False Christs

Chuckle away, Walter.

Here is more fodder for you to chuckle over.

By 2013 the Roman Catholic Church in America had paid out nearly $3 Billion in child abuse awards and expenses.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/04/sex-abuse-catholic-church_n_5085414.html

Below are a few of the ‘faithful’ priests who Walter calls his beloved Roman Catholic brothers in Christ.


Rev. Robert Van Handel, himself molested as a student at St. Anthony’s Seminary, returned there as a priest where he molested boys in the choir.



Monsignor William Lynn moved predatory priests to unwitting parishes.


Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua ordered aides to destroy a list with the names of priests accused of sexual abuse.


Ex-priest and pedophile John Fiala was found guilty of plotting the murder of the very boy he was abusing in 2008.

Edited because the picture size was too large. If the size of the picture is too large just give the link instead.

 

Scripture was present way before the RCC. You don't the letters Apostles wrote were circulated. The OT scriptures were available. How did the we get the OT if the RCC wasn't there to to tell people what scripture was?

Before 1500, the church still had scripture. The letters where available. Teachers, had access to them and did teach from them. The claim of the RCC that there was no scripture before the 1546 is a myth. There is still 99 manuscripts existing today, that were written before 400 A.D. Written before 1546, there is still 5,700 Greek NT manuscripts surviving. If you count other languages, there is nearly 25,000 surviving NT manuscripts. The church had scripture. They church has always had scripture. To say they didn't is a RCC myth.
*facts taken from Article written by Wayne Grudem, research professor at Phoenix Seminary.

 

Brother Lakeside, I never received a response to my quote above, care to respond? I responded to your post.

Brother Lakeside, another quote of mine above you never replied to, please respond to it as this is a debate forum!

Brother Lakeside, more that you never responded to above!

Brother Lakeside, if apostolic authority continues from the Catholic church after the completion of the New Testament, from the days the apostles died up until the present, why do the leaders of your church not exhibit the signs of apostles as Paul mentions in 2: Corinthians 12:12? If they are truly have apostolic authority as you assert, I would expect this.

 

Brother Lakeside, just one more post above of mine that you never replied to. I await your reply. I responded to all your posts with quotes, but you did not quote any of mine, but rather only expounded your Catholic dogma as brother DHK has correctly noted. I respect your right to your views, however please show you also respect mine by responding to all of my posts. If you do not, I see no further need to continue this one sided discussion/debate. I will not "talk" to myself.

 

BrotherJoseph, In the future as in the past I will answer your bible verses with the same understanding as those early bishops that gave us the correct canon of Holy Scripture understood Holy Scripture.
In my previous posts most of your questions have been answered. I can not help you if you refuse to acknowledge the only interpretation used by those very first Christians that walked, talked, lived with and were taught by Jesus, along with those future early Christians that were taught by those who were taught by Christ, so on and so forth, today, tomorrow and forever until Christ returns.

 

DHK, I and other Catholics have at one time adequately answered all of those questions. All of your questions are just a continuous repeat. You just refuse the Catholic answers.
DHK, if I was to answer the following questions all at once, I'd have to write a book. I'll touch on a few and if you want other questions answered please explain a little more in detail. What I can do is to answer them the way you want me to answer or I can answer the way Jesus and His apostles would want me to answer as per Bible, which way ? After all I am only being taught the way Jesus wants us to learn, as pass on down from His Apostolic Teaching along with the " only one interpretation" of God's Holy Scripture { Matt.28:18-20, Luke 10:16 }Jesus said that in listening to His church we are listening to Him. The Holy Bible is being read to us at Mass every day 24/7.

Originally Posted by DHK View Post
Concerning salvation evangelical churches are united.
Concerning salvation the RCC is lost. They don't know what it is.
Concerning other doctrines the RCC believes doctrines that are: extra-biblical, unbiblical, and even anti-biblical.
Many of them have already been listed for you. You go directly against the Ten Commandments.

Idolatry (worship of Mary and other saints)
necromancy (praying to the dead)
--In the OT these sins were punishable by death.
All of the many sins or doctrines related to Mary
--her birth--immaculate conception: heresy.
--her continual virginity: her children are mentioned in the Bible.
--her assumption into heaven--no biblical or historical basis. It only became accepted as a doctrine in the RCC in 1950. (the changing facade of the RCC)
--her position in heaven: redemptrix, intercessor, (taking the place of Christ)

Purgatory
mortal, venial sins, etc. There is no division of sins.
confession of sins to a priest. Only Christ can forgive sins.
Baptismal regeneration.
transubstantiation.
"the sacrifice of the mass" an abomination before God.
"last rites" It won't do any good at that point in one's life.
celibacy of the priesthood. According to 1Tim.4:1-5, it is a doctrine of demons.
indulgences

There are many more. Those are just the ones that I can think of off the top of my head.
No evangelical church believes in such a laundry list of so many heretical anti-biblical doctrines that in no way can be defended by the Scriptures.

