Please share these videos with your Roman Catholic friends, either on Facebook or wherever you tend to find them. Dr. Robert Godfrey provides excellent summary statements of prevalent Roman myths, in the context of what Roman Catholic apologists are always telling us, in a couple of very short summaries.
The Inventions of Rome Part 1: Godfrey directly addresses Roman Catholic apologists here: especially the myth that Rome is fundamentally unchanged, with an unbroken tradition for 2000 years. He calls this notion "fundamentally untrue and historically inaccurate".Godfrey traces the various historical phases of the Roman church through history, and how it has changed at various times.
The inventions of Rome Part 2: A look at "development" and how Rome invented "The Eucharist".
Rome "cherry-picks" what early church writings say, that seem to support its later doctrines. But when you look at them more broadly, that language is used very loosely, and the early writers can also support Lutheran and Reformed doctrines. If Rome's story about itself is "fundamentally untrue", as Godfrey says, and as I thoroughly believe, then calling it out, in any period, is a necessary duty of Christians in any age.
Vast majority of the Early Church Fathers taught that the Eucharist is the real, physical Body and Blood of Jesus Christ. Yes, they use different language, some are more explicit than the others and there were different emphasis, but the Zwinglian idea that the Eucharist is simply bread consumed in a memorial meal is incompatible with the beliefs of the Early Church. This showed up very well in the debate between Robert Sungenis and James White about the Mass (it was the first one of the two debates on the Holy Mass, as far as I remember) - White had to dodge most of the quotes from the Church Fathers which Sungenis provided in his opening statement, did not even touch them, but had to focus on a more ambiguous quote from St. Augustine.
ReplyDeleteBesides that, the Catholic doctrine of the Real Presence in the Eucharist has much more Patristic support than key Reformed doctrines such as double imputation, forensic justification as a one-time event or OSAS, all of which have little to no support in the Early Church. The Reformers simply made up these doctrines based on serious errors in exegesis of passages like Romans 3-4 or 2 Corinthians 5:21 (which some Protestants realize today, such as proponents of the New Perspective on Paul) and poor attempts to explain away the warning passages which clerly teach that justification and salvation can be lost, and the reality of apostasy. An example is infamous Calvin's doctrine of "evanescent grace", according to which the reprobate receive "fake" grace which makes them behave same way as the elect (which throws out of the window any assurance of salvation which the Reformed doctrine claims to give). If I remember correctly, Calvin did not support this doctrine with a single Scriptural verse in the relevant passage of the Institutes - not surprising, as Scripture does not teach such a thing. Rather, as the Early Church Fathers recognized and the Catholic Church teaches, justification and salvation can be lost through unrepented sin.
Writers like Tertullian and Augustine all held to a symbolic presence, and the retention of the form of the bread. No "change" was introduced until Ambrose around the year 400. Check out Edward Kilmartin's "The Eucharist in the West: History and Theology". Aside from that, there is a huge change moving from a banquet meal (see 1 Cor 8-12) to the notion of a sacerdotal system. See Hebrews, for that matter -- a once-for-all sacrifice. There is no "re-presentation". That's just bogus.
ReplyDeleteIn fact, "the New Perspective on Paul" has largely been debunked. And Protestant doctrines ought not to be in question anyway. If Rome changed the faith, Rome is hugely culpable.
You should also check the accuracy of your statement "the Zwinglian idea that the Eucharist is simply bread consumed in a memorial meal..."
Delete"Writers like Tertullian and Augustine all held to a symbolic presence, and the retention of the form of the bread. No "change" was introduced until Ambrose around the year 400."
ReplyDeleteThat is simply not true, and many examples can be quoted. St. Cyril of Jerusalem (Catechetical Lecture 22) explicitly compares the change of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist to the change of water into wine at Cana, which was a physical change of course. Other Church Fathers also supported Catholic interpretation of John 6 linking the necessity of eating the flesh and drinking blood of the Son of Man with the Eucharist, rather than simply "believing" (St. Cyprian of Carthage, St. Basil the Great and others). And of course there is no question that the sacrificial character of the Eucharist and the New Testament sacrificial priesthood itself were widely believed in by the early Christians long before 400 AD.
"See Hebrews, for that matter -- a once-for-all sacrifice. There is no "re-presentation". That's just bogus."
Once and for all sacrifice which needs to be applied to Christians through time, which is why Our Lord interceeds for the believers constantly (Hebrews 7:24-25). Which is also why 1 John 1:9 teaches that we will be forgiven if we keep confessing our sins (conditional depending upon doing that in the future) - if we don't, the Sacrifice of Christ will not be applied to us (Hebrews 10:26). 1 John 1:9 completely refutes the idea of OSAS and justification as a one-time event, for it speakes about future forgiveness of sins which is conditional upon whether we confess our sins or not.
