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