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SLIDE: WHO ARE WE TALKING TO? THE BASICS AND THE FIVE SOLAE

ENGAGING WITH PROTESTANTS Compiled Notes – Ben Rahimi SLIDE: WHAT’S THE POINT?

Reunion is not an option or an extra, it is as much a part of the , or a corollary of , as social ethics is. If a Christian is a little (an extremely little Christ), he or she must feel agony over the fact that the world, looking at Christians, no longer says “Look how they love one another!” but “Look how they contradict each other” and even “Look how they hate each other” – although we have made very significant progress on that latter issue in the last generation or two, which has to be the starting point for progress on the former issue. Christians see (or try to see) what Christ sees. He sees His beloved children fighting among themselves, and this causes Him far more agony than it causes us. His Mother too: mothers are especially sensitive to their children fighting. The (the common absolute authority for both Catholics and Protestants) is very clear about God’s attitude toward denominationalism: Cf. Jn 17. And St. Paul has zero tolerance for it (e.g. I Cor. 1). Anyone, Protestant or , who accepts the current situation as normal and natural or even inevitable, is not reading the right Book.1 “No Christian, however, should be satisfied with these forms of communion. They do not correspond to the will of Christ, and weaken his in the exercise of its mission. The grace of God has impelled members of many Churches and ecclesial Communities, especially in the course of this present century, to strive to overcome the divisions inherited from the past and to build anew a communion of love by prayer, by repentance and by asking pardon of each other for sins of disunity past and present, by meeting in practical forms of cooperation and in theological dialogue. These are the aims and activities of what has come to be called the ecumenical movement.” – Vatican Document: “Principles and Norms of Ecumenism”

1 https://www.catholicworldreport.com/2017/05/15/what-can-catholics-and-protestants-learn-from-each- another-2/ CATHOLIC FOR A REASON – ENGAGING PROTESTANTS TABLE OF CONTENTS

PREFACE – HOW TO USE THIS DOCUMENT…………..…………………………..4 WHO ARE WE TALKING TO?...... 5-9 WHAT’S WITH THE ?...... 10-16 SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION…………………………………………………...17-26 FAITH AND WORKS……………………………………………………………....27-36 THE SACRAMENTS……………………………………………………………….37-53 MARY//PRIESTHOOD……………………………………………………54-64 WHAT WILL IT MEAN TO HAVE UNITY?...... 65-66 WHY DO CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANTS DIFFER?...... 67-72 WHY CATHOLICS CALL PRIESTS “FATHER”…………………………………73-76 CATHOLICISM IS A PERVERSION OF EARLY …………...... 77-78 IS ONLY SYMBOLIC?...... 79 SAVED BY “FAITH ALONE”?...... 80-86 ONCE SAVED, ALWAYS SAVED?...... 87 DOCTRINE VS DISCIPLINE……………………………………………………….88-89 THE QUESTION OF ……………………………………………….90-93

HOW TO USE THIS DOCUMENT

Dear reader, If you are perusing this monstrosity of a document, thanks for your interest. This document is intended to act as an accompaniment to the slides for “Catholic for a Reason – Engaging Protestants” or as a resource document that you can go to for specific questions you might have. It is not intended to be read cover to cover. My hope is that this document will provide you with the resources you need for your conversations with our brothers and sisters in Christ who desire an encounter with the Truth, Jesus Christ. Too often, our desire is to get our Protestant friends to join the “Catholic Club” as if we were trying to recruit from one team to another team. This cannot be how we speak. Our conversations with those outside the should always come from a desire for them to fully know Jesus and from the knowledge that to know Jesus in the most intimate way is to know him in the Eucharist, i.e., in his body, blood, soul, and divinity present to us and given to you and I so that we might grow in our faith, hope, and love. If the common ground between us and our Protestant brethren is a love for Jesus and a desire to know him even more deeply, then showing our brothers and sisters how deeply the Eucharist transforms our lives, to show them how much deeper the relationship with Jesus can go, can be the tinder for sparking the desire to know Jesus in his fullness within the Catholic Church. So, long story short, our evangelization must be Eucharistic in nature. Finally, some brief notes about the document and the sources: 1) Very little of this document is my own work. Maybe 15 of the 94 pages are my own writing. That being said, I have not meticulously cited works as I would in an academic work instead opting to just give you the links to the works themselves. 2) The sources for the information in this document are provided in three places: a. In the footnotes of certain pages b. At the top of a new section c. At the end of a section where I list all the resources I used as well as additional resources you can use 3) The table of contents sections are linked to their corresponding sections. I am grateful to God for your desire to evangelize and for your interest in learning more about our Protestant brothers and sisters as well as about our own Catholic faith. Working towards Christian unity is one of the most important missions in our increasingly secular age. It will only be through a unified, Eucharistic, and apostolic witness that the Gospel of Jesus Christ will be at its most fruitful and powerful testimony. In Christ,

Benjamin Rahimi SLIDE: WHO ARE WE TALKING TO? THE BASICS AND THE FIVE SOLAE

1) By the time of ’s death, there were already 280 new split denominations from his original split. a. To try and get into all of the particulars of each ecclesial communities and churches is impossible in this short presentation and would, in fact, not do justice to the nuances of belief amongst our Christian brothers and sisters. This would reduce all the different communities to some generic Protestant genus and would not allow for real discussion and argument if we are not speaking about what the actually hold. 2) = A Christian community with non-apostolic origins. a. Ecclesial from the Greek ‘ekklesia’---’church’ b. Christian Communities that do not enjoy in the sacrament of c. Christian Communities which, specifically because of the absence of the sacramental priesthood, have not preserved the genuine and integral substance of the Eucharistic Mystery d. This is NOT to say that Protestants are not Christian 3) The fullness of the Church of Jesus Christ can trace itself back to apostolic origins, e.g., the Orthodox Church, Armenian Church, Coptic Church, Church, etc. 4) All (first affirmed in the of 325 AD) were compromised to a greater or lesser extent by the “reformers” of the : a. One (Eucharistic unity is broken after the Reformation) b. Holy (The “wholeness” of the Body of Christ is ruptured, different view of the sacraments and different version of Scripture) c. Catholic (no longer universal or independent) d. Apostolic (Pope, Apostolic Succession, Priesthood) 5) However vague and indefinite the creed of individual Protestants may be, it always rests on a few standard rules, or principles, bearing on the Sources of faith, the means of , and the constitution of the Church. An acknowledged Protestant authority, Philip Schaff (in "The New Schaff-Herzog Encyclopedia of Religious Knowledge", s.v. Reformation), sums up the principles of in the following words: a. “The Protestant goes directly to the Word of God for instruction, and to the throne of grace in his devotions; whilst the pious Roman Catholic consults the teaching of his church, and prefers to offer his prayers through the medium of the Mary and the saints. From this general principle of Evangelical freedom, and direct individual relationship of the believer to Christ, proceed the three fundamental doctrines of Protestantism — the absolute supremacy of (1) the Word, and of (2) the grace of Christ, and (3) the general priesthood of believers.” 6) The Five Solae of the Reformation a. : i. is the free gift of God to man. It is given by God’s Grace alone and not through any on the part of the Christian. SLIDE: WHO ARE WE TALKING TO? THE BASICS AND THE FIVE SOLAE

b. : i. We are judged righteous in the sight of God purely on the basis of our faith. The atoning sacrifice of Christ leads to righteousness being imputed to us as sinners through a legal declaration by God. This is often stated as Justification by faith alone. There is a clear distinction between Justification and , the latter being the growth in holiness arising from the work of the Holy Spirit in the Christian. c. : i. Christ is the one Mediator between God and man and our salvation is accomplished only through His death and resurrection. In addition, every believer is a priest before God, with immediate access to him for the forgiveness of sins. This is known as the doctrine of the Priesthood of all believers. The doctrine is not unique to Protestantism, being also found in the Roman Catholic Church, for example, but Protestants insist that no other special form of Priesthood is necessary, as opposed to the Catholic view of a ministerial priesthood being required for the administration of the Sacraments and forgiveness of sins. d. : i. Scripture alone is the only infallible source of divine revelation and the final authority for matters of faith and practice. Sola Scriptura does not mean that all truth is contained in (for example the Nicene Creed is widely accepted and recited within orthodox Christianity), but rather that all mankind needs to know for salvation is contained within its pages. ii. Protestants typically argue that scripture is perspicuous or clear to all people regarding the essential truths of the Christian gospel of salvation. In contrast to the Roman Catholic view of a (or teaching office) of the church, which is required to infallibly interpret scripture; Protestants argue that through the Holy Spirit, individuals can, by themselves interpret the scriptures responsibly. e. : i. Every aspect of the Christian life is to be seen as giving glory to God. In essence, this summarizes the other four Soli above. It also stemmed from the reformers opposition to what they perceived as the unwarranted glorification of the and other clergy. 7) Dealing with the two big Solae a. Sola Scriptura i. If the doctrine of sola scriptura is true then we must be able to prove all doctrines from Scripture alone. If that is true, then we must be able to prove sola scriptura from Scripture alone. If we canot do that then sola scriptura turns out to be self-refuting, an idea that cuts its own basis out from under itself, like the proposition “No generalizations are true.” b. Sola Fide SLIDE: WHO ARE WE TALKING TO? THE BASICS AND THE FIVE SOLAE

i. The subjective principle of the Reformation is justification by faith alone, or, rather, by free grace through faith operative in . It has reference to the personal appropriation of the Christian salvation, and aims to give all glory to Christ, by declaring that the sinner is justified before God (i.e. is acquitted of guilt, and declared righteous) solely on the ground of the all-sufficient merits of Christ as apprehended by a living faith, in opposition to the theory — then prevalent, and substantially sanctioned by the — which makes faith and good works co-ordinate sources of justification, laying the chief stress upon works. Protestantism does not depreciate good works; but it denies their value as sources or conditions of justification, and insists on them as the necessary fruits of faith, and evidence of justification. Relevant Article from a Convert: https://jimmyakin.com/library/justification-by-faith-alone Many Protestants today realize that Catholics adhere to the idea of salvation sola gratia (by grace alone), but fewer are aware that Catholics do not have to condemn the formula of justification sola fide (by faith alone), provided this phrase is properly understood. The term pistis is used in the Bible in a number of different senses, ranging from intellectual belief (Romans 14:22, 23, James 2:19), to assurance (Acts 17:31), and even to trustworthiness or reliability (Romans 3:3, Titus 2:10). Of key importance is Galatians 5:6, which refers to “faith working by charity.” In , this is what is known as fides formata or “faith formed by charity.” The alternative to formed faith is fides informis or “faith unformed by charity.” This is the kind of faith described in James 2:19, for example. Whether a Catholic rejects the idea of justification by faith alone depends on what sense the term “faith” is being used in. If it is being used to refer to unformed faith then a Catholic rejects the idea of justification by faith alone (which is the point James is making in James 2:19, as every non- antinomian Evangelical agrees; one is not justified by intellectual belief alone). However, if the term “faith” is being used to refer to faith formed by charity then the Catholic does not have to condemn the idea of justification by faith alone. In fact, in traditional works of Catholic theology, one regularly encounters the statement that formed faith is justifying faith. If one has formed faith, one is justified. Period. A Catholic would thus reject the idea of justification sola fide informi but wholeheartedly embrace the idea of justification sola fide formata. Adding the word “formed” to clarify the nature of the faith in “sola fide” renders the doctrine completely acceptable to a Catholic. Why, then, do Catholics not use the ther in this regard, we would have to say, “Jesus is not God.” Obviously, the Church could not have people running around saying “Jesus is God” and “Jesus is not God,” though both would be perfectly consistent with the depending on how the term “God” is being used (i.e., as a noun or a proper name for the Father). Hopeless confusion (and charges of , and bloodbaths) would have resulted in the early centuries if the Church did not specify the meaning of the term “God” when used in this context. Of course, the Bible uses the term “God” in both senses, but to avoid confusion (and heretical misunderstandings on the part of the faithful, who could incline to either or Modalism if they misread the word “God” in the above statements) it later became necessary to adopt one usage over the other when discussing the identity of Jesus. A similar phenomenon SLIDE: WHO ARE WE TALKING TO? THE BASICS AND THE FIVE SOLAE occurs in connection with the word “faith.” Evangelical leaders know this by personal experience since they have to continually fight against antinomian understandings of the term “faith” (and the corresponding antinomian evangelistic practices and false conversions that result). Because “faith” is such a key term, it is necessary that each theological school have a fixed usage of it in practice, even though there is more than one use of the term in the Bible. Evangelical leaders, in response to the antinomianism that has washed over the American church scene in the last hundred and fifty years, are attempting to impose a uniform usage to the term “faith” in their community to prevent these problems. (And may they have good luck in this, by the way.) This leads me to why Catholics do not use the formula “faith alone.” Given the different usages of the term “faith” in the Bible, the early Church had to decide which meaning would be treated as normative. Would it be the Galatians 5 sense or the Romans 14/James 2 sense? The Church opted for the latter for several reasons:

1) First, the Romans 14 sense of the term pistis is frankly the more common in the . It is much harder to think of passages which demand that pistis mean “faith formed by charity” than it is to think of passages which demand that pistis mean “intellectual belief.” In fact, even in Galatians 5:6 itself, Paul has to specify that it is faith formed by charity that he is talking about, suggesting that this is not the normal use of the term in his day.

2) Second, the New Testament regularly (forty-two times in the KJV) speaks of “the faith,” meaning a body of theological beliefs (e.g. Jude 3). The connection between pistis and intellectual belief is clearly very strong in this usage.

3) Third, Catholic theology has focused on the triad of faith, hope, and charity, which Paul lays great stress on and which is found throughout his writings, not just in 1 Corinthians 13:13 (though that is the locus classicus for it), including places where it is not obvious because of the English translation or the division of verses. If in this triad “faith” is taken to mean “formed faith” then hope and charity are collapsed into faith and the triad is flattened. To preserve the distinctiveness of each member of the triad, the Church chose to use the term “faith” in a way that did not include within it the ideas of hope (trust) and charity (love). Only by doing this could the members of the triad be kept from collapsing into one another.

Thus the Catholic Church normally expresses the core essences of these virtues like this:

Faith is the theological virtue by which we believe in God and believe all that he has said and revealed to us . . . because he is truth itself. (CCC 1814)

Hope is the theological virtue by which we desire the kingdom of heaven and eternal life as our happiness, placing our trust in Christ’s promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit. (CCC 1817) SLIDE: WHO ARE WE TALKING TO? THE BASICS AND THE FIVE SOLAE

Charity is the theological virtue by which we love God above all things for his own sake, and our neighbor as ourselves for the love of God. (CCC 1822)

In common Catholic usage, faith is thus unconditional belief in what God says, hope is unconditional trust in God, and charity is unconditional love for God. When we are justified, God places all three of these virtues in our hearts. These virtues are given to each of the justified, even though our outward actions do not always reflect them because of the fallen nature we still possess. Thus a person may still have the virtue of faith even if momentarily tempted by doubt, a person may still have the virtue of trust even if scared or tempted by despair, and a person may still have the virtue of charity even if he is often selfish. Only a direct, grave violation ( against) of one of the virtues destroys the virtue. As our sanctification progresses, these virtues within us are strengthened by God and we are able to more easily exercise faith, more easily exercise trust, and more easily exercise love. Performing acts of faith, hope, and charity becomes easier as we grow in the Christian life (note the great difficulty new converts often experience in these areas compared to those who have attained a measure of spiritual maturity). However, so long as one has any measure of faith, hope, and charity, one is in a state of justification. Thus Catholics often use the soteriological slogan that we are “saved by faith, hope, and charity.” This does not disagree with the Protestant soteriological slogan that we are “saved by faith alone” if the term “faith” is understood in the latter to be faith formed by charity or Galatians 5 faith. One will note, in the definitions of the virtues offered above, the similarity between hope and the way Protestants normally define “faith”; that is, as an unconditional “placing our trust in Christ’s promises and relying not on our own strength, but on the help of the grace of the Holy Spirit.” The definition Protestants normally give to “faith” is the definition Catholics use for “hope.” However, the Protestant idea of faith by no means excludes what Catholics refer to as faith, since every Evangelical would (or should) say that a person with saving faith will believe whatever God says because God is absolutely truthful and incapable of making an error. Thus the Protestant concept of faith normally includes both the Catholic concept of faith and the Catholic concept of hope. Thus if a Protestant further specifies that saving faith is a faith which “works by charity” then the two soteriological slogans become equivalents. The reason is that a faith which works by charity is a faith which produces acts of love. But a faith which produces acts of love is a faith which includes the virtue of charity, the virtue of charity is the thing that enables us to perform acts of supernatural love in the first place. So a Protestant who says saving faith is a faith which works by charity, as per Galatians 5:6, is saying the same thing as a Catholic when a Catholic says that we are saved by faith, hope, and charity. We may put the relationship between the two concepts as follows:

Protestant idea of faith = Catholic idea of faith + Catholic idea of hope + Catholic idea of charity

The three theological virtues of Catholic theology are thus summed up in the (good) Protestant’s idea of the virtue of faith. And the Protestant slogan “salvation by faith alone” becomes the Catholic slogan “salvation by faith, hope, and charity (alone) SLIDE: WHAT’S WITH THE POPE? THE ISSUE OF THE MAGISTERIUM

1) What is the Magisterium? a. The Magisterium is, simply put, the teaching authority of the Church. The apostles and their successors are Christ’s appointed teachers and the Magisterium exists as a gift of the Holy Spirit given to the in communion with the chair of Peter to keep the church from error in faith and morals. 2) Upon whom did Jesus build his Church? a. According to Scripture, Jesus founded a visible Church that would last until he comes again and had the authority to teach and, if needed, discipline believers. St. Paul tells us that this Church is “the pillar and foundation of truth” (1 Timothy 3:15) and it was built on the “foundation of the apostles” (Ephesians 2:20). b. Unlike the apostles, the Church of Jesus Christ would exist for all ages, so the apostles passed on to their successors the authority to bind and loose doctrine, forgive sins (John 20:23) and speak on behalf of Christ. In Acts 1:20, we see Peter telling the apostles that Judas’ office would be transferred to a worthy successor. In 1 Timothy 5:22, Paul warned Timothy to “not be hasty in the laying on of hands” when he appointed new leaders in the church. Just as the apostles’ authority was passed on to their successors, Peter’s authority as the leader of the apostles was passed on to his successor. This man inherited the keys to the kingdom of heaven and Peter’s duty to shepherd Christ’s flock. Peter’s successor is the pastor of Christ’s church and a spiritual father to the Lord’s children – this is why he is called “Pope” from the word “Papa” for “father.” 3) “Petra = Kepha = Petros” – No difference of meaning - **From USCCB** a. You are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church: the word kēpā’ meaning rock and transliterated into Greek as Kēphas is the name by which Peter is called in the Pauline letters (1 Cor 1:12; 3:22; 9:5; 15:4; Gal 1:18; 2:9, 11, 14) except in Gal 2:7–8 (“Peter”). It is translated as Petros (“Peter”) in Jn 1:42. The presumed original Aramaic of Jesus’ statement would have been, in English, “You are the Rock (Kēpā’) and upon this rock (kēpā’) I will build my church.” The Greek text probably means the same, for the difference in gender between the masculine noun petros, the ’s new name, and the feminine noun petra (rock) may be due simply to the unsuitability of using a feminine noun as the proper name of a male. Although the two words were generally used with slightly different nuances, they were also used interchangeably with the same meaning, “rock.” Church: this word (Greek ekklēsia) occurs in the only here and in Mt 18:17 (twice). There are several possibilities for an Aramaic original. Jesus’ church means the community that he will gather and that, like a building, will have Peter as its solid foundation. That function of Peter consists in his being witness to Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of the living God. The gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it: the netherworld (Greek Hadēs, the abode of the dead) is conceived of as a walled city whose gates will not close in upon the church of Jesus, i.e., it will not be overcome by the power of death. SLIDE: WHAT’S WITH THE POPE? THE ISSUE OF THE MAGISTERIUM

b. [16:19] The keys to the kingdom of heaven: the image of the keys is probably drawn from Is 22:15–25 where Eliakim, who succeeds Shebna as master of the palace, is given “the key of the House of David,” which he authoritatively “opens” and “shuts” (Is 22:22). Whatever you bind…loosed in heaven: there are many instances in rabbinic literature of the binding-loosing imagery. Of the several meanings given there to the metaphor, two are of special importance here: the giving of authoritative teaching, and the lifting or imposing of the ban of . It is disputed whether the image of the keys and that of binding and loosing are different metaphors meaning the same thing. In any case, the promise of the keys is given to Peter alone. In Mt 18:18 all the disciples are given the power of binding and loosing, but the context of that verse suggests that there the power of excommunication alone is intended. That the keys are those to the kingdom of heaven and that Peter’s exercise of authority in the church on earth will be confirmed in heaven show an intimate connection between, but not an identification of, the church and the kingdom of heaven.2 4) The Pope’s Authority – The Early Church a. In regard to the authority of the of Rome, Clement (writing in the 1st century as the 4th pope) intervened in a dispute in the Church of Corinth. He warned those who disobeyed him that they would “involve themselves in transgression and in no small danger,” thus demonstrating his authority over non- Roman Christians. b. St. Ignatius of referred to the Roman Church as the one that teaches other churches and “presides in love (charity)” over them. c. In A.D. 190, Pope St. Victor I excommunicated an entire region of churches for refusing to celebrate on the proper date. While St. thought this was not prudent, neither he nor anyone else denied that Victor had the authority to do this saying, “it is a matter of necessity that every Church should agree with this Church (Rome) on account of its preeminent authority.”3 i. Keep in mind that all of this evidence dates a hundred to two hundred years before Christianity was legalized in the . I mention this because it deflates the Fundamentalist theory that the Papacy was created by the Roman Emperor in the 4th century. 5) Apostolic Succession a. Christ established one visible Church, not numerous churches with contradictory beliefs. To see which Church is the true church, we must look for the one with an unbroken historical link to the Church of the New Testament. Catholics can trace their leaders, the bishops, back through time, bishop by bishop, all the way to the apostles, and they show that the pope is the lineal successor to the pope, the first bishop of Rome. This is precisely what led to the conversion of soon to be St. , a convert from the Anglican Church. Starting in the 19th

