s grace leaves no room for sin.
Now keep in mind that some may argue that Jesus does not qualify as a type of the Paschal Lamb because the Paschal Lamb was required to be without any physical blemish. Certainly, the wounds of Jesus by His scourging left Him as anything but a physically unblemished sacrifice. It is significant to acknowledge that the Paschal Lamb of the Passover saved one from physical death while Jesus being emblematic saves one from the death of the soul into sin. Therefore, the Lamb of God had the perfection of the soul necessary to atone for sin which causes spiritual death.
Furthermore, while the obedience of the Israelites at Passover instituted a special kinship of the people as the family of God so too does the new kingdom instituted by Christ’s atoning sacrifice institute a new kinship or Covenant signified by the fact that we are to eat the Lamb in all its Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity just as the Israelites had to eat the Lamb to be saved. Just like them it could not be a symbolic Lamb but its real flesh consumed; so too are we to partake of the reality of the feast provided by our Lord.
People may argue that it is not possible for Christ to save the blessed mother at her conception as the atoning sacrifice on the Cross has not yet occurred; this same argument by critics of the Eucharist argue similarly. But the fact is that God dwells outside of time where everything is in the eternal present without future or past. In the Scriptures according to St. Johns account of Jesus’ Colloquy at Capernaum in chapter 6 he said, “do this in remembrance of me” as translated into English but this is often a misunderstanding as to what Jesus was really saying because in English “remembrance means to recall a past event which is an approximation of the Greek meaning since there is no corresponding English equivalent. . However, the Koine Greek word used was “anamnesis” which has in its meaning an expectation of a miracle which transcends time and place. So what was truly being conveyed by Jesus’ words recorded by St. John is that the disciples truly ate the sacrificed flesh and drank the spilt Blood of our Lord just as we do today sharing in that one sacrifice presented by our Lord and shared by the entire Church in all its glorious manifestations. Therefore His atoning sacrifice provides for all humanity past, present and future.
Here you are bearing false witness because you state that Catholic teaching denies that the blessed mother of God needed a Savior. The Catholic teaching is the opposite of what you surmise.
(Sagittarius) - That Mary ascended to heaven and sits at the right hand of God - not Biblical. I havent been able to find anything in the Bible about her death or assumption.
(Cristoiglesia) This is simply stating that she serves God in her role of the mother of all humanity in giving our prayers to God and encouraging us to endure in our faith. It would not be meant as literal but would be in reference to the role she was given by Jesus from the cross. The Assumption is not in the Bible for several reasons first of which is that the New Testament books are about the teachings and acts of Jesus; as well as the formation and building of the Church through apostolic succession. Secondly, she was most likely assumed into heaven after the books were written. Thirdly, not all that Jesus taught is recorded in Scriptures; also not all things that happened to the followers of Jesus are recorded.
Not being recorded in Scriptures does not relate to it not being true.
(Sagittarius) - Catholics view the church tradition as equal to the Bible - Christians see the Bible as the only source of God's teachings.
(Cristoiglesia) Praise God very few Christians believe in Sola Scriptura which is a heresy that has spawned tens of thousands of schisms among Protestant Christians. Such surely is a doctrine from the depths of hell. To Catholics the Bible is the fruit of the Church as we wrote the New Testament and through the authority given by Christ to His Church we canonized the Christian Bible. The Bible itself states that is not the complete teachings of Jesus but contains only a small amount of His teaching. The fullness of His teaching is contained in the Church and maintained through apostolic succession.
The approach to authority is very different in the ancient Church than in the modernist Protestant church. The Catholic Church follows the “Word of God alone” while the Protestant ecclesiastical groups follow Sola Scriptura which states that only God’s written word is authoritative. The latter is a sixteenth century man made doctrine designed to destroy the unity of the Church and fragments the entire body of Christ by exponentially increasing schisms caused by accepting only part of God’s word by the Protestants. Sola Scriptura is not a doctrine for a better understanding of the Logos but instead is designed to circumvent the legitimate authority of the Church given by Christ.
It is the belief of the ancient Church that is the Magisterium of the Church that has the authority given by Christ to expound on, recognize and guard the Word of God. The Word of God is not only the written Scriptures but all that is handed to the Church by the Holy Spirit. In so doing and carrying out her responsibility the Church is the true servant of the Word.
God’s people have never been Sola Scriptura advocates. In Jesus’ day the orthodox Jews were not, nor were Jesus or the apostles. The continuation Sola Verbum Dei is a theological continuation of God’s Word from the Old Covenant to the New. The only ones who believed in anything resembling Sola Scriptura were the Sadducees who were the theological liberals of their day. We know that the first century Christians did not believe in Sola Scriptura by the teaching of St. Paul in Holy writ:
(2Th 2:15 DRB) (2:14) Therefore, brethren, stand fast: and hold the traditions, which you have learned, whether by word or by our epistle.
The Church teaches that the Word of God is the Logos:
(Joh 1:1 DRB) In the beginning was the Word: and the Word was with God: and the Word was God.
(Joh 1:2 DRB) The same was in the beginning with God.
(Joh 1:3 DRB) All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made.
(Joh 1:4 DRB) In him was life: and the life was the light of men.
So the question among Christians should not be what is the Word but instead how is the Word revealed to man. To the Protestant the Word is only revealed in written form called Sola Scriptura. To the Catholic Christian the word has a much broader meaning and is revealed to man in more than a written form where men were inspired to reveal God’s Word. Catholics believe that inspiration is not only personal as with the biblical writers but is also revealed to and through the Church such as in the Ecumenical Councils and through the authority exercised through the Church to recognize, guard, interpret and teach the Word. The Church throughout history has faithfully exercised her authority to guard the word of God against the attacks of heresies, such as Sola Scriptura.
(Sagittarius) - Catholics have sacraments: baptism, first communion, confirmation, marriage, orders, reconseliation, and the euchrist - This is not so with other Christian faiths.
(Cristoiglesia) Most Christian groups do have Sacraments. The Sacraments are the means by which our Lord provides grace and it is sad that some refuse this grace that our Lord provides.
(Sagittarius) You may choose to believe in unbiblical doctrine which is man-made but I do not. And for the record, I am not Protestant so you can stop the hatred right there. I am born again. I take my teachings directly from the Bible - and it is not a sin to tell the truth about the Catholic religion as I understand it.
(Cristoiglesia) There is not a single Catholic doctrine that is in conflict with biblical teaching. But because of your statement I am compelled to remind you that you are obedient to a man-made sect whose teachings and doctrines are entirely man-made. As opposed to Protestants like you, the “man” that made Catholic doctrines is the God/man Jesus and yes you are a Protestant opposing the Church created by Jesus and the disciples. No one has said that it is a sin to tell the truth but it is a sin to lie about others beliefs and make a straw man to attack as you have done. The fact, whether true or not, that it is the Catholic faith, as “you understand it”;does NOT remove your act as being less than sinful. You were still bearing false witness against the only Church Jesus and the disciples founded. If I hated you as you said there would have been no sense in my rebuking you for your sinfulness, would it?
The truth is I did so out of love instead.
(Sagittarius) All sin is mortal but for the grace of God through Jesus Christ. I need no more than that. My soul is ready for judgment and I dont fear the day I meet the Lord in person because I have made peace with Him and I try as far as I'm able to live a life that is pleasing to Him - and when I mess up I ask for forgiveness directly. I have a personal relationship with Him - do you?
(Cristoiglesia) I have shown you that the Bible teaches that not all sin is mortal. If you are saying that you are living a life pleasing to God and as evidence of that you try to be a good person. We can never be good enough. At least you recognize the need for repentance.
I have the most intimate of personal relationships with our Lord. I obey all of His commandments and have become a part of His Church rejecting the doctrines of men contained in Protestantism. I am in His will because He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane before His arrest that we all be one in His Church as He and the Father are one. I receive the Eucharist that He commanded which are His truly real and substantial Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of our Lord. One cannot have a more personal relationship than this. Thanks for asking.
(Sagittarius) I have honestly tried not to judge, but I have been a part of the Catholic Church but I left when I started doing my own Bible study and realised that what you teach is not what the Bible teaches. You teach everyone to fear God, and to pray to saints who do not deserve worship. God is the only one worthy of praise and worship.
(Cristoiglesia) I am sorry but it is hard to understand how one could have been a part of the Catholic Church and yet not learn anything about Catholic teaching. If you had indeed been a part of the Church we would not be having this discussion and you would not be involved in bearing false witness against the Church unless you are telling me that you are doing so intentionally. Yes we do teach that we are to fear God as that is what God’s word says for us to teach so that one can gain knowledge. Here is what the Bible says:
Proverbs 1:7 (NIV)
7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
To ask another to pray for you is not worship or praising another.
(Sagittarius) You have judged me because you made an assumption about my faith - I am not protestant. And I ask you very nicely now to stop preaching to me about your doctrines that have no Biblical basis. If that's what you believe then fine - but I have not lied and I have not sinned in telling people the truth about your beliefs and doctrines.
(Cristoiglesia) There are two kinds of Christians. The first kind of Christian were the Catholic Christians that follow the Church founded by Jesus and the disciples that contain all of Christ’s promises to humanity about His Church. The second kind are the Protestants who are described in the Bible as those unable to endure sound doctrine and gather around them teachers that satisfy their itching ears. You are obviously not Catholic and are certainly Protestant. We have no doctrines that are not in harmony with Scriptures. As I have shown you, what you have been saying about Catholic teaching is NOT true.
(Sagittarius) I was raised Catholic. I went to mass and confession and I was confirmed. I learnt the Catechism. And then I started reading the Bible. Jesus never told anyone to eat His flesh or to drink His blood both are abhorrent to the faith and laws. He means to accept Him as the Lord and to have him in your heart.
(Cristoiglesia) I guess you have never read John 6. Here is my commentary on the colloquy of Jesus at the Synagogue in Capernaum”
Certainly the Eucharist is food for the believer if one is to believe Jesus’ in His colloquy at Capernaum. It is food for endurance till eternal life. It provides the grace necessary to complete the race. Jesus compares it to the manna that was eaten in the desert to sustain the Israelites. But Jesus is speaking of the New Covenant requiring a new sustenance which is His Body and Blood. In making this comparison He says that real bread comes from the father just as He and then says that He is the bread of life. If one eats this bread they will live forever. The disciples listening to Him began to realize that Jesus was not speaking metaphorically but literally and then we come to the following verse:
(Joh 6:52 DRB) (6:53) The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying: How can this man give us his flesh to eat
Then Jesus said in unambiguous literal language:
(Joh 6:53 DRB) (6:54) Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen, I say unto you: except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.
The following verse indicates the purpose of eating His body and drinking His blood. It is so that we can “abidete” or in other words remains in Him by the Grace bestowed by the act of receiving His Body and His Blood. But the Eucharist benefits us even more in that it augments our union with Christ as the principal fruit of receiving the Eucharist is an intimate union with Christ.
(Joh 6:56 DRB) (6:57) He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood abideth in me: and I in him.
An additional benefit of the Eucharist is that it is impossible to unite to Christ without the cleansing of past sins and preserving us from future sins through His grace. This is part of the sanctification process where we grow in our faith in him which separates us further from the risk of mortal sin. Additionally, the Eucharist participation renews, strengthens and deepens ones incorporation into the Church which is achieved through Baptism. It joins us to the entire Church Militant, Suffering and Triumphant.
This is what St. Ignatius said about the Eucharist at the end of the first century, “ the one bread that provides the medicine of immortality, the antidote for death, and the food that makes live forever in Jesus Christ.”
One may ask the question does God’s spiritual work always require a physical channel. “Always” is a very dangerous position to take when speaking of God as God can as our sovereign creator do things however he wishes. So this is really not a matter of “always” but instead, did God use the physical channel of Jesus transforming simple bread and wine into His body and Blood to bestow the Grace of eternal life.
I was reading another apologist’s commentary some time ago and He related how some Protestants get an almost Docetist view when it comes to the Eucharist. They have no problem believing something to be spiritual but when it comes to mixing spirit and matter they seem to experience intellectual and theological mind block. This is the usual excuse for not believing in Sacraments because a spiritual reality is being conveyed by means of matter. They may even believe that this is a violation of the divine plan. Matter instead of being used is to be avoided which would explain why some have difficulties understanding the incarnation. Many believe that it would be much easier if God did not dirty himself with matter. The Eucharist proves that God loves matter because He comes to us under the appearance of bread and wine. In doing so there is no contradiction in Christ being physically and sacramentally present.
One may question how can Christ be present in the Eucharist and be also in heaven and that is a fair question. First of all, in my explanation let me make it clear that how Christ performs this miracle is a great mystery that we accept on faith through our spirit to His. If we look at the account of the last supper we see Jesus present in two ways. He is present at the table in a natural way and is present also in a sacramental way which is no different than the Eucharistic experience today and through the history of the Church. How this is done while being a mystery is not impossibility just because it cannot be understood fully with our reason. We can all accept as Christians that God is everywhere and that He is present in a spiritual sense when we are gathered together. This is no greater a mystery than him reigning in heaven in His glorified body and on earth in His natural body. If he can create the universe from nothing can he not make bread and wine into His Body and Blood? These things may be beyond our understanding but certainly not beyond God’s abilities.
For those who do not believe in the real presence there are the difficulties of the following verses:
(1Co 11:26 DRB) For as often as you shall eat this bread and drink the chalice, you shall shew the death of the Lord, until he come.
(1Co 11:27 DRB) Therefore, whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord.
(1Co 11:28 DRB) But let a man prove himself: and so let him eat of that bread and drink of the chalice.
(1Co 11:29 DRB) For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord.
(1Co 11:30 DRB) Therefore are there many infirm and weak among you: and many sleep.
People who refuse to believe in the real presence believe that this represents a metaphor. But, if it is a mere metaphor, how can one be “guilty of the body and Blood” when one receives unworthily? As one scholar put it “Plain and simple reason seem to tell us that the presence of Christ’s body is necessary for an offense committed against it.” (Nicholas Cardinal Wiseman, Lectures on the Real Presence) It would seem reasonable that one cannot be guilty of Christ’s body and Blood if it is not present in the Sacrament. Other scholars said ” No one is guilty of homicide if he merely does damage to the statue or picture of a man without touching the man in person.” (Rumble and Carty, Eucharist Quizzes to a Street Preacher) The question might be asked in light of St. Paul’s teaching, can one be theologically satisfied in the meaningless belief in a Real Absence than the fuller meaning of a Real Presence.
(Sagittarius) I do not hate you or your faith. I simply believe that you have lost some of the truth in your way to Christ. The Catholic Church is not the one Church of Christ. Christianity is His church. His family and brethren. In believing in and loving Christ I am a part of His church. I repeat, I have not lied about the Catholic Church. I showed you extracts of your own Catechism that proved the truth of my statements. I merely showed how they were different from my and other Christian beliefs.
