Featured My Journey Into The Catholic Church

Which of the factions in the Anglican Church do you adhere to: Anglo-Catholic, Evangelical, etc., or none of them?

 

it fits in the way John outlined his Gospel that Jesus was referencing spiritual concepts in physical terms!

John contrasted unsaved saw it in physical terms, saved as knowing it meant a spiritual meaning, contrasting light and darkness!

Unsaved saw jesus referring to destroying temple of Solomon, spiritual truth was referencing his pwn body as that temple!

Like fashion, his body/blood refernce would NOT be physical sense, as jews took it, by representing his death on the Cross for atonement for sins, and that was to be received by faith!

 

My personal belief..

I know my name is there because Christ is my Saviour and Lord! Thanks and praise to God for His Love, Grace and Mercy!

My personal belief, based on Revelation 3:5 is that we are ALL born into this life with our names appearing in the Lambs book of life (placed there by our Creator God). Our names will remain in that book for all eternity UNLESS we fail to come to faith in Christ while in this life("He that overcometh"). Should we fail to accept Christ, our names will thus be "BLOTTED OUT"....either at our death or the judgement. That is the only interpretation I can come to that does not, as far as I can tell, conflict with or contradict the rest of scripture. Remember that at the Great White Throne Judgement (Rev. 20:11-15) they are to be judged out of book(s) which detail their works...and THE Book(of life). None (of those who appear at the GWTJ) of their names will be in THAT book (the book of life) at that point in the future. That ought to give us ALL an extreme burden for the souls of men. Time is truly getting short. By the way...if anyone can refute what I just said then I would be interested in seeing "what ya got".
Bro.Greg:saint:

 

I agree Matt, I was trying to get Walter's stance on Sola Scriptura and the Tradition of practicing Catholics.

 

This thread is good to know who the cannibals are

 

I guess, 'none of them'*. I guess you can describe me as a conservative, central churchman--not too high, not too low. I'm just a 'mere Anglican'. :thumbs:

(*and I'm certainly not an Episcopagan)

 

Good morning Walter. I asked the question that I did because you stated

As you seemed to imply that His words were not a metaphor, but that He was saying the bread He was presenting was actually His flesh. I ask again, if He was being LITERAL about them eating His flesh and not talking from a spiritual sense, then why not literally give them a piece of flesh and his own blood?

I think these are the problems we run into when people say that He was saying that the bread had now supernaturally become His body, now eat of it.

So either His intent was that they eat of His physical body, which they could of because He was right there, yet that's not what was offered. Or He was talking about supernaturally eating from His spiritual body and drinking His spiritual blood.

The disciples didn't literally do it so why would we think that Holy Communion leads us to literally do it as opposed to it being a spiritual sacrament?

Sacraments appear to always be spiritual as opposed to physical. Baptism is likewise supposed to be an outward representation of the spiritual.

Or do Catholics also believe that something else is taking place by the sprinkling on of the water?

 

Thanks for the explanation.

 

I wanted to comment on the comments that have been made on the words of Jesus in John:6 trying to prove that this affirms the RC view of Communion/Eucharist.

A few points: Jesus spoke these words long before the Last Supper was taken; therefore, they cannot refer to the Lord's Supper. Notice the context of the words and the associated verses. "Belief" is strongly associated with these words of Jesus. Jesus is saying that whoever believes eats His body and drinks His blood; it is by faith in Jesus that people receive Him as the living bread from heaven. This has nothing to do with a ritual. Same as water baptism. It is by faith, by believing, that people partake of Jesus, the living water, and are baptized by the Spirit into His Body.

Thus, it is by believing that people drink of Jesus and partake of Jesus the living bread. Water baptism and the Lord's Supper are signs and symbols of this.

Now is Jesus there when we do this? Certainly, as He is everywhere and in everything done by faith!

Does our partaking of or "eating" this living bread require the mediation of a priest, Roman Catholic or other? Absolutely not. We partake simply by believing.

 

Being Reasonable...

Walter....unlike some others who might tend toward the "extreme", I don't believe it is even reasonable to compare or try to characterize what the Catholics (and I presume the Episcopalians and Anglicans as well) call the "Eucharist" or "Communion" (what we Baptists rightly call the Lord's Supper) a form of "cannibalism". That is both crude and unreasonable.
I know that the doctrine that is taught and upheld by the Catholic Church is known as "Transubstantiation". I would like to know what Scripture plainly and without doubt supports this doctrine. Please remember that I cannot accept ANY extra-Biblical "tradition" of the Catholic church (OR the Baptist denomination) as "authoritative" in a binding sense. I can ONLY accept clear Biblical Authority from the Word of God.
Respectfully, I certainly don't think Catholics are "cannibals", but I believe their practice of "Communion" teaches things that have no valid Biblical ground. You are in my prayers.

Bro.Gregraying:

 

To Thinkingstuff:

I want to re-post what I wrote earlier because I used the word "honest" inappropriately, twice. Since I can't edit that post, I'll re-post it here with the word "honest" changed. I'll put the new word in bold. This is post #40:

"If you're going to debate church history with me, at least be factual. No Baptist individual or church ever persecuted or murdered anyone for their religious beliefs.