2 http://www.usccb.org/bible/matthew/16 (See Bottom of Page) 3 Irenaeus, Against 3.3.2 SLIDE: WHAT’S WITH THE POPE? THE ISSUE OF THE MAGISTERIUM

century (he was writing in 1844), he worked backward century by century, seeing if Catholic beliefs existing at any particular time could be traced to beliefs existing a century before. What he demonstrated was that there is a real continuity of beliefs, that the fullness of Christ’s church subsists in (LG) the Catholic Church and that this is the Church established by Christ. (An Essay on the Development of Christian Doctrine). Newman was not a Catholic when he started writing the book and he suffered greatly as a result of his conversion. 6) ?4 a. What does it mean? i. The doctrine of Papal Infallibility teaches that the Pope has a special grace from Christ that protects him from leading the Church into error. That grace does not keep him from sinning (even gravely), nor will it give him the right answer to every issue facing the Church. Instead, it will protect the pope from officially leading the Church into heresy. As a private theologian, the pope might speculate, even incorrectly, about the faith, but he will never issue a false teaching related to the faith or morality that claims to be binding and infallible. b. Why do we as Catholics hold the Pope to be infallible?5 i. Matthew 16:18 says the “gates of hell” will never prevail against the Church, so it makes sense that the pastor of Christ’s church will never steer it into hell by teaching heresy. In Matthew 22:31-32, Jesus tells Peter, “Satan has demanded to sift you all like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren.” The original Greek in the passage shows that Satan demanded to “sift you all” (all the apostles) but Jesus prayed only for Peter and his faith not to fail. Christ prayed that once Peter had “turned again” from his sins, he would lead and strengthen the apostles. ii. Funnily enough, most Protestants would have to admit that Peter was infallible when he wrote 1 and 2 Peter, or at least that those have no errors. When Paul corrects Peter in Antioch, it is not an error of teaching on Peter’s part but of behavior. Remember that Peter feared antagonism from Christians who thought circumcision was necessary for salvation. So, while he was in their presence, Peter declined to eat with the uncircumcised. Paul criticized Peter for doing this but even Paul accommodated himself to this group when he had his disciple, Timothy, circumcised – he did this to make it easier to preach to the Jews (Acts 16:1-3).6 iii. Also, infallibility does not protect the pope from tolerating heresy, just from proclaiming it.

4 https://www.catholic.com/tract/papal-infallibility 5 https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/infallibility 6 https://www.catholic.com/tract/papal-infallibility SLIDE: WHAT’S WITH THE POPE? THE ISSUE OF THE MAGISTERIUM

iv. The papacy is God’s gift to the Church. It ensures the Church will be united in one faith, one baptism, and the worship of the one God who entrusted his Church to the successors of the apostles under the leadership of Peter’s successor, whom we call Pope. 7) The infallibility of the Pope is not something that just appeared in Church teaching. Rather, it is a doctrine that was implicit in the early Church and has developed and been more clearly understood. a. Implicit in John 21:15-17 (Feed my sheep…), Luke 22:32 (I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail) and Matthew 16:18 (You are Peter…) b. It is based on Christ’s mandate to preach everything he taught (Matthew 28:19- 20) and promised the protection of the Holy Spirit to “guide you into all truth.” (John 16:13). c. It is from this that the doctrine of infallibility developed. We see that development in the , e.g. of Carthage in 256 A.D. said, “Would the heretics dare to come to the very seat of Peter whence apostolic faith is derived and whither no errors can come?” (Letters 59) Augustine also put it this way, “Rome has spoke; the case is concluded” (Sermons 131, 10). 8) Clarifications on Infallibility a. An infallible pronouncement is typically only made when some doctrine has been called into question. It applies only to solemn, official teachings on faith and morals, not to disciplinary decisions or unofficial comments on faith and morals. b. What infallibility does do is prevent a pope from solemnly and formally teaching as “truth” something that is, in fact, error. It does not help him know what is true, nor does it “inspire” him to teach what is true. He has to learn the truth the way we all do – through study. c. Again, the toleration of a heresy is not the same thing as proclaiming and defining a heresy as a Church teaching. Famed preacher, , said, “Nobody, I think, has ever claimed that the pope is infallible in NOT defining a doctrine.” d. The critique of infallibility stems from a skewed view of the Church. Critics do not think that Christ established a visible church, which means they do not believe in a hierarchy of bishops headed by the pope. e. To that point, , in the 2nd century, wrote to the church in Smyrna, “Wherever the bishop appears , let the people be there; just as wherever Jesus Christ is, there is the Catholic Church. (Letters to the Smyrnaeans 8, 110 AD) Identifying Infallible Statements7 - Catholic Answers, Jimmy Akin Many people have a difficult time discerning when the magisterium has engaged its infallibility and when it hasn’t. Recently, I came across an instance where a Jehovah’s Witness was trying to make hay with the Exsurge Domine, and I thought the case might be instructive for seeing the delicacy with which such matters have to be treated. Exsurge Domine (which takes its name from the first two words of the document’s opening sentence: “Arise, Lord, and

7 https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/identifying-infallible-statements SLIDE: WHAT’S WITH THE POPE? THE ISSUE OF THE MAGISTERIUM judge your own cause”) was the 1520 papal bull rejecting forty-one propositions from Martin Luther’s writings. It threatened Luther—who was still a Catholic at the time—with excommunication if he did not repent. This Jehovah’s Witness claimed that Exsurge Domine was a document for which papal infallibility had been engaged and that it contained error— specifically, in its rejection of the proposition “That heretics be burned is against the will of the Spirit.” This, he argued, made Exsurge Domine a fallible “infallible” document and was evidence against the doctrine of papal infallibility.

There are several ways to resolve this supposed dilemma. One would be to affirm that sometimes it is the will of the Spirit to put heretics to death. After all, didn’t God on some occasions command the use of capital punishment for certain offenses connected with false religion (Ex. 22:18, 20; Deut. 13:5, 8–10, 15, 18:20)? Another would be to point out that when the Church censures a proposition, it means the Church finds something about the proposition problematic. But since the proposition is phrased in the offender’s own words, it is often phrased badly, and so one cannot take the Church’s position to be the opposite of the offending proposition. For example, if the Church chose to condemn the proposition “The sky is white,” one could not then infer that the Church adhered to the proposition “The sky is black.”

Let’s apply this reasoning to the case at hand. If the Church condemned the proposition that it is contrary to the will of the Spirit to put heretics to death, that does not mean that the Church holds that it is the will of the Spirit to do so. There is the possibility that the application of the death penalty in such circumstances is one that the Spirit willed in one age but does not will today. There is also the possibility that he wills it in the case of some offenses against the faith but not others, or that he wills it in the case of some individuals but not others, or that he neither wills for nor against it.

The most fundamental way of resolving the alleged dilemma is to examine the question of whether or not Exsurge Domine involves an infallible exercise of papal teaching. The answer is that it does not. We must recognize where the burden of proof lies in this matter. The Code of Canon Law provides that “No doctrine is understood to be infallibly defined unless it is clearly established as such” (CIC 749 § 3). This means that the propositions in Exsurge Domine must be assumed to have received a non-infallible handling unless proven otherwise.

We must look also at the conditions regarding papal infallibility. According to Vatican I, which defined the doctrine, “The Roman pontiff, when he speaks ex cathedra . . . possesses through the divine assistance promised to him in the person of blessed Peter, the infallibility with which the divine Redeemer willed his Church to be endowed in defining the doctrine concerning faith or morals” (Pastor Aeternus 4). The passage in the ellipsis explains that the pope speaks ex cathedra “when, acting in the office of shepherd and teacher of all Christians, he defines, by virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the universal Church.”

The key word is “defines.” Defining something is not the same as stating, teaching, declaring, condemning, or what have you. The meaning of this term is explained in a relatio on Pastor Aeternus 4. (A relatio is an official interpretation of the text that is presented to the council bishops by a man called the relator so that the bishops will know the official sense of the text on SLIDE: WHAT’S WITH THE POPE? THE ISSUE OF THE MAGISTERIUM which they are voting. Thus, what is said in a relatio is key to resolving queries about the meaning of a conciliar text.)

On July 16, 1870, Vincent Gasser, the relator for Pastor Aeternus 4, gave a relatio that explained “the word ‘defines’ signifies that the pope directly and conclusively pronounces his sentence about a doctrine which concerns matters of faith or morals and does so in such a way that each one of the faithful can be certain of the mind of the , of the mind of the Roman Pontiff; in such a way, indeed, that he or she knows for certain that such and such a doctrine is held to be heretical, proximate to heresy, certain or erroneous, etc., by the Roman Pontiff” (Gasser & O’Connor, The Gift of Infallibility [Boston: St. Paul Editions, 1986], 74 n.).

This means that, in order for him to define a doctrine to be held by the universal Church, the pope must express himself in such a way that the faithful can know with certitude that he holds a particular proposition to have a particular doctrinal note (de fide, certain, false, proximate to heresy, heretical, et cetera). The faithful are then required to regard it likewise. If the faithful cannot know from what the pope says that a particular proposition is to be regarded in a particular way, then the pope has not defined the matter for the universal Church and thus has not spoken infallibly. During the course of Church history, there have been many occasions where a person has committed not just a single heresy but a whole raft of theological errors. In such cases, the Church has sometimes responded by censuring a list of propositions found in the person’s writings. Sometimes this is done by condemning the propositionsone by one, “the proper qualifications being attached to each individually (in individuo). [However,] in the case of . . . Luther . . . to a whole series of propositions a whole series of censures was attached generally (in globo). . . . To each of the propositions thus condemned apply one, or several, or all of the censures employed—the task of fitting each censure to each propositions being left to theologians” (Catholic Encyclopedia, 1907 ed., s.v. “Theological Censures”).

If one examines the Exsurge Domine’s condemnation of Luther’s propositions, it is clear that they are being condemned in globo rather than in individuo. wrote, “All and each of the preceding articles or errors, so to speak, as set before you, we condemn, disapprove, and entirely reject as respectively [1] heretical or [2] scandalous or [3] false or [4] offensive to pious ears or [5] seductive of simple minds and [6] in opposition to Catholic truth.” The pontiff lists six different censures, but he doesn’t tell us which of these apply to which of the forty-one propositions. When one looks at the Latin text of the sentence, this ambiguity is even more obvious. The various censures the pope names—from “heretical” to “offensive to pious ears”— are all joined by the conjunction aut. In ecclesiastical Latin the word aut tends to have the sense of an exclusive “or”—i.e., it’s this or that, not both. This makes it a slam-dunk that one cannot determine the kind of censure being applied to the individual propositions. One cannot even infer that the pontiff’s mind was that all of the propositions were false. The censures “heretical” and “false” both imply falsity, but “scandalous,” “offensive to pious ears,” and “seductive of simple minds” do not.

Heresy is a term reserved for falsehoods that contradict points that must be believed with divine and Catholic faith. The more general term false is used to refer to erroneous propositions more generally (i.e., ones that do not have to be believed with divine and Catholic faith). But the next SLIDE: WHAT’S WITH THE POPE? THE ISSUE OF THE MAGISTERIUM three named censures do not imply error. In fact, they may even presuppose the truth of a position.

Scandalous means “likely to cause scandal,” but that does not automatically mean false. Sometimes things that are true lead to scandals. Offensive to pious ears means “phrased in an offensive manner” or “phrased in a manner repugnant to Catholic sensibilities.” But again, that doesn’t automatically mean false. (In fact, this censure tends to be applied to propositions that are basically true but badly expressed.) Seductive of simple minds means “likely to be understood in a way that would lead the uneducated or inattentive to believe an error.” This also does not mean automatically false.

One can speculate which censure might be applied to the proposition that using the death penalty for heresy is contrary to the will of the Spirit (a view Luther himself later repudiated). It seems to me that this proposition in that age would have been scandalous. Many people would have pointed to the examples in Scripture cited above and would have been scandalized by the proposition that it is never God’s will to use capital punishment for doctrinal matters.

However, we cannot infer from the pope’s statement that the proposition is anything more than scandalous. It could also be deserving of one or more of the other censures, but we can’t infer from what the pope said if that were true or which would be the case. Indeed, from what the pope said alone we can’t be sure that scandalous is what was in mind for that proposition. Because we can’t know that, Exsurge Domine does not infallibly define the theological status of this proposition or the others that it treats, meaning that it cannot be used to attack the doctrine of papal infallibility. One trying to do so needs to better understand papal infallibility, learn to parse ecclesiastical documents more carefully, or become aware of the meaning of theological censures SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

Protestants claim the Bible is only measure of faith. This means that the bible contains all of the material one needs for theology and that this material is sufficiently clear that one does not need apostolic tradition or the Church’s magisterium (teaching authority) to help one understand it. The Protestant belief is that the Scriptures are their final and only infallible authority.8 This is where the Protestant doctrine of Sola Scriptura comes from. However, in order to honestly assess this issue, we should know what Sola Scriptura is not: 1) It does not mean that Scripture is the ONLY source of spiritual insight.

2) It does not mean that there are no other authorities in the lives of Protestants: they obey their pastors and have respect for tradition (it is just not infallible).

3) It does not mean that if something is not in the Bible it is not divinely binding.

4) It does not mean that the Scriptures are an exhaustive source for us to know how to live our lives each day – does not tell us where to work, whom to marry, what to eat, how often to shower.

5) It does not mean that Protestants are uncertain about the canon of Scripture – they have a strong and binding conviction.

Scripture and Tradition 1) Catholics hold that divine revelation comes from two sources: Scripture and Tradition a. Interestingly, the Bible itself denies that it alone is sufficient as the complete rule of faith. Paul says much Christian teaching is to be found in the tradition which is handed down by word of mouth (2 Timothy 2:2) and instructs Timothy to “stand firm and hold to the traditions which you were taught by us, either by word of mouth or by letter.” (2 Thessalonians 2:15) b. In the ’s document on divine revelation, (Latin: “The Word of God”), the relationship between Tradition and Scripture is explained: “Hence there exists a close connection and communication between and sacred Scripture. For both of them, flowing from the same divine wellspring, in a certain way merge into a unity and tend toward the same end. For sacred Scripture is the word of God inasmuch as it is consigned to writing under the inspiration of the divine Spirit. To the successors of the

8 This section is derived from a variety of different sources. Since this is not an academic treatise, I am not being precise in my quote citations. However, please note that the vast majority of this work is not my own words but the words of far smarter people. Here are the sources for the “Scripture and Tradition” section: 1) https://www.catholic.com/tract/scripture-and-tradition 2) https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/the-complex-relationship-between-scripture-and- tradition 3) https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/sacred-scripture-depends-on-sacred-tradition 4) https://www.catholic.com/tract/apostolic-tradition

SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

apostles, sacred Tradition hands on in its full purity God’s word, which was entrusted to the apostles by Christ the Lord and the Holy Spirit. The Church, in the persons of the apostles, was given the authority to teach by Christ; the Church would be his representative. He commissioned them, saying, “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations” (Matt. 28:19). 2) How were the disciples to spread the Gospel of Jesus Christ? a. By preaching and oral instruction: i. “So faith comes from what is heard, and what is heard comes by the preaching of Christ” (Rom. 10:17). The Church would always be the living teacher. It is a mistake to limit “Christ’s word” to the written word only or to suggest that all his teachings were reduced to writing. The Bible nowhere supports either notion. This is made clear when the apostle Paul tells Timothy: “[W]hat you have heard from me before many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also” (2 Tim. 2:2). Here we see the first few links in the chain of apostolic tradition that has been passed down intact from the apostles to our own day. Paul instructed Timothy to pass on the oral teachings (traditions) that he had received from the apostle. He was to give these to men who would be able to teach others, thus perpetuating the chain. 3) What is Tradition? a. In this discussion it is important to keep in mind what the Catholic Church means by tradition. The term does not refer to legends or mythological accounts, nor does it encompass transitory customs or practices which may change, as circumstances warrant, such as styles of priestly dress, particular forms of devotion to saints, or even liturgical rubrics. b. Sacred or apostolic tradition consists of the teachings that the apostles passed on orally through their preaching. These teachings largely (perhaps entirely) overlap with those contained in Scripture, but the mode of their transmission is different. c. Sacred Tradition more technically also means, within this transmitted revelation, that part of God's revealed word which is not contained in Sacred Scripture. i. Referring specifically to how was handed on, the Second Vatican Council says: "It was done by the apostles who handed on, by the spoken word of their preaching, by the example they gave, by the institutions they established, what they themselves had received-- whether from the lips of Christ, from His way of life and His works, or whether they had learned it by the prompting of the Holy Spirit" (Constitution on Divine Revelation, II, 7). 4) Scripture and Tradition: Necessary Partners a. It is necessary that Christians believe in and follow this tradition as well as the Bible (Luke 10:16). The truth of the faith has been given primarily to the leaders of the Church (Eph. 3:5), who, with Christ, form the foundation of the Church (Eph. 2:20). The Church has been guided by the Holy Spirit, who protects this teaching from corruption (John 14:25-26, 16:13). Paul illustrated what tradition is: SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

“For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins in accordance with the scriptures. . . . Whether then it was I or they, so we preach and so you believed” (1 Cor. 15:3,11). The apostle praised those who followed Tradition: “I commend you because you remember me in everything and maintain the traditions even as I have delivered them to you” (1 Cor. 11:2). b. The first Christians “devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching” (Acts 2:42) long before there was a New Testament. From the very beginning, the fullness of Christian teaching was found in the Church as the living embodiment of Christ, not in a book. The teaching Church, with its oral, apostolic tradition, was authoritative. i. Fundamentalists say Jesus condemned tradition. They note that Jesus said, “And why do you transgress the commandment of God for the sake of your tradition?” (Matt. 15:3). Paul warned, “See to it that no one makes a prey of you by philosophy and empty deceit, according to human tradition, according to the elemental spirits of the universe, and not according to Christ” (Col. 2:8). But these verses merely condemn erroneous human traditions, not truths which were handed down orally and entrusted to the Church by the apostles. These latter truths are part of what is known as apostolic tradition, which is to be distinguished from human traditions or customs. c. What Fundamentalists and Evangelicals often do, unfortunately, is see the word “tradition” in Matthew 15:3 or Colossians 2:8 or elsewhere and conclude that anything termed a “tradition” is to be rejected. They forget that the term is used in a different sense, as in 1 Corinthians 11:2 and 2 Thessalonians 2:15, to describe what should be believed. Jesus did not condemn all traditions; he condemned only erroneous traditions, whether doctrines or practices, that undermined Christian truths. The rest, as the apostles taught, were to be obeyed. 5) Who determines what authentic “Tradition” is? a. The task is to determine what constitutes authentic tradition. How can we know which traditions are apostolic and which are merely human? The answer is the same as how we know which scriptures are apostolic and which are merely human—by listening to the magisterium or teaching authority of Christ’s Church. Without the Catholic Church’s teaching authority, we would not know with certainty which purported books of Scripture are authentic. If the Church revealed to us the canon of Scripture, it can also reveal to us the “canon of Tradition” by establishing which traditions have been passed down from the apostles. 6) The Relationship Between Scripture and Tradition a. It is historical fact that man communicated orally before he wrote things down. Whether one puts the beginning of mankind at 5000 B.C. or 5,000,000 B.C., there is no archeological evidence of any written communication earlier than 4000 B.C. b. The outside date any Scripture scholars are willing to give for the beginning of the writing down of the , the first five books of the Bible, is approximately 1450 SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