(Cristoiglesia) Thanks for your opinion but it would be more believable if it was backed by more than straw man arguments and had some basis in fact. Show me where Jesus founded any other Church than the Catholic Church. You can not because there was no other. In the first century the Church was defined as those who gather around the bishop. Your man-made sect does not match that description. As I have shown you, you have inferred into the Catechism beliefs that are not shared by Catholics and that are not Catholic teaching.
(Sagittarius) You are being unreasonable in not even taking the time to think about it and taking Catholic dogma as fact without Biblical support.
(Cristoiglesia) I spent 50 years of my life before becoming a Catholic Christian comparing the Bible, Protestant and Catholic teaching. I never wanted to be Catholic but it was impossible to deny that the Church had the fullness of Christ’s teaching and the veracity and scholarship of doctrine. There is absolutely no conflict between Catholic doctrine and the Bible.
(Sagittarius) Your Church has made it so that people actually believe that a personal relationship with Christ is impossible without a priest intervening.
(Cristoiglesia) Nonsense
(Sagittarius) Praying for the dead and transubstantiation is not Biblical.
(Cristoiglesia) I have shown you Scriptural support for both. You may disagree but to claim that there is not biblical support is blatantly dishonest/
(Sagittarius) I have not sinned in telling people about the Catholic beliefs. Anyone can see the same from reading the Catechism. And then read the Bible and you'll see the difference.
(Cristoiglesia) Bearing false witness is a sin to God. I have read the Catechism and the Bible and can find absolutely no disagreement. The only reason you do is because you assume Catholic teaching that does not exist.
(Sagittarius) I'm not saying Catholics aren't devoted to Christ or that its false. Im saying I prefer to take my teaching from the words of God
(Cristoiglesia) If only you practiced what you preached we would not be having this discussion and you would be a Catholic Christian. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
(Cristoiglesia) Well, let us see if you understand or applied the Catechism correctly…..
(Sagitarius) - The Catholics believe in purgatory - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical, there is no halfway point, only heaven or hell.
(Cristoiglesia) Of course Purgatory is a doctrine of the Church. Where you err and bear false witness is when you suggest that Catholic teaching is that Purgatory is a “halfway point”. Here is some information you need to know about purgatory:
There is a common Protestant misunderstanding of purgatory. At least one protestant minister, John Wesley, spoke of perfectionism in this life, possible but rare. He is one of the few to proclaim that one can be sanctified in this life and he left the Moravian Church over this issue after a rebuke by Count Zinzendorf for this teaching.
People in purgatory are already justified by receiving the supernatural eternal life into our souls through Baptism making us a part of the Body of Christ. Those in purgatory have accepted Christ by faith and have not rejected Him by unrepentant mortal sin. It is a place where one is purified by fire (Mal 3:2). Imagine the joy of being in purgatory and knowing that you are there because you have passed judgment and are assured of being in the presence of God in heaven. Purgatory is not an eternal destination, there are only two, heaven or hell.
We should not think of purgatory as some kind of legal punishment for past sins as it would be under the old law. Those in purgatory are already new creatures changed by Christ’s grace, they are the adopted children and part of God’s family in purgatory one receives final discipline and cleansing preparing one for the perfection of heaven. Catholics believe that sanctification is a process and is not completed when one comes to belief. So purgatory is not a suggestion that Christ’s atonement is insufficient but that we have not yet completed our sanctification through the grace of Christ.
Cleansing or sanctification is a gradual process and we must endure to the end to be saved.
(Mat 10:22 DRB) And you shall be hated by all men for my name's sake: but he that shall persevere unto the end, he shall be saved.
(Mat 24:13 DRB) But he that shall persevere to the end, he shall be saved.
(Mar 13:13 DRB) And you shall be hated by all men for my name's sake. But he that shall endure unto the end, he shall be saved.
Catholic soteriology recognizes that for some of us the process was not completed at death or that we died with unrepentant sin.
(Heb 9:27 DRB) And as it is appointed unto men once to die, and after this the judgment:
The judgment is our eternal destiny and for those whose name is in the Lamb’s Book of Life, heaven is assured. But we know that one must be free of sin to be in God’s presence.
(1Ti 6:14 DRB) That thou keep the commandment without spot, blameless, unto the coming of our Lord Jesus Christ,
It may be that one is not prepared to be in our Lord’s presence as we may still be with spiritual shortcomings or temporal effects of forgiven sins on our soul making it necessary for some form of purification to enter heaven in God’s presence. Since this is a process of purgation it is called purgatory and it is in keeping with prophecy of the prophet Habakkuk who said that only that which is holy may enter heaven.
(Hab 1:13 DRB) Thy eyes are too pure to behold evil, and thou canst not look on iniquity. Why lookest thou upon them that do unjust things, and holdest thy peace when the wicked devoureth the man that is more just than himself?
St. Paul also taught of a process of purgation which may involve suffering on the soul of Christians and in his first letter to the Corinthian Church he describes the process of purgation after death.
(1Co 3:10 DRB) According to the grace of God that is given to me, as a wise architect, I have laid the foundation: and another buildeth thereon. But let every man take heed how he buildeth thereupon.
(1Co 3:11 DRB) For other foundation no man can lay, but that which is laid: which is Christ Jesus.
(1Co 3:12 DRB) Now, if any man build upon this foundation, gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble:
(1Co 3:13 DRB) Every man's work shall be manifest. For the day of the Lord shall declare it, because it shall be revealed in fire. And the fire shall try every man's work, of what sort it is.
(1Co 3:14 DRB) If any man's work abide, which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward.
(1Co 3:15 DRB) If any mans work burn, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved, yet so as by fire.
St. Paul speaks metaphorically that the results of sin that remain on one’s soul is like “wood, hay and straw” and are burned away in the process of final purification to be received in the presence of the Lord. St. Paul also speaks of one’s works as “gold, silver and precious stones” which are refined and retained.
This passage reminds me of what Christ said in the following indicating that some sins may be forgiven after death.
(Mat 12:32 DRB) And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but he that shall speak against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him neither in this world, nor in the world to come.
Purgatory is also related to the parable of the unforgiving servant which is as follows…
(Mat 18:32 DRB) Then his lord called him: and said to him: Thou wicked servant, I forgave thee all the debt, because thou besoughtest me:
(Mat 18:33 DRB) Shouldst not thou then have had compassion also on thy fellow servant, even as I had compassion on thee?
(Mat 18:34 DRB) And his lord being angry, delivered him to the torturers until he paid all the debt.
After telling the parable Christ emphasizes His message lest it be misunderstood with this warning……..
(Mat 18:35 DRB) So also shall my heavenly Father do to you, if you forgive not every one his brother from your hearts.
Christ was warning us of the danger of a hard heart or anger making us unwilling to forgive others. We should acknowledge that these are the signs and example of a defective soul in need of purgation so that he that is imperfect may be in the presence of God and dwell in glory. (See CCC 1030-1032)
As you can see Purgatory has a great deal of biblical support to come to the sound theological conclusion that Purgatory is a necessary part of God’s salvific plan. It is a process rather than a halfway point and those going through purgation are already judged worthy of heaven and are being prepared to enter God’s presence. So, by your misunderstanding and erroneous assumptions you are indeed guilty of bearing false witness.
(Sagittarius) - That during the Holy Eucharist the wafer and wine are literally turned into the body and blood of Christ (a continuing sacrifice) - Other Christians say this is not Biblical. The one sacrifice of Christ was sufficient.
(Cristoiglesia) Catholic Christian would agree that one sacrifice is sufficient for the atonement of mankind and that is why the Eucharist is a continuation of that one sacrifice and not a re-sacrifice as you suggest. See John Chapter 6 to see if the Eucharist is biblical or not and read the colloquy of our Lord at Capernaum.
Catholics see the Scriptures written about the Eucharist as literal teaching by Jesus and have interpreted Jesus’ words as literal since before the NT Scriptures were written as recorded in Scripture. Catholics find no reason to interpret Jesus’ teaching to be anything but literal from a hermeneutical, historical or theological perspective.
Some Protestants, on the other hand, are very much like the proto-Protestants who were former disciples and left Jesus after His teaching in John 6, about the commandment to eat His Body and drink His Blood. They remain in the carnal sense and deny the miracle of the Eucharist. They believe that instead of being present at the one sacrifice of Christ, that what Jesus instituted is a symbolic ordinance instead.
So, what we are speaking of is two totally different practices. The first identical to what the apostles taught and put into practice which is the real presence and the second a modernist interpretation of a man Ulrich Zwingli which is a symbolic ordinance. The first is actually Christ on the Cross where the worshippers are at the foot of the cross; the second is just a remembering of what Christ did as recorded in the Bible. When a Catholic Christian remembers Christ’s sacrifice it is from being there, when a Protestant remembers Christ’s sacrifice it is recalling what is written in Scriptures about the event. Certainly, one should be able to understand the level of passion one would have after being at the foot of the cross compared to the level of one just remembering what is written in a book. So even though some do not take it lightly, even though they do not believe, it cannot be the same passion for an exercise or ordinance in supposed obedience, as the Protestant act can be described; to the Catholic practice of being present with the living corporeal Christ at the cross and eating His real body and Blood as He commanded.
You are bearing false witness by suggesting that Christ’s one sacrifice is not sufficient in Catholic teaching. The opposite is true.
(Sagittarius) - That priests are the direct route to God and sins can be forgiven by them - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical, only the Lord can forgive sin.
(Cristoiglesia) Again you misunderstand Catholic teaching because it is Christ who forgives as the priest acts in persona Cristi. Actually, going directly to God for forgiveness is not biblical.
Christ instituted the sacraments purposefully. The sacrament called reconciliation or penance is what we call our actions when we go to confession. Going to confession and confessing to a priest is the normative way of reconciling oneself back into God's family when we have committed a mortal sin. It is the biblical way corresponding to Jesus' teaching as recorded by the apostle John in John 20: 22-23. What we learn from John is the authority given to the priests is not only to forgive sins but also to retain sins. Jesus commanded the authority to be used. It is the duty given by Jesus for the priest to measure the contrition of the penitent and act accordingly.
However, one must repent and pray sincerely to God as an act of contrition before one enters the confessional. The priest represents Jesus by acting in persona Christi and for the entire family of God represented by the Church militant who is harmed by the sin of another. No sin is private but all sin affects others. Jesus described this relationship as a vine with Him as the vine and we as the branches (John 15:5). If one member of the branch is sick then all
the branches are affected and suffer as a result. Because of our familial relationship with each other Jesus created a means of confession so that all those affected in His family are represented by the priest as is God. The acts of sin and forgiveness are not private matters.
Here you are guilty of bearing false witness by suggesting that the Church teaches that anyone but Jesus forgives sin.
(Sagittarius) - The sins are divided into mortal and venial sin - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical. All sin is equal in God's eyes.
(Cristoiglesia) It seems that you are one of those rare Protestants that believe that all sins are equal in the eyes of God. They truly believe that the Bible teaches that a child being jealous of another’s toy is the same as one murdering another. Such teaching is not supported in the Scriptures. Here is what the Bible says:
Luke 12:47 (KJV) And that servant, which knew his lord's will, and prepared not himself, neither did according to his will, shall be beaten with many stripes.
12:48 But he that knew not, and did commit things worthy of stripes, shall be beaten with few stripes. For unto whomsoever much is given, of him shall be much required: and to whom men have committed much, of him they will ask the more.
1 John 5:16 (KJV) If any man see his brother sin a sin which is not unto death, he shall ask, and he shall give him life for them that sin not unto death. There is a sin unto death: I do not say that he shall pray for it.
5:17 All unrighteousness is sin: andthere is a sin not unto death. (See also Lev 5:17 and Luke 23:34)
John 19:11 (KJV) Jesus answered, Thou couldest have no power at all against me, except it were given thee from above: therefore he that delivered me unto thee hath the greater sin.
(Sagittarius) - Catholics worship/pray to Mary - This is not Christian, no one but the Lord is worthy of worship.
(Cristoiglesia)Catholics would agree with you that worshipping anything or anyone but God is not a Christian teaching. That is why the Church teaches against idolatry. This is from the Catechism:
Idolatry
2112 The first commandment condemns polytheism. It requires man neither to believe in, nor to venerate, other divinities than the one true God. Scripture constantly recalls this rejection of "idols, [of] silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see." These empty idols make their worshippers empty: "Those who make them are like them; so are all who trust in them."42 God, however, is the "living God"43 who gives life and intervenes in history.
2113 Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc. Jesus says, "You cannot serve God and mammon."44 Many martyrs died for not adoring "the Beast"45 refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God.46
2114 Human life finds its unity in the adoration of the one God. The commandment to worship the Lord alone integrates man and saves him from an endless disintegration. Idolatry is a perversion of man's innate religious sense. An idolater is someone who "transfers his indestructible notion of God to anything other than God."47
When we “pray” to the blessed mother of God, the word pray should be understood in the archaic sense of simply “ask”.
We are instructed in Scripture to have a prayer life for others as it is part of God’s commandment to love one another.
(2Co 5:8 DRB) But we are confident and have a good will to be absent rather from the body and to be present with the Lord.
The Catholic Church does not teach that it is absolutely necessary for one to ask for the intercession of saints for salvation. The Church does teach that prayer to God is necessary for salvation for all believers. For a Catholic it would be wrong to ignore the liturgical worship offered to God at feast days for the saints and the prayers asking for their intercession.
The Communion of Saints is a dogma of the ancient Church and is recorded in the apostles Creed. It simply states that the faithful because of their relationship with Christ are alive even after the death of their flesh and worship with us. To us the Church is made up of the Church militant who represents all those believers living out their hope in the flesh.
(Phi 2:12 DRB) Wherefore, my dearly beloved, (as you have always obeyed, not as in my presence only but much more now in my absence) with fear and trembling work out your salvation.
(Phi 2:13 DRB) For it is God who worketh in you, both to will and to accomplish, according to his good will.
It consists of the Church Suffering who are those who are temporarily in need of further purgation from sin so that they may enjoy the presence of God.
(2Ma 12:46 DRB) It is therefore a holy and wholesome thought to pray for the dead, that they may be loosed from sins.
Lastly, the Communion of the Saints consists of those who have won the race:
(Phi 3:14 DRB) I press towards the mark, to the prize of the supernal vocation of God in Christ Jesus.
Their immortal souls are in heaven in God’s presence:
(Rev 5:8 DRB) And when he had opened the book, the four living creatures and the four and twenty ancients fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints.
