ReligionDiscuss General Theology, Religions and Denominations, God's Attributes, Predestination and Free Will, Dispensationalism, Eschatology, Philosophy, Origins, Archaeology, Science, World History and other such topics.
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How forcible are right words! but what doth your arguing reprove? (Job 6:25 KJV )
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May 7th, 2012, 11:32 PM
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Originally Posted by Traditio
God's authority isn't fallible.
What you think that having and using God's authority magically transforms us into something we're not?
God's servants are only infallible if they choose to relay the message exactly as God gave it to them and follow direction precisely. Moses clearly shows us that God can give direction to His servants who have His authority on Earth and those servants can disregard that direction and do something different or add their own interpretations to it.
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It's only the fairy tales they believe.
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May 7th, 2012, 11:36 PM
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Originally Posted by Traditio
But you've failed to address my reasoning: suppose I grant that Catholicism is the wide gate, and that it is the ploy of Satan to lead us to Hell. Suppose I grant that. What hope do any of us have? Your reading of scripture? My reading of scripture?
So, you'd grant that you're on completely the wrong path, a path intended to take you the wrong way, in fact, and stay on that path because you don't think you can figure anything else out on your own?
Eternal life is an easy promise to make and a hard one to fulfill.
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For as much as it depends on you, live at peace with others.
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May 8th, 2012, 04:22 AM
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Originally Posted by Traditio
The head of the Church is Jesus Christ. If you want to know who's really in charge, then go to your local Catholic church, kneel before the tabernacle, and consider Who is inside. If perchance your eyes should wander to the altar, contemplate what sacrifice She offers. And perhaps your eyes will drift upwards...and then, when you gaze upon the crucifix, maybe God will grant that you understand.
You are an idolator... plain and simple.
All the things you mention mock God and Jesus.
Jesus is in heaven and his Holy Spirit dwells inside of us, he does not dwell in a tabernacle anymore. Jesus is no longer on the cross, so to be honest, the though of even making a crucifix dishonors Jesus and disgusts me.
Your a pagan, plain and simple, and you have no idea who Christ is.
So, you'd grant that you're on completely the wrong path, a path intended to take you the wrong way, in fact, and stay on that path because you don't think you can figure anything else out on your own?
My point is simply this: absent an infallible authority, there's no other sure way to come to salvation. Even if HS is right about the Catholic Church being wrong, then he hasn't given me a viable alternative.
It's either an infallible authority or complete ignorance/uncertainty.
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For as much as it depends on you, live at peace with others.
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May 8th, 2012, 07:44 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Traditio
My point is simply this: absent an infallible authority, there's no other sure way to come to salvation. Even if HS is right about the Catholic Church being wrong, then he hasn't given me a viable alternative.
It's either an infallible authority or complete ignorance/uncertainty.
Your base premise always comes down to needing a man to trust as some sort of interpreter.
The end result is you do not trust the Holy Spirit.
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It's only the fairy tales they believe.
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May 8th, 2012, 08:43 AM
Quote:
Originally Posted by Traditio
My point is simply this: absent an infallible authority, there's no other sure way to come to salvation. Even if HS is right about the Catholic Church being wrong, then he hasn't given me a viable alternative.
It's either an infallible authority or complete ignorance/uncertainty.
That's a perplexing attitude, to me. Are you so dependent on infallibility that you're willing to rely on it even if you know it's wrong?
Eternal life is an easy promise to make and a hard one to fulfill.
That's a perplexing attitude, to me. Are you so dependent on infallibility that you're willing to rely on it even if you know it's wrong?
Of course not. If I know that it's wrong, then it's not infallible. The problem with religious faith is that we simply don't know. We are like blind and deaf men. To borrow what Aristotle says, albeit to a different context, our eyes are suited to knowing the truth about salvation as like "the eyes of a bat are suited to seeing the sun."
We wander about in the darkness of spiritual blindness and sin.
I know that I deserve everlasting punishment. I know that I long for everlasting joy in a God whom I know can bring every desire of my heart to peace and rest. But of my own power, I am completely incapable of seeking the latter and escaping the former. This exceeds the power of my human nature.
God has to supply for my defect and show me the way.
But unless He has given me a visible and heirarchical Church which infallibly can show me the way, then even if He's supplied for my defect, I still won't be able to know what I am to do or what I am to believe. He'll have paved the way, but I wouldn't be able to find it.
What you think that having and using God's authority magically transforms us into something we're not?
God cannot err. Therefore, if He decides to use men to teach infallibly, then those men, though of themselves fallible and peccable, will teach infallibly.
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Moses clearly shows us that God can give direction to His servants who have His authority on Earth and those servants can disregard that direction and do something different or add their own interpretations to it.
We aren't puppets.
But God can ensure that the teachings of the ones whom He appoints will not fail. You fail to grasp that 1. God is all powerful, 2. all knowing and 3. timeless. It is upon the free will of God that the entire created order suspends.
Is an infallible teaching authority invested in a heirarchical Church beyond the absolute power of such a God?
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For as much as it depends on you, live at peace with others.
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May 8th, 2012, 09:48 AM
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Originally Posted by Traditio
God cannot err. Therefore, if He decides to use men to teach infallibly, then those men, though of themselves fallible and peccable, will teach infallibly.