B.C. Yet the Torah conveys facts relating to God’s creating the universe and events that happened as far back as circa 1850 B.C., when God brought Abram “from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan” (Gen. 11:31). Obviously, unless we were to dismiss the validity of the entire Bible, we must admit the Jews had an accurate oral tradition (from the Latin traditio, meaning “handed or passed down”) centuries to its being recorded in writing. i. The life of a human being works similarly. Once born, it learns to speak long before it can write. It learns what is right and wrong from what its parents say and do. Only after years of upbringing does a child can learn to read and write. And so the life of a human being parallels that of Sacred Scripture: Oral tradition necessarily precedes the act of writing. c. The same is true for the New Testament. Jesus spoke to his disciples long before the things he taught were written down. While tradition means a “handing down,” Sacred Tradition means the handing down of divine revelation from one generation of believers to the next, as preserved under the divine guidance of the Catholic Church established by Christ. i. The Second Vatican Council, in its Dogmatic Constitution on Divine Revelation (Dei Verbum), defines Sacred Tradition as what “the apostles who, by their oral preaching, by example, and by observances handed on what they had received from the lips of Christ, from living with him, and from what he did, or what they learned from the prompting of the Holy Spirit” (DV 7). Sacred Tradition, of which Sacred Scripture is a part, is a deeply penetrating, living reality. It is transmitted to us through the practices of the Church since apostolic times. These include official professions of faith, from the Apostles’ Creed (circa A.D. 120) and Nicene Creed (325) to the Credo of the by Pope Paul VI (1968); the official teachings of the 21 ecumenical councils of the Church, from Nicea I (325–381) to Vatican II (1962–65); the writings of Church Fathers and doctors; papal documents; sacred Scripture; sacred liturgy; and even Christian art that portrays what we believed and how we worshiped over the centuries. d. Many non-Catholics today claim to base their faith on the Bible alone, a doctrine known as sola scriptura. This was a phrase coined by the Reformation Protestants who broke away from the Church in the 1500s. In addition to rejecting papal authority in all matters, daily governance, teaching authority, et cetera, the Protestants reject Sacred Tradition. e. But where did the Bible come from? It came from the Church, not vice versa. In apostolic times most people were illiterate. So what Christ said and did was passed on orally. Christ instructed the apostles were to “go into all the world and preach the gospel to the whole creation” (Mark 16:15). How could Our Lord order them to “preach the gospel” at a time when the gospels themselves did not exist in written form? Unless one is to accuse our Lord of being unreasonable, the only answer is that the gospel (“good news”) already existed in oral form as a part of SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

the Sacred Tradition of the Church, “handed on . . . from the lips of Christ” (DV 8). f. From the year of Christ’s Resurrection until roughly 100, the New Testament itself was not completely written. And in the view of many nothing was written prior to the year 50. Yet this was a period of tremendous growth for the Church. How could it have grown intact, with the same teachings being passed on orally and consistently, unless the Holy Spirit was safeguarding the transmission of Sacred Tradition? How were so many converted without the aid of Sacred Scripture, if not with the aid of Sacred Tradition? i. Many Protestant churches, in order to circumvent the Sacred Tradition issue, maintain that the Catholic Church fell into error at some point before the Reformation. And they are somehow in a position to judge where God and his Church have gone wrong. ii. But Sacred Scripture contains many of Christ’s promises to protect and safeguard his Church until the end of time. He tells the apostles, “I am with you always, to the close of the age” (Matt. 28:20). Again he promises, “I will pray to the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, to be with you forever, even the Spirit of truth” (John 14:16– 17). Jesus promises, “When the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own authority, but whatever he hears he will speak, and he will declare to you the things that are to come” (John 16:13). And Paul calls the Church “the pillar and bulwark of the truth” (1 Tim. 3:15). These verses are quite clear: The one, true Church Christ founded cannot err because God, who can neither deceive nor be deceived, protects it for all time. g. Another place Sacred Scripture is quite clear is the divine origin of the papacy and therefore its divine authority. Our Lord says to Peter, “You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatsoever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatsoever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven (Matt. 16:18–19). i. A common Protestant argument against the Catholic interpretation of this passage is that our Lord’s words refer only to Peter and nobody after him. But would the Creator of the universe, who took the awesome trouble to become man in order to save us from our sins, leave us without a competent guide after Peter? Did God not have enough foresight? Do not human families, governments, and even corporations institute appropriate structures to insure smooth transitions of power? Could our Lord have somehow forgotten this or not be concerned enough with the man’s welfare? h. Sacred Scripture positions itself as a part—albeit a very important part—of a much bigger picture: Sacred Tradition. At the end of his Gospel, John tells us that not everything taught by Christ was written down: “There are also many other SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

things which Jesus did; were every one of them to be written, I suppose that the world itself could not contain the books that would be written” (John 21:25). i. These two sources of divine revelation which make up this one “sacred deposit” are safeguarded and defended by the Sacred Magisterium (the teaching authority of the Church), whose job it is to guarantee the authenticity of the message while at the same time remaining its servant: i. “The task of authentically interpreting the word of God, whether written or spoken, has been entrusted exclusively to the living teaching office of the Church, whose authority is exercised in the name of Jesus Christ. This teaching office is not above the word of God, but serves it, teaching only what has been handed on, listening to it devoutly, guarding it scrupulously, and explaining it faithfully. In accord with a divine commission and with the help of the Holy Spirit, it draws from this one deposit of faith everything which it presents for belief as divinely revealed” (Dei Verbum 10). j. The Sacred Magisterium is embodied in the living teaching office and authority of the papacy. Immediately after declaring Peter the first pope, our Lord gives him the “keys to the kingdom of heaven,” so that whatever the papacy declares “bind[ing] on earth shall be bound in heaven,” and whatsoever the Papacy declares “loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” It is here that Sacred Scripture confirms the reality and power of the Sacred Magisterium. k. The subject of purgatory provides a clear-cut example of how Sacred Tradition works. Protestants object that purgatory is unbiblical. The Catechism explains the doctrine of purgatory in this way: “All those who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified, are indeed assured of their eternal salvation; but after death they undergo purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven” (1030). The Catechism cites Sacred Scripture (1 Cor. 3:15, 1 Peter 1:7, Matt. 12:31, and 2 Macc. 12:46); it cites Sacred Tradition (three ecumenical councils—Lyons, Florence, and Trent); it cites a papal (Benedictus Deus by Pope Benedict XII); and it cites two Church Fathers who are also doctors of the Church (Gregory the Great and ). Or we can quote just the Scripture passages: “If any man’s work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only through fire” (1 Cor. 3:15). Or, “Therefore, he made atonement for the dead, that they might be delivered from their sin” (2 Macc. 12:46) 7) The complexity of the relationship between Scripture and Tradition9 a. It isn’t as simple as a truth being “in Scripture” or “not in Scripture.” There are more possible relationships than that. i. Some truths of Tradition are directly stated in Scripture, such as God’s creation of the world. the Bible comes right out and says, “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen. 1:1).

9 https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/the-complex-relationship-between-scripture-and-tradition SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

ii. Other truths of Tradition are not stated directly in Scripture but are implied clearly by the biblical author. For example, while the Bible doesn’t come out and say that the Holy Spirit is a person rather than a force, it is implied in numerous passages, such as those in which the Spirit is depicted as speaking to people (e.g., Acts 13:2), and the biblical authors meant us to understand this. iii. Some truths of Tradition can be inferred from Scripture even though the biblical authors did not clearly imply them. For example, Christ having both a human will and a divine will can be inferred from his being “true God and true man” (CCC 464). Various biblical passages state or imply that he is true God and true man, but in none does the biblical author state or imply that he had two wills. We have to figure that out by inference. iv. A truth is sometimes alluded to or reflected in the text even though it can’t be proved from the text alone. The may be reflected in what Gabriel says to Mary in Luke 1:28, and the Assumption may be reflected in the wings the woman is given in Revelation 12:14, but you couldn’t prove these truths from the text alone. v. Some truths are presupposed by Scripture, such as many of the particulars of how the sacraments are celebrated—their proper form, matter, ministers, and recipients. The sacraments are mentioned in the Bible, but the biblical authors didn’t give many details about their administration. They assumed that the reader would look to the practice of the Church for the answers to these questions. For example, the sacrament of reconciliation is discussed, but the words that need to be used to make an valid are not. vi. Some truths are not in Scripture at all; not even a piece of the truth in question is indicated. As we saw earlier, the truths that public revelation is ended and that there will be no more apostles fall in this category. b. Often it isn’t easy to decide which of these categories a truth falls into, but it is beneficial to think the question through, consider whether the Scriptural basis for a truth is found in the literal or the spiritual sense of the text, and consider how much confidence in the truth can be drawn from the Bible compared to how much must be drawn from Tradition. Early Church Fathers – Quotes on Scripture and Tradition Papias

“Papias [A.D. 120], who is now mentioned by us, affirms that he received the sayings of the apostles from those who accompanied them, and he, moreover, asserts that he heard in person Aristion and the presbyter John. Accordingly, he mentions them frequently by name, and in his writings gives their traditions [concerning Jesus]. . . . [There are] other passages of his in which SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers) he relates some miraculous deeds, stating that he acquired the knowledge of them from tradition” (fragment in , Church History 3:39 [A.D. 312]).

Eusebius of Caesarea

“At that time [A.D. 150] there flourished in the Church Hegesippus, whom we know from what has gone before, and Dionysius, bishop of Corinth, and another bishop, Pinytus of Crete, and besides these, Philip, and Apollinarius, and Melito, and Musanus, and Modestus, and, finally, Irenaeus. From them has come down to us in writing, the sound and orthodox faith received from tradition” (Church History 4:21).

Irenaeus

“As I said before, the Church, having received this preaching and this faith, although she is disseminated throughout the whole world, yet guarded it, as if she occupied but one house. She likewise believes these things just as if she had but one soul and one and the same heart; and harmoniously she proclaims them and teaches them and hands them down, as if she possessed but one mouth. For, while the languages of the world are diverse, nevertheless, the authority of the tradition is one and the same” (Against Heresies 1:10:2 [A.D. 189]).

“That is why it is surely necessary to avoid them [heretics], while cherishing with the utmost diligence the things pertaining to the Church, and to lay hold of the tradition of truth. . . . What if the apostles had not in fact left writings to us? Would it not be necessary to follow the order of tradition, which was handed down to those to whom they entrusted the churches?” (ibid., 3:4:1).

“But since it would be too long to enumerate in such a volume as this the successions of all the churches, we shall confound all those who, in whatever manner, whether through self- satisfaction or vainglory, or through blindness and wicked opinion, assemble other than where it is proper, by pointing out here the successions of the bishops of the greatest and most ancient church known to all, founded and organized at Rome by the two most glorious apostles, Peter and Paul, that church which has the tradition and the faith which comes down to us after having been announced to men by the apostles. With this church, because of its origin, all churches must agree—that is, all the faithful in the whole world—and it is in her that the faithful everywhere have maintained the apostolic tradition” (ibid., 3:3:1–2).

Clement of Alexandria

“Well, they preserving the tradition of the blessed doctrine derived directly from the holy apostles, Peter, James, John, and Paul, the sons receiving it from the father (but few were like the fathers), came by God’s will to us also to deposit those ancestral and apostolic seeds. And well I know that they will exult; I do not mean delighted with this tribute, but solely on account of the preservation of the truth, according as they delivered it. For such a sketch as this, will, I think, be agreeable to a soul desirous of preserving from loss the blessed tradition” (Miscellanies 1:1 [A.D. 208]).

Origen SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

“Although there are many who believe that they themselves hold to the teachings of Christ, there are yet some among them who think differently from their predecessors. The teaching of the Church has indeed been handed down through an order of succession from the apostles and remains in the churches even to the present time. That alone is to be believed as the truth which is in no way at variance with ecclesiastical and apostolic tradition” (The Fundamental Doctrines 1:2 [A.D. 225]).

Cyprian of Carthage

“[T]he Church is one, and as she is one, cannot be both within and without. For if she is with , she was not with [Pope] Cornelius. But if she was with Cornelius, who succeeded the bishop Fabian by lawful ordination, and whom, beside the honor of the priesthood the Lord glorified also with martyrdom, Novatian is not in the Church; nor can he be reckoned as a bishop, who, succeeding to no one, and despising the evangelical and apostolic tradition, sprang from himself. For he who has not been ordained in the Church can neither have nor hold to the Church in any way” (Letters 75:3 [A.D. 253]).

Athanasius

“Again we write, again keeping to the apostolic traditions, we remind each other when we come together for prayer; and keeping the feast in common, with one mouth we truly give thanks to the Lord. Thus giving thanks unto him, and being followers of the saints, ‘we shall make our praise in the Lord all the day,’ as the psalmist says. So, when we rightly keep the feast, we shall be counted worthy of that joy which is in heaven” (Festal Letters 2:7 [A.D. 330]).

“But you are blessed, who by faith are in the Church, dwell upon the foundations of the faith, and have full satisfaction, even the highest degree of faith which remains among you unshaken. For it has come down to you from apostolic tradition, and frequently accursed envy has wished to unsettle it, but has not been able” (ibid., 29).

Basil the Great

“Of the dogmas and messages preserved in the Church, some we possess from written teaching and others we receive from the tradition of the apostles, handed on to us in mystery. In respect to piety, both are of the same force. No one will contradict any of these, no one, at any rate, who is even moderately versed in matters ecclesiastical. Indeed, were we to try to reject unwritten customs as having no great authority, we would unwittingly injure the gospel in its vitals; or rather, we would reduce [Christian] message to a mere term” (The Holy Spirit 27:66 [A.D. 375]).

Epiphanius of Salamis

“It is needful also to make use of tradition, for not everything can be gotten from sacred Scripture. The holy apostles handed down some things in the scriptures, other things in tradition” (Medicine Chest Against All Heresies 61:6 [A.D. 375]).

SLIDE: SCRIPTURE AND TRADITION (Scriptural Basis and the Early Church Fathers)

Augustine

“[T]he custom [of not rebaptizing converts] . . . may be supposed to have had its origin in apostolic tradition, just as there are many things which are observed by the whole Church, and therefore are fairly held to have been enjoined by the apostles, which yet are not mentioned in their writings” (On Baptism, Against the Donatists 5:23[31] [A.D. 400]).

“But the admonition that he [Cyprian] gives us, ‘that we should go back to the fountain, that is, to apostolic tradition, and thence turn the channel of truth to our times,’ is most excellent, and should be followed without hesitation” (ibid., 5:26[37]).

“But in regard to those observances which we carefully attend and which the whole world keeps, and which derive not from Scripture but from Tradition, we are given to understand that they are recommended and ordained to be kept, either by the apostles themselves or by plenary [ecumenical] councils, the authority of which is quite vital in the Church” (Letter to Januarius [A.D. 400]).

John Chrysostom

“[Paul commands,] ‘Therefore, brethren, stand fast and hold the traditions which you have been taught, whether by word or by our letter’ [2 Thess. 2:15]. From this it is clear that they did not hand down everything by letter, but there is much also that was not written. Like that which was written, the unwritten too is worthy of belief. So let us regard the tradition of the Church also as worthy of belief. Is it a tradition? Seek no further” (Homilies on Second Thessalonians [A.D. 402]).

Vincent of Lerins

“With great zeal and closest attention, therefore, I frequently inquired of many men, eminent for their holiness and doctrine, how I might, in a concise and, so to speak, general and ordinary way, distinguish the truth of the Catholic faith from the falsehood of heretical depravity.

“I received almost always the same answer from all of them—that if I or anyone else wanted to expose the frauds and escape the snares of the heretics who rise up, and to remain intact and in sound faith, it would be necessary, with the help of the Lord, to fortify that faith in a twofold manner: first, of course, by the authority of [Scripture] and then by the tradition of the Catholic Church.

“Here, perhaps, someone may ask: ‘If the canon of the scriptures be perfect and in itself more than suffices for everything, why is it necessary that the authority of ecclesiastical interpretation be joined to it?’ Because, quite plainly, sacred Scripture, by reason of its own depth, is not accepted by everyone as having one and the same meaning . . .”

“Thus, because of so many distortions of such various errors, it is highly necessary that the line of prophetic and apostolic interpretation be directed in accord with the norm of the ecclesiastical and Catholic meaning” (The Notebooks [A.D. 434]). SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

One passage Fundamentalists often cite as a prooftext against the Catholic view of salvation is Ephesians 2:8–9: “For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God—not by works, so that no one can boast.” Though this passage can stymie Catholics in conversation, they need not feel threatened by it. Even if we assume that Paul is speaking of “good works” when he says we have not been saved by works, this in no way conflicts with Catholic theology.

Notice that the passage speaks of salvation in the past tense—”you have been saved.” In Greek this is the perfect tense, which denotes a past, completed action. We know from the Bible that salvation also has present and futureaspects, so the kind of salvation Paul is discussing in Ephesians 2:8–9 is initialsalvation. It is the kind which we received when we first came to God and were justified, not the kind of salvation we are now receiving (1 Pet. 1:8–9, Phil. 2:12) or the kind we one day will receive (Rom. 13:11, 1 Cor. 3:15, 5:5).

But the Catholic Church does not teach that we receive initial justification by good works. You do not have to do good works in order to come to God and be justified. The Council of Trent states: “And we are said to be justified by grace because nothing that precedes justification, whether faith or works, merits the grace of justification. For ‘if it is by grace, it is no longer by works; otherwise,’ as the apostle says, ‘grace is no more grace’ [Rom. 11:6]” (Decree on Justification 8). So even if Paul were using “works” to mean “good works” in Ephesians 2:8–9, there is no conflict with Catholic theology. However, Paul probably does not mean “good works.” Normally when he says “works,” he means “works of the Law”—those done out of the Law of Moses. His point is to stress that we are saved by faith in Jesus Christ and not by obeying the Mosaic Law. Jews may not boast of having a privileged relationship with God because they keep the Mosaic Law and its requirement of circumcision (Rom. 2:6–11, 17–21, 25–29, 3:21–22, 27–30). Paul discusses how Jew and Gentiles are united together in the body of Christ and mentions works in connection with boasting, before turning to the whole subject of circumcision and membership in Christ: “Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called the uncircumcision by what is called the circumcision . . . remember that you were at that time separated from Christ. . . . But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near in the blood of Christ. For he is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down the dividing wall of hostility, by abolishing in his flesh the Law of commandments and ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two . . . and might reconcile us both to God in one body. . . . So then you are no longer strangers and sojourners, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God” (Eph. 2:11–19). Paul is probably using “works” and “boasting” here as he does in Romans, of Jews boasting before Gentiles of having privilege with God due to their keeping the Mosaic Law. He says we are not saved in that manner, but by faith—meaning faith in Christ—so no one, either Jew or Gentile, can boast of having a more privileged position with God. We are all saved on the same basis—through faith in Christ and union in his body, the Church.