The universal stream connecting all of God’s creation is His love, which we take on in our baptism into our journey towards sanctification. This is not an emotional but a desire placed in us by the Spirit of God that endures as a desire for those other than ourselves and this love extends even to our enemies. This is truly a love that comes only from God and is a foreign concept and nonsense to those who have not received God’s salvific grace. This desire within our souls does not end with the death of our flesh but continues into eternity where the saints through their intercession in prayer encourage us in our race and assist us to endure unto our union with God.
I think that some people of faith, who do not understand the Communion of Saints, somehow believe that asking saints to pray for us is detracting from our love or our trust in God. In truth it is impossible, if we truly love as God commands and has given us the grace to understand, not to pray to those whom we love and in turn we expect them to return that same love to us by praying for us and presenting our prayers to God. You may want to Google “Communion of Saints” for a more complete understanding of the Church militant, suffering and triumphant.
So, here again you have misunderstood Catholic teaching and in doing so you were bearing false witness.
(Sagittarius) - They believe in the immaculate conception, that Mary was free from original sin - Other Christians believe this is not Biblical, Mary was a sinner just like everyone else and needed to be saved by Christ.
(Cristoiglesia) Praise God that your position on the sinlessness of the blessed mother of God is a minority position among Christians because such a belief is a direct attack on the divinity of our Lord.
We are all born with original sin which was caused by our original parents bringing sin and death into the world. We have inherited that sin nature from the original fall from grace.
As was prophesied in the Old Testament a virgin will bear a son called Immanuel (Isaiah 7:14). That Son is to become the Lamb of God and a replacement for the Paschal Lamb of Passover which is emblematic of Christ as the feast of the New Covenant. This prophecy is important in that it illustrates the necessity of the perfect sacrifice. Not one of a perfection of the flesh as the Paschal Lamb refers but the perfection of the soul which requires a divine nature as no human alone could fulfill the perfection required by the Father but only the God-man in Jesus. Being fully God, He could not dwell and be nurtured in a vessel containing sin nor could the Lamb of God inherit the original sin of our original parents. So, out of necessity and in preparation to the blessed mother’s obedience she was saved by Christ at her conception. The blessed mother was in such a state of grace before conceiving and nurturing the unborn Jesus that she is described as being “full of Grace”. Of course being full of God’s grace leaves no room for sin.
Now keep in mind that some may argue that Jesus does not qualify as a type of the Paschal Lamb because the Paschal Lamb was required to be without any physical blemish. Certainly, the wounds of Jesus by His scourging left Him as anything but a physically unblemished sacrifice. It is significant to acknowledge that the Paschal Lamb of the Passover saved one from physical death while Jesus being emblematic saves one from the death of the soul into sin. Therefore, the Lamb of God had the perfection of the soul necessary to atone for sin which causes spiritual death.
Furthermore, while the obedience of the Israelites at Passover instituted a special kinship of the people as the family of God so too does the new kingdom instituted by Christ’s atoning sacrifice institute a new kinship or Covenant signified by the fact that we are to eat the Lamb in all its Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity just as the Israelites had to eat the Lamb to be saved. Just like them it could not be a symbolic Lamb but its real flesh consumed; so too are we to partake of the reality of the feast provided by our Lord.
People may argue that it is not possible for Christ to save the blessed mother at her conception as the atoning sacrifice on the Cross has not yet occurred; this same argument by critics of the Eucharist argue similarly. But the fact is that God dwells outside of time where everything is in the eternal present without future or past. In the Scriptures according to St. Johns account of Jesus’ Colloquy at Capernaum in chapter 6 he said, “do this in remembrance of me” as translated into English but this is often a misunderstanding as to what Jesus was really saying because in English “remembrance means to recall a past event which is an approximation of the Greek meaning since there is no corresponding English equivalent. . However, the Koine Greek word used was “anamnesis” which has in its meaning an expectation of a miracle which transcends time and place. So what was truly being conveyed by Jesus’ words recorded by St. John is that the disciples truly ate the sacrificed flesh and drank the spilt Blood of our Lord just as we do today sharing in that one sacrifice presented by our Lord and shared by the entire Church in all its glorious manifestations. Therefore His atoning sacrifice provides for all humanity past, present and future.
Here you are bearing false witness because you state that Catholic teaching denies that the blessed mother of God needed a Savior. The Catholic teaching is the opposite of what you surmise.
(Sagittarius) - That Mary ascended to heaven and sits at the right hand of God - not Biblical. I havent been able to find anything in the Bible about her death or assumption.
(Cristoiglesia) This is simply stating that she serves God in her role of the mother of all humanity in giving our prayers to God and encouraging us to endure in our faith. It would not be meant as literal but would be in reference to the role she was given by Jesus from the cross. The Assumption is not in the Bible for several reasons first of which is that the New Testament books are about the teachings and acts of Jesus; as well as the formation and building of the Church through apostolic succession. Secondly, she was most likely assumed into heaven after the books were written. Thirdly, not all that Jesus taught is recorded in Scriptures; also not all things that happened to the followers of Jesus are recorded.
Not being recorded in Scriptures does not relate to it not being true.
(Sagittarius) - Catholics view the church tradition as equal to the Bible - Christians see the Bible as the only source of God's teachings.
(Cristoiglesia) Praise God very few Christians believe in Sola Scriptura which is a heresy that has spawned tens of thousands of schisms among Protestant Christians. Such surely is a doctrine from the depths of hell. To Catholics the Bible is the fruit of the Church as we wrote the New Testament and through the authority given by Christ to His Church we canonized the Christian Bible. The Bible itself states that is not the complete teachings of Jesus but contains only a small amount of His teaching. The fullness of His teaching is contained in the Church and maintained through apostolic succession.
The approach to authority is very different in the ancient Church than in the modernist Protestant church. The Catholic Church follows the “Word of God alone” while the Protestant ecclesiastical groups follow Sola Scriptura which states that only God’s written word is authoritative. The latter is a sixteenth century man made doctrine designed to destroy the unity of the Church and fragments the entire body of Christ by exponentially increasing schisms caused by accepting only part of God’s word by the Protestants. Sola Scriptura is not a doctrine for a better understanding of the Logos but instead is designed to circumvent the legitimate authority of the Church given by Christ.
It is the belief of the ancient Church that is the Magisterium of the Church that has the authority given by Christ to expound on, recognize and guard the Word of God. The Word of God is not only the written Scriptures but all that is handed to the Church by the Holy Spirit. In so doing and carrying out her responsibility the Church is the true servant of the Word.
God’s people have never been Sola Scriptura advocates. In Jesus’ day the orthodox Jews were not, nor were Jesus or the apostles. The continuation Sola Verbum Dei is a theological continuation of God’s Word from the Old Covenant to the New. The only ones who believed in anything resembling Sola Scriptura were the Sadducees who were the theological liberals of their day. We know that the first century Christians did not believe in Sola Scriptura by the teaching of St. Paul in Holy writ:
(2Th 2:15 DRB) (2:14) Therefore, brethren, stand fast: and hold the traditions, which you have learned, whether by word or by our epistle.
The Church teaches that the Word of God is the Logos:
(Joh 1:1 DRB) In the beginning was the Word: and the Word was with God: and the Word was God.
(Joh 1:2 DRB) The same was in the beginning with God.
(Joh 1:3 DRB) All things were made by him: and without him was made nothing that was made.
(Joh 1:4 DRB) In him was life: and the life was the light of men.
So the question among Christians should not be what is the Word but instead how is the Word revealed to man. To the Protestant the Word is only revealed in written form called Sola Scriptura. To the Catholic Christian the word has a much broader meaning and is revealed to man in more than a written form where men were inspired to reveal God’s Word. Catholics believe that inspiration is not only personal as with the biblical writers but is also revealed to and through the Church such as in the Ecumenical Councils and through the authority exercised through the Church to recognize, guard, interpret and teach the Word. The Church throughout history has faithfully exercised her authority to guard the word of God against the attacks of heresies, such as Sola Scriptura.
(Sagittarius) - Catholics have sacraments: baptism, first communion, confirmation, marriage, orders, reconseliation, and the euchrist - This is not so with other Christian faiths.
(Cristoiglesia) Most Christian groups do have Sacraments. The Sacraments are the means by which our Lord provides grace and it is sad that some refuse this grace that our Lord provides.
(Sagittarius) You may choose to believe in unbiblical doctrine which is man-made but I do not. And for the record, I am not Protestant so you can stop the hatred right there. I am born again. I take my teachings directly from the Bible - and it is not a sin to tell the truth about the Catholic religion as I understand it.
(Cristoiglesia) There is not a single Catholic doctrine that is in conflict with biblical teaching. But because of your statement I am compelled to remind you that you are obedient to a man-made sect whose teachings and doctrines are entirely man-made. As opposed to Protestants like you, the “man” that made Catholic doctrines is the God/man Jesus and yes you are a Protestant opposing the Church created by Jesus and the disciples. No one has said that it is a sin to tell the truth but it is a sin to lie about others beliefs and make a straw man to attack as you have done. The fact, whether true or not, that it is the Catholic faith, as “you understand it”;does NOT remove your act as being less than sinful. You were still bearing false witness against the only Church Jesus and the disciples founded. If I hated you as you said there would have been no sense in my rebuking you for your sinfulness, would it?
The truth is I did so out of love instead.
(Sagittarius) All sin is mortal but for the grace of God through Jesus Christ. I need no more than that. My soul is ready for judgment and I dont fear the day I meet the Lord in person because I have made peace with Him and I try as far as I'm able to live a life that is pleasing to Him - and when I mess up I ask for forgiveness directly. I have a personal relationship with Him - do you?
(Cristoiglesia) I have shown you that the Bible teaches that not all sin is mortal. If you are saying that you are living a life pleasing to God and as evidence of that you try to be a good person. We can never be good enough. At least you recognize the need for repentance.
I have the most intimate of personal relationships with our Lord. I obey all of His commandments and have become a part of His Church rejecting the doctrines of men contained in Protestantism. I am in His will because He prayed in the Garden of Gethsemane before His arrest that we all be one in His Church as He and the Father are one. I receive the Eucharist that He commanded which are His truly real and substantial Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity of our Lord. One cannot have a more personal relationship than this. Thanks for asking.
(Sagittarius) I have honestly tried not to judge, but I have been a part of the Catholic Church but I left when I started doing my own Bible study and realised that what you teach is not what the Bible teaches. You teach everyone to fear God, and to pray to saints who do not deserve worship. God is the only one worthy of praise and worship.
(Cristoiglesia) I am sorry but it is hard to understand how one could have been a part of the Catholic Church and yet not learn anything about Catholic teaching. If you had indeed been a part of the Church we would not be having this discussion and you would not be involved in bearing false witness against the Church unless you are telling me that you are doing so intentionally. Yes we do teach that we are to fear God as that is what God’s word says for us to teach so that one can gain knowledge. Here is what the Bible says:
Proverbs 1:7 (NIV)
7 The fear of the Lord is the beginning of knowledge,
but fools despise wisdom and discipline.
To ask another to pray for you is not worship or praising another.
(Sagittarius) You have judged me because you made an assumption about my faith - I am not protestant. And I ask you very nicely now to stop preaching to me about your doctrines that have no Biblical basis. If that's what you believe then fine - but I have not lied and I have not sinned in telling people the truth about your beliefs and doctrines.
(Cristoiglesia) There are two kinds of Christians. The first kind of Christian were the Catholic Christians that follow the Church founded by Jesus and the disciples that contain all of Christ’s promises to humanity about His Church. The second kind are the Protestants who are described in the Bible as those unable to endure sound doctrine and gather around them teachers that satisfy their itching ears. You are obviously not Catholic and are certainly Protestant. We have no doctrines that are not in harmony with Scriptures. As I have shown you, what you have been saying about Catholic teaching is NOT true.
(Sagittarius) I was raised Catholic. I went to mass and confession and I was confirmed. I learnt the Catechism. And then I started reading the Bible. Jesus never told anyone to eat His flesh or to drink His blood both are abhorrent to the faith and laws. He means to accept Him as the Lord and to have him in your heart.
(Cristoiglesia) I guess you have never read John 6. Here is my commentary on the colloquy of Jesus at the Synagogue in Capernaum”
Certainly the Eucharist is food for the believer if one is to believe Jesus’ in His colloquy at Capernaum. It is food for endurance till eternal life. It provides the grace necessary to complete the race. Jesus compares it to the manna that was eaten in the desert to sustain the Israelites. But Jesus is speaking of the New Covenant requiring a new sustenance which is His Body and Blood. In making this comparison He says that real bread comes from the father just as He and then says that He is the bread of life. If one eats this bread they will live forever. The disciples listening to Him began to realize that Jesus was not speaking metaphorically but literally and then we come to the following verse:
(Joh 6:52 DRB) (6:53) The Jews therefore strove among themselves, saying: How can this man give us his flesh to eat
Then Jesus said in unambiguous literal language:
(Joh 6:53 DRB) (6:54) Then Jesus said to them: Amen, amen, I say unto you: except you eat the flesh of the Son of man and drink his blood, you shall not have life in you.
The following verse indicates the purpose of eating His body and drinking His blood. It is so that we can “abidete” or in other words remains in Him by the Grace bestowed by the act of receiving His Body and His Blood. But the Eucharist benefits us even more in that it augments our union with Christ as the principal fruit of receiving the Eucharist is an intimate union with Christ.
(Joh 6:56 DRB) (6:57) He that eateth my flesh and drinketh my blood abideth in me: and I in him.
An additional benefit of the Eucharist is that it is impossible to unite to Christ without the cleansing of past sins and preserving us from future sins through His grace. This is part of the sanctification process where we grow in our faith in him which separates us further from the risk of mortal sin. Additionally, the Eucharist participation renews, strengthens and deepens ones incorporation into the Church which is achieved through Baptism. It joins us to the entire Church Militant, Suffering and Triumphant.
This is what St. Ignatius said about the Eucharist at the end of the first century, “ the one bread that provides the medicine of immortality, the antidote for death, and the food that makes live forever in Jesus Christ.”
One may ask the question does God’s spiritual work always require a physical channel. “Always” is a very dangerous position to take when speaking of God as God can as our sovereign creator do things however he wishes. So this is really not a matter of “always” but instead, did God use the physical channel of Jesus transforming simple bread and wine into His body and Blood to bestow the Grace of eternal life.
I was reading another apologist’s commentary some time ago and He related how some Protestants get an almost Docetist view when it comes to the Eucharist. They have no problem believing something to be spiritual but when it comes to mixing spirit and matter they seem to experience intellectual and theological mind block. This is the usual excuse for not believing in Sacraments because a spiritual reality is being conveyed by means of matter. They may even believe that this is a violation of the divine plan. Matter instead of being used is to be avoided which would explain why some have difficulties understanding the incarnation. Many believe that it would be much easier if God did not dirty himself with matter. The Eucharist proves that God loves matter because He comes to us under the appearance of bread and wine. In doing so there is no contradiction in Christ being physically and sacramentally present.