But God can ensure that the teachings of the ones whom He appoints will not fail. You fail to grasp that 1. God is all powerful, 2. all knowing and 3. timeless. It is upon the free will of God that the entire created order suspends.
Is an infallible teaching authority invested in a heirarchical Church beyond the absolute power of such a God?
But since the heirarchical church you speak of was not created or even commissioned by God.. and Peter was not given infallibility in his teaching... to just plainly accept the pagan roman church as speaking for God is beyond what a reasonable person would accept.
Jesus said we had to accept him alone... and the Apostles were purely WITNESSES to his work on the cross. I.E. dogma development was prohibited from them. Given the fact that your church has given itself the authority to invent doctrine based on human reason alone, it isn't worth the paper it is printed on.
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It's only the fairy tales they believe.
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May 8th, 2012, 01:16 PM
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Originally Posted by Traditio
Of course not. If I know that it's wrong, then it's not infallible.
Ok. So, what were you saying here:
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Originally Posted by Traditio
Even if HS is right about the Catholic Church being wrong, then he hasn't given me a viable alternative.
It sounds like you're saying that even if the Catholic Church is wrong, you'll stick with it because it's the only source of infallibility on offer.
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Originally Posted by Traditio
The problem with religious faith is that we simply don't know.
And yet you demand certain salvation? How does that work? I would say that there's an important difference between an infallible authority and an authority that believes itself to be infallible.
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Originally Posted by Traditio
I know that I deserve everlasting punishment.
You're sure about that? How do you know?
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Originally Posted by Traditio
I know that I long for everlasting joy in a God whom I know can bring every desire of my heart to peace and rest.
What if that's not out there?
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Originally Posted by Traditio
God has to supply for my defect and show me the way.
What does he get out of this bargain?
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Originally Posted by Traditio
But unless He has given me a visible and heirarchical Church which infallibly can show me the way, then even if He's supplied for my defect, I still won't be able to know what I am to do or what I am to believe. He'll have paved the way, but I wouldn't be able to find it.
That just not true. You make decisions every day based on less than infallible sources of information. And even if there were an infallible authority out there, your ability to recognize it is fallible. What's another word for a mostly-infallible system? Fallible.
Eternal life is an easy promise to make and a hard one to fulfill.
Slogan/motto:
Luke 9:23 Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me."
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May 8th, 2012, 01:27 PM
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Originally Posted by rexlunae
It sounds like you're saying that even if the Catholic Church is wrong, you'll stick with it because it's the only source of infallibility on offer.
He is saying that infallibility is necessary. If the Catholic Church isn't infallible, then something else is. The church falls apart like it has in Protestantism without a place where the buck stops.
"If a sheerly linguistic version of the gospel could be concocted, it would merely so be no longer the gospel. In the Lutheran Reformation’s understanding, which we believe in this matter to be correct, the sacraments make the inalienable externality of the gospel message and therefore are necessary to the authenticity of that message." (Christian Dogmatics [1984], II:302-303 as cited in Pontifications)
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It's only the fairy tales they believe.
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May 8th, 2012, 01:41 PM
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Originally Posted by zippy2006
He is saying that infallibility is necessary. If the Catholic Church isn't infallible, then something else is.
I'm not sure that's what he's saying, but it's a very, very silly thing to believe. Nothing in the world entitles you to an infallible source of anything, and it's actually a pretty gutsy thing to demand of a God that you believe exists.
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Originally Posted by zippy2006
The church falls apart like it has in Protestantism without a place where the buck stops.
That's very convenient if you want to always have a veto over anything your followers think up for themselves. Perhaps if God wanted to endorse a church, he's simply save it from schism.
Eternal life is an easy promise to make and a hard one to fulfill.
Slogan/motto:
Luke 9:23 Then He said to them all, “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross daily, and follow Me."
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May 8th, 2012, 01:45 PM
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Originally Posted by rexlunae
I'm not sure that's what he's saying, but it's a very, very silly thing to believe. Nothing in the world entitles you to an infallible source of anything, and it's actually a pretty gutsy thing to demand of a God that you believe exists.
I think it's quite rational to think that when God established a church He also established authority within it, especially in light of Mt 16:18. I thought you would be able to infer some of these more obvious points
"If a sheerly linguistic version of the gospel could be concocted, it would merely so be no longer the gospel. In the Lutheran Reformation’s understanding, which we believe in this matter to be correct, the sacraments make the inalienable externality of the gospel message and therefore are necessary to the authenticity of that message." (Christian Dogmatics [1984], II:302-303 as cited in Pontifications)
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It's only the fairy tales they believe.
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May 8th, 2012, 02:08 PM
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Originally Posted by zippy2006
I think it's quite rational to think that when God established a church He also established authority within it, especially in light of Mt 16:18.
Even if that were true, which I think is pretty suspect, but even if it were, you can't parlay authority into infallibility. Or you shouldn't anyway. And it isn't the argument that Trad was making. The Catholic Church rests very hard on those few word by Jesus.
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Originally Posted by zippy2006
I thought you would be able to infer some of these more obvious points
Sorry, heathen logic doesn't allow us to presume infallibility.
Eternal life is an easy promise to make and a hard one to fulfill.
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