The apostle then turns our attention away from works of the Mosaic Law and toward the kind of works a Christian should be interested in—good works: “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them” (Eph. 2:10). The sense of what Paul is saying is: “God has raised up both of us—Jews and Gentiles—to sit in the heavenly places in Christ Jesus, for we received initial salvation as a gift. SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

We obtained it by faith in Christ (which itself is a gift from God), not by works of obedience to the Mosaic Law—so neither Jew or Gentile can boast over the other of having privilege with God. Instead, we Christians are the result of God’s work, for he created us anew in the body of Christ so that we might do good works—the kind of works we should be concerned about—for God intended ahead of time for us to do them” (paraphrase of Eph. 2:6–10).10

1) Terms: Justification and Salvation11 a. The concepts of salvation and justification refer to the same work that God does within us, but each emphasizes different aspects. b. The term salvation i. Within Catholic theology tends to emphasize the idea that we are rescued by Jesus from sin and its eternal consequences. The Catechism defines salvation as such: 1. The forgiveness of sins and restoration of friendship with God, which can be done by God alone (Glossary, Salvation). c. The concept of justification i. Within Catholic theology emphasizes right relationship with God. But rather than God merely declaring us to be in good standing with him, he actually makes us holy. The Catechism highlights this in its definition justification: 1. The gracious action of God which frees us from sin and communicates “the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ” (Rom. 3:22). Justification is not only the remission of sins but also the sanctification and renewal of the interior man (Glossary, Justification). d. In light of these two definitions, we can say that the Catholic understanding of salvation (rescued from sin and its eternal consequences) involves justification (right relationship with God and renewed within) and that justification involves salvation. 2) The Catholic Position a. The Catholic Church does not now, nor has it ever, taught a doctrine of salvation by works…that we can “work” our way into Heaven. Additionally, nowhere in the Bible does it teach that we are saved by “faith alone.” The only place in all of Scripture where the phrase “faith alone” appears is in James 2:24, where it says that we are not justified (or saved) by faith alone. b. The Bible says very clearly that we are not saved by faith alone.Works do have something to do with our salvation. Numerous passages in the New Testament that I know of about judgment says we will be judged by our works, not by whether or not we have faith alone. We see this in Romans 2, Matthew 15 and 16, 1 Peter 1, Revelation 20 and 22, 2 Corinthians 5, and many, many more verses. c. If we are saved by faith alone, why does 1 Corinthians 13:13 say that love is greater than faith? Shouldn’t it be the other way around? As Catholics we believe that we are saved by God’s grace alone. We can do nothing, apart from God’s grace, to receive the free gift of salvation. We also believe, however, that we have

10 https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/not-by-works 11 https://www.catholic.com/qa/the-difference-between-salvation-and-justification SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

to respond to God’s grace. Protestants believe that, too. However, many Protestants believe that the only response necessary is an act of faith; whereas, Catholics believe a response of faith and works is necessary…or, as the Bible puts it in Galatians 5:6, “For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumsion is of any avail, but faith working through love…” Faith working through love…just as the Church teaches. 3) Elaborating on Justification a. The Reformers saw justification as a mere legal act by which God declares the sinner to be meriting heaven even though he remains in fact unjust and sinful. It is not an inner renewal and a real sanctification, only an external application of Christ’s righteousness. b. Scripture understands justification differently. It is a true eradication of sin and a true sanctification and renewal of the inner man, for “There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus” and “if any one is in Christ, he is a new creation; the old has passed away, behold, the new has come” (Rom. 8:1 and 2 Cor. 5:17). Thus God chose us “to be saved through sanctification by the Spirit and belief in the truth” (2 Thess. 2:13). i. Scripture conceives of forgiveness of sins as a real and complete removal of them. The words used are “wipe out,” “blot out,” “take away,” “remove,” and “cleanse” (Ps. 51:2[50:3]; Isa. 43:25; Mic. 7:18; John 1:29; Ps. 103 [102]:12). Scripture shows justification as a rebirth, as a generation of the supernatural life in a former sinner (John 3:5; Titus 3:5), as a thorough inner renewal (Eph. 4:23), and as a sanctification (1 Cor. 6:11). The soul itself becomes beautiful and holy. It is not just an ugly soul hidden under a beautiful cloak. c. A subject of perennial disagreement has been the nature of justification. Lutherans have frequently characterized it as only a forgiveness of sins, while the Church insists that it is more than this. Two key Protestant slogans are “justification by grace alone” and “justification by faith alone.” (These do not contradict each other since they are speaking on different levels of what causes justification.) i. Catholics have never had trouble affirming the first slogan, though Protestants commonly believe they do. But both Catholics and Lutherans often have wrongly thought that Catholics must reject the second slogan. ii. This confusion is based on a misreading of canon 9 of Trent’s Decree on Justification, which rejects the proposition that “the sinner is justified by faith alone, meaning that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the action of his own will” (emphasis added). d. As a careful reading of this canon shows, not every use of the formula “faith alone” is rejected, but only those that mean “nothing else is required,” etc. If one acknowledges that things besides the theological virtue of faith are required, then one’s use of the “faith alone” formula does not fall under the condemnation of Trent. SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

e. The classic Catholic alternative to saying that we are saved “by faith alone” is to say that we are saved by “faith, hope, and charity.” It is, however, possible for these two formulas to be equivalent in meaning. i. Charity-the supernatural love of God-is what ultimately unites the soul to God. It therefore is recognized as the “form” of the virtues, the thing which binds them together and gives them their fullest meaning. Catholic theologians have historically talked about virtues like faith and hope being “formed” or “unformed” based on whether they are united with charity. ii. St. Paul tells us that charity “believes all things, hopes all things” (1 Cor. 13:7). Thus, if you have “formed faith,” you have not only faith, but hope and charity. This is why the two formulas-“faith alone” and “faith, hope, and charity”-can be equivalent. If you assert that we are justified by “faith alone”-and by that you mean formed faith-then there is no problem from the Catholic perspective. The phrase is not being used in a way that falls under Trent’s condemnation. f. Different Protestants mean different things when they use the “faith alone” slogan. Some (rank antinomians) really do mean that one is justified by intellectual belief alone, without hope or charity. Others (many American Evangelicals) appear to believe one is justified by faith plus hope, which is trust in God for salvation. Many others (including the Lutherans signing the Joint Declaration) believe that charity, the principle behind good works, always accompanies faith, and so believe in justification by formed faith. g. This is the sense reflected in the Joint Declaration on Justification of 1999 (with the Lutherans), which states that “justifying faith . . . includes hope in God and love for him. Such a faith is active in love and thus the Christian cannot and should not remain without works” (Joint Declaration (JD), 25). i. It is this understanding that also lies behind statements in the Joint Declaration such as: “We confess together that persons are justified by faith in the gospel ‘apart from works prescribed by the law’ (Rom. 3:28)” (JD, 31). h. However, it should be pointed out that the “faith alone” formula is unbiblical language. The phrase “faith alone” (pisteus monon) appears in the New Testament only once-in James 2:24-where it is rejected. For those who use this language, though, it can be given an acceptable meaning. 4) The Justified as Sinner a. This is the classic Lutheran expression that man is “at once righteous and a sinner” (simul justus et peccator). b. The Catholic teaching is that “in baptism everything that is really sin is taken away, and so, in those who are born anew there is nothing that is hateful to God. It follows that the concupiscence that remains in the baptized is not, properly speaking, sin”. c. This goes back to a dispute at the time of the Protestant breakaway, when Lutherans wished to say that the concupiscence (disordered desire) that remains in the individual after justification still has the character of sin. The Catholic Church has always taught that concupiscence “has never [been] understood to be called SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

sin in the sense that it is truly and properly sin in those born again, but in the sense that it is from sin and inclines to sin” (Trent, Decree on 5). i. The Annex to the Joint Declaration responds by conceding that “it can be recognized from a Lutheran perspective that [concupiscent] desire can become the opening through which sin attacks” (Annex, 2B). This is fine. Concupiscence is a vulnerability that leads to sin but is not the sin itself. 5) Justification and Sanctification a. As Catholics, we believe we need sanctifying grace, i.e., the life of God given to us at Baptism, in our souls if we’re to be equipped for heaven. Another way of saying this is that we need to be justified. i. “But you were washed, you were sanctified, you were justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God” (1 Cor. 6:11). b. The Protestant misunderstanding of justification lies in its claim that justification is merely a legal declaration by God that the sinner is now “justified.” If you “accept Christ as your personal Lord and Savior,” he declares you justified, though he doesn’t really make you justified or sanctified; your soul is in the same state as it was before, but you’re eligible for heaven. c. A person is expected thereafter to undergo sanctification (don’t make the mistake of thinking Protestants say sanctification is unimportant), but the degree of sanctification achieved is, ultimately, immaterial to the question of whether you’ll get to heaven. You will, since you’re justified; and justification as a purely legal declaration is what counts. Unfortunately, this amounts to God telling an untruth by saying the sinner has been justified, while all along he knows that the sinner is only covered under the “cloak” of Christ’s righteousness. But, what God declares, he does. “[S]o shall my word be that goes forth from my mouth; it shall not return to me empty, but it shall accomplish that which I purpose, and prosper in the thing for which I sent it” (Is. 55:11). So, when God declares you justified, he makes you justified. Any justification that is not woven together with sanctification is no justification at all. d. The Bible’s teaching on justification is much more nuanced. Paul indicates that there is a real transformation that occurs in justification. This is seen, for example, in Romans 6:7, which every standard translation—Protestant ones included— renders as “For he who has died is freed from sin” (or a close variant). e. Paul is obviously speaking about being freed from sin in an experiential sense, for this is the passage where he is at pains to stress the fact that we have made a decisive break with sin that must be reflected in our behavior: “What shall we say then? Are we to continue in sin that grace may abound? By no means! How can we who died to sin still live in it?” (Rom. 6:1-2). “Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal bodies, to make you obey their passions. Do not yield your members to sin as instruments of wickedness, but yield yourselves to God as men who have been brought from death to life, and your members to God as instruments of righteousness” (Rom. 6:12-13). f. The context here is what Protestants call sanctification, the process of being made holy. Sanctification is the sense in which we are said to be “freed from sin” in this passage. Yet in the Greek text, what is actually said is “he who has died has SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

been justified from sin.” The term in Greek (dikaioo) is the word for being justified, yet the context indicates sanctification, which is why every standard translation renders the word “freed” rather than “justified.” This shows that, in Paul’s mind, justification involves a real, experiential freeing from sin, not just a change of legal status. And it shows that, the way he uses terms, there is not the rigid wall between justification and sanctification that Protestants imagine. g. According to Scripture, sanctification and justification aren’t just one-time events, but are ongoing processes in the life of the believer. As the author of Hebrews notes: “For by one offering he has perfected forever those who are being sanctified” (Heb. 10:14). In regard to justification also being an ongoing process, compare Romans 4:3; Genesis 15:6 with both Hebrews 11:8; Genesis 12:1-4 and James 2:21-23; Genesis 22:1-18. In these passages, Abraham’s justification is advanced on three separate occasions. 6) Can Justification Be Lost? a. Many Protestants go on to say that losing ground in the sanctification battle won’t jeopardize your justification. You might sin worse than you did before “getting saved,” but you’ll enter heaven anyway, because you can’t undo your justification. i. Calvin taught the absolute impossibility of losing justification. Luther said it could be lost only through the sin of unbelief; that is, by undoing the act of faith and rejecting Christ, but not by what Catholics call mortal sins. b. Catholics see it differently. If you sin grievously, the supernatural life in your soul disappears, since it can’t co-exist with serious sin. You then cease to be justified. If you were to die while unjustified, you’d go to hell. But you can become rejustified by having the supernatural life renewed in your soul, and you can do that by responding to the actual graces God sends you. 7) Acting on Actual Graces a. God sends you an actual grace, say, in the form of a nagging voice that whispers, “You need to repent! Go to confession!” You do, your sins are forgiven, you’re reconciled to God, and you have supernatural life again (John 20:21–23). i. Or you say to yourself, “Maybe tomorrow,” and that particular supernatural impulse, that actual grace, passes you by. But another is always on the way, God never abandoning us to our own stupidity (1 Tim. 2:4). b. Once you have supernatural life, once sanctifying grace is in your soul, you can increase it by every supernaturally good action you do: receiving Communion, saying prayers, performing corporal . Is it worth increasing sanctifying grace once you have it; isn’t the minimum enough? Yes and no. It’s enough to get you into heaven, but it may not be enough to sustain itself. The minimum isn’t good enough because it’s easy to lose the minimum. i. We must continually seek God’s grace, continually respond to the actual graces God is working within us, inclining us to turn to him and do good. This is what Paul discusses when he instructs us: “Therefore, my beloved, as you have always obeyed, so now, not only as in my presence but much more in my absence, work out your own salvation with fear and trembling; for God is at work in you, both to will and to work for his SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

good pleasure. Do all things without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish c. Romans 5:1 is a favorite verse for Calvinists and those who hold to the doctrine commonly known as “once saved, always saved:” i. “Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ.” d. This text is believed to indicate that the justification of the believer in Christ at the point of faith is a one-time completed action. All sins are forgiven immediately— past, present and future. The believer then has, or at least, can have, absolute assurance of his justification regardless of what may happen in the future. There is nothing that can separate the true believer from Christ—not even the gravest of sins. Similarly, with regard to salvation, Eph. 2:8-9 says: i. “For by grace you have been saved through faith; and this is not your own doing, it is the gift of God—not because of works, lest any man should boast.” e. For the Protestant, these texts seem plain. Ephesians 2 says the salvation of the believer is past—perfect tense, passive voice in Greek, to be more precise—which means a past completed action with present on-going results. It’s over! And if we examine again Romans 5:1, the verb to justify is in a simple past tense (Gr. Aorist tense). And this is in a context where St. Paul had just told these same Romans: i. “For if Abraham was justified by works, he has something to boast about, but not before God. For what does the scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was reckoned to him as righteousness.” f. Righteousness is a synonym for justice or justification. How does it get any clearer than that? Abraham was justified once and for all, the claim is made, when he believed. Not only is this proof of sola fide, says the Calvinist, but it is proof that justification is a completed transaction at the point the believer comes to Christ. The paradigm of the life of Abraham is believed to hold indisputable proof of the Reformed position. 8) THE CATHOLIC ANSWER: a. The Catholic Church actually agrees with the above, at least on a couple points. First, as baptized Catholics, we can agree that we have been justified and we have been saved. Thus, in one sense, our justification and salvation is in the past as a completed action. The initial grace of justification and salvation we receive in baptism is a done deal. And Catholics do not believe we were partially justified or partially saved at baptism. Catholics believe, as St. Peter said in I Peter 3:21, “Baptism… now saves you…” Ananias said to Saul of Tarsus, “Rise and be baptized, and wash away your sins, calling on his name.” That means the new Christian has been “washed… sanctified… [and] justified” as I Cor. 6:11clearly teaches. That much is a done deal; thus, it is entirely proper to say we “have been justified” and we “have been saved.” b. However, this is not the end of the story. Scripture reveals that it is precisely through this justification and salvation the new Christian experiences in baptism that he enters into a process of justification and salvation requiring his free SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

cooperation with God’s grace. If we read the very next verses of our above-cited texts, we find the inspired writer himself telling us there is more to the story here. c. Romans 5:1-2 reads: i. “Therefore, since we are justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through him we have obtained access to this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in our hope of sharing the glory of God.” ii. This text indicates that after having received the grace of justification we now have access to God’s grace by which we stand in Christ and we can then rejoice in the hope of sharing God’s glory. That word “hope” indicates that what we are hoping for we do not yet possess (see Romans 8:24). d. Ephesians 2:10 reads: i. “For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand, that we should walk in them.” e. There is no doubt that we must continue to work in Christ as Christians and it is also true that it is only by the grace of God we can continue to do so. But even more importantly, Scripture tells us this grace can be resisted. II Cor. 6:1 tells us: i. “Working together with him, then, we entreat you not to accept the grace of God in vain.” f. St. Paul urged believers in Antioch—and all of us by allusion—“to continue in the grace of God” (Acts 13:43). Indeed, in a text we will look at more closely in a moment, St. Paul warns Christians that they can “fall from Grace” in Galatians 5:4. 9) Grace – What is it and how does it work? a. If you took your ’s catechism classes when you were growing up, you at least remember that there are two kinds of grace, sanctifying and actual. That may be all you recall. The names being so similar, you might have the impression sanctifying grace is nearly identical to actual grace. Not so. b. Sanctifying grace stays in the soul. It’s what makes the soul holy; it gives the soul supernatural life. More properly, it is supernatural life. c. Actual grace, by contrast, is a supernatural push or encouragement. It’s transient. It doesn’t live in the soul, but acts on the soul from the outside, so to speak. It’s a supernatural kick in the pants. It gets the will and intellect moving so we can seek out and keep sanctifying grace. i. In its natural state, your soul isn’t fit for heaven. What you need to live there is supernatural life, not just natural life. That supernatural life is called sanctifying grace. d. If sanctifying grace dwells in your soul when you die, then you can live in heaven (though you may need to be purified first in purgatory; cf. 1 Cor. 3:12–16). If it doesn’t dwell in your soul when you die—in other words, if your soul is spiritually dead by being in the state of mortal sin (Gal. 5:19-21)— you cannot live in heaven. You then have to face an eternity of spiritual death: the utter separation of your spirit from God (Eph. 2:1, 2:5, 4:18). 10) What did the Reformers think about grace? SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

a. Luther’s newly-invented theory of righteousness, i.e. the doctrine of justification by faith alone. If man is to be sanctified not by an interior renovation through grace which will blot out his sins, but by an extrinsic imputation through the merits of Christ, which will cover his soul as a cloak, there is no place for signs that cause grace, and those used can have no other purpose than to excite faith in the Savior. b. Protestants tend to think grace works extrinsically to the person c. One of the great divisions between Catholic and Protestant theology regards the understanding of how grace, the gift of God won for humanity by the sacrifice of Jesus Christ, works on the human soul. This division essentially became a disagreement between the Catholic Church and the Protestant reformers of the 16th century about man’s justification, or means of salvation – a matter that remains a source of tension even today. d. The Protestant reformers of the 16th century supported the idea that grace works extrinsically on the human person; it does not penetrate and cleanse human nature from within. Martin Luther, a central figure of the Protestant Reformation, taught that after baptism, original sin remained. Grace acts as a sort of cloak which covers the corruption of human nature and makes the person acceptable to God, though underneath he remains depraved. Luther is famously credited with having said that the justified soul is a “snow-covered pile of dung.” e. What follows from this understanding of grace is the Protestant teaching that a person’s actions are worth nothing toward his or her justification, since they come from a sinful source. From this has emerged the doctrine of sola fide, or justification by “faith alone”. Evangelical Protestants identify the moment of justification as the moment when the person experiences, for the first time, genuine faith – this moment is what the well-known phrase “born again,” (John 3:3) means for them. Protestants consider good works and taking after the example of Christ as a process of becoming holy, which is distinct from justification. 11) The Catholic Teaching on Grace a. The Catholic teaching, on the other hand, is that grace does indeed work intrinsically, and that in Baptism the person is truly made a “new creation” (2 Cor. 5:17). i. “The grace of the Holy Spirit has the power to justify us, that is, to cleanse us from our sins and to communicate to us ‘the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ’ (Rom 3:22) and through Baptism,” the Catechism of the Catholic Church teaches. b. And the Second Vatican Council re-affirmed that “[t]he followers of Christ … are justified in the Lord Jesus, because in the baptism of faith they truly become sons of God and sharers in the divine nature. In this way they are really made holy. Then too, by God's gift, they must hold on to and complete in their lives this holiness they have received” (Lumen Gentium, #40). c. So baptism fully cleanses the human person of original sin, though the tendency to sin remains and keeps us in need of ongoing grace, especially through the Sacraments. And against the notion of justification by faith alone, the Church teaches that we are saved not only through faith but also through the expression of SLIDE: FAITH AND WORKS – JUSTIFICATION, SALVATION, AND GRACE

this faith in good actions. "My brothers, what good is it to profess faith without practicing it? Such faith has no power to save one, has it?” wrote St. James (James 2:14), in the which Luther significantly called a “perfect straw- epistle” compared to the writings of St. Paul, who emphasized the need for faith.

Sources for this section: https://www.catholic.com/encyclopedia/Justification https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/faith-and-works-0 https://www.catholic.com/tract/grace-what-it-is-and-what-it-does https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/justification-process-or-one-time-deal https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/justification https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/are-good-works-necessary-for-salvation https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/arent-we-saved-by-faith-alone www.carm.org https://www.thecatholicthing.org/2012/11/11/faith-or-works-a-different-approach/ https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/faith-and-works SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

Introduction

Much of what Christians are asked to believe is not explicit in Scripture. In fact, some of what we believe is arguably not contained in Scripture at all. Questions about the canon of Scripture itself, the nature of biblical inspiration, who can write Scripture, when the canon closed, when a couple is joined in marriage, and by whom, is there on-going public revelation, and more, are not contained explicitly in Scripture.

The Sacraments

When on earth, Christ used his humanity as a medium of his power (see Mark 5:25–30). He uses sacraments to distribute his grace now (see John 6:53–58, 20:21–23; Acts 2:38; Jas. 5:14–15; 1 Peter 3:21). Not mere symbols, sacraments derive their power from him, so they are his very actions. In them he uses material things—water, wine, oil, the laying on of hands—to be avenues of his grace. Although one can receive grace in other ways, a key way is through sacraments instituted by Christ. A sacrament is a visible rite or ceremony which signifies and confers grace. Thus baptism is a visible rite, and the pouring of the water signifies the cleansing of the soul by the grace it bestows. There are six sacraments other than baptism: the Eucharist, penance (also known as reconciliation or confession), the , confirmation, matrimony, and holy orders.

Sacraments via Storytelling – “Is Sacramental Grace Magic?” – Mark Shea

My friend Ludwig was troubled again. We had talked before about the Catholic understanding of grace, but he still found the notion of sacraments uncomfortable to his Evangelical bones. Ludwig said to me, "It seems to me that the Catholic image of grace is vaguely magical, as though grace is some sort of substance God "pours out" through baptismal water, Eucharist and the like. But I thought the biblical reality is that grace was God's attitude of unmerited, forgiving favor toward us, not some magical something or other that must be bestowed like a charm or "good medicine." Why does grace require matter to get the job done in the Catholic scheme of things?"

To answer this, we must first acknowledge something. Namely, Ludwig was partly right. Grace is unmerited favor and it does forgive sins. But it is (and does) more than that. However, before we can say what that "more" is, we have to get something very clear. In discussing, not only grace, but any intangible thing from evolution to democracy to quantum physics, we are forced to use images in order to describe what we mean. Why? Because that (and no other way) is simply how language works when discussing what we cannot see or touch.