One may question how can Christ be present in the Eucharist and be also in heaven and that is a fair question. First of all, in my explanation let me make it clear that how Christ performs this miracle is a great mystery that we accept on faith through our spirit to His. If we look at the account of the last supper we see Jesus present in two ways. He is present at the table in a natural way and is present also in a sacramental way which is no different than the Eucharistic experience today and through the history of the Church. How this is done while being a mystery is not impossibility just because it cannot be understood fully with our reason. We can all accept as Christians that God is everywhere and that He is present in a spiritual sense when we are gathered together. This is no greater a mystery than him reigning in heaven in His glorified body and on earth in His natural body. If he can create the universe from nothing can he not make bread and wine into His Body and Blood? These things may be beyond our understanding but certainly not beyond God’s abilities.
For those who do not believe in the real presence there are the difficulties of the following verses:
(1Co 11:26 DRB) For as often as you shall eat this bread and drink the chalice, you shall shew the death of the Lord, until he come.
(1Co 11:27 DRB) Therefore, whosoever shall eat this bread, or drink the chalice of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and of the blood of the Lord.
(1Co 11:28 DRB) But let a man prove himself: and so let him eat of that bread and drink of the chalice.
(1Co 11:29 DRB) For he that eateth and drinketh unworthily eateth and drinketh judgment to himself, not discerning the body of the Lord.
(1Co 11:30 DRB) Therefore are there many infirm and weak among you: and many sleep.
People who refuse to believe in the real presence believe that this represents a metaphor. But, if it is a mere metaphor, how can one be “guilty of the body and Blood” when one receives unworthily? As one scholar put it “Plain and simple reason seem to tell us that the presence of Christ’s body is necessary for an offense committed against it.” (Nicholas Cardinal Wiseman, Lectures on the Real Presence) It would seem reasonable that one cannot be guilty of Christ’s body and Blood if it is not present in the Sacrament. Other scholars said ” No one is guilty of homicide if he merely does damage to the statue or picture of a man without touching the man in person.” (Rumble and Carty, Eucharist Quizzes to a Street Preacher) The question might be asked in light of St. Paul’s teaching, can one be theologically satisfied in the meaningless belief in a Real Absence than the fuller meaning of a Real Presence.
(Sagittarius) I do not hate you or your faith. I simply believe that you have lost some of the truth in your way to Christ. The Catholic Church is not the one Church of Christ. Christianity is His church. His family and brethren. In believing in and loving Christ I am a part of His church. I repeat, I have not lied about the Catholic Church. I showed you extracts of your own Catechism that proved the truth of my statements. I merely showed how they were different from my and other Christian beliefs.
(Cristoiglesia) Thanks for your opinion but it would be more believable if it was backed by more than straw man arguments and had some basis in fact. Show me where Jesus founded any other Church than the Catholic Church. You can not because there was no other. In the first century the Church was defined as those who gather around the bishop. Your man-made sect does not match that description. As I have shown you, you have inferred into the Catechism beliefs that are not shared by Catholics and that are not Catholic teaching.
(Sagittarius) You are being unreasonable in not even taking the time to think about it and taking Catholic dogma as fact without Biblical support.
(Cristoiglesia) I spent 50 years of my life before becoming a Catholic Christian comparing the Bible, Protestant and Catholic teaching. I never wanted to be Catholic but it was impossible to deny that the Church had the fullness of Christ’s teaching and the veracity and scholarship of doctrine. There is absolutely no conflict between Catholic doctrine and the Bible.
(Sagittarius) Your Church has made it so that people actually believe that a personal relationship with Christ is impossible without a priest intervening.
(Cristoiglesia) Nonsense
(Sagittarius) Praying for the dead and transubstantiation is not Biblical.
(Cristoiglesia) I have shown you Scriptural support for both. You may disagree but to claim that there is not biblical support is blatantly dishonest/
(Sagittarius) I have not sinned in telling people about the Catholic beliefs. Anyone can see the same from reading the Catechism. And then read the Bible and you'll see the difference.
(Cristoiglesia) Bearing false witness is a sin to God. I have read the Catechism and the Bible and can find absolutely no disagreement. The only reason you do is because you assume Catholic teaching that does not exist.
(Sagittarius) I'm not saying Catholics aren't devoted to Christ or that its false. Im saying I prefer to take my teaching from the words of God
(Cristoiglesia) If only you practiced what you preached we would not be having this discussion and you would be a Catholic Christian. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
17 November, 2009
Papal infallibility and authority discussed with "Bourn Again".
(Bourn Again) So basically, my claims of support from second Peter, is that it is saying that the will of man is not infallible, but the Word of God is. It also supports that the writer, in this case Peter who you claim was the first pontif, taught that he was not infallible. He taught that people should not follow the will of man but the Word of God. Surely if there was an infallible teacher of scriptures the Bible would have mentioned it.
(Cristoiglesia)
2Pe 1:20 Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
2Pe 1:21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.
I am assuming that the preceding verses are those you are using as support for your opinion. Let us examine what is being said here and compare it to the infallible teaching of the Pope. The only way I can see that you are using this verse to argue against Papal infallibility is by assuming a different understanding of what Papal infallibility consists of in Catholic teaching than what is the true teaching.
The Church assumes a certain and special charism with the authority as the leader of the disciples and of the Church. This charism assumes that the Pope may be moved by the Holy Spirit which seems not only theologically possible but likely. Why would Jesus give the authority of leadership unless this authority could be used. Further it states in the book of Acts that the Paraclete came upon the Church, including St. Peter at Pentecost. Certainly a measure of the Spirit was given before this when Jesus breathed on the disciples and gave them the authority to forgive or retain sins. Certainly it is reasonable and theologically supported that the Pope based on His commission by Jesus as the leader would be considered in this context as a holy man, not based on the holiness of himself but by the holiness of His office based on the veracity of Jesus' appointment and His authority given to the Pope. Furthermore, according to Scripture in accordance to 2Pe 1:21, the Pope under specific circumstances, being the prompting of the Holy Spirit, can teach infallibly. One must remember, of course, that the Pope can only exercise this charism when speaking on matters of faith and morals and even then only when the teaching is in accordance with the ongoing teaching of the Church. Since the exercise of this charism has been so rare, only a few of times in the 2000 year history of the Papacy such and assumption by the Church would be in accordance with 2Pe 1:21.
(Bourn Again) Does 1 Corinthians 2:13 say that Paul spoke, "not in words taught to us by human wisdom except of that of the Supreme Pontif and in words taught by the Spirit"?
(Cristoiglesia)
1Co 2:12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
1Co 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
1Co 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
1Co 2:15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
1Co 2:16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.
As in the preceding commentary we see that the Pope indeed speaks infallibly when moved by the Holy Spirit in certain circumstance by the charism given by Christ. Certainly by the authority given by Jesus the Church has the teaching authority of the Holy Spirit which was given to the Church to lead it to truth and not each man to teach himself. The Holy Spirit prepares the soul to receive the Word of God and the Word of God comes from the Church whether it be the written Word or the oral teaching of the Church.
(Bourn Again) No! Does Mark 7:8 or Collosians 2:8 declare that tradition is infallible? No! When Jesus battled with Satan, did He talk to Satan about what tradition had taugt Him? No! Did Moses or Joshua or Samuel or Isaiah expect their teachings to remain through tradition in Exodus 24:4, Joshua 24:26, 1 Samuel 12:25, or Isaiah 8:1? Surely these books do not contain their life time of teaching verbatim!
(Cristoiglesia)
Mar 7:8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do.
Col 2:8 Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
These verses are speaking of the traditions of the law and not the Sacred Traditions spoken of by St. Paul when he said to hold fast to the oral and written traditions. Sacred Traditions are not the Pharisaical Traditions of the law but the teaching of Jesus and the disciples. The Church holds that the teaching of Jesus and the disciples is infallible teaching whether protected and maintained as the doctrines of the Church or the Sacred writings of the Bible.
(Bourn Again) Acts 17:11 shows something intresting. The Bereans tested Paul’s claims against scripture, did he condemn them for having a “private interpretation”? NO! He commended them! Paul encouraged people to test what the Bible says AGAINST the Church.
(Cristoiglesia)
Act 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
St. Paul is not stating here that the Bereans were interpreting the Scriptures but simply comparing Scriptures to his teaching that was received from Christ. The Bereans could find no contradiction between the teaching of Jesus and the disciples with Scriptures. So, you made an error of getting things backwards, they compared the teaching of the Church (St. Paul representing the Church and its authority) against Scriptures. They were found in accordance with each other as Sacred Tradition should be always.
(Bourn Again) So obviously the Bible teaches that there are man-made traditions that should not be exalted above scripture. It encourages people to look for private interpretations and to study for themselves. How can you still disagree? God bless!
(Cristoiglesia) No, it says that the traditions of the law are not above or equal to God's Word. The Bible does not at any time encourage anyone to look for private interpretations but instead to study to understand the truth which is contained in the Sacred Traditions of Christ's Church. That is what the Bereans did; they searched for the truth and found it. That is the same thing I did when I reconciled with the Church as I found the Bible and the teaching of the Church to be in perfect accord. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
(Cristoiglesia)
2Pe 1:20 Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
2Pe 1:21 For the prophecy came not in old time by the will of man: but holy men of God spake as they were moved by the Holy Ghost.
I am assuming that the preceding verses are those you are using as support for your opinion. Let us examine what is being said here and compare it to the infallible teaching of the Pope. The only way I can see that you are using this verse to argue against Papal infallibility is by assuming a different understanding of what Papal infallibility consists of in Catholic teaching than what is the true teaching.
The Church assumes a certain and special charism with the authority as the leader of the disciples and of the Church. This charism assumes that the Pope may be moved by the Holy Spirit which seems not only theologically possible but likely. Why would Jesus give the authority of leadership unless this authority could be used. Further it states in the book of Acts that the Paraclete came upon the Church, including St. Peter at Pentecost. Certainly a measure of the Spirit was given before this when Jesus breathed on the disciples and gave them the authority to forgive or retain sins. Certainly it is reasonable and theologically supported that the Pope based on His commission by Jesus as the leader would be considered in this context as a holy man, not based on the holiness of himself but by the holiness of His office based on the veracity of Jesus' appointment and His authority given to the Pope. Furthermore, according to Scripture in accordance to 2Pe 1:21, the Pope under specific circumstances, being the prompting of the Holy Spirit, can teach infallibly. One must remember, of course, that the Pope can only exercise this charism when speaking on matters of faith and morals and even then only when the teaching is in accordance with the ongoing teaching of the Church. Since the exercise of this charism has been so rare, only a few of times in the 2000 year history of the Papacy such and assumption by the Church would be in accordance with 2Pe 1:21.
(Bourn Again) Does 1 Corinthians 2:13 say that Paul spoke, "not in words taught to us by human wisdom except of that of the Supreme Pontif and in words taught by the Spirit"?
(Cristoiglesia)
1Co 2:12 Now we have received, not the spirit of the world, but the spirit which is of God; that we might know the things that are freely given to us of God.
1Co 2:13 Which things also we speak, not in the words which man's wisdom teacheth, but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.
1Co 2:14 But the natural man receiveth not the things of the Spirit of God: for they are foolishness unto him: neither can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned.
1Co 2:15 But he that is spiritual judgeth all things, yet he himself is judged of no man.
1Co 2:16 For who hath known the mind of the Lord, that he may instruct him? But we have the mind of Christ.
As in the preceding commentary we see that the Pope indeed speaks infallibly when moved by the Holy Spirit in certain circumstance by the charism given by Christ. Certainly by the authority given by Jesus the Church has the teaching authority of the Holy Spirit which was given to the Church to lead it to truth and not each man to teach himself. The Holy Spirit prepares the soul to receive the Word of God and the Word of God comes from the Church whether it be the written Word or the oral teaching of the Church.
(Bourn Again) No! Does Mark 7:8 or Collosians 2:8 declare that tradition is infallible? No! When Jesus battled with Satan, did He talk to Satan about what tradition had taugt Him? No! Did Moses or Joshua or Samuel or Isaiah expect their teachings to remain through tradition in Exodus 24:4, Joshua 24:26, 1 Samuel 12:25, or Isaiah 8:1? Surely these books do not contain their life time of teaching verbatim!
(Cristoiglesia)
Mar 7:8 For laying aside the commandment of God, ye hold the tradition of men, as the washing of pots and cups: and many other such like things ye do.
Col 2:8 Beware lest any man spoil you through philosophy and vain deceit, after the tradition of men, after the rudiments of the world, and not after Christ.
These verses are speaking of the traditions of the law and not the Sacred Traditions spoken of by St. Paul when he said to hold fast to the oral and written traditions. Sacred Traditions are not the Pharisaical Traditions of the law but the teaching of Jesus and the disciples. The Church holds that the teaching of Jesus and the disciples is infallible teaching whether protected and maintained as the doctrines of the Church or the Sacred writings of the Bible.
(Bourn Again) Acts 17:11 shows something intresting. The Bereans tested Paul’s claims against scripture, did he condemn them for having a “private interpretation”? NO! He commended them! Paul encouraged people to test what the Bible says AGAINST the Church.
(Cristoiglesia)
Act 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
St. Paul is not stating here that the Bereans were interpreting the Scriptures but simply comparing Scriptures to his teaching that was received from Christ. The Bereans could find no contradiction between the teaching of Jesus and the disciples with Scriptures. So, you made an error of getting things backwards, they compared the teaching of the Church (St. Paul representing the Church and its authority) against Scriptures. They were found in accordance with each other as Sacred Tradition should be always.
(Bourn Again) So obviously the Bible teaches that there are man-made traditions that should not be exalted above scripture. It encourages people to look for private interpretations and to study for themselves. How can you still disagree? God bless!
(Cristoiglesia) No, it says that the traditions of the law are not above or equal to God's Word. The Bible does not at any time encourage anyone to look for private interpretations but instead to study to understand the truth which is contained in the Sacred Traditions of Christ's Church. That is what the Bereans did; they searched for the truth and found it. That is the same thing I did when I reconciled with the Church as I found the Bible and the teaching of the Church to be in perfect accord. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
07 November, 2009
Discussion with "Jehoel disciple of Jesus" about his contempt for the Church
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) You are not the first person to twist the Scriptures and you will not be the last person to do it.
(Cristoiglesia) Where in the Bible does it give you the authority to interpret Scriptures? The fact is that the Church is the only body with the authority from Christ to interpret Scriptures as the Bible teaches that the Scriptures are Not for private interpretation.
