Well, Ol' Jimbo White has decided that Dr. Francis Beckwith needs to be "disciplined" for deciding to return to the Catholic Church. Speaking "ex cathedra" from his high horse in Phoenix, AZ, Jimbo has declared that "whatever church, if any" Dr. Beckwith was affiliated with needs to punish him by excommunication. He also has the bad taste to insist that his own sister, Patty Bonds, should have received a similar punishment but -- he is disappointed to say -- she did not. It seems that Mr. White doesn't care what Protestant Church anybody belongs to but when they become Catholic they deserve vilification.
Gosh! Do you think it is possible that some non-Catholic Christians are realizing that Catholics are Christians too and some of the bigotry and hatred that has marred relations between Catholics and Protestants from both sides needs to be discarded? Is it possible that not everyone in the Protestant world HATES Catholics like James does?
I am reminded of what my Lord and Savior once taught us:
John 13:34
"A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
John 13:35
By this all men will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another."
I must ask humbly in the name of Jesus, my Lord and Savior, how Mr. White is showing his love for his fellow Catholic Christians by his wholly negative and uncharitable attitude? We have suffered vilification and misrepresentation at his hands for many years without a single apology from him. Now he rabidly denounces being a practicing Catholic as "a denial of the gospel." A quaint idea since this would necessarily excommunicate EVERY CHRISTIAN from Apostolic Times until Luther made his "discovery."
Is it not just POSSIBLE, Jimbo, that you are NOT infallible and that we Catholics might have a point in our criticisms of the Deformation? After all, in your Protestant systems, you insist on private interpretation of the Bible and freedom of conscience. Why not extend that same privilege to those of us who interpret the Bible in a Catholic manner?
Jimmy, we love ya! And we would love you to join us in fellowship. But right now we are welcoming our brother Francis back to Catholic unity. Any gestures of spite from you or your co-religionists will sit in judgment against you and have no effect on him or us. Francis is part of the Body of Christ and your spite cannot touch him.
Art
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4 comments:
Dr. Sippo,
It's wonderful to see you blogging!
I don't think that Mr. White considers people who swim the Tiber beacause they have become convinced that Christ's Church sits on the other bank to be "christians."
For Mr. White I would imagine a "christian" is someone who was giving the alien righteousness of the penal substutite (God's "only begotten Son) who God murdered to exact punishment for the sins of the elect. And that these elect were chosen unconditionally from all eternity past to recieve God's saving grace alone by faith alone.
*sigh*
What a "gospel," that is, eh?
IC XC
BC
"A quaint idea since this would necessarily excommunicate EVERY CHRISTIAN from Apostolic Times until Luther made his "discovery."
Not exactly, Mr. Sippo. As the noted Church history scholar Harold O.J. Brown (Ph.D., Harvard University) observed:
"The concept of justification by faith alone was by no means new with Luther. Indeed, the ecumenically minded Roman Catholic scholar Hans Küng has in effect contended that Luther's doctrine really was fully and satisfactorily Catholic, but of course Küng himself has been rebuked by the pope".
Indeed, the fact of the matter is that it was the Papal system that incrementally introduced the novelties of the Galatian-styled works religion promoted by Roman Catholicism. Dr. Brown continued:
"From the early Middle Ages onward, the doctrine of the merits of Christ's work underwent a decisive change...It was not justification by faith that was the innovation and therefore the heresy; transubstantiation was the innovation that made the orthodoxy of the past into the heresy of the present." (Harold O.J. Brown, Heresies. Peabody, MA: Hendrickson Publishers, 1984, 1988, pp. 305-306).
What gnostic, magic knowledge do you possess that Harold O.J. Brown, Ph.D., Harvard University, does not possess. He's just a liar, right?
Prior to Luther (circa 1490's), John Colet's lectures on the book of Romans contained a substantial Augustinian content, and more importantly particular emphasis upon the doctrine of grace is stressed as found in the Pauline epistles; Colet stated at Romans 5:1 "Wherefore Paul concludes that justification is of faith and confidence in God alone, reconciliation to God through Jesus and restitution to grace." (John Colet, Romans. ed., J.H. Lupton. London: Bell and Daldy, 1873, p. 141.).
To Colet, writing prior to Luther, justification is "of faith...in God alone." In his Oxford lectures, Colet directly affirmed that those that have faith, which he defined as "belief and trust in God," "will undoubtedly be saved". Undoubtedly be saved! Based upon what? Faith...in God alone.
Such security of salvation based upon faith alone in the work of God is remarkably similar to Luther and evangelical doctrine. Colet's commentary likewise affirmed the assensus and fiducia components of evangelical saving faith, or intellectual assent and trust, respectively; the notitia, or content, is likewise affirmed by Colet in his stressing of true doctrine in the same lecture.
So much for Luther's "discovery" and it not being historic or existing within the thought of Church scholars, Roman Catholic and those existing prior to the Roman Catholic church (vis., prior to the 7th century).
Mr. Sippo, you simply don't know what you're talking about.
Hi Art,
I was once a Protestant, and thought Catholics were cannibals, (perpahs I was young when I thought that!) and then I converted, slowly shedding my prejudices. Its lovely to see that you have you own blog, You needed it!
I hope you have fun and that it does a lot of good. I am following these arguments, although some of it is tedious.
>Also, I think it is sick how Catholics have relics in churches (fingers of dead saints, etc.). Gross.
I reply: If you are consistant you must say the say for Holy Scripture.
"So Elisha died, and they buried him. Now bands of Moabites used to invade the land in the spring of the year. And as a man was being buried, lo, a marauding band was seen and the man was cast into the grave of Elisha; and as soon as the man touched the bones of Elisha, he revived, and stood on his feet" (2 Kgs. 13:20-21).
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