Why stress this? Because Ludwig has forgotten it. Note his words: he wants to know why the Church uses this "image" of grace as a "substance poured out" (like water into a bucket) when the "reality" is that it is unmerited favor. What has happened here? Ludwig has forgotten that "unmerited favor" is just as metaphorical as "substance" to describe grace. The only difference is that it is borrowed from our experience with human parents instead of from our experience with garden hoses. In contrast, the Church does not limit our understanding of grace to the single image of unmerited favor (valuable as it is). Rather, She uses other images as well--and all of SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION them rooted in Scripture too. Thus, there is no question of saying that Catholic theology uses images to describe grace but the Bible talks about the "reality." Rather, both Bible and Church use images since there is no other way to talk about grace. And all of those images are images of the invisible reality.

But the question remains: Why sacraments? And why are they seen as something more than mere images? For Ludwig is quite right. The Church does see sacraments, not merely as images of grace (though they are that too), but as things which actually do something to you--real agents through which grace comes. To understand this, we need to think of a kiss. A kiss is both physical and spiritual. Through a kiss we give, not merely an invisible reality, nor yet a merely physical gesture without spiritual content, but a sort of combination: an incarnation of love. A kiss is both physical and spiritual, like a human being.

Now sacraments are the kisses of God. Through them God not only symbolizes His love, He enacts it. Something happens to us through sacraments. Something is given. Something of the "stuff" of God is poured ("infused" to use theological technobabble) into the human soul like water into a bucket. Thus, when the Church speaks of grace infused, She speaks of God himself as if He were made of "stuff." In particular, She is recalling us to the language of the Creeds, which describe God himself as a substance when they say that the Three Persons of the Trinity, while distinct, are "one in being." They are made of the same substance, the same "God stuff" if you will. To many, this seems crude. But then Jesus never shied from "crude" images (like comparing God to a mother hen) if they got His point across. And this is for a very good reason: Jesus Himself is a physical image--the Physical Image--of the ultimate spiritual reality (Hebrews 1:3). He is God in human flesh (John 1:1). And as God in human flesh he both symbolized God and carried to us His very Life--like a sacrament.

Which this leads us directly back to the Catholic image of grace as a "substance." For according to Scripture, the new life of grace is nothing other than the new life of God himself coming to dwell in a human personality. Thus, when the Catholic tradition describes the bestowal of grace as an "infusion" it is being thoroughly biblical, for it is relying directly on what our Lord himself said when He described the new life as "living water" welling up in the soul of the one who believes in him (John 7:38). Elsewhere, he put the same idea a bit differently and promised, "Anyone who loves me will be true to my word, and my Father will love him; we will come to him and make our dwelling place with him" (John 14:23). Or to use an even more shocking biblical image, grace is that "seed" which impregnates our souls with Christ as it impregnated the womb of Mary.

The idea, then, is that grace (that is, the very substance of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit) is something which really enters into our being and radically alters it, generating new life. This is in contrast to the idea held by some Christians that grace is merely a sort of legal fiction by which sinners (who remain objectively bad) are simply declared legally "not guilty" and "covered with Christ's righteousness as snow covers a dunghill." To be sure, we are pardoned by the sacrifice of Christ, but this is the beginning, not the end of the Christian life. The rest of the story, which all believers live every day, is the fact that God causes us to "grow in him" to be changed by an increasing "infusion" of his grace into more and more areas of our being. We don't merely stop being sinners and have the heavenly account books zeroed out so we can squeak into SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION heaven. We start being saints and go from grace to grace and glory to glory. But why then, since this is all image and metaphor, do we need physical sacraments? What good is all this water and oil and laying on of hands and bread and wine and smells and bells if they are only pointing us to the purely spiritual reality? Why not cut to the chase and avoid all this clumsy paraphernalia?

In a word, says the Church, because we are not disembodied angelic spirits. As God reminds us every time we use the restroom or make love or eat a sandwich, we are a peculiar combination of dreams and bones, part angel and part alley cat. So if sanctity is to really permeate our total being (body, soul and spirit, as Paul points out in 1 Thessalonians 5:23) it must be addressed to our total being. As the child said to his mother, curling up to her side during the lightning storm, he couldn't just pray to God in his spirit because "I needed someone with skin on." So do we. Thus, the grace of God is given to our entire being, not just the spiritual part, in the sacraments which are both physical and spiritual "." We experience, not just a legal "not guilty," not merely a divine attitude of "unmerited favor," but a physical touch and, through it, power from the grace of God so that we may be like the Man (not the disembodied Ghost) Christ Jesus and love the Lord with all our heart, soul, mind and strength: that is, with our total being. For Jesus, the Word made flesh, is the Original Sacrament. He came to give us "life abundantly." And that life comes to us, not merely in spirit, but "in spirit and in truth" through his very physical flesh, which He gives for the life of the world. (John 6:51).

When viewed in this way, it become apparent that sacramentality is not a "magical" Catholic thing. Rather, it is a Christian thing since a) all Christians believe that the Holy Spirit was poured out on the earth through the veil of Christ's very literal, very material, very human flesh (Hebrews 10:20) and b) all Christians believe that the body, (not just the spirit) belongs to the Lord and is holy to him (1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Likewise, all Christians believe that the heaven and earth are full of God's glory (and are intended to show forth that glory). Indeed, it becomes apparent that (when we aren't talking about Catholic theology) even those Christians who find the idea of Catholic sacramentality magical see no difficulty at all with it in other areas. That is why a "Bible-believing Christian" feels no strangeness when he picks up a book (made of nothing more than paper, ink and glue as baptismal water is "only" water) and declares with perfect faith (as any Catholic would) that this mere creature is, in very truth, the Word of God that can bring us to salvation. The principle is exactly the same: God communicating his life through a physical book called the Bible and God communicating his life through the physical waters of baptism. The only difference is that in the former, his life is communicated verbally while in the latter it is communicated non-verbally. But both are sacramental for both draw their life from the spiritual Word made matter in Christ Jesus. That's not magic. It's just the way things have been ever since Bethlehem.

The Protestant Position on Sacraments

Luther’s capital errors, viz. private interpretation of the Scriptures, and justification by faith alone, logically led to a rejection of the Catholic doctrine on certain sacraments, not all of them though because the words of Scripture were too convincing and the retained three as “having the command of God and the promise of the grace of the New Testament”. These three, baptism, the Lord’s Supper, and penance were admitted by Luther and SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION also by Cranmer in his “Catechism” (see Dix, “op. cit.”, p. 79). Followers of Luther’s principles surpassed their leader in opposition to the sacraments.

Once granted that they were merely “signs and testimonies of God’s good will towards us”, the reason for great reverence was gone. Some rejected all sacraments, since God’s good will could be manifested without these external signs. Confession (penance) was soon dropped from the list of those retained. The Anabaptists rejected , since the ceremony could not excite faith in children. Protestants generally retained two sacraments, baptism and the Lord’s Supper, the latter being reduced by the denial of the Real Presence to a mere commemorative service.

Protestants generally hold that the sacraments are signs of something sacred (grace and faith), but deny that they really cause . Zwingli lowered still further the dignity of the sacraments, making them signs not of God’s fidelity but of our fidelity.

For many Protestants, receiving the sacraments we manifest faith in Christ: so they are merely the badges of our profession and the pledges of our fidelity. Fundamentally all these errors arise from Luther’s newly-invented theory of righteousness, i.e. the doctrine of justification by faith alone. If man is to be sanctified not by an interior renovation through grace which will blot out his sins, but by an extrinsic imputation through the merits of Christ, which will cover his soul as a cloak, there is no place for signs that cause grace, and those used can have no other purpose than to excite faith in the Savior.

The Eucharist – Does the bread and wine become the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus Christ? Is there Scriptural evidence?

The Mass

The Catholic Church teaches that the sacrifice of the cross was complete and perfect. The Mass is not a new sacrificing of Christ (he doesn’t suffer and die again; see Heb. 9:26), but a new offering of the same sacrifice. Through the instrumentality of the priest, he is present again, demonstrating how he accomplished our salvation: “For from the rising of the sun to its setting my name is great among the nations, and in every place incense is offered to my name, and a pure offering; for my name is great among the nations, says the Lord of hosts” (Mal. 1:11).

Now, there is much that is remarkably clear in Scripture about the Blessed Sacrament, especially concerning the real presence, i.e., the Catholic belief that the bread and wine truly become the body and blood of Jesus Christ – not just symbolically. The institution narratives, of course John 6, 1 Cor. 10:15-18, etc., come to mind immediately. But in this post, I would like to deal with what may well be the plainest text of all: 1 Corinthians 11:27-29 (though some may argue for John 6 and make a strong case):

“Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord. Let a man examine himself, and so eat of the bread and drink of the cup. For anyone who eats and drinks without discerning the body eats and drinks judgment upon himself.” SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

According to St. Paul, a constitutive element involved in a Christian’s preparation to receive the Eucharist is “discerning the body.” What body is St. Paul talking about that must “discerned” you ask? It’s really not very hard to tell. He just said, in verse 27, “Whoever . . . eats . . . in an unworthy matter will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.” Any questions? These very plain words were a stark reminder to the Corinthians 2,000 years ago, and should be for us as well. We must recognize not just what it is that we are receiving in the Eucharist, but who it is: Jesus Christ.

And there’s more!

St. Paul uses unequivocal language in describing the nature of the Eucharist by using the language of homicide when he describes the sin of those who do not recognize Christ’s body in this sacrament and therefore receive him unworthily. He says they are “guilty of the body and blood of the Lord.” According to Numbers 35:27, Deuteronomy 21:8, 22:8, Ezekiel 35:6 and elsewhere in Scripture, to be “guilty of blood” means you are guilty of shedding innocent blood in murder. This is not the language of pure symbolism. This is the language of real presence.

Think about it: If someone were to put a bullet through a picture of a real person, I am sure the person represented in the photo would not be thrilled about it, but the perpetrator would not be “guilty of blood.” But if this same perpetrator were to put a bullet through the actual person you better believe he would be “guilty of blood.” And that’s what Paul is saying in a manner of speaking: you better believe! Thus, the language used here in 1 Corinthians 11 is very strong— some of the strongest language St. Paul could have used, in fact—to underscore the truth that when he says we must “discern the body” here in the Eucharist, he means we must “discern the body” here in the Eucharist.

The body that is present in the Eucharist is that of Christ now reigning in heaven, the same body which Christ received from Adam, the same body which was made to die on the cross, but different in the sense that it has been transformed. This spiritualized body was a physical reality, as discovered. “Put your finger here; look, here are my hands. Give me your hand and put it into my side” (John 20:27). It is this glorious body which is now, under the appearance of bread, communicated to us. When Christ himself promised his Real Presence in the Eucharist, many of his disciples could not accept it. “This is intolerable language. How could anyone accept it?” (John 6:68). But Peter had the right mentality. “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the message of eternal life, and we believe; we know that you are the holy one of God” (John 6:69).

Regarding the Eucharist: What is ?

Transubstantiation is the complete change of the substance of bread and wine into the substance of Christ's body and blood by a validly ordained priest during the at Mass, so that only the accidents of bread and wine remain. While the faith behind the term itself was already believed in apostolic times, the term itself was a later development.

When we say that the substance of the bread and wine are completely changed, by "substance" here, we understand the essence or that which makes something what it is. "Accidents" are those SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION aspects of a thing that are not essential to it. Water is a compound of hydrogen and oxygen. This is its essence or substance. Of itself it is colorless. But one can add color to it. The color would be considered an "accident" since it is not essential to what water basically is.

With "transubstantiation" the essence or substance of bread and wine changes into the body and blood of Christ while the accidents such as the color and shape and taste remain the same. So you have a substantial change that is not available by our senses. But we know through our faith what Jesus says in Scripture and by what the early Christians believed: that the bread and wine have been changed into the body and blood of Jesus.

The Lutheran Understanding: Consubstantiation

With "consubstantiation" no substantial change takes place with the bread and wine. The substance of the body and blood of Christ are added to the substance of the bread and wine. So you have bread that remains bread that somehow has Christ's body added to it. And so with the wine. But whatever change that has taken place is spiritual and not physical. This explanation, held by some Protestants, is not held by the Catholic Church. We emphatically believe what Scriptures teaches: that the bread and wine actually become Christ's body and blood. A physical change takes place.

Superficially, consubstantiation might seem more “incarnational” than transubstantiation, but there’s a catch. For the Eucharist to be both Jesus Christ and bread and wine, as Jesus is both God and man, Jesus would have to unite the nature of bread to himself as he united human nature to himself. It would amount to a new incarnation, a new of heaven and earth. We would confess a Lord who is truly God, truly man, and truly pastry. This would demean and trivialize the significance of our Lord’s assuming our human nature. Furthermore, such a reprise of the Incarnation would not accomplish what the Eucharist is all about: It would not make present the human body and blood of Christ. If the Second Person of the Trinity were to acquire a new, confectionery nature, this new nature would have no direct relationship to Jesus’ human nature. He would be present in the Eucharist in his divinity and his breadness, but not his humanity. His human body, born of Mary, crucified on the cross, raised from the dead, and ascended into glory, would be uninvolved.

This is not, of course, what consubstantiationists believe. They picture Christ in his divinity and his humanity juxtaposed with bread and wine, not becoming them. But this is not the incarnational principle. It is more like . It makes the Eucharist an amalgam of Jesus and bread, just as Nestorius made Jesus an amalgam of God and man without truly uniting the two natures in one person. The authentic Catholic understanding of the Eucharist, by contrast, is not a repetition of the Incarnation but an extension of it. Christ is not hypostatically united to bread, but the one hypostatic union of divinity and humanity is presented to us under the appearances of bread and wine. It is not a new, independent redemptive act, but the making present of the one redemption accomplished by Christ in his Incarnation, Crucifixion, Resurrection, and Ascension.

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Memorialism

This view is attributed to Ulrich Zwingli. It maintains that there is no real presence of Christ at the Lord's Table, but the Meal is only a memorial of the atonement purchased by Christ (Luke 22:19; 1 Cor 11:23-26). They assert that the bread and wine remain as bread and wine at the Meal. However, this view observes a real absence of Christ during the Lord's Supper? As it turned out, it was the Lord's Supper that prevented the uniting of the German and Swiss reform movements. At a 1529 meeting at Marburg, called to unite the two movements, Luther and Zwingli met. Though they agreed on 14 points of doctrine, they stumbled on the fifteenth: the Lord's Supper. Against Zwingli's view, Luther insisted on Christ's literal presence. Zwingli balked. Luther said Zwingli was of the devil and that he was nothing but a wormy nut. Zwingli resented Luther's treating him "like an ass."

Reformed

This view is attributed to . It maintains that the Lord's Supper is both a remembrance (Luke 22:19; 1 Cor 11:23-26) and that there is a spiritual presence of Christ (1 Cor 10:16-17) at the Lord's Table. So, when believers drink the cup and eat the bread, the whole body of Christ is therefore joined to the Lord in deep spiritual fellowship. Christ is present with believers at the Table (spiritually, not physically). So, this view holds that the Lord's Table is a rich symbolic covenantal meal, but not another sacrifice.

Did belief in transubstantiation and the Real Presence really just start at the Council of Trent in 1545?

The short answer is no. Scripture provides plenty of evidence that the Eucharist was not viewed merely as a symbol but as exactly what Christ said it would be, exactly that which lost him so many disciples – his body, blood, soul, and divinity. In fact, when Photius started the Greek Schism in 869, he still believed in the Real Presence. The Greeks always believed in it. They repeated it at the reunion councils in 1274 at Lyons and 1439 at Florence. Therefore, it is evident that the Catholic doctrine must be older than the Eastern Schism of Photius.

If the Eucharist the body and blood of Jesus, then why don’t Catholics always refer to the bread and wine as the “body and blood”?

It is entirely proper to refer to the Eucharist as such because the Eucharist is Jesus. Second, in human discourse we tend to refer to things as they appear. This is called “phenomenological” language. We say “the sun will rise at 5:45AM tomorrow.” Does this mean we are all geocentrists who believe the sun rotates around the earth? I hope not!

We find examples of phenomenological language in many texts of Scripture as well. Daniel 12:2 in the and Acts 7:60 in the New Testament refer to death as “falling asleep.” I assure you there is an essential difference between dropping dead and taking a nap, but the inspired authors use this language because it was and still is common to do so. When someone dies, his body looks like he “fell asleep.” Thus, the dead are often referred to as having “fallen SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION asleep.” When it comes to the Eucharist, it retains the appearances of bread and wine; it should be expected that it would be referred to at times as it appears.

So wait…is the Eucharist cannibalism?

The Eucharist is not cannibalism. Rather, Jesus provides his very much alive and glorified body and blood in a sacramental manner, not as a mere human corpse given in a grotesque, three- dimensional way. As (2nd Century Church Father) writes a little later, “And what is spoken of as the blood of the grape, signifies that he who should appear would have blood, though not of the seed of man, but of the power of God” (First Apology 32). Indeed, the Eucharist is not the blood of a mere man but that of the God-man who became flesh (John 1:14) and who thus has related divine power in offering his body and blood as salvific food. Justin affirms here both the symbolic nature of the Eucharist—its having the appearance of bread and wine—and also its being the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Jesus, as he goes on to say in chapters 65-66:

For not as common bread and common drink do we receive these; but in like manner as Jesus Christ our Savior, having been made flesh by the word of God, had both flesh and blood for our salvation, so likewise have we been taught that the food which is blessed by the prayer of his word, and from which our blood and flesh by transmutation are nourished, is the flesh and blood of that Jesus who was made flesh. For the apostles, in the memoirs composed by them, which are called Gospels, have thus delivered unto us what was enjoined upon them; that Jesus took bread, and when he had given thanks, said, “This do in remembrance of me, this is my body;” and that, after the same manner, having taken the cup and given thanks, he said, “This is my blood;” and gave it to them alone (First Apology, 66; emphasis added).

Similarly, Jesus describes himself as “the bread of life” and also, to the dismay of many followers, says that his flesh and blood are true food and true drink—and therefore should be received “not as common bread.” In this light, the Church agrees with Culliton “that Christians do not partake of [Christ’s] flesh and blood in any carnal way,” for we partake of it after the manner of a spirit, in a whole and undivided way under the appearances of bread and wine. And yet we partake of the real body and blood of Jesus.

Early Church Fathers on the Eucharist

St. Ignatius of Antioch

He became the third bishop of Antioch, succeeding St. Evodius, who was the immediate successor of St. Peter. He heard St. John preach when he was a boy and knew St. , Bishop of Smyrna. Seven of his letters written to various Christian communities have been preserved. Eventually, he received the martyr's crown as he was thrown to wild beasts in the arena. SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

"Consider how contrary to the mind of God are the heterodox in regard to the grace of God which has come to us. They have no regard for charity, none for the widow, the orphan, the oppressed, none for the man in prison, the hungry or the thirsty. They abstain from the Eucharist and from prayer, because they do not admit that the Eucharist is the flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, the flesh which suffered for our sins and which the Father, in His graciousness, raised from the dead." (Letter to the Smyrnaeans", paragraph 6. circa 80-110 A.D.)

"Come together in common, one and all without exception in charity, in one faith and in one Jesus Christ, who is of the race of David according to the flesh, the son of man, and the Son of God, so that with undivided mind you may obey the bishop and the priests, and break one Bread which is the medicine of immortality and the antidote against death, enabling us to live forever in Jesus Christ."-("Letter to the Ephesians", paragraph 20, c. 80-110 A.D.

St. Justin Martyr

St. Justin Martyr was born a pagan but converted to Christianity after studying philosophy. He was a prolific writer and many Church scholars consider him the greatest apologist or defender of the faith from the 2nd century. He was beheaded with six of his companions sometime between 163 and 167 A.D.

"This food we call the Eucharist, of which no one is allowed to partake except one who believes that the things we teach are true, and has received the washing for forgiveness of sins and for rebirth, and who lives as Christ handed down to us. For we do not receive these things as common bread or common drink; but as Jesus Christ our Savior being incarnate by God's Word took flesh and blood for our salvation, so also we have been taught that the food consecrated by the Word of prayer which comes from him, from which our flesh and blood are nourished by transformation, is the flesh and blood of that incarnate Jesus." – ("First Apology", Ch. 66, inter A.D. 148-155.)

St. Irenaeus of Lyon

St. Irenaeus succeeded St. Pothinus to become the second bishop of Lyons in 177 A.D. Earlier in his life he studied under St. Polycarp. Considered, one of the greatest theologians of the 2nd century, St. Irenaeus is best known for refuting the Gnostic heresies.

[Christ] has declared the cup, a part of creation, to be his own Blood, from which he causes our blood to flow; and the bread, a part of creation, he has established as his own Body, from which he gives increase to our bodies." – (St. Irenaeus of Lyons, Against Heresies, 180 A.D.)

"For just as the bread which comes from the earth, having received the invocation of God, is no longer ordinary bread, but the Eucharist, consisting of two realities, earthly and heavenly, so our bodies, having received the Eucharist, are no longer corruptible, because they have the hope of the resurrection." – (Five Books on the Unmasking and Refutation of the Falsely named Gnosis". Book 4:18 4-5, circa 180 A.D.)