Further, where is your historical evidence to support your statement of "Ana-Baptist factions who slaughtered Catholics"? It isn't there. Now, if you're referring to the Munster fanatics, every knowledgeable person knows they were atypical of the Anabaptist movement and an aberration. The Anabaptists were pacifists who believed in religious freedom even for their tormentors.

The fact is that the reason state church murderers have religious freedom today is because of Baptists, Anabaptists, and Quakers."

 

Are you then saying that the KKK liked Catholics?

SolaSaint - if you're asking what Walter on what he bases his doctrine in your Scripture or Tradition question, then I would humbly submit that you're proposing a false dichotomy: the two are not IMO to be pitted against each other but rather complement each other. So my answer and I suspect Walter's to your question, "which do you rely on for doctrine: Scripture or Church Tradition", would be "Both! It's not an either/or question."

 

Ever read Galatians 5:4 ?

 

I think Catholics would agree that we are justified by grace not by law, so that's a bit of a straw man you're putting up there.

 

Yeah, I'm not sure what that verse has to do with anything Walter has posted.

 

You are setting up a strawman arguement. I didn't say that Baptist killed anyone for their beliefs not once. Well at least not the present day model of baptist which is an amalgamation of differing reformed influences. What I did say in response to this Statement of yours

Was 1) it wasn't the Church that was responsible for massacre your cited with The Piedmont Easter rather the Civil Authority who was not the church but a regional leader. 2) and that Baptist have a history that is not innocent of as you say it

as baptist have certainly tortured and murdered other Christians (note I didn't say for their faith, Non the less they tortured and murdered with the full backing of their local churches). I then pointed to the wide acceptance of Slavery by the Southern Baptist (which many were tortured and hung for various reasons) and the trail of tears acknowledging that both African American slaves were Christian as well as the Cherokee Natives. Thus it can be said baptist did kill torture and kill other christians though not for their faith. My third point 3) was that we can no more tie the bad behavoir of this duke to the Catholic Church than we can of baptist belief to those who participated in slavery or or the trail of tears despite the wide support from their local churches. Though of course the difference is that the Catholic Church is a singular institution where as each baptist church is an institution of itself. Still can I say the fundementals which form baptist faith and doctrine lead to these attrocities? No. But neither can I say the Duke acted in accordance with Catholic Teaching.

indeed I am

If your argument is they acted independently apart from their faith then this is no different than the argument I've proposed regarding the civil authorities who killed these protestants. The only difference is that where one is a mob (munster) and the other is a civil authority (The Duke). Both belied the teachings of their faith but to include one to be fair must include the other.

A little reforemed history here? First of all you haven't properly Identified "state church" and how that opperates. Where a king who holds to a faith believes they must protect that faith with in their territory thus a Catholic King will seek to root out heresy (protestant) in a manner they see fit. OR a protestant King (or Queen as in Elizabeth) will seek to root out heresey (catholic) as they see fit. The Church itself apart from the civil authorities is not involved execpt as a Clergy member may be involved in an advisory roll whose advise often wasn't taken or else you had corrupt a clergy member. But this is true in both camps as we can see how things played out in Europe. This is not reflective of the teachings of faith and morals. Catholics btw in the United States were just as invested in not only the fight for independence but ensuring that the State didn't impose itself upon religeous practices as well as were other faiths to inlcude those you mentioned. As we can see that the first three original states that provided for religious tolleration were Pennsylvania (thanks to William Penn a Quaker), Maryland (pedominately Catholic), and Virginia. And interesting to note before the Revolutionary War Catholic Maryland passed the Toleration Act in 1649 allowing for religious liberty which later was to be taken away by Puritans who leaving Anglican Virginia revolted against Maryland leadership. However, once the Catholics again took control they re-enacted the toleration act in 1658.

 

I was just wondering what the advantage of moving away from being a Baptist to being a Roman Catholic would be? Really, is it the mysticism, the boring service or is it the feeling like your a part of something (maybe bigger --more grandiose)

I have 32 years as a RC & was born into it.... they (RCC) would have to offer me some pretty compelling reasons to make that switch (ie preferred stock, bonds, real estate in NYC--which they own most of BTW). And because I live up in the northland area of the USA, I am well aware of the fact that most religious are Roman Catholics....so perhaps I could be given authority to take over a mid-western state (Im thinkin Iowa) with my contingency of Ladino's, working class Irish, Polish & Italians. Because I live in NJ though, would have to pass on any young Catholic gals from the DR. I could also have some local parishes prepare trays of lasagna for our esteemed Governor---who needs to keep his strength up by inhaling 2 at one sitting? And now since we are into lent.....Friday tuna casseroles. :thumbsup: :laugh:

 

For me it would be the issue of sanctification through the sacraments in particular; time and again I've seen sola fide used as an excuse for a lack of holy living ("'cos that's 'works', innit? I don't have to do anything to please God so I can please meself", etc) and I myself have come to the conclusion for me that there must be more to being a Christian in this life than that. Whether that means 'Rome' or not is another matter, but for a number of years I personally have felt 'spiritually incomplete' within evangelicalism