When you see differences here on the board, or in evangelical churches at least they are "biblical" differences. For example, both Calvinism and Arminianism have a biblical foundation to them which both sides defend. Your doctrines are founded on Tradition, the imagination of men, and superstition. Many of them originate in paganism have no connection to Christianity at all.
That is why the RCC is closer to a cult rather than actual Christianity.

Answer this post Lakeside.
It is posts like this you avoid.
__________________
DHK

 

Not a Protestant but good questions, so I'll take a stab at it.


Deuteronomy 4:1-2

King James Version (KJV)

1 Now therefore hearken, O Israel, unto the statutes and unto the judgments, which I teach you, for to do them, that ye may live, and go in and possess the land which the Lord God of your fathers giveth you.

2 Ye shall not add unto the word which I command you, neither shall ye diminish ought from it, that ye may keep the commandments of the Lord your God which I command you.

Of course they did. Consider the quotes of the Old Testament found in the New Testament.

And the New Testament was present among the Church. Much of it came about due to the error of the Church. And that which came about stayed consistent with the Bible they already had, incorporating, explaining, and reiterating what God had already commanded.

On the contrary, as noted, much of the New Testament was necessary due to the tendency of many in the Church following...

...tradition.

Necessary because many thought they had the authority to create doctrine as they saw fit, whether it stayed consistent with previous revelation or not.


God bless.

 

No way, Sorry, wrong again. That V1-2is only speaking about God's 10 Commandments. Not the Holy Bible

 

So you say.


Matthew 4:4

King James Version (KJV)

4 But he answered and said, It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God.



Could you point out the Commandment that has been nullified through Christian Doctrine, rather than the historical and Biblical truth that the Word of God is consistent, harmonious, and eternal?

There is a difference between the Law (Word) and the (Covenant of) Law.

In the Promise of the New Covenant God said He would do what Israel failed to do...


Ezekiel 36:27

King James Version (KJV)

27 And I will put my spirit within you, and cause you to walk in my statutes, and ye shall keep my judgments, and do them.

Relationship with God centers on obedience, and specifically to His Word. When Israel was commanded to keep His Word this commandment was given on an individual basis. Moses did not keep the Law for them, and they themselves were obligated to keep it.

And just because we see at times the leadership whose job it was to minister the Word, fall into disobedience...that did not negate their responsibility to God to keep it.

Were the people of Christ's day relieved of their responsibility to obey God because the leadership was in large part corrupt and in serious doctrinal error ?

No.

So too, we each have a responsibility to obey that which God has commanded of us, which may be a little more complicated for some, but, I can't help but think that complication is often self imposed, and complimenting that complication is, ironically, over-simplification of our responsibility to God and our neighbor, meaning...

...some are quite content to let others do their thinking for them.

Now I won't charge laziness on their parts, because it is understandable for those who belong to groups who advocate this shirking of responsibility, but, I will suggest to them that while their is indeed an established leadership in the Body, while there is indeed tradition which should be based on the Word of God, there is still that same personal obligation and personal accountability that each of us will answer to when we stand before the Lord.

For me, it is difficult to take another man's word for anything, because Scripture tells us man's condition and teaches there is only One Who can be trusted in regards to truth.

And I would also say that the irony of the authority bestowed upon certain men and groups is that if that principle were adhered to in rigid fashion, that group, for obvious reasons, would cease to exist. There is always going to be a need for those charged with handling the Word of God to be replaced, because the Church, though a Temple, more closely resembles the Tabernacle in the Wilderness: always being taken down and rebuilt.

The one point I would make is that the Word of God has been given to every man. It is by nature the very revelation of God, given to men, that they might know God and His will for our lives. If we refuse to allow God to speak to us, and instead simply adopt the beliefs of others, then it might be said we engage in religion only, rather than in the personal relationship Christ's death made available to men on a personal and individual basis.

God bless.