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Confession – Is it in the Bible? Did the early Church believe in it?

Where is the sacrament of confession in the Bible?

As soon as Jesus rose from the dead and earned salvation for us, he brought his apostles a new gift. After speaking peace to them, he said, “As the Father has sent me, even so I send you” (John 20:21). Just as Jesus was sent by the Father to reconcile the world to God, Jesus sent the apostles to continue his mission.

Jesus then breathed on the apostles. This is a verse that is often passed over, but it has extraordinary significance because it is only the second time in all of Scripture where God breathes on anyone. The other instance was at the moment of creation, when God breathed his own life into the nostrils of Adam. This should tell us that something of great importance is taking place. Upon doing this, Jesus said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained” (John 20:22–23).

Notice that Jesus is not simply commissioning the apostles to preach about God’s forgiveness. He is not saying, “Go tell everyone that when God forgives men’s sins, they’re forgiven.” In using the second person plural you, Jesus is telling his apostles that by the power of the Holy Spirit he has given them the power to forgive and retain the sins of men. Having the power to forgive and to retain sins implies that the apostle knows what a person’s sins are, which in turn implies oral confession. Otherwise, how is the apostle to know what to retain or forgive?

In the same way that Jesus gave his apostles other supernatural powers (such as raising men from the dead), he gave them power to absolve sins (raising them from spiritual death). In Matthew 9, we read that Jesus forgave a paralytic and then healed him so “that you may know that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins” (Matt. 9:6) After he exercised this power as a man, the crowds glorified God for having given “such authority to men” (Matt. 9:8, emphasis added). Notice that Matthew indicates this power to forgive sins had been given to men, and not simply to a man.

Some verses against confession to a priest

The Lord declares in :25:

I, I am He who blots out your transgressions for my own sake, and I will not remember your sins.

Psalm 103:2-3 adds:

Bless the Lord, O my soul, and forget not all his benefits, who forgives all your iniquity, who heals all your diseases…

Many will use these verses against the idea of confession to a priest. God forgiving sins, they will claim, precludes the possibility of there being a priest who forgives sins. Further, Hebrews 3:1 and 7:22-27 tell us Jesus is, “the… high priest of our confession” and that there are not “many priests,” but one in the New Testament—Jesus Christ. Moreover, if Jesus is the “one SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION mediator between God and men” (I Tim. 2:5), how can Catholics reasonably claim priests act in the role of mediator in the Sacrament of Confession?

BEGINNING WITH THE OLD

The Catholic Church acknowledges what Scripture unequivocally declares: it is God who forgives our sins. But that is not the end of the story. Leviticus 19:20-22 is equally unequivocal:

If a man lies carnally with a woman… they shall not be put to death… But he shall bring a guilt offering for himself to the Lord… And the priest shall make atonement for him with the ram of the guilt offering before the Lord for his sin which he has committed; and the sin which he has committed shall be forgiven him.

Apparently, a priest being used as God’s instrument of forgiveness did not somehow take away from the fact that it was God who did the forgiving. God was the first cause of the forgiveness; the priest was the secondary, or instrumental cause. Thus, God being the forgiver of sins in Isaiah 43:25 and Psalm 103:3 in no way eliminates the possibility of there being a ministerial priesthood established by God to communicate his forgiveness.

OUT WITH THE OLD

Many Protestants will concede the point of priests acting as mediators of forgiveness in the Old Testament. “However,” they will claim, “The people of God had priests in the Old Testament. Jesus is our only priest in the New Testament.” The question is: could it be that “our great God and Savior Jesus Christ” (Titus 2:13) did something similar to that which he did, as God, in the Old Testament? Could he have established a priesthood to mediate his forgiveness in the New Testament?

IN WITH THE NEW

Just as God empowered his priests to be instruments of forgiveness in the Old Testament, the God/man Jesus Christ delegated authority to his New Testament ministers to act as mediators of reconciliation as well. Jesus made this remarkably clear in John 20:21-23:

Jesus said to them again, “Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.” And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.”

Having been raised from the dead, our Lord was here commissioning his apostles to carry on with his work just before he was to ascend to heaven. “As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.” What did the Father send Jesus to do? All Christians agree he sent Christ to be the one true mediator between God and men. As such, Christ was to infallibly proclaim the Gospel (cf. Luke 4:16-21), reign supreme as King of kings and Lord of lords (cf. Rev. 19:16); and especially, he was to redeem the world through the forgiveness of sins (cf. I Peter 2:21-25, Mark 2:5-10). SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

The New Testament makes very clear that Christ sent the apostles and their successors to carry on this same mission. To proclaim the gospel with the authority of Christ (cf. Matthew 28:18- 20), to govern the Church in His stead (cf. Luke 22:29-30), and to sanctify her through the sacraments, especially the Eucharist (cf. John 6:54, I Cor. 11:24-29) and for our purpose here, Confession.

John 20:22-23 is nothing more than Jesus emphasizing one essential aspect of the priestly ministry of the apostles: To Forgive men’s sins in the person of Christ— “Whose sins you forgive, they are forgiven, whose sins you retain are retained.” Moreover, auricular confession is strongly implied here. The only way the apostles could either forgive or retain sins is by first hearing those sins confessed, and then making a judgment whether or not the penitent should be absolved.

TO FORGIVE OR TO PROCLAIM?

Many Protestants and various quasi-Christian sects claim John 20:23 must be viewed as Christ simply repeating “the ” of Matthew 28:19 and Luke 24:47 using different words that mean the same thing:

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit.

… and that repentance and forgiveness of sins should be preached in his name to all nations…

Commenting on John 20:23 in his book, Romanism—The Relentless Roman Catholic Assault on the Gospel of Jesus Christ! (White Horse Publications, Huntsville Alabama, 1995), p. 100, Protestant Apologist Robert Zins writes:

It is apparent that the commission to evangelize is tightly woven into the commission to proclaim forgiveness of sin through faith in Jesus Christ.

Mr. Zin’s claim is that John 20:23 is not saying the apostles would forgive sins; rather, that they would merely proclaim the forgiveness of sins. The only problem with this theory is it runs head- on into the text of John 20. “If you forgive the sins of any… if you retain the sins of any.” The text cannot say it any clearer: this is more than a mere proclamation of the forgiveness of sins— this “commission” of the Lord communicates the power to actually forgive the sins themselves.

Confession to a priest means that there is a priesthood…

A major obstacle to Confession for many Protestants (me included when I was Protestant) is that it presupposes a priesthood. As I said above, Jesus is referred to in Scripture as “the apostle and high priest of our confession.” The former priests were many in number, as Hebrews 7:23 says, now we have one priest—Jesus Christ. The question is: how does the idea of priests and confession fit in here? Is there one priest or are there many?

I Peter 2:5-9 gives us some insight: SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

… and like living stones be yourselves built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ… But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people…

If Jesus is the one and only priest in the New Testament in a strict sense, then we have a contradiction in Sacred Scripture. This, of course, is absurd. I Peter plainly teaches all believers to be members of a holy priesthood. Priest/believers do not take away from Christ’s unique priesthood, rather, as members of his body they establish it on earth.

FULL AND ACTIVE PARTICIPATIO

If one understands the very Catholic and very biblical notion of participatio, these problematic texts and others become relatively easy to understand. Yes, Jesus Christ is the “one mediator between God and men” just as I Tim. 2:5 says. The Bible is clear. Yet, Christians are also called to be mediators in Christ. When we intercede for one another or share the Gospel with someone, we act as mediators of God’s love and grace in the one true mediator, Christ Jesus, via the gift of participatio in Christ, the sole mediator between God and men (see I Timothy 2:1-7, I Timothy 4:16, Romans 10:9-14). All Christians, in some sense, can say with St. Paul, “…it is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me…” (Gal. 2:20)

PRIESTS AMONG PRIESTS

If all Christians are priests, then why do Catholics claim a ministerial priesthood essentially distinct from the ? The answer is: God willed to call out a special priesthood among the universal priesthood to minister to his people. This concept is literally as old as Moses.

When St. Peter taught us about the universal priesthood of all believers, he specifically referred to Exodus 19:6 where God alluded to ancient Israel as “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.” St. Peter reminds us that there was a universal priesthood among the Old Testament people of God just as in the New Testament. But this did not preclude the existence of a ministerial priesthood within that universal priesthood (see Exodus 19:22, Exodus 28, and Numbers 3:1-12).

In an analogous way, we have a universal “Royal Priesthood” in the New Testament, but we also have an ordained clergy who have priestly authority given to them by Christ to carry out his ministry of reconciliation as we have seen.

TRULY AWESOME AUTHORITY

A final couple of texts we will consider are Matt. 16:19 and 18:18. Specifically, we’ll examine the words of Christ to Peter and the apostles: “Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.” As CCC 553 says, Christ here communicated not only authority “to pronounce doctrinal judgments, and to make disciplinary decisions in the Church,” but also “the authority to absolve sins” to the apostles. SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

These words are unsettling, even disturbing, to many. And understandably so. How could God give such authority to men? And yet he does. Jesus Christ, who alone has the power to open and shut heaven to men, clearly communicated this authority to the apostles and their successors. This is what the forgiveness of sins is all about: to reconcile men and women with their heavenly Father. CCC 1445 puts it succinctly:

The words bind and loose mean: whomever you exclude from your communion, will be excluded from communion with God; whomever you receive anew into your communion, God will welcome back into his. Reconciliation with the Church is inseparable from reconciliation with God.

Doesn’t confession of one’s sins imply that Christ’s work was insufficient? The Bible says that if I believe that Jesus is Lord, I’ll be saved.

The passage referred to is Acts 16:31, which reads, “Believe in the Lord Jesus, and you will be saved.” Sounds pretty simple. However, the Bible says much more about salvation and forgiveness. Jesus repeatedly affirmed that if we do not forgive others, we will not be forgiven (Matt. 6:15). When Jesus breathed on the apostles in John 20, he gave them the power to retain sins. But if one’s salvation is contingent upon nothing other than a verbal profession of faith, then there is no reason why Jesus would given any man the power to retain sins. In the midst of all of these passages what we need to be careful of is that we do not camp out on one particular Bible passage without consulting the rest of Scripture.

It is because of the work of Christ that we obtain forgiveness. All Christians can agree on that. What needs to be discussed is how that forgiveness comes to mankind. When Ananias spoke to Paul in Acts 22:16, he said, “And now why do you wait? Rise and be baptized, and wash away your sins” (Acts 22:16). Later in the New Testament, the forgiveness of sins is tied to the sacrament of the anointing of the sick (James 5:13–15). Just as these Biblical practices are channels of God’s forgiving grace, the sacrament of confession does not add to or take away from the finished work of Christ. It is evidence of the finished work of Christ in our midst.

How can Catholics claim confession to a priest is an apostolic tradition? I heard it was invented in 1215 at the Fourth Lateran Council.

What you heard probably came from the anti-Catholic book Roman Catholicism by Loraine Boettner. This book is well known for its inaccurate history, and the reference you gave is a primary example. During the Fourth Lateran Council, the Church reminded the faithful in an official way what had already been the ancient practice of the Church—to confess mortal sins at least once a year. In no way was this the initiation of a new sacrament or even a new way to celebrate an old sacrament. If the Church did initiate the sacrament of reconciliation in 1215, why were there no cries at the time of invention? The obvious answer is no one objected because they were aware that the sacrament was over a millennium old at the time of the Council.

Consider the following early Christian writings from the first five centuries: SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

“Confess your sins in church, and do not go up to your prayer with an evil conscience. This is the way of life. . . . On the Lord’s Day gather together, break bread, and give thanks, after confessing your transgressions so that your sacrifice may be pure” ( 4:14, 14:1 [A.D. 70]).

“[Regarding confession, some] flee from this work as being an exposure of themselves, or they put it off from day to day. I presume they are more mindful of modesty than of salvation, like those who contract a disease in the more shameful parts of the body and shun making themselves known to the physicians; and thus they perish along with their own bashfulness”(, Repentance 10:1 [A.D. 203]).

“[The bishop conducting the ordination of the new bishop shall pray:] God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ . . . pour forth now that power which comes from you, from your royal spirit, which you gave to your beloved Son, Jesus Christ, and which he bestowed upon his holy apostles . . . and grant this your servant, whom you have chosen for the episcopate, [the power] to feed your holy flock and to serve without blame as your high priest . . . and by the Spirit of the high- priesthood to have the authority to forgive sins, in accord with your command” (Hippolytus, Apostolic Tradition 3 [A.D. 215]).

Another common objection: Only God can forgive sin.

Here's the objection as stated in "The Cripplegate," an evangelical blog site:

The Pharisees hated the fact that Jesus forgave sin (Matt 9:3). They knew that it was something only the creator of the universe was allowed to do. When Jesus healed the paralitic [sic] man the Pharisees were ready to lynch him for saying that he forgave him of his sin. It’s incredible that the Pope could think that he has the power to absolve someone of sin, give them some work to do and send them on their way absolved of sin. The only one with the power to forgive sin is God himself (1 John 1:9), and thankfully he does not leave it up to us to be the judges of whether someone deserves forgiveness or not.

So is this truly what the Bible says? Is God the only One with the power to forgive sins, and no one can forgive sin in God's name? Cripplegate cites 1 John 1:9, above, to support this claim, so what does 1 John 1:9 say? Here's the passage from the RSV-CE Bible (I'll always give you the surrounding verses, because citing verses without context, i.e. "proof-texting", is irresponsible):

(8) If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us. (9) If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just, and will forgive our sins and cleanse us from all unrighteousness. (10) If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.

Hmmm ... this verse actually encourages us to "confess our sins." No where does this verse refute that Jesus' priests have been empowered to forgive sins in Jesus' name. Even the Pope goes to Confession!

SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

Commonly phrased objection: Do I have to confess my sins to a priest? A priest is just a man - what power does he have to forgive sin?

First off, it's true. It's not the priest who forgives sins. The priest forgives sins in Christ's name, in persona Christi. As it is written at John 20:21-23, Jesus empowered the disciples to forgive sins in His name. Jesus hands over his authority to the new priesthood of the Twelve which he ordained at the Last Supper, cf. John 13.

Jesus gave his Apostles power to heal the sick, cleanse lepers, raise the dead, and cast out devils (Matthew 10:7-8). In the same way, He also gave them power to absolve sins. That is, they healed people who were spiritually sick, spiritually lepers, and spiritually dead.

Listen to what Jesus says after healing the paralytic in Matthew 9:

(6) But that you may know that the Son of man has authority on earth to forgive sins”—he then said to the paralytic—“Rise, take up your bed and go home.” (7) And he rose and went home. (8) When the crowds saw it, they were afraid, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to men.

Does it say God gave "such authority to A MAN"? Is it Jesus alone who exercises this authority? No. The crowds glorified God because He had given such authority to MEN, namely the Twelve.

From Ben Rahimi:

In response to this question, the first remark I often make is, “Why do we not object to having a mediator, another man, at the sacrament of baptism? Why don’t we just baptize ourselves?” Baptism, among other things, cleanses us of sin. The sacrament of reconciliation is like a second baptism; it cleanses us of post-baptismal sin. If we have no objections to another man’s mediating to us God’s grace in the sacrament of baptism, why should we object to another man’s mediating God’s grace in the sacrament of reconciliation?

The primary reason, however, why the Catholic Church asks her members to confess their sins to a priest is simply because the Church has always believed that sin, however private, is a community affair. Every sin, however small, wounds the Body of Christ, the members of the Church. . . . When any of its members sin, they all suffer. Moreover, because my sins wound the community and diminish its effectiveness, reconciliation must include the community and not just God. In the confessional, the priest is the representative of God and of the community. In the confessional, the priest represents the whole Christ, the Head (Jesus) and the members (the Church). [Emphases added]

Strictly speaking, there is no such thing as a “private” sin—not in the sense of a sin that affects nobody but myself. There are secret sins, but there are none which are matters affecting “only myself and God.” Likewise, our penitence benefits the whole Church, so we celebrate reconciliation communally. SLIDE: THE SACRAMENTS – THE EUCHARIST AND CONFESSION

St. Paul says the following in his second letter to the Corinthians:

(18) All this is from God, who through Christ reconciled us to himself and gave us the ministry of reconciliation; (19) that is, God was in Christ reconciling the world to himself, not counting their trespasses against them, and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. (20) So we are ambassadors for Christ, God making his appeal through us. We beseech you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. (21) For our sake he made him to be sin[d] who knew no sin, so that in him we might become the righteousness of God. (5:18-21)

Wow. That's a pretty strong voice defending the Sacrament of Reconciliation, no less than Paul, himself! The apostles and their successors, i.e. bishops and priests, are merely ambassadors for Christ, on a mission from Jesus to forgive sins in Jesus' name. "All this is from God" - therefore, it is God's own choice to send sinners into the world to forgive sins in His Name. There may be other ways to accomplish this, but God chose this way. Maybe He's on to something? Maybe He who designed human nature has some special insight into how to heal it?

Sources: https://www.catholic.com/encyclopedia/sacraments https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/transubstantiation-for-beginners https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/is-transubstantiation-unbelievable https://www.catholic.com/tract/christ-in-the-eucharist https://www.catholic.com/tract/the-real-presence https://www.catholic.com/encyclopedia/consubstantiation https://aleteia.org/2015/04/26/why-do-catholics-confess-their-sins-to-a-priest-instead-of-directly- to-god/ https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/how-to-defend-the-sacrament-of-confession https://www.catholic.com/tract/confession http://www.saintaquinas.com/confess_essay.html

SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD

How to Explain Mary to a Sola Scriptura Protestant: https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/how-to-explain-mary-to-a-sola-scripture- protestant

The main problem with criticism of Catholic devotion to Mary is the basic Protestant mindset. Because Catholics venerate Mary, non-Catholics assume that this devotion must take the place of proper devotion to the Lord Jesus. They see the whole question in terms of either/or when it is really both/and.

A powerful analogy can be used to show non-Catholics how strange this seems to Catholics. If an Evangelical believes that devotion to Mary replaces proper devotion to Jesus, ask him to imagine what it would be like if he discovered that another Christian group thought Evangelicals were in grave error because of their emphasis on the Bible. Ask him to imagine that these fictional Christians accuse Evangelicals of neglecting Jesus because of their devotion to the Bible.

These hypothetical Christians might say, “You Evangelicals stress the Bible to the neglect of Jesus. You call your churches ‘Bible’ churches and have ‘Bible’ colleges instead of ‘Christian’ churches and colleges. Inside your church you don’t have pictures of Jesus, you don’t have crucifixes; and you don’t have the Stations of the Cross. Instead, all you have is a big central pulpit to preach the Bible.”

The accusers could point out, “The New Testament says the early Christians ‘devoted themselves . . . to the breaking of the bread’ (Acts 2:42) and that the way to remember Jesus and proclaim his death is through the Eucharist (1 Cor. 11:24-26). Yet you Evangelicals celebrate the Lord’s Supper once a month, or even less often, and the main feature of your church service is a long Bible sermon.

“You even have a formal doctrine named sola scriptura. This manmade dogma is a later distortion and addition to the Christian faith—something that was unheard of both in the early Church and in Scripture itself. This dogma—which you treat as infallible—states that the Bible and not Jesus is the only source of truth. You teach your children to memorize Bible verses instead of receiving Jesus in communion. You teach them to sing, ‘The B-I-B-L-E, / Yes, that’s the book for me. / I stand alone on the word of God.’

“Notice that they are not to ‘stand alone’ on the sure foundation of Jesus Christ (1 Cor. 3:11) but instead on the Bible. Evangelical preachers say that there is no way anyone can come to God without believing the Bible. They declare their undying love for the Bible instead of for Jesus. They say how their lives are dedicated to preaching the Bible instead of the cross of Christ.”

If someone were to make these charges, a good Evangelical might well snort with derision. How could anyone so misunderstand the Evangelical position? Surely, they are doing it on purpose. The good Evangelical would patiently explain to his critic, “You have misunderstood completely. Sola scriptura doesn’t set the Bible in opposition to Jesus. It does exactly the opposite: It helps us to glorify Jesus. Don’t you see that we love the Bible because it gives us SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD access to our Savior? It’s true that we believe people need to know the Bible, but that’s because the written word and the incarnate Word are inextricably intertwined. You can’t have one without the other. It is really Jesus we worship and proclaim through the Bible. If you look at our practice and teaching with an open mind you would see how misguided and mistaken you are.”

But the critic of the Evangelical won’t have it. He replies, “No, no. That all sounds very plausible, but you will never convince me. I just know that you worship the Bible instead of Jesus, and all your clever wordplay just goes to show how blind you really are.” To prove his point, this critic says, “I know you Evangelicals worship the Bible instead of Jesus. Just look at this quotation I found that proves it. This comes from an Evangelical one of your classic theological text books:

“The Bible . . . has produced the highest results in all walks of life. It has led to the highest type of creations in the fields of art, architecture, literature, and music. . . . You will find everywhere the higher influence of the Bible. . . . William E. Gladstone said, ‘If I am asked to name the one comfort in sorrow, the sole rule of conduct, the true guide of life, I must point to what in the words of a popular hymn is called “the old, old story,” told in an old, old Book, which is God’s best and richest gift to mankind” (Henry Thiessen, Introductory Lectures in Systematic Theology [Eerdmans, 1949], p. 86; emphasis added).