2 Peter 1:20 (King James Version)
20Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
Jesus gave all authority on earth to His Church and central to this authority is the teaching of the Church as the Bible states is the “Pillar and foundation of the truth”. The Church is described in the early Church as those who are gathered in obedience around the bishop by St. Ignatius of Antioch in about the year 107AD. Certainly the Church used this authority to write the New Testament books and to canonize them in the African Synods in the late fourth century and earl fifth century under the leadership of the great doctor of the Church St. Agustin and the authority of Pope Damasus I.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) God does not need Mary’s help in the salvation of sinners. God has the power to do it by Himself and does not need a created being to help Him. The truth is Mary is still dead in the grave.
(Cristoiglesia)Certainly God is all powerful and can do all things but the fact is that God chose to use the blessed mother of God to bear the Savior of the world. The Bible clearly states that this is no accident but that she was chosen and played an important part in the salvation of man and the defeat of Satan:
Luke 1:26-56 (King James Version)
26And in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God unto a city of Galilee, named Nazareth,
27To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin's name was Mary.
28And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.
29And when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be.
30And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God.
31And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS.
32He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David:
33And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.
34Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?
35And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
36And, behold, thy cousin Elisabeth, she hath also conceived a son in her old age: and this is the sixth month with her, who was called barren.
37For with God nothing shall be impossible.
38And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her.
39And Mary arose in those days, and went into the hill country with haste, into a city of Juda;
40And entered into the house of Zacharias, and saluted Elisabeth.
41And it came to pass, that, when Elisabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost:
42And she spake out with a loud voice, and said, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.
43And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
44For, lo, as soon as the voice of thy salutation sounded in mine ears, the babe leaped in my womb for joy.
45And blessed is she that believed: for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord.
46And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord,
47And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
48For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
49For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.
50And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.
51He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
52He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree.
53He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away.
54He hath helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy;
55As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever.
56And Mary abode with her about three months, and returned to her own house.
The blessed Mother of God is certainly not dead in Christ or in a grave as you suggest but has been assumed into heaven by her Son and protected from the corruption of the flesh at death. If the blessed mother of God is not in heaven then there is no hope for mankind to receive salvation.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Will your believing that Mary is helping God effect your salvation? Maybe, but why take the risk of losing your salvation over a myth?
(Cristoiglesia) Believing in the truth is not risking salvation but instead assuring it. The blessed Mother bearing the Savior of the world is not a myth but instead it is truth.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) What you are doing is teaching a different Gospel.
Galatians 1 As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.
If teaching a different Gospel does not effect your salvation it would have a big effect on your rewards on heaven.
(Cristoiglesia) The Gospel to me means the revelation of Jesus in regards to redemption which is contained in the following Scriptures:
Matthew 9:35 (King James Version)
35And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.
Matthew 24:14 (King James Version)
14And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.
Mark 1:14 (King James Version)
14Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God,
Mark 13:10 (King James Version)
10And the gospel must first be published among all nations.
Mark 16:15 (King James Version)
15And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
Acts 20:24 (King James Version)
24But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.
Romans 1:1 (King James Version)
1Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,
Romans 1:9 (King James Version)
9For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers;
Romans 1:16 (King James Version)
16For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.
Romans 10:16 (King James Version)
16But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report?
These verses describe the Gospel I preach from God’s written Word. Where do you disagree with the teaching of God’s written Word and why? Since this describes the true Gospel it must be you who teaches a false Gospel.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Would it not be better to teach the true Gospel that we received from God instead of a man made Gospel that comes from a false church?
(Cristoiglesia) Well let us see if your question makes any sense coming from you. You are a member of a sect in protest of what Jesus and the disciples founded with Jesus Himself as the cornerstone and the 12 disciples as the foundation stones. You are estranged from His Church by choice and prefer a man-made counterfeit of what Christ founded. You call Christ’s creation a false Church while promoting your doctrines of men against the Scriptures I provided which are written by Catholic Christians recording the teaching of Jesus Himself about the meaning of the Gospel. How can anyone give you any credibility for such a stance in testimony of your disobedience to God’s will when Jesus prayed to His Father that we all be one in His Church as He and the Father are one. So, in answer to your question, yes it is better to teach the true Gospel that is contained in His Church instead of the man-made pretenders.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Repent and turn back to the true Gospel that Jesus gave us. We do not need to have our ear’s tickled by myths and false teachings. Do those good works of God that brings rewards in heaven for us instead of the works of Satan that have no reward in heaven!
(Cristoiglesia) The true Gospel was given to His enduring Church which can only be the Catholic Church as it is the only Church founded by Jesus and the disciples and the only Church that endures today fulfilling Jesus’ promise to mankind. It is the Protestants who most resemble Jesus’ teaching about those who would no longer be able to endure sound doctrine and would seek out those who satisfy their itching ears like false teachers like Charles Stanley, David Koresh, Jim Jones and Benny Hinn. Before them there were the Secular humanists John Calvin and Ulrich Zwingli who desired a God who served man instead of the orthodox Christian God that man served instead. They changed the Gospel to suit their Humanist ideals. Unity in Christ’s Church is not the works of Satan but instead this describes the disunity of the 30,000 + Protestant sects.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Your church is full of lies from Satan. How can you say that Jesus built a church that has lies in it?
(Cristoiglesia) The Bible says that the Church is the “Pillar and foundation of the truth”. The Bible prophesizes and warns about the falling away of some for the teaching of “false teachers” and “ravaging wolves” into heretical sects like yours.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) You say your church is the only true church yet you make mary the Queen of heaven. That doctrine is so false its straight from the pit of hell.
(Cristoiglesia) That argument is with God and not I. It was God who chose the blessed mother to bear the God/man. He is the King of Israel and of Heaven. In Judeo-Christian tradition that means that the mother of the King is Queen. Therefore to claim she is not Queen denies the titles of the Son.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Then there is your doctrine you have to be baptized first before you can receive salvation. Even Dr. Charles Stanly says that doctrine is straight from the pit of hell.
(Cristoiglesia) Charles Stanley has no authority from our Lord to teach anything. That authority lies only with Christ’s Church. So it should not matter to any Christian what is Charles Stanley’s opinion. The bible says the following about Baptism:
John 3:3-5 (King James Version)
3Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
4Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?
5Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
I think one should follow the true teacher which is Jesus rather than Charles Stanley.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) All your church does is lie. There is no truth in your church. You need to repent of your evil ways and return to Jesus. Return to the true gospel that Jesus gave to us, cast aside the false teachings from the pit of hell
Repent and ask Jesus to open your eyes so you can see the real truth from God and not the lies of Satan that has infiltrated your church over the centuries.
(Cristoiglesia) You say that Christ’s Church lies and lacks truth yet you cannot identify a single lie. In doing so you attack the very promises Jesus made to humanity about His Church such as it being the enduring Church for all times that will never fall into apostasy and will remain for all times the “pillar and foundation of the truth.” Clearly it is you who has departed from Jesus by seeking out the teachers of false doctrines to satisfy your itching ears. I repent of my sins regularly but it is not necessary for anyone to repent from being in God’s will by being in His Church. Satan has infiltrated the invisible Church through the false and heretical teaching of Protestantism like Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide and “Once saved always saved” which are all doctrines of devils separating and causing divisions in the Corpus Christi. But, Christ’s Church remains true and is the ark of humanity from a sinful and seductive world. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
(Cristoiglesia) Where in the Bible does it give you the authority to interpret Scriptures? The fact is that the Church is the only body with the authority from Christ to interpret Scriptures as the Bible teaches that the Scriptures are Not for private interpretation.
2 Peter 1:20 (King James Version)
20Knowing this first, that no prophecy of the scripture is of any private interpretation.
Jesus gave all authority on earth to His Church and central to this authority is the teaching of the Church as the Bible states is the “Pillar and foundation of the truth”. The Church is described in the early Church as those who are gathered in obedience around the bishop by St. Ignatius of Antioch in about the year 107AD. Certainly the Church used this authority to write the New Testament books and to canonize them in the African Synods in the late fourth century and earl fifth century under the leadership of the great doctor of the Church St. Agustin and the authority of Pope Damasus I.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) God does not need Mary’s help in the salvation of sinners. God has the power to do it by Himself and does not need a created being to help Him. The truth is Mary is still dead in the grave.
(Cristoiglesia)Certainly God is all powerful and can do all things but the fact is that God chose to use the blessed mother of God to bear the Savior of the world. The Bible clearly states that this is no accident but that she was chosen and played an important part in the salvation of man and the defeat of Satan:
Luke 1:26-56 (King James Version)
26And in the sixth month the angel Gabriel was sent from God unto a city of Galilee, named Nazareth,
27To a virgin espoused to a man whose name was Joseph, of the house of David; and the virgin's name was Mary.
28And the angel came in unto her, and said, Hail, thou that art highly favoured, the Lord is with thee: blessed art thou among women.
29And when she saw him, she was troubled at his saying, and cast in her mind what manner of salutation this should be.
30And the angel said unto her, Fear not, Mary: for thou hast found favour with God.
31And, behold, thou shalt conceive in thy womb, and bring forth a son, and shalt call his name JESUS.
32He shall be great, and shall be called the Son of the Highest: and the Lord God shall give unto him the throne of his father David:
33And he shall reign over the house of Jacob for ever; and of his kingdom there shall be no end.
34Then said Mary unto the angel, How shall this be, seeing I know not a man?
35And the angel answered and said unto her, The Holy Ghost shall come upon thee, and the power of the Highest shall overshadow thee: therefore also that holy thing which shall be born of thee shall be called the Son of God.
36And, behold, thy cousin Elisabeth, she hath also conceived a son in her old age: and this is the sixth month with her, who was called barren.
37For with God nothing shall be impossible.
38And Mary said, Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word. And the angel departed from her.
39And Mary arose in those days, and went into the hill country with haste, into a city of Juda;
40And entered into the house of Zacharias, and saluted Elisabeth.
41And it came to pass, that, when Elisabeth heard the salutation of Mary, the babe leaped in her womb; and Elisabeth was filled with the Holy Ghost:
42And she spake out with a loud voice, and said, Blessed art thou among women, and blessed is the fruit of thy womb.
43And whence is this to me, that the mother of my Lord should come to me?
44For, lo, as soon as the voice of thy salutation sounded in mine ears, the babe leaped in my womb for joy.
45And blessed is she that believed: for there shall be a performance of those things which were told her from the Lord.
46And Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord,
47And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour.
48For he hath regarded the low estate of his handmaiden: for, behold, from henceforth all generations shall call me blessed.
49For he that is mighty hath done to me great things; and holy is his name.
50And his mercy is on them that fear him from generation to generation.
51He hath shewed strength with his arm; he hath scattered the proud in the imagination of their hearts.
52He hath put down the mighty from their seats, and exalted them of low degree.
53He hath filled the hungry with good things; and the rich he hath sent empty away.
54He hath helped his servant Israel, in remembrance of his mercy;
55As he spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever.
56And Mary abode with her about three months, and returned to her own house.
The blessed Mother of God is certainly not dead in Christ or in a grave as you suggest but has been assumed into heaven by her Son and protected from the corruption of the flesh at death. If the blessed mother of God is not in heaven then there is no hope for mankind to receive salvation.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Will your believing that Mary is helping God effect your salvation? Maybe, but why take the risk of losing your salvation over a myth?
(Cristoiglesia) Believing in the truth is not risking salvation but instead assuring it. The blessed Mother bearing the Savior of the world is not a myth but instead it is truth.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) What you are doing is teaching a different Gospel.
Galatians 1 As we have said before, so now I say again: If anyone is preaching to you a gospel contrary to the one you received, let him be accursed.
If teaching a different Gospel does not effect your salvation it would have a big effect on your rewards on heaven.
(Cristoiglesia) The Gospel to me means the revelation of Jesus in regards to redemption which is contained in the following Scriptures:
Matthew 9:35 (King James Version)
35And Jesus went about all the cities and villages, teaching in their synagogues, and preaching the gospel of the kingdom, and healing every sickness and every disease among the people.
Matthew 24:14 (King James Version)
14And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.
Mark 1:14 (King James Version)
14Now after that John was put in prison, Jesus came into Galilee, preaching the gospel of the kingdom of God,
Mark 13:10 (King James Version)
10And the gospel must first be published among all nations.
Mark 16:15 (King James Version)
15And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.
Acts 20:24 (King James Version)
24But none of these things move me, neither count I my life dear unto myself, so that I might finish my course with joy, and the ministry, which I have received of the Lord Jesus, to testify the gospel of the grace of God.
Romans 1:1 (King James Version)
1Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God,
Romans 1:9 (King James Version)
9For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of his Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers;
Romans 1:16 (King James Version)
16For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.
Romans 10:16 (King James Version)
16But they have not all obeyed the gospel. For Esaias saith, Lord, who hath believed our report?
These verses describe the Gospel I preach from God’s written Word. Where do you disagree with the teaching of God’s written Word and why? Since this describes the true Gospel it must be you who teaches a false Gospel.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Would it not be better to teach the true Gospel that we received from God instead of a man made Gospel that comes from a false church?
(Cristoiglesia) Well let us see if your question makes any sense coming from you. You are a member of a sect in protest of what Jesus and the disciples founded with Jesus Himself as the cornerstone and the 12 disciples as the foundation stones. You are estranged from His Church by choice and prefer a man-made counterfeit of what Christ founded. You call Christ’s creation a false Church while promoting your doctrines of men against the Scriptures I provided which are written by Catholic Christians recording the teaching of Jesus Himself about the meaning of the Gospel. How can anyone give you any credibility for such a stance in testimony of your disobedience to God’s will when Jesus prayed to His Father that we all be one in His Church as He and the Father are one. So, in answer to your question, yes it is better to teach the true Gospel that is contained in His Church instead of the man-made pretenders.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Repent and turn back to the true Gospel that Jesus gave us. We do not need to have our ear’s tickled by myths and false teachings. Do those good works of God that brings rewards in heaven for us instead of the works of Satan that have no reward in heaven!
(Cristoiglesia) The true Gospel was given to His enduring Church which can only be the Catholic Church as it is the only Church founded by Jesus and the disciples and the only Church that endures today fulfilling Jesus’ promise to mankind. It is the Protestants who most resemble Jesus’ teaching about those who would no longer be able to endure sound doctrine and would seek out those who satisfy their itching ears like false teachers like Charles Stanley, David Koresh, Jim Jones and Benny Hinn. Before them there were the Secular humanists John Calvin and Ulrich Zwingli who desired a God who served man instead of the orthodox Christian God that man served instead. They changed the Gospel to suit their Humanist ideals. Unity in Christ’s Church is not the works of Satan but instead this describes the disunity of the 30,000 + Protestant sects.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Your church is full of lies from Satan. How can you say that Jesus built a church that has lies in it?