 

I guess Thomas was wrong when he said he evangelized without any Written Scripture while preaching in India. While all those people that walked and talked with Jesus and his apostles must be all in hell because the only evangelizing they received was through "Oral Traditional Teaching ,''same goes for all the early martyrs, illiterate, blind and those Christians that could not afford a bible, all in hell, as according to you.

 

I am not a protestant, but Psalm 19:7 states, "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the soul: the testimony of the Lord is sure, making wise the simple"

Brother Lakeside, passages in the New Testament epistles confirm that even at the time of Paul's writings the gospels themselves were considered Holy Scripture. 1 Timothy 5:18 reads, " For the scripture saith... The labourer is worthy of his reward". Paul is referring to what Jesus said Luke 10:7, "for the labourer is worthy of his hire..."

Paul's epistles were considered "Scripture" too at the time of Peter's writings as Peter declares, "15 ... even as our beloved brother Paul also according to the wisdom given unto him hath written unto you; 16 As also in all his epistles, speaking in them of these things; in which are some things hard to be understood, which they that are unlearned and unstable wrest, as they do also the other scriptures..." ( 2 Peter 3:15-16)

Also we know the various churches were reading Paul's epistles and exchanging epistles because he writes, "And when this epistle is read among you, cause that it be read also in the church of the Laodiceans..." (Colossians 4:16) and "I charge you by the Lord that this epistle be read unto all the holy brethren." (1 Thess 5:27).

 

What bishops?
You don't know what a bishop is?
1Ti 3:1 This is a true saying, If a man desire the office of a bishop, he desireth a good work.
--Here the word "bishop" simply mean "overseer" or pastor. Every bishop was a pastor.
James was the bishop or pastor of the church in Jerusalem. He was also the half brother of Jesus.

 

There is no biblical answer for the questions I present. If you have no answer then why are you here? If it is propagate the RCC then get off the board! NOW! Asked before or not they still demand an answer.

Take the doctrines one by one, post by post if you like and show by scripture how they are in the scripture. You shouldn't have a problem defending your own church.
The Bible says:
1Pe 3:15 But sanctify the Lord God in your hearts: and be ready always to give an answer to every man that asketh you a reason of the hope that is in you with meekness and fear:

--When asked I do the same for people that ask of my doctrine. You need to reciprocate.
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What is salvation in the RCC? How does one become saved?
I say you are lost because the Bible distinctly says:
"For by grace are you saved through faith...NOT of works." That is where that question came from.

That is list of doctrines I gave you that are entirely against biblical teaching when you said you follow the Bible. So prove you follow biblical teaching by defining those doctrines with the Bible. What is each doctrine and then show it through the scriptures.

Find who you consider to be an Arminian. Ask him what salvation is. That is, what does a person have to do in order to be saved?
Find a Calvinist. Ask him the same question. See how much difference there is. I guarantee you that their answers will be very much the same and totally different from what the RCC teaches you.

Prove me wrong if you take offense to my statement. Or, if you refuse to give me any rebuttal I assume that I am correct. Right?

 

DHK is right. Our difference is a "chicken vs. The egg" debate. The way to Heaven is the same.

 

DHK, We are constantly being saved by the incarnation, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Why? Because salvation is dynamic, ongoing. It�s a past, present, and future reality. Let me explain.

Salvation is a past reality: We have been saved by the death of Jesus Christ. While we were still sinners, Jesus� death canceled the bond that stood against us (Col. 2:14). In other words, the guilt of original sin has been wiped away. God pardoned our sins. But being pardoned isn�t the same as being holy. Being pardoned gives us back our freedom to choose the road to holiness, to walk the narrow path. Right now, today, we are being saved. Grace is wooing us down the narrow path. We are becoming holy. Salvation is an ongoing event.

We can easily verify salvation as an ongoing event�just look at the world around us. If salvation was a past event, then Mother Theresa and Pope John Paul II would be a dime a dozen. Instead, they shine like stars in the darkness. The world is a cultural and spiritual battleground�a collision between the culture of life and the culture of death. This, however, is nothing new. St. Paul described man�s predicament in these terms: "What happens is that I do, not the good I will to do, but the evil I do not intend. But if I do what is against my will, it is not I who do it, but sin which dwells in me" (Rom 7:19-20).

Whether you�re St. Paul, Pope John Paul II, or living in St. Paul, the reality is the same: We are being saved because grace has not yet fully transformed every area of our mind, emotions, desires, and will into the mind, emotions, desires, and will of Christ.