“You see,” the critic finishes with a flourish, “your famous Evangelical leader says that it is not Jesus but the Bible that is his ‘one comfort,’ his ‘true guide,’ and ‘God’s best and richest gift to mankind.’ It just goes to show that Evangelicals worship the Bible and not the Lord.” Of course, this is a ridiculous distortion of the Evangelical view, but the extended analogy may help Protestants understand how Catholics feel when Protestants make similarly inaccurate charges about the Catholic devotion to Mary.

In the face of such charges Catholics reply, “Are you serious? How can you possibly make such a fundamental mistake about what we believe? We admit that some Catholics may overemphasize Mary, just like some Evangelicals may take extreme views on the Bible. We don’t venerate Mary for herself but because by her free consent she gave us our Savior and because she constantly leads us to him. If you took time to study our whole teaching and practice, you’ll see it’s unreasonable to make such a towering mistake.”

Honor vs Worship: Dulia, Hyperdulia, and Latria https://www.catholic.com/tract/saint-worship

“Now, the Catholic Church draws a sharp line between ‘honoring’ somebody and ‘worshiping’ him. In fact, we have specific words for the differences.” I pulled out a piece of paper with the words “dulia,” “hyperdulia,” and “latria” written in bold magic marker. I asked the students if they had ever heard of St. Nicholas; they all nodded yes. St. Patrick? St. Valentine? Yes, yes.

“These people are called ‘saints’ because the Catholic Church believes these people are in heaven. We believe that they lived holy lives and that we should imitate them in some way, SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD because obviously they did something right. Not only should we imitate them, but we should be careful to respect them, just as you might respect your pastor or your minister. This respect, or honor, we call ” ‘dulia.'” I got nods and eye contact, so I went on “The saints did God’s will, and we believe Mary is a saint. We believe Mary, since she never chose to sin, did God’s will better than any other saint.”

Suddenly, I changed the subject. “What’s the difference between being active and hyperactive?” I asked. One of the girls volunteered that they kind of meant the same thing, but being hyperactive was more intense than just being active. “Right,” I responded, “so what we give Mary is hyperdulia. It’s just what we give the saints — honor and respect — but more intense.

The last word, latria, is completely different. It means ‘worship.’ Catholics use this word to describe how we act toward God, and we don’t use it for anything else. If anyone ever tells you that Catholics worship Mary, that’s not true. We give her hyperdulia, or ‘great respect and honor,’ but we give latria only to God. If you ever run into a Catholic who says we worship Mary, that Catholic doesn’t understand his faith. That person is not living within Catholic teaching but is outside the mind of the Church. We worship God, and we honor the saints.”

“Prayers to saints are just asking them to pray to God for us, like you might ask your friend or your pastor to pray for you.”

The Immaculate Conception https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/how-to-defend-the-immaculate-conception

It’s important to understand what the doctrine of the Immaculate Conception is and what it is not. Some people think the term refers to Christ’s conception in Mary’s womb without the intervention of a human father; but that is the Virgin Birth. Others think the Immaculate Conception means Mary was conceived “by the power of the Holy Spirit,” in the way Jesus was, but that, too, is incorrect. The Immaculate Conception means that Mary, whose conception was brought about the normal way, was conceived without original sin or its stain—that’s what “immaculate” means: without stain. The essence of original sin consists in the deprivation of sanctifying grace, and its stain is a corrupt nature. Mary was preserved from these defects by God’s grace; from the first instant of her existence she was in the state of sanctifying grace and was free from the corrupt nature original sin brings.

When discussing the Immaculate Conception, an implicit reference may be found in the angel’s greeting to Mary. The angel Gabriel said, “Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with you” (Luke 1:28). The phrase “full of grace” is a translation of the Greek word kecharitomene. It therefore expresses a characteristic quality of Mary.

The traditional translation, “full of grace,” is better than the one found in many recent versions of the New Testament, which give something along the lines of “highly favored daughter.” Mary was indeed a highly favored daughter of God, but the Greek implies more than that (and it never mentions the word for “daughter”). The grace given to Mary is at once permanent and of a unique kind. Kecharitomene is a perfect passive participle of charitoo, meaning “to fill or endow SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD with grace.” Since this term is in the perfect tense, it indicates that Mary was graced in the past but with continuing effects in the present. So, the grace Mary enjoyed was not a result of the angel’s visit. In fact, Catholics hold, it extended over the whole of her life, from conception onward. She was in a state of sanctifying grace from the first moment of her existence.

Fundamentalists’ Objections

Fundamentalists’ chief reason for objecting to the Immaculate Conception and Mary’s consequent sinlessness is that we are told that “all have sinned” (Rom. 3:23). Besides, they say, Mary said her “spirit rejoices in God my Savior” (Luke 1:47), and only a sinner needs a Savior.

Let’s take the second citation first. Mary, too, required a Savior. Like all other descendants of Adam, she was subject to the necessity of contracting original sin. But by a special intervention of God, undertaken at the instant she was conceived, she was preserved from the stain of original sin and its consequences. She was therefore redeemed by the grace of Christ, but in a special way—by anticipation.

Consider an analogy: Suppose a man falls into a deep pit, and someone reaches down to pull him out. The man has been “saved” from the pit. Now imagine a woman walking along, and she too is about to topple into the pit, but at the very moment that she is to fall in, someone holds her back and prevents her. She too has been saved from the pit, but in an even better way: She was not simply taken out of the pit, she was prevented from getting stained by the mud in the first place. This is the illustration Christians have used for a thousand years to explain how Mary was saved by Christ. By receiving Christ’s grace at her conception, she had his grace applied to her before she was able to become mired in original sin and its stain.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church states that she was “redeemed in a more exalted fashion, by reason of the merits of her Son” (CCC 492). She has more reason to call God her Savior than we do, because he saved her in an even more glorious manner!

But what about Romans 3:23, “all have sinned”? Have all people committed actual sins? Consider a child below the age of reason. By definition he can’t sin, since sinning requires the ability to reason and the ability to intend to sin. This is indicated by Paul later in the letter to the Romans when he speaks of the time when Jacob and Esau were unborn babies as a time when they “had done nothing either good or bad” (Rom. 9:11).

We also know of another very prominent exception to the rule: Jesus (Heb. 4:15). So if Paul’s statement in Romans 3 includes an exception for the New Adam (Jesus), one may argue that an exception for the New Eve (Mary) can also be made.

Paul’s comment seems to have one of two meanings. It might be that it refers not to absolutely everyone, but just to the mass of mankind (which means young children and other special cases, like Jesus and Mary, would be excluded without having to be singled out). If not that, then it would mean that everyone, without exception, is subject to original sin, which is true for a young child, for the unborn, even for Mary—but she, though due to be subject to it, was preserved by God from it and its stain. SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD

The objection is also raised that if Mary were without sin, she would be equal to God. In the beginning, God created Adam, Eve, and the angels without sin, but none were equal to God. Most of the angels never sinned, and all souls in heaven are without sin. This does not detract from the glory of God, but manifests it by the work he has done in sanctifying his creation. Sinning does not make one human. On the contrary, it is when man is without sin that he is most fully what God intends him to be.

The doctrine of the Immaculate Conception was officially defined by Pope Pius IX in 1854. When Fundamentalists claim that the doctrine was “invented” at this time, they misunderstand both the history of dogmas and what prompts the Church to issue, from time to time, definitive pronouncements regarding faith or morals. They are under the impression that no doctrine is believed until the pope or an issues a formal statement about it.

Actually, doctrines are defined formally only when there is a controversy that needs to be cleared up or when the magisterium (the Church in its office as teacher; cf. Matt. 28:18–20; 1 Tim. 3:15, 4:11) thinks the faithful can be helped by particular emphasis being drawn to some already- existing belief. The definition of the Immaculate Conception was prompted by the latter motive; it did not come about because there were widespread doubts about the doctrine. In fact, the Vatican was deluged with requests from people desiring the doctrine to be officially proclaimed. Pope Pius IX, who was highly devoted to the Blessed Virgin, hoped the definition would inspire others in their devotion to her.

The Assumption https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/how-to-argue-for-marys-assumption

The doctrine of the Assumption says that at the end of her life on earth Mary was assumed, body and soul, into heaven, just as Enoch, Elijah, and perhaps others had been before her. It’s also necessary to keep in mind what the Assumption is not. Some people think Catholics believe Mary “ascended” into heaven. That’s not correct. Christ, by his own power, ascended into heaven. Mary was assumed or taken up into heaven by God. She didn’t do it under her own power.

The Church has never formally defined whether she died or not, and the integrity of the doctrine of the Assumption would not be impaired if she did not in fact die, but the almost universal consensus is that she did die. Pope Pius XII, in Munificentissimus Deus (1950), defined that Mary, “after the completion of her earthly life” (note the silence regarding her death), “was assumed body and soul into the glory of heaven.”

The possibility of a bodily assumption before the Second Coming is suggested by Matthew 27:52–53: “[T]he tombs also were opened, and many bodies of the saints who had fallen asleep were raised, and coming out of the tombs after his resurrection they went into the holy city and appeared to many.” Did all these Old Testament saints die and have to be buried all over again? There is no record of that, but it is recorded by early Church writers that they were assumed into heaven, or at least into that temporary state of rest and happiness often called “paradise,” where the righteous people from the Old Testament era waited until Christ’s resurrection (cf. Luke SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD

16:22, 23:43; Heb. 11:1–40; 1 Pet. 4:6), after which they were brought into the eternal bliss of heaven.

No Remains

There is also what might be called the negative historical proof for Mary’s Assumption. It is easy to document that, from the first, Christians gave homage to saints, including many about whom we now know little or nothing. Cities vied for the title of the last resting place of the most famous saints. Rome, for example, houses the tombs of Peter and Paul, Peter’s tomb being under the high altar of St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome. In the early Christian centuries relics of saints were zealously guarded and highly prized. The bones of those martyred in the Coliseum, for instance, were quickly gathered up and preserved—there are many accounts of this in the biographies of those who gave their lives for the faith.

It is agreed upon that Mary ended her life in Jerusalem, or perhaps in . However, neither those cities nor any other claimed her remains, though there are claims about possessing her (temporary) tomb. And why did no city claim the bones of Mary? Apparently because there weren’t any bones to claim, and people knew it. Here was Mary, certainly the most privileged of all the saints, certainly the most saintly, but we have no record of her bodily remains being venerated anywhere.

Complement to the Immaculate Conception

Over the centuries, the Fathers and the Doctors of the Church spoke often about the fittingness of the privilege of Mary’s Assumption. The speculative grounds considered include Mary’s freedom from sin, her Motherhood of God, her perpetual virginity, and—the key—her union with the salvific work of Christ.

The dogma is especially fitting when one examines the honor that was given to the ark of the covenant. It contained the manna (bread from heaven), stone tablets of the ten commandments (the word of God), and the staff of Aaron (a symbol of Israel’s high priesthood). Because of its contents, it was made of incorruptible wood, and Psalm 132:8 said, “Arise, O Lord, and go to thy resting place, thou and the ark of thy might.” If this vessel was given such honor, how much more should Mary be kept from corruption, since she is the new ark—who carried the real bread from heaven, the Word of God, and the high priest of the New Covenant, Jesus Christ.

Some argue that the new ark is not Mary, but the body of Jesus. Even if this were the case, it is worth noting that 1 Chronicles 15:14 records that the persons who bore the ark were to be sanctified. There would be no sense in sanctifying men who carried a box, and not sanctifying the womb who carried God himself! After all, wisdom will not dwell “in a body under debt of sin” (Wis. 1:4 NAB).

But there is more than just fittingness. After all, if Mary is immaculately conceived, then it would follow that she would not suffer the corruption in the grave, which is a consequence of sin [Gen. 3:17, 19]. SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD

Mary’s Cooperation

Mary freely and actively cooperated in a unique way with God’s plan of salvation (Luke 1:38; Gal. 4:4). Like any mother, she was never separated from the suffering of her Son (Luke 2:35), and Scripture promises that those who share in the sufferings of Christ will share in his glory (Rom. 8:17). Since she suffered a unique interior martyrdom, it is appropriate that Jesus would honor her with a unique glory.

All Christians believe that one day we will all be raised in a glorious form and then caught up and rendered immaculate to be with Jesus forever (1 Thess. 4:17; Rev. 21:27). As the first person to say “yes” to the good news of Jesus (Luke 1:38), Mary is in a sense the prototypical Christian, and received early the blessings we will all one day be given.

The Bible Only?

Since the Immaculate Conception and Assumption are not explicit in Scripture, Fundamentalists conclude that the doctrines are false. Here, of course, we get into an entirely separate matter, the question of sola scriptura, or the Protestant “Bible only” theory. There is no room in this tract to consider that idea. Let it just be said that if the position of the Catholic Church is true, then the notion of sola scriptura is false. There is then no problem with the Church officially defining a doctrine which is not explicitly in Scripture, so long as it is not in contradiction to Scripture.

The Catholic Church was commissioned by Christ to teach all nations and to teach them infallibly—guided, as he promised, by the Holy Spirit until the end of the world (John 14:26, 16:13). The mere fact that the Church teaches that something is definitely true is a guarantee that it is true (cf. Matt. 28:18-20, Luke 10:16, 1 Tim. 3:15).

The Universal Priesthood and why we have a Ministerial Priesthood https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/why-we-have-a-ministerial-priesthood

The Catholic belief in and great emphasis upon the priesthood was one of the “Romish” beliefs I thought to be refuted most easily in Sacred Scripture when I was Protestant. This was an extremely important doctrine, because I surmised that multiple other Catholic doctrines went up in smoke with the demise of the Catholic understanding of the priesthood. Confession, the Mass as sacrifice, “,” and more crumbled like a house of cards without the priesthood as a foundation.

The biblical texts seemed so clear to me. For example, Hebrews 7:22–25 says:

“This makes Jesus the surety of a better covenant. The former priests were many in number, because they were prevented by death from continuing in office; but he holds his priesthood permanently, because he continues for ever. Consequently, he is able for all time to save those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them” (emphasis added). SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD

Doesn’t this text eliminate the possibility of there being priests who are “many in number” as we see in Catholicism? Moreover, this text tells us that Christ is our intercessor before the Father. Coupled with 1 Timothy 2:5, which says, “For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus,” I could not see how anyone could say there could be priests in the New Covenant. A priest, by definition, is a mediator between God and men. As I interpreted the above texts, Christ would be our one, unique priest and intercessor, excluding the possibility of a ministerial priesthood. (Intercessor and mediatorare synonymous in the New Testament.)

The Catholic Response

First, we need to dispel the notion that there cannot be “many priests” in the New Covenant. First Peter 2:5–9 tells us, “Like living stones be yourselves built into a spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. . . . But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, God’s own people.” The fact that all baptized Christians are referred to as priests in the New Testament necessarily means it is not a contradiction to say that Christ is our unique priest/mediator/intercessor while affirming the biblical truth that Christians can act as priests/mediators/intercessors as well.

The key is to understand properly the nature of the body of Christ. Christians do not usurp or diminish the unique priesthood of Christ when they are referred to as priests; they participate in that unique priesthood. So intimate is the union of the baptized with Christ that Paul describes this mystical union as a body (cf. 1 Cor. 12:12–27; Rom. 12:5) with Christ as its head (cf. Eph. 1:22–23). What can be attributed to a hand in the body does not somehow take away from the head. The fact that Christians are priests does not usurp the priesthood of Christ because it is Christ who empowers them to participate in his own priesthood. Indeed, it is Christ (and his priesthood) living in them (cf. Gal. 2:20).

Further, it is obvious that Hebrews 7:22–25 and 1 Timothy 2:5 are not saying that Christians cannot act as mediators or intercessors in any sense. Paul says, “First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for all men, for kings and all who are in high positions” (1 Tim. 2:1–2). This text urges Christians to act as mediators or intercessors. When we understand that Christians can intercede only because they are in the one true mediator/intercessor and that they act as members of his body, the difficulty goes away. Simple enough.

The Priest-Elder

But even if a Protestant accepts the notion of Christians being priests and accepts the Catholic interpretation of 1 Timothy 2:5 and Hebrew 7:22–25 in this respect, this in no way shows that there is a distinct ordained priesthood apart from the universal priesthood of the faithful. First Peter 2 indicated that all Christians are priests—but not ministerial priests. Here was my biggest problem with the Catholic notion of a ministerial priesthood. The ordained ministers of the New Covenant are called apostles (cf. Eph. 4:11), elders (Jas. 5:14), bishops (1 Tim. 3:1), and (1 Tim. 3:8ff). They are not referred to directly with the typical Greek word for “priest,” which is hiereus. SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD

Apostles, Elders, and Bishops

In Scripture, we see our Lord definitively choosing and sending apostles to act as mediators between God and men. This, again, is the very definition of a priest. For example, after the Resurrection, Jesus appears to the apostles in the upper room and says to them:

“‘Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them, and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained’” (John 20:21–23).

Jesus gave the power to forgive and retain sins to the apostles. This is a priestly ministry (cf. Lev. 19:21–22). In 2 Corinthians 2:10, Paul says, “If I have pardoned anything for your sakes I have done it in the person of Christ” (DRV).

Presbyters are seen as priests as well. James 5:14–15 puts it quite plainly:

“Is any among you sick? Let him call for the elders (presbyteroi) of the church, and let them pray over him, anointing him with oil in the name of the Lord; and the prayer of faith will save the sick man, and the Lord will raise him up; and if he has committed sins, he will be forgiven.”

Notice that Scripture does not say we should go to anyone because we are all priests as Christians. It singles out the presbyters and clearly depicts them as having the power and authority to act as mediators in the forgiveness of sins and healing.

Two Definitive Texts

In the end, there were two texts of Scripture that I could not escape. I believe that attempting to find Protestant explanations for these texts only served to solidify the Catholic understanding of confession and the priesthood in my mind. Those two texts are John 20:21–23 and Matthew 16:18–19.

When it came to John 20:21–23, cited above, some of the Protestant scholars I read attempted to evade the obvious by claiming that the perfect tense verbs “are forgiven” and “are retained” indicate that when Jesus said, “Whosoever sins you forgive are forgiven,” he actually meant whoever’s sins you forgive have already been forgiven, not through the ministry of the apostle but by God apart from the apostle. This is an example of reading into a text something that is simply not there.

The text is really quite plain. It tells us when the sins are forgiven: They are forgiven when the apostles forgive them. The Catholic Church is not saying that the apostles accomplish this by some magical powers or by their own power. Jesus “breathed on them” and gave them the power of the Holy Spirit to forgive sins. But the fact is that the apostles are the instruments of God’s forgiveness, and there can be no plainer example of a priestly function than this—except perhaps for the final text we will examine: Matthew 16:18–19. SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD

“And I tell you, you are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys of the kingdom of heaven, and whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”

All Catholics are well acquainted with this text and its implications for papal infallibility. Here Jesus promises Peter the power to proclaim the gospel on earth with the infallible authority of heaven to back him up. But less well known is that this text also refers to the forgiveness of sins (cf. CCC 553). In both cases, as stated above, we are talking about priestly functions; that is, Peter and his successors are promised the power to be mediators of both the message of God’s truth and the healing communicated through God’s forgiveness. The text itself is most clear because it uses a very rare Greek construction that profoundly brings out the sacerdotal nature of the Petrine office.

The Second Vatican Council affirmed the definitive teaching of the Church regarding the different participations of the Church in the one priesthood of Jesus, and explains the relationship between the two, in Lumen Gentium:

“Though they differ from one another in essence and not only in degree, the common priesthood of the faithful and the ministerial or hierarchical priesthood are nonetheless interrelated: each of them in its own special way is a participation in the one priesthood of Christ. The ministerial priest, by the sacred power he enjoys, teaches and rules the priestly people; acting in the person of Christ, he makes present the Eucharistic sacrifice, and offers it to God in the name of all the people. But the faithful, in virtue of their royal priesthood, join in the offering of the Eucharist. They likewise exercise that priesthood in receiving the sacraments, in prayer and thanksgiving, in the witness of a holy life, and by self-denial and active charity” (LG no. 10).

The essential distinction between the two participations in the one priesthood of Christ lies in the fact that the ministerial priest acts in persona Christi capitis, that is “in the person of Christ the Head of the Church.” It is through the ministerial priest acting in the person of Jesus that Jesus, the Head and Spouse of the Church, is able to make the Church part of His self-offering in the Eucharist and to bestow His saving grace on the Church through the sacraments.