(Cristoiglesia) The Bible says that the Church is the “Pillar and foundation of the truth”. The Bible prophesizes and warns about the falling away of some for the teaching of “false teachers” and “ravaging wolves” into heretical sects like yours.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) You say your church is the only true church yet you make mary the Queen of heaven. That doctrine is so false its straight from the pit of hell.
(Cristoiglesia) That argument is with God and not I. It was God who chose the blessed mother to bear the God/man. He is the King of Israel and of Heaven. In Judeo-Christian tradition that means that the mother of the King is Queen. Therefore to claim she is not Queen denies the titles of the Son.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) Then there is your doctrine you have to be baptized first before you can receive salvation. Even Dr. Charles Stanly says that doctrine is straight from the pit of hell.
(Cristoiglesia) Charles Stanley has no authority from our Lord to teach anything. That authority lies only with Christ’s Church. So it should not matter to any Christian what is Charles Stanley’s opinion. The bible says the following about Baptism:
John 3:3-5 (King James Version)
3Jesus answered and said unto him, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born again, he cannot see the kingdom of God.
4Nicodemus saith unto him, How can a man be born when he is old? can he enter the second time into his mother's womb, and be born?
5Jesus answered, Verily, verily, I say unto thee, Except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God.
I think one should follow the true teacher which is Jesus rather than Charles Stanley.
(Jehoel disciple of Jesus) All your church does is lie. There is no truth in your church. You need to repent of your evil ways and return to Jesus. Return to the true gospel that Jesus gave to us, cast aside the false teachings from the pit of hell
Repent and ask Jesus to open your eyes so you can see the real truth from God and not the lies of Satan that has infiltrated your church over the centuries.
(Cristoiglesia) You say that Christ’s Church lies and lacks truth yet you cannot identify a single lie. In doing so you attack the very promises Jesus made to humanity about His Church such as it being the enduring Church for all times that will never fall into apostasy and will remain for all times the “pillar and foundation of the truth.” Clearly it is you who has departed from Jesus by seeking out the teachers of false doctrines to satisfy your itching ears. I repent of my sins regularly but it is not necessary for anyone to repent from being in God’s will by being in His Church. Satan has infiltrated the invisible Church through the false and heretical teaching of Protestantism like Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide and “Once saved always saved” which are all doctrines of devils separating and causing divisions in the Corpus Christi. But, Christ’s Church remains true and is the ark of humanity from a sinful and seductive world. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
05 November, 2009
Discussion with 'June M" about her criticisms of Christ's Church
(June M) It appears that you do not know your history professor. You only know what and how you where taught. This is not uncommon in the Baptist Universities. I know my History, one example is a man named Edward Gibbon Esq. 1782 Decline and fall of the Roman Empire. Another is; J. H. Merle D’Aubigne, others are John Calvin, Martin Luther and the list goes on. Your degrees mean nothing to me; these are things of men, not God. What degrees did the disciples have? They taught the people, in plain language about Jesus and His Father.
(Cristoiglesia) So, you respect those who do not seek knowledge more than those who do. False teachers are often those who lack education and knowledge and teach from their imagination believing pride fully that what they imagine is truth has some veracity simply because it originated in their own mind. The disciples sat at the foot of Jesus and received knowledge by His teaching. They in turn taught their disciples and apostolic succession continued throughout the history of the Church. They had a great education by the greatest of all teachers. One should not ignorantly disrespect those who seek the knowledge of God.
(June M) The word ‘patristic’ is a word that came about in 1847 and it is not even found in the Webster’s dictionary from 1828 – 1913. The word means the study of the writings and history of the church fathers. These “church fathers” are from the RCC alone. Your Church has nothing to do with God or Jesus. If you studied the Bible, you would know that.
(Cristoiglesia) My goodness, why are you denying the early leadership of the Church? If you are Christian these are the disciples of Jesus and the disciples of the apostles. They were the ones chosen and the closest to our Lord. Of course they are Catholic as there was no other Christian Church but the one founded by Jesus and the disciples and continued through apostolic succession. Jesus did not found a Church without a permanent leadership and the fathers passed on their bishoprics to their disciples and successors. You say we have nothing to do with God or Jesus yet it was Jesus who founded the Church. Do you realize that your church is one founded by men in protest of the Church founded by Christ? They believed that they could create a Church superior to Jesus and the disciples and they and you are wrong.
(June M) Maybe you should get off Yahoo Answers awhile and study Daniel & Revelation. I am an ANTI-Catholic and everything for which that abomination stands I am against. That denomination has blinded the world and is still doing so. It is no different than from the Reformers days. It is leading people to follow Satan in the guise of Christ. The leadership and dogmas of that denomination have nothing to do with God and His Word.
(Cristoiglesia) I have studied all of Scripture including Daniel and St. John’s Apocalypse and like all other Scriptures find these books to support the teaching of Christ’s Church. There are no Catholic Christians that follow Satan but instead Christ without being in protest of His teaching as your church and you are in teaching the doctrines of men and of devils. The Catholic Church and its teachings are the fullness of truth in Christ. Jesus said that His Church is the “pillar and foundation of the truth and not some pretending counterfeit church founded by men in modern times. The true Church is the one founded by Jesus in whom the Church Fathers taught the fullness of truth and not the heresies of the Protestant heretics.
(June M) They follow that pagan act of idol worship, worshipping the dead. This is nothing more than worshipping Satan who wants to be worshipped as God and even above God.
(Cristoiglesia) There is no idol worship among Catholics as the Church forbids the worship of anyone or anything but God. The last place one would find idol worship is among Catholic Christians. Catholics worshipping Satan is profound nonsense.
(June M) Just in case you have forgotten I will add a reminder of who and what the RCC is.
The Extreme Oath of the Jesuits I furthermore promise and declare that I will, when opportunity present, make and wage relentless war, secretly or openly, against all heretics, Protestants and Liberals, as I am directed to do, to extirpate and exterminate them from the face of the whole earth; and that I will spare neither age, sex or condition; and that I will hang, waste, boil, flay, strangle and bury alive these infamous heretics, rip up the stomachs and wombs of their women and crush their infants' heads against the walls, in order to annihilate forever their execrable race. That when the same cannot be done openly, I will secretly use the poisoned cup, the strangulating cord, the steel of the poniard or the leaden bullet, regardless of the honor, rank, dignity, or authority of the person or persons, whatever may be their condition in life, either public or private, as I at any time may be directed so to do by any agent of the Pope or Superior of the Brotherhood of the Holy Faith, of the Society of Jesus.
(Cristoiglesia) Jesuits make no such oath and this is the creation of anti Catholic bigots. Jesuits are dedicated to our Lord and Savior in all they do. You should be ashamed of spreading such lies. Bearing false witness is a serious sin of which you proudly participate and of which you will be judged by our Lord and Savior. You have been the victim of the worst of false teachers and I pray that you are saved from your spirit of contention. Your lies come from Satan and not from our Lord who teaches love for one another and charity. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
(Cristoiglesia) So, you respect those who do not seek knowledge more than those who do. False teachers are often those who lack education and knowledge and teach from their imagination believing pride fully that what they imagine is truth has some veracity simply because it originated in their own mind. The disciples sat at the foot of Jesus and received knowledge by His teaching. They in turn taught their disciples and apostolic succession continued throughout the history of the Church. They had a great education by the greatest of all teachers. One should not ignorantly disrespect those who seek the knowledge of God.
(June M) The word ‘patristic’ is a word that came about in 1847 and it is not even found in the Webster’s dictionary from 1828 – 1913. The word means the study of the writings and history of the church fathers. These “church fathers” are from the RCC alone. Your Church has nothing to do with God or Jesus. If you studied the Bible, you would know that.
(Cristoiglesia) My goodness, why are you denying the early leadership of the Church? If you are Christian these are the disciples of Jesus and the disciples of the apostles. They were the ones chosen and the closest to our Lord. Of course they are Catholic as there was no other Christian Church but the one founded by Jesus and the disciples and continued through apostolic succession. Jesus did not found a Church without a permanent leadership and the fathers passed on their bishoprics to their disciples and successors. You say we have nothing to do with God or Jesus yet it was Jesus who founded the Church. Do you realize that your church is one founded by men in protest of the Church founded by Christ? They believed that they could create a Church superior to Jesus and the disciples and they and you are wrong.
(June M) Maybe you should get off Yahoo Answers awhile and study Daniel & Revelation. I am an ANTI-Catholic and everything for which that abomination stands I am against. That denomination has blinded the world and is still doing so. It is no different than from the Reformers days. It is leading people to follow Satan in the guise of Christ. The leadership and dogmas of that denomination have nothing to do with God and His Word.
(Cristoiglesia) I have studied all of Scripture including Daniel and St. John’s Apocalypse and like all other Scriptures find these books to support the teaching of Christ’s Church. There are no Catholic Christians that follow Satan but instead Christ without being in protest of His teaching as your church and you are in teaching the doctrines of men and of devils. The Catholic Church and its teachings are the fullness of truth in Christ. Jesus said that His Church is the “pillar and foundation of the truth and not some pretending counterfeit church founded by men in modern times. The true Church is the one founded by Jesus in whom the Church Fathers taught the fullness of truth and not the heresies of the Protestant heretics.
(June M) They follow that pagan act of idol worship, worshipping the dead. This is nothing more than worshipping Satan who wants to be worshipped as God and even above God.
(Cristoiglesia) There is no idol worship among Catholics as the Church forbids the worship of anyone or anything but God. The last place one would find idol worship is among Catholic Christians. Catholics worshipping Satan is profound nonsense.
(June M) Just in case you have forgotten I will add a reminder of who and what the RCC is.
The Extreme Oath of the Jesuits I furthermore promise and declare that I will, when opportunity present, make and wage relentless war, secretly or openly, against all heretics, Protestants and Liberals, as I am directed to do, to extirpate and exterminate them from the face of the whole earth; and that I will spare neither age, sex or condition; and that I will hang, waste, boil, flay, strangle and bury alive these infamous heretics, rip up the stomachs and wombs of their women and crush their infants' heads against the walls, in order to annihilate forever their execrable race. That when the same cannot be done openly, I will secretly use the poisoned cup, the strangulating cord, the steel of the poniard or the leaden bullet, regardless of the honor, rank, dignity, or authority of the person or persons, whatever may be their condition in life, either public or private, as I at any time may be directed so to do by any agent of the Pope or Superior of the Brotherhood of the Holy Faith, of the Society of Jesus.
(Cristoiglesia) Jesuits make no such oath and this is the creation of anti Catholic bigots. Jesuits are dedicated to our Lord and Savior in all they do. You should be ashamed of spreading such lies. Bearing false witness is a serious sin of which you proudly participate and of which you will be judged by our Lord and Savior. You have been the victim of the worst of false teachers and I pray that you are saved from your spirit of contention. Your lies come from Satan and not from our Lord who teaches love for one another and charity. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
Discussion with the Arian who calls himself "David"
(David) #I am not a ‘Christian’ and I praise God for that. I do however follow the Son of God. I do keep the Commandments of God and not man as some 90% of the so-called Protestants today do. They follow the papacy and not God.
(Cristoiglesia) So, if you are not a Christian, what do you claim to be? Are you a member of one of the heretical groups like the Arian Jehovah Witnesses or oneness Pentecostals? Perhaps you are a henotheist like the Mormons?
Jesus gave all authority on earth to His Church led by St. Peter and the other disciples. Only St. Peter was appointed as His prime minister by giving Him the keys to the kingdom. Now, the orthodox Christian teaching which you reject says that Jesus is God in the Trinity so if you reject the appointment of St. Peter and the disciples as the leaders of the Church then you are rejecting the authority of God and are in fact rejecting God’s Word. To reject Christ’s Church is to reject God.
(David) Paganism #1 patron saints adopted by the Catholic Church and held to by some so-called Protestants.
#2 Going to the Priest to get forgiveness forgive transgressions. By this claim they are themselves taking the place of the Son of God.
#3 as the above but they are going to the ‘priest’ for blessings just like the pagan believers have.
(Cristoiglesia) Jesus gave the priests the authority to forgive sins and expected them to use the authority and for the faithful to seek forgiveness from the priests. The priest always acts in persona Christi doing the work of our Lord. The priests acts as the hands and the mouth of God when delivering the Sacraments of wich the Sacrament of Reconciliation is one. Blessings are also given in persona Christi and come from Jesus through the priest.
(David) #4 Many pagan religions had a mother and son Worship system. You can find this is the Mary worship. Even Christ is still a baby in Mary’s arms. In fact just look at the old pagan statutes from Egypt. Also different pagan goddess’s where even worshipped in a cave and their ‘in-home’ statutes had the female god in a small cave like setting, this is seen with Mary.
(Cristoiglesia) Huh??? So, you are finding vague similarities with Pagan worship and attribute these as being the same as Christian practices. This is pure nonsense, we as Christians believe that Jesus really and truly lived and that the blessed mother of God existed also. We have the testimony of Scriptures of this fact. You claim that some pagans worshipped similar false deities and in a backhanded way accuse the Christians of copying the Pagan practices with the only evidence that there was a Pagan deity that had a son. I cannot imagine a weaker argument against Jesus and His mother. Where you really fail in your comparison is that the Church forbids the worship of anyone or anything but God. So, contrary to your beliefs, the Church does not worship a woman or mother like the pagans supposedly do.
(David) pt 1 5 another purely pagan belief is that the dead know something or that they can help you etc. This is yet another un-scriptural dogma that the RCC used to control its masses in the dark ages. ECC 9:5, 6; teaches that the dead know nothing and have no memory.
(Cristoiglesia) The verse you refer to is speaking of the spiritually dead in Christ and not the physically dead. Those who have died physically in Christ are alive forever. The Bible states that we are instantly alive in heaven in the presence of our Lord upon our physical death. Certainly this teaching is Scriptural but it is instead your eisegesis that is in error.
(David) I can list out many pagan items like the so-called statute of Peter which is actually the statute of Jupiter that the pagans from (if I remember the country correctly) Norway.
(Cristoiglesia) This is an accusation that has no basis in fact but was instead claimed by the anti-Catholic named Alexander Hislop in His book “Two Babylons” without any proof except his imagination.
(David) One last note it was the RCC that changed the Ten Commandments of God.
(Cristoiglesia) Never happened! The Catholic translations have the same commandments of any other translation but they are just numbered differently. In the original Hebrew they were not numbered at all.
(David) Changing the worship of the Seventh day Sabbath to the venerable day of the sun, which is nothing but pagan sun worship. At the same time they teach that idol worship and they removed that from their catechism and split the last Commandment to still have ten. Compare your catechism ten commandments to the Bibles and see what the difference is.