And when this transformation takes place, what will we be? The body of Christ. We will be one with Christ. Too often we think of salvation in terms of what we�re saved from. It�s absolutely critical to be saved from hell, damnation, and the stain of original sin, but what are we saved for? This is the ultimate question and the reason why salvation is a present and future reality. We are saved for union with Christ. Or, to put it in more poetic terms, we are saved so that the two may become one.

Wow, what a completely different view of salvation! Salvation is not only a legal event where the guilty prisoner is set free (hallelujah!), but a nuptial event�the two becoming one. God and man becoming one.

God and I becoming one.

If this is true�if salvation means the two becoming one�then our view of what "saves" us needs to back up. Scripture is quite clear that we are saved by the cross of Christ, but what makes the cross possible? It is the Incarnation, God and man becoming one in the person of Jesus Christ. The Incarnation is the supreme nuptial event of salvation history and, therefore, it reveals what we are saved for�the two becoming one.

This nuptial re-union of each person and God is only one dimension of salvation. The two becoming one also extends to the body and the spirit, to each person and his neighbor, to nation and nation. Salvation is a multi-layered affair because sin was a multi-layered affair. Original sin not only ruptured man�s relationship with God (being cast out of the Garden), but it also ruptured Adam and Eve�s relationship with each other and creation, and their inner harmony of body and spirit (i.e., St. Paul�s lament).

Nuptial salvation, then, cannot simply mean being saved from God�s wrath or punishment. Nuptial salvation is the freedom to become successively and ever more profoundly one with the Trinity. It is the re-marriage of body and soul in love and harmony. It is the wedding of social and economic systems with Christ so as to restore human dignity and create "one new man from us who had been two" (Eph 2:15).

Finally, salvation is a future event. After the veil of this life is ripped in two, we shall be fully liberated to become one, but not all at once. In God�s mysterious and progressive plan, our nuptial salvation is completed only with the resurrection of the body. It is then that body and soul will return to perfect unity, and in this perfect unity, we will enter into perfect unity with the Trinity. The two will truly and definitively become one�body and soul, God and man, man and neighbor.

"Are you saved?" You might ask me, I can answer "Finally!"

 

All theoretical gobbledy-gook.

None of it is personal. None of it personally applies to you.

Lakeside, Are you saved? Yes or no.
If so how were you saved?
If now, how does that Catholic Church teach that you can get to heaven right now. Suppose you have cancer and only have 24 hours to live. What hope can the RCC give you that you might know for sure you will enter into heaven?

Then when you get to heaven, and stand before a holy and righteous God, and He were to ask you: "Why should I let you into my heaven"? What answer would you give?

However, on what basis do you think you will get to heaven?
On what basis do you think you will stay out of heaven.

Remember we don't believe in purgatory. So if your answer includes purgatory, you must give scriptural proof that it exists.

 

When were you fully justified before God then?

When did you receive remission of your sins, and receive the Holy Spirit?

And when does God declare that you have indeed been saved, is it here in this life, or will you have to await the future judgement after death?

Are you heading to heaven or purgeotory if you died today then?

 

Nonsense? Really? All the research I have done tells me I'm right on the money. Although I understand your reluctance to include the churches I listed in my post as evangelical, very few people disagree with me. So, although you feel I haven't done any research about the evangelical wing of Christianity, here is an example of who is considered evangelical within Protestantism. Btw, the churches I listed hold vastly different doctrines from each other) is held by very few educated people.
"Evangelical" is an umbrella term which Includes Christian Identity, Fundamentalist, Pentecostal and Reconstructionist, some Baptist (many American Baptists shudder if they are referred to as evangelicals or fundamentalist) and many other groups of denominations.
Some examples of evangelical denominations are: [Assemblies of God, Southern Baptists, Independent Baptists, Black Protestants, African Methodist Episcopal, African Methodist Episcopal Zion; Church of Christ, Churches of God in Christ, Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod, National Baptist Church, National Progressive Baptist Church, Nondenominational, Pentecostal denominations, and the Presbyterian Church in America. Many theologians would also include as evangelicals the conservative members and reform movements within such mainline denominations as the Episcopal Church, USA, the Presbyterian Church (USA), and the United Methodist Church."

So we have listed every type of church or denomination I listed in my post with the addition of the liberal ones that I mentioned I would not consider evangelical. Your definition of 'evangelical' is very, very limited and probably only few fundamentalist groups would agree with you.