"In fact, "the New Perspective on Paul" has largely been debunked."
Way too often Reformed polemics with NT Wright and people like him focus on accusing them of abandoning Christian orthodoxy rather than refuting the exegetical arguments themselves. James White debated NT Wright on justification in St. Paul and did not do well.
"And Protestant doctrines ought not to be in question anyway."
Why not? Since you complain about alleged lack of Patristic evidence for the Eucharist (which is not true), I simply point out that the Reformed doctrines such as OSAS, double imputation and one-time forensic justification have very poor or no support in the Early Church, and thus, by your standards, need to be rejected. The reality is that the Early Church simply did not beleive in anything like that. Alister McGrath quite explicitly admits in his book "Iustitia Dei. A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification" that the Reformed understanding of justification as a one-time event was a complete break with the earlier Christian theology which saw justification as a process. Reformed theology is a 16th century man-made set of doctrines.
Delete///St. Cyril of Jerusalem (Catechetical Lecture 22) explicitly compares the change of bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ in the Eucharist to the change of water into wine at Cana, which was a physical change of course.///
Paul Bradshaw, a professor of Liturgy at Notre Dame University, noted that the five "Mystagogical Catecheses" -- one of which you cite (22), "questions have been raised about their authorship". This is not a surprise, given all the forged and mis-attributed works from early church history.
Bradshaw points out "differences in literary style and theology" and a description of the liturgy at Jerusalem, which not only was not necessarily "the liturgical customs of other places at the same period", but is later (around 383-386 -- much later than the rest of the homilies), and also "a more developed form than is likely to have been the case as early as 348".
Which puts these lectures around the time of Ambrose, at the end of the 4th century. That's a pretty remarkable leap (and a very long one) before the earliest comments to the effect that there is "full assurance concerning those Divine Mysteries".
///Once and for all sacrifice which needs to be applied to Christians through time, which is why Our Lord interceeds for the believers constantly (Hebrews 7:24-25).///
Yes HE intercedes. There is no need for an eartly priest. In fact, Hebrews makes Christ a priest "according to the order of Melchizedek", whereas the Roman "priesthood" is a continuation of the Aaronic priesthood.
///rather than refuting the exegetical arguments themselves. ///
See Charles Lee Irons, "The Righteousness of God" for example. There are also the two-volume works on "Variegated Nomism" edited by D.A. Carson. Both of these works make a mockery of Sanders. WSCal has done excellent work in this area. Dunn has also backed off quite a bit. Wright is not the exegetical genius of the NPP.
///James White debated NT Wright on justification in St. Paul and did not do well.///
You want exegetical arguments, and here you are, citing a poor performance (says you) in a debate.
///"And Protestant doctrines ought not to be in question anyway."
Why not?///
Because if Rome has corrupted something, having "patristic evidence" is not a shield. If Rome was corrupt at that date, then Protestant efforts to return to Biblical clarity have no need to rely on "patristic" evidence.
As for McGrath on justification, you are mis-reading and proof-texting just like everyone else.
http://triablogue.blogspot.com/2011/10/righteousness-of-god.html
The references to Cyril of Jerusalem were from Bradshaw's "The Search for the Origins of Christian Worship", 1992, Oxford University Press, 113-114.
DeleteArvinger,
DeleteEvangelicals make different claims about church history, so they bear a different burden of proof accordingly. You can't just select a few Roman Catholic beliefs or beliefs somewhat similar to Catholicism's, contrast the alleged patristic popularity of those beliefs to the alleged patristic unpopularity of a few Evangelical beliefs of your choice, then expect us to reach conclusions like yours on that basis. Evangelicals don't claim that they're an infallible denomination that's existed throughout church history, always teaching the same doctrines, making the sort of high historical claims for our teachings that Catholicism makes for its own. Even if we were to adopt your positions on issues like the ones you raised, based on your reasoning, those beliefs would have to be accompanied by others that are anti-Roman-Catholic, based on the same sort of reasoning.
Arvinger,
Delete"the New Perspective on Paul"
This undermines your entire argument of the Consensus Fidelium. The point of the NPP is that they have uncovered the true context of Paul and that it was lost till recently. This undermines the idea that the true beliefs about Justification has been preserved through the Church.
" Alister McGrath quite explicitly admits in his book "Iustitia Dei. A History of the Christian Doctrine of Justification" that the Reformed understanding of justification as a one-time event was a complete break with the earlier Christian theology which saw justification as a process. Reformed theology is a 16th century man-made set of doctrines."
This is ironic, because McGrath would conclude that the Catholic view of justification was a later novelty.