(Cristoiglesia) If you read the book of Acts you will see that the first century Catholic Church worshipped on Sunday. Jesus gave the Church the authority to worship on Sunday and all other days as well. It has absolutely no similarity to Sun worship. Ask any Catholic if they worship the sun and you will find none answering in the affirmative. This is from the Catechism to prove that it has not been removed as you claim:
Idolatry
2112 The first commandment condemns polytheism. It requires man neither to believe in, nor to venerate, other divinities than the one true God. Scripture constantly recalls this rejection of "idols, [of] silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see." These empty idols make their worshippers empty: "Those who make them are like them; so are all who trust in them."42 God, however, is the "living God"43 who gives life and intervenes in history.
2113 Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc. Jesus says, "You cannot serve God and mammon."44 Many martyrs died for not adoring "the Beast"45 refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God.46
2114 Human life finds its unity in the adoration of the one God. The commandment to worship the Lord alone integrates man and saves him from an endless disintegration. Idolatry is a perversion of man's innate religious sense. An idolater is someone who "transfers his indestructible notion of God to anything other than God."47
The Church has NEVER taught idolatry.
(David) I am not lying when I speak out against a false and ungodly religion. I am not blind.
(Cristoiglesia) Certainly Catholic teaching is not “ungodly” as you say because the Bible teaches that it is the “pillar and foundation of the truth” and was founded on the promise of Jesus that it would never fall into apostasy and would endure for all times. You obviously are blind to the things that are spiritual.
(David) Since you feel that I am not a Christian (I am not, explained above) why would you say ‘God bless’?
(Cristoiglesia) Mat 5:44- But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who insult you and persecute you,
(David) This brings me to another point. I do not follow a triune PAGAN god. I follow the One True God read 1 Cor 8:6. I follow the Son of God as well. He is my savior and He is not God, He is the Son of the Living God as Peter stated. I follow the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob I follow the God of Jesus Christ who is His Father. I do not follow nor acknowledge any other God but this One God. This triune, three headed, three person monstrosity is so vile and satanic that it makes me sick every time I remember that I once held to something that is totally against God.
Read your history look at the history.
May God have mercy upon you
David
(Cristoiglesia) I teach early ecclesiastical history. The Arian heresy was confronted at the Council of Nicaea and Arianism lost. The teaching of Jesus and the disciples won out due to the miraculous defense of a lowly deacon named Athanasius. No one wanted to confront the powerful bishop Arius except Athanasius. Did you know that Christ’s Church under the authority of Jesus found the followers on Arius in anathema. Arianism is certainly a doctrine of devils in denying the divinity of our Lord. Jesus is God and you are heretical in your beliefs. How can you call yourself a follower of Jesus and deny His teaching and His appointed leadership represented by the disciples and their successors. May the Lord have mercy on you. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
(Cristoiglesia) So, if you are not a Christian, what do you claim to be? Are you a member of one of the heretical groups like the Arian Jehovah Witnesses or oneness Pentecostals? Perhaps you are a henotheist like the Mormons?
Jesus gave all authority on earth to His Church led by St. Peter and the other disciples. Only St. Peter was appointed as His prime minister by giving Him the keys to the kingdom. Now, the orthodox Christian teaching which you reject says that Jesus is God in the Trinity so if you reject the appointment of St. Peter and the disciples as the leaders of the Church then you are rejecting the authority of God and are in fact rejecting God’s Word. To reject Christ’s Church is to reject God.
(David) Paganism #1 patron saints adopted by the Catholic Church and held to by some so-called Protestants.
#2 Going to the Priest to get forgiveness forgive transgressions. By this claim they are themselves taking the place of the Son of God.
#3 as the above but they are going to the ‘priest’ for blessings just like the pagan believers have.
(Cristoiglesia) Jesus gave the priests the authority to forgive sins and expected them to use the authority and for the faithful to seek forgiveness from the priests. The priest always acts in persona Christi doing the work of our Lord. The priests acts as the hands and the mouth of God when delivering the Sacraments of wich the Sacrament of Reconciliation is one. Blessings are also given in persona Christi and come from Jesus through the priest.
(David) #4 Many pagan religions had a mother and son Worship system. You can find this is the Mary worship. Even Christ is still a baby in Mary’s arms. In fact just look at the old pagan statutes from Egypt. Also different pagan goddess’s where even worshipped in a cave and their ‘in-home’ statutes had the female god in a small cave like setting, this is seen with Mary.
(Cristoiglesia) Huh??? So, you are finding vague similarities with Pagan worship and attribute these as being the same as Christian practices. This is pure nonsense, we as Christians believe that Jesus really and truly lived and that the blessed mother of God existed also. We have the testimony of Scriptures of this fact. You claim that some pagans worshipped similar false deities and in a backhanded way accuse the Christians of copying the Pagan practices with the only evidence that there was a Pagan deity that had a son. I cannot imagine a weaker argument against Jesus and His mother. Where you really fail in your comparison is that the Church forbids the worship of anyone or anything but God. So, contrary to your beliefs, the Church does not worship a woman or mother like the pagans supposedly do.
(David) pt 1 5 another purely pagan belief is that the dead know something or that they can help you etc. This is yet another un-scriptural dogma that the RCC used to control its masses in the dark ages. ECC 9:5, 6; teaches that the dead know nothing and have no memory.
(Cristoiglesia) The verse you refer to is speaking of the spiritually dead in Christ and not the physically dead. Those who have died physically in Christ are alive forever. The Bible states that we are instantly alive in heaven in the presence of our Lord upon our physical death. Certainly this teaching is Scriptural but it is instead your eisegesis that is in error.
(David) I can list out many pagan items like the so-called statute of Peter which is actually the statute of Jupiter that the pagans from (if I remember the country correctly) Norway.
(Cristoiglesia) This is an accusation that has no basis in fact but was instead claimed by the anti-Catholic named Alexander Hislop in His book “Two Babylons” without any proof except his imagination.
(David) One last note it was the RCC that changed the Ten Commandments of God.
(Cristoiglesia) Never happened! The Catholic translations have the same commandments of any other translation but they are just numbered differently. In the original Hebrew they were not numbered at all.
(David) Changing the worship of the Seventh day Sabbath to the venerable day of the sun, which is nothing but pagan sun worship. At the same time they teach that idol worship and they removed that from their catechism and split the last Commandment to still have ten. Compare your catechism ten commandments to the Bibles and see what the difference is.
(Cristoiglesia) If you read the book of Acts you will see that the first century Catholic Church worshipped on Sunday. Jesus gave the Church the authority to worship on Sunday and all other days as well. It has absolutely no similarity to Sun worship. Ask any Catholic if they worship the sun and you will find none answering in the affirmative. This is from the Catechism to prove that it has not been removed as you claim:
Idolatry
2112 The first commandment condemns polytheism. It requires man neither to believe in, nor to venerate, other divinities than the one true God. Scripture constantly recalls this rejection of "idols, [of] silver and gold, the work of men's hands. They have mouths, but do not speak; eyes, but do not see." These empty idols make their worshippers empty: "Those who make them are like them; so are all who trust in them."42 God, however, is the "living God"43 who gives life and intervenes in history.
2113 Idolatry not only refers to false pagan worship. It remains a constant temptation to faith. Idolatry consists in divinizing what is not God. Man commits idolatry whenever he honors and reveres a creature in place of God, whether this be gods or demons (for example, satanism), power, pleasure, race, ancestors, the state, money, etc. Jesus says, "You cannot serve God and mammon."44 Many martyrs died for not adoring "the Beast"45 refusing even to simulate such worship. Idolatry rejects the unique Lordship of God; it is therefore incompatible with communion with God.46
2114 Human life finds its unity in the adoration of the one God. The commandment to worship the Lord alone integrates man and saves him from an endless disintegration. Idolatry is a perversion of man's innate religious sense. An idolater is someone who "transfers his indestructible notion of God to anything other than God."47
The Church has NEVER taught idolatry.
(David) I am not lying when I speak out against a false and ungodly religion. I am not blind.
(Cristoiglesia) Certainly Catholic teaching is not “ungodly” as you say because the Bible teaches that it is the “pillar and foundation of the truth” and was founded on the promise of Jesus that it would never fall into apostasy and would endure for all times. You obviously are blind to the things that are spiritual.
(David) Since you feel that I am not a Christian (I am not, explained above) why would you say ‘God bless’?
(Cristoiglesia) Mat 5:44- But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless those who curse you, do good to those who hate you, and pray for those who insult you and persecute you,
(David) This brings me to another point. I do not follow a triune PAGAN god. I follow the One True God read 1 Cor 8:6. I follow the Son of God as well. He is my savior and He is not God, He is the Son of the Living God as Peter stated. I follow the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob I follow the God of Jesus Christ who is His Father. I do not follow nor acknowledge any other God but this One God. This triune, three headed, three person monstrosity is so vile and satanic that it makes me sick every time I remember that I once held to something that is totally against God.
Read your history look at the history.
May God have mercy upon you
David
(Cristoiglesia) I teach early ecclesiastical history. The Arian heresy was confronted at the Council of Nicaea and Arianism lost. The teaching of Jesus and the disciples won out due to the miraculous defense of a lowly deacon named Athanasius. No one wanted to confront the powerful bishop Arius except Athanasius. Did you know that Christ’s Church under the authority of Jesus found the followers on Arius in anathema. Arianism is certainly a doctrine of devils in denying the divinity of our Lord. Jesus is God and you are heretical in your beliefs. How can you call yourself a follower of Jesus and deny His teaching and His appointed leadership represented by the disciples and their successors. May the Lord have mercy on you. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
Discussion with "Jeanmarie" about her false teaching about the Church
(Jeanmarie) I attended the RCC as a child. Christ brought me back to him as an adult, then I went on a mission reading the bible and searching for him.
(Cristoiglesia) Obviously you were not properly catechized or the false teachers that preyed on your lack of knowledge would not have been able to turn you from Christ’s Church. The Bible and especially the New Testament are about the Church so if you used the Bible to search for God it is the Churches testimony of the Church that you read. I am sure that the people you studied with twisted the Scriptures to besmirch the Church that wrote them as is typical of the ravaging wolves who prey on Christ’s faithful.
(Jeanmarie) I was shocked when I read so many passages in the bible that contradicted the RCC teachings.
(Cristoiglesia) Well, I have been reading and studying the Bible for more than 50 years and was trained at Protestant seminaries and when I tried to find Scriptures that contradicted Catholic teaching I could not find any. As a former anti-Catholic this was very disturbing. Every time I tried to support my Protestant differences with Catholic teaching I found out they were correct and I was wrong. Being stubborn and prideful it took me almost 50 years to realize that if I was to teach the fullness of truth and not be a false teacher that I must become Catholic. This was a very difficult realization for me knowing that I was formerly one of those ravaging wolves the Bible speaks of so condemningly. May the Lord have mercy on me for attacking His Church.
(Jeanmarie)I believe there are many kind people who attend the RCC and God will judge their heart and judge them by the gospel of Jesus Christ.
(Cristoiglesia) Yes, He will judge us all but those that bear false witness against His Church will be judged more harshly for this unrepentant sin. I pray for those like you daily who are so deceived by the teaching of the world and embrace the doctrines of men in counterfeit churches before the teaching of Jesus and the disciples through His Church.
(Jeanmarie)Yet I know the Vatican and it's teachings are anti-christ.
So then, you believe Jesus to be a liar and the Bible to be false teaching? Jesus said that His Church is the enduring Church that will NEVER fall into apostasy but instead prevail until the Parousia as the “pillar and foundation of the truth”. You are saying that the gates of hell have indeed prevailed and His Church has not endured and the truth He promised has been lost. Your opinion is pure blasphemy and calls Jesus, at best, an incompetent and at worst a liar in founding His Church which you seem to believe is built upon sand instead of the foundation of stone with Himself as the cornerstone. Furthermore, if one cannot trust His Church with the truth, why would one think that man’s creations like the more than 30,000 different Protestant sects would have veracity greater than what Jesus Himself founded. Such thinking is the epitome of pride and arrogance and is surely a collection of doctrines of devils. Shame on you for attacking Christ’s veracity in this way.
(Jeanmarie) I attend a non-denom church-no we don't speak in tongues or have snakes we preach from the bible and do not hold the traditions of man above scripture.
(Cristoiglesia) I do not know why you would have a problem with speaking in tongues or any of the other gifts of the Spirit. All believers are endowed by the Holy Spirit with gifts that build up the Church in faith. I agree with you on the snakes. However, I find your next statement in opposition to the rest of your statements. You say that you do not holed the traditions of men above Scriptures but yet you reject Christ’s Church calling it the antichrist while attending a man-made church in Protest of what Jesus founded and the disciples. Furthermore, you follow false teachers teaching entirely doctrines of men. Clearly Scriptures to you are only followed when they agree with your doctrines of men and ignore the Scriptures that contradict your teaching as ALL Protestant teaching contains heresy mixed with what limited truth they retain from the teaching of Christ’s Church. So, your statement contradicts your actions, do they not?
(Jeanmarie) In fact in my church there's a former priest and nun who sat down, read the new test and left the RCC-their words.
(Cristoiglesia) Yeah, I know the non-existent Sister that is created by fundamentalist bigots as a compilation of their bigotry and ignorance of Church teaching called Mary Ann Collins. She does not now or ever existed. Yes, there are a couple of charlatan ex priests who go around making a fortune supporting bigotry and false beliefs about Catholics. One of them is promoted by the evil writer of anti-Catholic comic books called Jack Chick and his name is Alberto Rivera. They are lying to become rich. God will deal with their sinfulness.
(Jeanmarie) Now tell me, what statements did I say that is not the truth in my post about the bible and RCC teachings considering scripture is for teaching and reproof.
My Christian church give honor to Jesus the christ not to a man named Peter. He was an apostle not the head of my church.
(Cristoiglesia) Well, we worship God in the Trinity and no one or anything else. So this is your first false accusation about the Church. Then you follow that up with your second false statement which alleges that contrary to Scriptures that He is not the leader even though Jesus clearly gives him this authority and no one else saying the following: “ thou art Peter, upon this rock I will build my Church” He then went on to give St. Peter the keys to the Church making him His prime minister on earth. (See Isaiah 22:20-22)
(Jeanmarie) The RCC does so many thing that are against the bible this page isn't long enough to site them all:
1-call priest father-Jesus said regarding spiritual leaders: "Call NO man father but your heavenly father"
(Cristoiglesia) From the early Church we find that clergy were addressed as father. There are those with little knowledge of history or hermeneutical discipline such as understanding Scriptures within context, who believe that the Bible prohibits one from calling a priest father. The words they rely on come directly from Christ:
(Mat 23:9 DRB) And call none your father upon earth; for one is your father, who is in heaven.