Before you accuse me of spreading 'Catholic propaganda' notice that the site I took the above quote from is in no way Catholic. The group behind this website has no dog in the fight and is made up of an irreligious agnostic, an irreligious atheist, a Christian, a Wiccan, and a Zen Buddhist.

http://www.religioustolerance.org/chr_evan.htm

 

DHK,I'd say it would be foolish to argue which of us has the correct interpretation of our Verses and passages that we show each other, yet you will still proceed to argue that your interpretation of any passage is correct and mine is not. What I noticed in yours and other Protestant posts, is that where I provided a direct verse or passage in response to your arguments, you and others will plainly contradict or plain ignore those verses. You did not directly answer all my questions either. I will forget all past questions { being I am on a Baptist site and must submit to your rules } except for this one question, and this is a very important question for you to think about and answer: Do you claim to be infallible in your interpretation of Scripture? Yes or No ? I ask because, if you are not infallible in your interpretation of Scripture, then will you admit that your interpretations could be wrong? Again, this is important because you are telling me that my interpretations and all other Protestant churches are wrong. Yet, you are not giving me anything other than your own personal opinion for why you think they are wrong.

Again, with all due respect, I am not anybody's judge. It is not up to me to say when one was saved or when one wasn’t saved. As Paul says in{ 1 Cor 4}, it is the Lord Who judges. Do you agree that it is the Lord who judges or not? We are not to pronounce judgment before the Lord comes. So, I will stand with Scripture on that point.

One is either in a state of grace {saved} or they are in a state of mortal sin {lost} – there is no halfway point between the two. Nor did I say that one gains their salvation by works. The Church that I am a member of teaches that one is saved through Baptism {John 3:3–5; 1 Peter 3:20–21; Acts 2:38}, and that this is an absolutely free gift of God – not because of faith nor because of works. That salvation is an absolutely free gift of God can be seen most clearly in the practice of infant Baptism, where the child cannot make an act of faith nor can he perform any work. He is saved gratuitously by God.

However, once a person is justified {saved} through Baptism, then they must continue to abide in Christ, or they can lose that salvation {John 15:6}. How do you abide in Christ? Through faith and works {John 6:54, 56; John 15:10; 1 John 2:5–6; 1 John 3:24; 1 John 4:16; 2 John 9}. In other words, God gives us a free gift – the gift of eternal life. We do not earn that gift, it is freely given. Yet, we have to respond to that gift. We can choose to not open that gift; to not apply it to our lives; to reject it – at any point after we have been saved. That’s why Paul warns the Gentiles about the possibility of being cut off from the olive tree {Christ} in{ Romans 11:17–24} – a verse which I previously mentioned, but which you failed to respond to. That’s why Paul tells the Galatians that if they accept circumcision, and the law that goes with it, they will be severed from Christ {Gal 5:4} – another verse to which you or somebody else wrote was wrong..

Furthermore, I do not throw out the Books of Romans and Galatians – my Christian Faith teaches and believes every single verse in each of those books, and there is nothing in either of those books that is contrary to anything in my Christian Faith, and vice versa. The problem you are having again stems from a bad interpretation you have made. Romans and Galatians do not say that “works play no part in salvation,” they say that “works of the law” play no part in salvation. Does that mean all works? No, it does not. It means the works of the law that were imposed upon the Israelites by God in the desert. We see this quite clearly in{ Galatians 3:17} which tells us the law came “four hundred and thirty years after” Abraham. In other words, the phrase, “works of the law,” refers not to all good works, as you interpret it, but to the very specific requirements of the Mosaic Law.

As I previously wrote in a past post and that is, by your reasoning, a person can be saved, but then can go out and commit murder, rape, robbery, blasphemy, heresy, etc., and every other manner of sin, and never repent of those sins, and yet still be absolutely assured of their salvation. That, with all due respect, is plain crazy. If eternal security – absolute assurance of salvation – is true, then Paul’s letters to the Romans, to the Corinthians, to anybody then should say something like; Relax guys, enjoy life, sin all you want, because we're all going to Heaven regardless of our sins.

 

Unfortunately for you, Rand, Protestants have a bigger problem with child molesting preachers than the Catholic Church. I could post websites which expose Protestant ministers who have been convicted of child molestation along with cover-ups by their congregations or their leadership. The Protestant church I grew up in covered up the crimes of a child molesting pastor for years until it all 'hit-the-fan'. According to the link I have posted below, there are probably far more Protestant ministers who have molested/molesting children than in the Catholic Church.

http://www.catholic-convert.com/wp-content/uploads/SexInProtestantChurches.pdf