Keeping the verse in context let us look at the verse preceding this verse:
(Mat 23:8 DRB) But be not you called Rabbi. For one is your master: and all you are brethren.
Rabbi means teacher and the Latin word for teacher is doctor so anyone using these terms as well are violating the literal interpretation of the text.
Let us look at the verse after verse 9:
(Mat 23:10 DRB) Neither be ye called masters: for one is your master, Christ.
There is no way that the interpretation could be correct if one reads and understands the Matthew passage in context. He is clearly teaching that one should not look to any human authority as our teacher, father, master, doctor or other titles of respect but instead give to God those things that are reserved for Him. Do you also refuse to call people doctor, teacher, professor, mister, or master? All of these are forbidden as well if we are to accept a literal understanding.
Context also requires that we investigate what the other Scriptures say as well as the understanding of these words by those who followed Christ. There are many instances where the writers of the New Testament contradict a literal understanding of not calling a man father, teacher or master. Consider the following verses:
(Act 5:34 DRB) But one in the council rising up, a Pharisee, named Gamaliel, a doctor of the law, respected by all the people, commanded the men to be put forth a little while.
(Col 4:1 DRB) Masters, do to your servants that which is just and equal: knowing that you also have a master in heaven.
(2Ti 1:11 DRB) Wherein I am appointed a preacher and an apostle and teacher of the Gentiles.
Let us examine the statements of St. Stephen to see if he understood Christ to be speaking literally….In is soliloquy (Acts Chapter 7) before the Sanhedrin before his stoning to martyrdom he used the term father in referring to Abraham Isaac and Jacob as fathers and also to his Israelite ancestors as fathers.
St. John the beloved disciple also did not understand Christ to be teaching literally as we can see in the following verses:
(1Jn 2:13 DRB) I write unto you, fathers, because you have known him who is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:14 DRB) I write unto you, babes, because you have known the Father. I write unto you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:15 DRB) Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.
(1Jn 2:16 DRB) For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life, which is not of the Father but is of the world.
St. Paul also had a different understanding of Christ’s words than the literalists:
(1Co 4:14 DRB) I write not these things to confound you: but I admonish you as my dearest children.
(1Co 4:15 DRB) For if you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, by the gospel, I have begotten you.
(1Co 4:16 DRB) Wherefore, I beseech you, be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ.
St. Paul was speaking of the fact that he is called to shepherd the flock as are all priests. We not only give birth to the Christian through Baptism but also nourish the faithful with the Holy Eucharist and God’s Word. We care for them and bind their spiritual wounds through the delivery of the Sacraments. It is no wonder that we are called father as we care for our Church family as a father cares for his own family.
(Jeanmarie) 2-Pray and honor mary as a mediator to God, "We have but one mediator to God, Jesus who is the christ is our ONLY mediator"
(Cristoiglesia) The Church does not teach that the blessed mother of God is a mediator between us and God but instead that Jesus is the sole mediator. Here is what one of the first Catholic Christian wrote as recorded in Scriptures:
1 Timothy 2:5 (King James Version)
5For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;
The blessed mother of God would never usurp Her sons role as mediator but instead is an intercessor and a prayer partner for all of the faithful that desire her prayers for them to Her son. This is a false attack on the Church and on the mother of God.
(Jeanmarie) 3- Tell priests not to marry. And Elder, priest, bishop were all called "overseers" in the bible which says, "the overseer shall be above reproach, husband to one wife with children, how can one oversee a church if one cannot handle their children"
There is no where in the Scriptures that it says not to tell clergy to marry. What it does say is not to forbid marriage. In fact, both St. Paul and Jesus recommend celibacy for clergy. Both of them gave testimony by their actions of being celibate. Neither does this say that they must marry but if they are married that they should be men of good moral character. So the Church teaches nothing against the teaching of Scriptures by allowing clergy to swear a vow of celibacy and emulate Jesus and St. Paul.
(Jeanmarie) 4-Purgatory-"man is appointed once to die, then comes judgment" Jesus told the man on the cross who was a thief, "today you will be with my in paradise."
(Cristoiglesia) The verse you quote against the doctrine of purgatory shows theological ignorance more than being evidence against the doctrine of purgatory. Jesus gave Him complete absolution by His statement to the thief. Jesus knew his heart and that his soul was cleansed of all sin allowing His presence in heaven. If he needed further purgation to enter heaven this would have been done outside of time and would be done instantaneously in the eternal presence as all are in who dwell in the heavenly realm.
(Jeanmarie) Shame on the roman cath church
(Cristoiglesia) The shame is on you for bearing false witness against Christ’s Church by fabricating your straw man, calling it Catholic and then condemning the teaching of your false caricature of the Catholic Church. Please for your own soul; refrain from false teaching against Christ’s Church. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
(Cristoiglesia) Obviously you were not properly catechized or the false teachers that preyed on your lack of knowledge would not have been able to turn you from Christ’s Church. The Bible and especially the New Testament are about the Church so if you used the Bible to search for God it is the Churches testimony of the Church that you read. I am sure that the people you studied with twisted the Scriptures to besmirch the Church that wrote them as is typical of the ravaging wolves who prey on Christ’s faithful.
(Jeanmarie) I was shocked when I read so many passages in the bible that contradicted the RCC teachings.
(Cristoiglesia) Well, I have been reading and studying the Bible for more than 50 years and was trained at Protestant seminaries and when I tried to find Scriptures that contradicted Catholic teaching I could not find any. As a former anti-Catholic this was very disturbing. Every time I tried to support my Protestant differences with Catholic teaching I found out they were correct and I was wrong. Being stubborn and prideful it took me almost 50 years to realize that if I was to teach the fullness of truth and not be a false teacher that I must become Catholic. This was a very difficult realization for me knowing that I was formerly one of those ravaging wolves the Bible speaks of so condemningly. May the Lord have mercy on me for attacking His Church.
(Jeanmarie)I believe there are many kind people who attend the RCC and God will judge their heart and judge them by the gospel of Jesus Christ.
(Cristoiglesia) Yes, He will judge us all but those that bear false witness against His Church will be judged more harshly for this unrepentant sin. I pray for those like you daily who are so deceived by the teaching of the world and embrace the doctrines of men in counterfeit churches before the teaching of Jesus and the disciples through His Church.
(Jeanmarie)Yet I know the Vatican and it's teachings are anti-christ.
So then, you believe Jesus to be a liar and the Bible to be false teaching? Jesus said that His Church is the enduring Church that will NEVER fall into apostasy but instead prevail until the Parousia as the “pillar and foundation of the truth”. You are saying that the gates of hell have indeed prevailed and His Church has not endured and the truth He promised has been lost. Your opinion is pure blasphemy and calls Jesus, at best, an incompetent and at worst a liar in founding His Church which you seem to believe is built upon sand instead of the foundation of stone with Himself as the cornerstone. Furthermore, if one cannot trust His Church with the truth, why would one think that man’s creations like the more than 30,000 different Protestant sects would have veracity greater than what Jesus Himself founded. Such thinking is the epitome of pride and arrogance and is surely a collection of doctrines of devils. Shame on you for attacking Christ’s veracity in this way.
(Jeanmarie) I attend a non-denom church-no we don't speak in tongues or have snakes we preach from the bible and do not hold the traditions of man above scripture.
(Cristoiglesia) I do not know why you would have a problem with speaking in tongues or any of the other gifts of the Spirit. All believers are endowed by the Holy Spirit with gifts that build up the Church in faith. I agree with you on the snakes. However, I find your next statement in opposition to the rest of your statements. You say that you do not holed the traditions of men above Scriptures but yet you reject Christ’s Church calling it the antichrist while attending a man-made church in Protest of what Jesus founded and the disciples. Furthermore, you follow false teachers teaching entirely doctrines of men. Clearly Scriptures to you are only followed when they agree with your doctrines of men and ignore the Scriptures that contradict your teaching as ALL Protestant teaching contains heresy mixed with what limited truth they retain from the teaching of Christ’s Church. So, your statement contradicts your actions, do they not?
(Jeanmarie) In fact in my church there's a former priest and nun who sat down, read the new test and left the RCC-their words.
(Cristoiglesia) Yeah, I know the non-existent Sister that is created by fundamentalist bigots as a compilation of their bigotry and ignorance of Church teaching called Mary Ann Collins. She does not now or ever existed. Yes, there are a couple of charlatan ex priests who go around making a fortune supporting bigotry and false beliefs about Catholics. One of them is promoted by the evil writer of anti-Catholic comic books called Jack Chick and his name is Alberto Rivera. They are lying to become rich. God will deal with their sinfulness.
(Jeanmarie) Now tell me, what statements did I say that is not the truth in my post about the bible and RCC teachings considering scripture is for teaching and reproof.
My Christian church give honor to Jesus the christ not to a man named Peter. He was an apostle not the head of my church.
(Cristoiglesia) Well, we worship God in the Trinity and no one or anything else. So this is your first false accusation about the Church. Then you follow that up with your second false statement which alleges that contrary to Scriptures that He is not the leader even though Jesus clearly gives him this authority and no one else saying the following: “ thou art Peter, upon this rock I will build my Church” He then went on to give St. Peter the keys to the Church making him His prime minister on earth. (See Isaiah 22:20-22)
(Jeanmarie) The RCC does so many thing that are against the bible this page isn't long enough to site them all:
1-call priest father-Jesus said regarding spiritual leaders: "Call NO man father but your heavenly father"
(Cristoiglesia) From the early Church we find that clergy were addressed as father. There are those with little knowledge of history or hermeneutical discipline such as understanding Scriptures within context, who believe that the Bible prohibits one from calling a priest father. The words they rely on come directly from Christ:
(Mat 23:9 DRB) And call none your father upon earth; for one is your father, who is in heaven.
Keeping the verse in context let us look at the verse preceding this verse:
(Mat 23:8 DRB) But be not you called Rabbi. For one is your master: and all you are brethren.
Rabbi means teacher and the Latin word for teacher is doctor so anyone using these terms as well are violating the literal interpretation of the text.
Let us look at the verse after verse 9:
(Mat 23:10 DRB) Neither be ye called masters: for one is your master, Christ.
There is no way that the interpretation could be correct if one reads and understands the Matthew passage in context. He is clearly teaching that one should not look to any human authority as our teacher, father, master, doctor or other titles of respect but instead give to God those things that are reserved for Him. Do you also refuse to call people doctor, teacher, professor, mister, or master? All of these are forbidden as well if we are to accept a literal understanding.
Context also requires that we investigate what the other Scriptures say as well as the understanding of these words by those who followed Christ. There are many instances where the writers of the New Testament contradict a literal understanding of not calling a man father, teacher or master. Consider the following verses:
(Act 5:34 DRB) But one in the council rising up, a Pharisee, named Gamaliel, a doctor of the law, respected by all the people, commanded the men to be put forth a little while.
(Col 4:1 DRB) Masters, do to your servants that which is just and equal: knowing that you also have a master in heaven.
(2Ti 1:11 DRB) Wherein I am appointed a preacher and an apostle and teacher of the Gentiles.
Let us examine the statements of St. Stephen to see if he understood Christ to be speaking literally….In is soliloquy (Acts Chapter 7) before the Sanhedrin before his stoning to martyrdom he used the term father in referring to Abraham Isaac and Jacob as fathers and also to his Israelite ancestors as fathers.
St. John the beloved disciple also did not understand Christ to be teaching literally as we can see in the following verses:
(1Jn 2:13 DRB) I write unto you, fathers, because you have known him who is from the beginning. I write unto you, young men, because you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:14 DRB) I write unto you, babes, because you have known the Father. I write unto you, young men, because you are strong, and the word of God abideth in you, and you have overcome the wicked one.
(1Jn 2:15 DRB) Love not the world, nor the things which are in the world. If any man love the world, the charity of the Father is not in him.
(1Jn 2:16 DRB) For all that is in the world is the concupiscence of the flesh and the concupiscence of the eyes and the pride of life, which is not of the Father but is of the world.
St. Paul also had a different understanding of Christ’s words than the literalists:
(1Co 4:14 DRB) I write not these things to confound you: but I admonish you as my dearest children.
(1Co 4:15 DRB) For if you have ten thousand instructors in Christ, yet not many fathers. For in Christ Jesus, by the gospel, I have begotten you.
(1Co 4:16 DRB) Wherefore, I beseech you, be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ.
St. Paul was speaking of the fact that he is called to shepherd the flock as are all priests. We not only give birth to the Christian through Baptism but also nourish the faithful with the Holy Eucharist and God’s Word. We care for them and bind their spiritual wounds through the delivery of the Sacraments. It is no wonder that we are called father as we care for our Church family as a father cares for his own family.
(Jeanmarie) 2-Pray and honor mary as a mediator to God, "We have but one mediator to God, Jesus who is the christ is our ONLY mediator"
(Cristoiglesia) The Church does not teach that the blessed mother of God is a mediator between us and God but instead that Jesus is the sole mediator. Here is what one of the first Catholic Christian wrote as recorded in Scriptures:
1 Timothy 2:5 (King James Version)
5For there is one God, and one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus;
The blessed mother of God would never usurp Her sons role as mediator but instead is an intercessor and a prayer partner for all of the faithful that desire her prayers for them to Her son. This is a false attack on the Church and on the mother of God.
(Jeanmarie) 3- Tell priests not to marry. And Elder, priest, bishop were all called "overseers" in the bible which says, "the overseer shall be above reproach, husband to one wife with children, how can one oversee a church if one cannot handle their children"
There is no where in the Scriptures that it says not to tell clergy to marry. What it does say is not to forbid marriage. In fact, both St. Paul and Jesus recommend celibacy for clergy. Both of them gave testimony by their actions of being celibate. Neither does this say that they must marry but if they are married that they should be men of good moral character. So the Church teaches nothing against the teaching of Scriptures by allowing clergy to swear a vow of celibacy and emulate Jesus and St. Paul.
(Jeanmarie) 4-Purgatory-"man is appointed once to die, then comes judgment" Jesus told the man on the cross who was a thief, "today you will be with my in paradise."
(Cristoiglesia) The verse you quote against the doctrine of purgatory shows theological ignorance more than being evidence against the doctrine of purgatory. Jesus gave Him complete absolution by His statement to the thief. Jesus knew his heart and that his soul was cleansed of all sin allowing His presence in heaven. If he needed further purgation to enter heaven this would have been done outside of time and would be done instantaneously in the eternal presence as all are in who dwell in the heavenly realm.
(Jeanmarie) Shame on the roman cath church
(Cristoiglesia) The shame is on you for bearing false witness against Christ’s Church by fabricating your straw man, calling it Catholic and then condemning the teaching of your false caricature of the Catholic Church. Please for your own soul; refrain from false teaching against Christ’s Church. God bless!
In Christ
Fr. Joseph
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)