The teaching of the Church is clear regarding the essential distinction between the two ways in which the Church participates in the one priesthood of Jesus. Both participations are ordered to one another and depend on one another, yet are essentially different from one another. It is through both participations in His one priesthood that the risen Jesus sanctifies and builds up His Body and Bride the Church, and through her offers salvation to the entire world.

Other Resources: https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/the-priesthood-is-both-ministerial-and- universal SLIDE: MARY, THE SAINTS, AND THE UNIVERSAL PRIESTHOOD https://www.wordonfire.org/resources/blog/in-defense-of-exaggerated-marian-devotion/ SLIDE: WHAT WILL IT MEAN TO BE “ONE”?

Taken from: http://www.ncregister.com/blog/steven-greydanus/praying-for-christian-unity

What do we pray for when we pray for Christian unity? What are the obstacles to unity that need to be overcome?

When we think of obstacles to Christian unity, perhaps we think first of all of the important doctrinal differences separating Catholics, Orthodox and Protestants, from the papacy (which divides Catholics from all other Christians) to apostolic succession and the seven sacraments (which divides Protestants in various ways from Catholics and Orthodox), and of course the host of theological and practical questions dividing Protestants into their myriads of camps.

From this perspective, ecumenism at its best means building on what we have in common to try to overcome our differences on the points that divide us. At its worst, of course, ecumenism devolved into what Vatican II’s Decree on Ecumenism called “a false irenicism,” i.e., downplaying or dismissing doctrinal differences and promoting good manners and bomhomie rather than unity in Christ.

The Catechism of the Catholic Church, in setting forth the Catholic understanding of “oneness” as one of the four marks of the Church, has this to say.

What are these bonds of unity? Above all, charity “binds everything together in perfect harmony.” But the unity of the pilgrim Church is also assured by visible bonds of communion:

1) Profession of one faith received from the Apostles; 2) Common celebration of divine worship, especially of the sacraments; 3) Apostolic succession through the sacrament of Holy Orders, maintaining the fraternal concord of God’s family. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 815)

Encapsulated in those three bullet points are the substance of the issues over which Christians are divided and around which ecumenical discussion revolves. Not so fast, though. Before the bullet points comes this important statement: “Above all, charity ‘binds everything together in perfect harmony.’” It’s easy to gloss over this because it’s uncontroversial. Obviously we all agree on that! That’s not what divides us.

On the other hand, it’s important to recognize that the ultimate root of divisions between Christians is not different theological opinions, conclusions or beliefs. The ultimate root of divisions between Christians is sin — and sin, alas, is a nonsectarian reality. As the Decree on Ecumenism notes:

Even in the beginnings of this one and only Church of God there arose certain rifts, which the Apostle strongly condemned. But in subsequent centuries much more serious dissensions made their appearance and quite large communities came to be separated from full communion with the Catholic Church — for which, often enough, men of both sides were to blame. SLIDE: WHAT WILL IT MEAN TO BE “ONE”?

That final admission is important because it highlights an important truth. As Catholics we believe we have a fullness of truth that non-Catholic Christians lack. That doesn’t mean, though, that we can sit back, complacent in our rightness, and wait for the Holy Spirit to convict non- Catholic Christians of their need to submit to the Pope. Nor can we put our faith in apologetical arguments to show why we’re right and others are wrong.

We must recognize that the sad story of division among Christians is a story of pride, partisan spirit, tribalism, triumphalism, wrath, unforgiveness, complacency and failure of love for God and neighbor. Such failings pave the way for sharpening of differences, breakdowns in understanding, mounting hostilities, and ultimately to , schisms and .

We cannot afford to forget that if we are not also united in charity, our unity is flawed and diminished — still important, but not the fullness of unity Christ wishes for us. It is not first of all by our theological orthodoxy, our visible communion with the bishop of Rome, our polemics against doctrinal error, our mastery of biblical arguments, or our hatred of heresy that our Lord said all men would know we are his disciples, but by our love.

Am I saying that if we loved one another, doctrinal and ecclesiological differences would cease to matter? Of course not. What I’m saying is that we cannot say we have done all we can to overcome our differences and restore unity if we fail in love. The way forward in ecumenism does not begin with better or more persuasive theological arguments, but with love and humility and a willingness to cross-examine ourselves as well as our brethren. SLIDE: WHY DO THE CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT BIBLES DIFFER?

The Catholic Church regards as part of the Bible the books of Tobit, Judith, Wisdom, Ecclesiasticus (), Baruch, 1 and , as well as some additional stories and verses in the books of Daniel and Esther. Catholics refer to these seven books as the "deuterocanonical" books, meaning the "second" standard books. Protestants refer to them as the "apocryphal," or "hidden," books.

The roots of this discrepancy go back more than 2,000 years, when Judaism was still developing. One of the results of the foreign invasions of Palestine in the first millennium before Christ was the dispersion of Jews throughout the Mediterranean basin. Some of the displaced Jews formed a community in the Egyptian city of Alexandria, while others remained in Palestine. When deciding which books should be included in their scriptures, the Palestinian Jews identified the following conditions: The book must have been written in Hebrew; it must have been written in the region of Palestine; and it must not have been written after Ezra, approximately the year 250 B.C.

The Alexandrian Jews, however, translated their Bible, our Old Testament, from the original Hebrew into Greek because that was the language they spoke. This translation, written sometime between the third and first centuries B.C., is called the . They also included some "extra" books and verses that did not meet the Palestinian conditions: For example, the books of Maccabees and Wisdom were written around the year 100 B.C.; the was written in Aramaic; and chapters 13 and 14 of Daniel have been preserved only in Greek.

By the end of the first century A.D. the Jews had officially chosen the Palestinian collection over the Alexandrian one. Christians, on the other hand, used the Septuagint as their Bible and eventually chose the Alexandrian over the Palestinian.

Early church councils of the fourth century list the as part of the Christian Bible. Centuries later, in response to Martin Luther's rejection of them, the Catholic Church's Council of Trent in 1546 officially recognized the deuterocanonical books and verses as belonging to the Old Testament. The Protestant churches rejected these books because they seemed to support certain Catholic beliefs with which the Protestants disagreed, such as purgatory and prayers for the dead. Thus, the Protestant churches decided to follow the Palestinian canon instead of the Alexandrian (Septuagint), which is why Catholics and Protestants to this day do not read from the same Bible-or at least the same Old Testament.

Now, it is popular in some Protestant circles to claim that the Jews had a closed canon of Scripture in the first century A.D. and that the early Christians accepted this final Jewish collection of inspired writings as final and binding upon the Church. Generally, the Council of Jabneh (usually referred to in Catholic literature as Jamnia) is assumed as the “proof” for this assertion. At the “Council of Jabneh,” you see, the Jewish rabbis supposedly got together— something like an ecumenical council in the Catholic Church—to lay down specific criteria for inspired Scripture and to finally define and close the Old Testament canon.

Is this true? First, we will look at how various authors defend the Protestant exclusion of seven books based on a flawed understanding of the so-called “Council of Jabneh.” Second, did the members of this “council” actually discuss the limit of the Old Testament canon, and third, if so, SLIDE: WHY DO THE CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT BIBLES DIFFER? did they have the authority to close the canon? Fourth, did they actually compile a final list of accepted writings, and, fifth—and importantly—if such a decision had been made, would the Christians be bound by that decision? We will conclude with the teaching of the Catholic Church and why we can trust it.

Let’s clarify a few terms. The canon of Scripture refers to the final collection of inspired books included in the Bible. The Catholic Bible contains seven books that do not appear in the Protestant Old Testament. These seven writings are called the deuterocanonicals or the Second Law. Protestants usually call these writings the (meaning hidden), books they consider outside the canon. These seven writings include 1 and 2 Maccabees, Tobit, Judith, Sirach, Wisdom, and Baruch, along with additional passages in Daniel and Esther. Before the time of Christ, these writings were included in the Jewish Greek Septuagint (LXX)—the Greek translation of Jewish Scripture—but they were not included in the Hebrew .

The Jewish Canon

The vast majority of Jews in the first centuries B.C. and A.D. lived outside of Israel. They were called the diaspora, those dispersed throughout the Roman Empire. Many had become Hellenized—that is, they had taken on the Greco-Roman culture, including the . The Septuagint, containing the deuterocanonical books, was the main Bible used by these Jews of the d.aspora.

Most non-Christian Jews of the first century A.D. considered the Church to be a heretical and misinformed Jewish cult, probably similar to the way Christians look at the Mormons or Jehovah’s Witnesses of today. In the first century, several decades after the life of Christ, the majority of early Christians were Gentiles, and they used the Greek Septuagint as their Old Testament, following the example of the Greek-speaking Jews, including Jesus and the apostles (note 1, sidebar, page 25).

When Christians began to use this Greek translation to convert Jews to the faith, the Jews began to detest it (note 2, sidebar, page 25). Does it surprise anyone that they would condemn the canon and translation the Christians used, even if it was originally translated, approved of, and put into circulation by the Jews themselves three hundred and fifty years earlier (c. 250 B.C.)? The early Church, following the Greek Septuagint and the apostles’ extensive use of it (Paul took most of his Old Testament quotations from it), accepted the deuterocanonical books. When the canon was finally closed by the councils of the Catholic Church, these books were included.

The so-called “Council of Jabneh” was a group of Jewish scholars who were granted permission by Rome around the year 90 to meet in Palestine near the Mediterranean Sea in Jabneh (or Jamnia). Here they established a non-authoritative, “reconstituted” Sanhedrin (note 3, sidebar, page 25). Among the things they discussed was the status of several questionable writings in the Jewish Bible. They also rejected the Christian writings and made a new translation of the Greek Septuagint. Since many Protestant authors have appealed to the “Council of Jabneh” in their case against the deuterocanonical books contained in the Catholic Bible, it will serve us well to look at a few examples. In his popular book Roman Catholics and Evangelicals: Agreements and Differences (co-authored by Ralph MacKenzie [Baker Books, 1995]), Norman Geisler, dean of SLIDE: WHY DO THE CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT BIBLES DIFFER?

Southern Evangelical Seminary, denies the Catholic canon of the Old Testament, claiming that the Jewish rabbis at Jabneh excluded the deuterocanonical books received by Catholics and that the canon was fixed (meaning finalized) at Jabneh.

Geisler writes, “The Jewish scholars at Jabneh (c. A.D. 90) did not accept the Apocrypha as part of the divinely inspired Jewish canon. Since the New Testament explicitly states that Israel was entrusted with the oracles of God and was the recipient of the covenants and the Law (Rom. 3:2), the Jews should be considered the custodians of the limits of their own canon. And they have always rejected the Apocrypha” (169). And though Geisler seems to deny the authority of the rabbis at Jabneh in one place in his A General Introduction to the Bible (with W. E. Nix [Moody Press, 1996]), he later relays in a chart, “Council of Jabneh (A.D. 90), Old Testament Canon fixed” (286).

Geisler is not alone in his assertion that the Apocrypha was rejected and the final Old Testament canon was fixed at Jabneh. It seems to be a common legend that is used as “proof” to bolster up an ahistorical and incorrect assumption. Before we take a look at the myth, we will demonstrate how it is often appealed to. A couple more quick examples of this false reliance on the “Council of Jabneh” will suffice:

“At the end of the first Christian century, the Jewish rabbis, at the Council of Gamnia [Jamnia], closed the canon of the Hebrew book (those considered authoritative)” (Jimmy Swaggart, Catholicism & Christianity [Jimmy Swaggart Ministries, 1986], 129). “After Jerusalem’s destruction, Jamnia became the home of the Great Sanhedrin. Around 100, a council of rabbis there established the final canon of the OT” (Ed. Martin, Ralph P., and Peter H. Davids, Dictionary of the Later New Testament and Its Developments [InterVarsity Press, 2000, c1997], 185).

Though many are now recognizing that Jabneh did not exclude the deuterocanonical books or authoritatively close the Old Testament canon, there are still plenty of sources that claim and assume that it did.

Did Jabneh Have Authority?

According to the Oxford Dictionary of the Christian Church, the “council” in Jabneh in 90 was not even an “official” council with binding authority to make such a decision:

“After the fall of Jerusalem (A.D.70), an assembly of religious teachers was established at Jabneh; this body was regarded as to some extent replacing the Sanhedrin, though it did not possess the same representative character or national authority. It appears that one of the subjects discussed among the rabbis was the status of certain biblical books (e.g. Eccles. and Song of Solomon) whose canonicity was still open to question in the 1st century A.D. The suggestion that a particular synod of Jabneh, held c. 100 A.D., finally settling the limits of the Old Testament canon, was made by H. E. Ryle; though it has had a wide currency, there is no evidence to substantiate it” (ed. by F. L. Cross and E. A. Livingston [Oxford Univ. Press, 861], emphasis added). SLIDE: WHY DO THE CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT BIBLES DIFFER?

Isn’t it interesting that the Jews did not have a “closed canon” of Scripture during the time of Christ, before 100, or even after Jabneh? Even during the time of Christ there were competing opinions on what books actually belonged in the Jewish Bible. There were various collections in existence. Sadducees and Samaritans accepted only the Pentateuch, the first five books, whereas the Pharisees accepted a fuller canon including and the prophets. The Masoretic text did not contain the deuterocanonicals, whereas the widely used Greek Septuagint did.

This uncertainty continued well into the second century. The discussion over the books of the canon of the Old Testament continued among the Jews long after Jabneh, which demonstrates that the canon was still under discussion in the third century—well beyond the apostolic period. The challenges to canonicity at Jabneh involved only and the Song of Solomon, but the debate over the canon continued past Jabneh, even into the second and third centuries. Even the Hebrew canon accepted by Protestants today was disputed by the Jews for two hundred years after Christ.

Some cautionary points should be noted here:

1. Although Christian authors seem to think in terms of a formal council at Jabneh, there was no such thing. There was a school for studying the Law at Jabneh, and the rabbis there exercised legal functions in the Jewish community.

2. Not only was there no formal council, there is no evidence that any list of books was drawn up at Jabneh.

3. A specific discussion of acceptance at Jabneh is attested only for the books of Ecclesiastes and the Song of Solomon. Even so, arguments regarding these books persisted in Judaism centuries after the Jabneh period. There were also subsequent debates about Esther.

4. We know of no books that were excluded at Jabneh. In fact, Sirach, which was read and copied by Jews after the Jabneh period, did not eventually become part of the standard (cf. Raymond Edward Brown, Joseph A. Fitzmyer, and Roland Edmund Murphy, The Biblical Commentary [Prentice-Hall, 1996, c. 1968], vol. 2, 522).

Why the Church Rejects the Jewish Canon

Even if the rabbis at Jabneh did have the authority to make such a canonical determination and had closed the canon, who says they had the authority from God to make such a binding determination? Why should Christians accept their determination? God had publicly turned aside from the Jews as his “prophetic voice” twenty years earlier when Jerusalem was destroyed and razed by fire. God judged them and rejected their old wineskins. The old wine and wineskin (Judaism) was now replaced by new wine (the gospel) and new wineskins (the Church). Why accept the unauthoritative rabbis’ determination rather than the Church’s?

There is a further reason we should not rely on the first-century Jews for their determination of the canon, even if they had made such a determination: The rabbis of Jabneh eventually provided a new translation in Greek to replace their previous translation of the Septuagint. Why? Because SLIDE: WHY DO THE CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT BIBLES DIFFER? the Gentile Christians were using the Septuagint for apologetic and evangelistic purposes—in other words, they were converting the Jews using their own Greek Scriptures!

For example, they were using it to prove the virginal birth of Jesus. In the Hebrew Bible, Isaiah 7:14 is rendered, “A young woman shall conceive and bear a son,” whereas the Greek Septuagint, quoted by Matthew (1:23), renders it, “A virgin shall be with child and bear a son” (emphasis added). The rabbis who supposedly “determined” the final Protestant canon also authorized a new Greek translation specifically to hinder the gospel. Aquila, the Jewish translator of the new version, denied the Virgin Birth and changed the Greek word from virgin to young woman.

One of the key issues in the first-century Jewish mind regarding the canon was not necessarily inspiration but resisting the Christian evangelization of the Jews and Gentiles. It was an issue of Jew versus the new Christian teaching and the Christians’ use of the Jewish Greek Scripture. It would seem rather strange for a Protestant to choose the truncated canon chosen by the Jewish leaders and by so doing fall on the side of the anti-Christian, disenfranchised Jew in this matter (see note 4, sidebar, page 25).

We do not know much about the deliberations at Jabneh, but we do know that they mentioned the Gospels of the New Testament. They mentioned them specifically in order to reject them. F. F. Bruce writes, “Some disputants also asked whether the Wisdom of Jesus the son of Sira (Ecclesiasticus), and the gilyonim (Aramaic Gospel writings) and other books of the minim (heretics, including Jewish Christians), should be admitted, but here the answer was uncompromisingly negative” (The Books and the Parchments [Fleming H. Revell, 1984], 88).

Many Protestants accept the Jewish opposition to the Catholic canon of Scripture because it supports them in their anti-Catholicism. Catholics, on the other hand, have accepted the determination and canon of the new covenant people of God, those who are the new priesthood (cf. 1 Pet. 2:9), the new wineskin. As we noticed earlier, Geisler comments, “Since the New Testament explicitly states that Israel was entrusted with the oracles of God and was the recipient of the covenants and the Law, the Jews should be considered the custodians of the limits for their own canon” (Roman Catholics and Evangelicals, 169).

Am I supposed to accept the alleged determination of the rabbis as authoritative and binding upon my soul, when the mantle of authority has been passed on to the Church by an act of the Holy Spirit? Does Geisler give his readers this historical information and timeline, reminding them that God had turned aside from the Jewish people and destroyed their temple before their unauthoritative “council” rejected the Gospels and the “whole Christian canon,” including the New Testament?

The Jewish people had no closed canon prior to 300, and they “built a wall around it” to keep the Christians out. Why rely upon them? I accept the canon of the apostles and the early Church, which was determined by the bishops of the Church. And, like them, I do not accept the canon of anti-Christian Jewish leaders. SLIDE: WHY DO THE CATHOLIC AND PROTESTANT BIBLES DIFFER?

(Several Fathers, such as Jerome, accepted the Jewish Masoretic canon, but it was never an individual Father that made binding decisions for the Church; only the councils could do so.)

The canon of the Old Testament was not closed at Jabneh, nor were the deuterocanonicals excluded from the Old Testament there. Who has the authority from God to determine and close the canon of Scripture? Simply put, the Church. The Jewish hierarchy during the time of Christ claimed authority to bind and loose, which was a clearly understood technical term, but Jesus specifically appointed a new hierarchy over the “new Israel”—the Church—and transferred to this new magisterium the power to bind and loose (Matt. 16:19; 18:18). The Church was thus appointed to speak for God, and the final canon of Scripture would thus fall under its authority.

Protestant author Paul Achtemeier tells us, “Eastern and Roman Catholic tradition generally considered the Old Testament ‘apocryphal’ books to be canonical. It was not until the Protestant Reformation that these books were clearly denied canonical status (in Protestant circles). The Roman church, however, continues to affirm their place in the canon of Scripture” (Harper’s Bible Dictionary, 1st ed. [Harper & Row, c1985], 69).

At the Council of Trent the Church put the matter to rest by listing definitively the accepted books, which included the deuterocanonicals, and the Catechism of the Catholic Church affirms this list (CCC 120). This is the Catholic Bible we have today.

Isn’t it interesting that Martin Luther acknowledged the Catholic Church as the custodian of sacred Scripture (note 5, sidebar, page 25) when he wrote, “We concede—as we must—that so much of what they [the Catholic Church] say is true: that the papacy has God’s word and the office of the apostles, and that we have received holy scriptures, baptism, the sacrament, and the pulpit from them. What would we know of these if it were not for them?”

Resources: https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/how-to-defend-the-deuterocanonicals http://www.holytrinityparish.net/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/Our-Catholic-Bibles.pdf https://shamelesspopery.com/catholic-and-protestant-bibles-101/ SLIDE: WHY DO CATHOLICS CALL PRIESTS “FATHER”?

Taken from: https://www.catholic.com/tract/call-no-man-father

Many Protestants claim that when Catholics address priests as “father,” they are engaging in an unbiblical practice that Jesus forbade: “Call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven” (Matt. 23:9).

How should Catholics respond?

The Answer

To understand why the charge does not work, one must first understand the use of the word “father” in reference to our earthly fathers. No one would deny a little girl the opportunity to tell someone that she loves her father. Common sense tells us that Jesus wasn’t forbidding this type of use of the word “father.”

In fact, to forbid it would rob the address “Father” of its meaning when applied to God, for there would no longer be any earthly counterpart for the analogy of divine Fatherhood. The concept of God’s role as Father would be meaningless if we obliterated the concept of earthly fatherhood.

But in the Bible the concept of fatherhood is not restricted to just our earthly fathers and God. It is used to refer to people other than biological or legal fathers, and is used as a sign of respect to those with whom we have a special relationship.

For example, Joseph tells his brothers of a special fatherly relationship God had given him with the king of Egypt: “So it was not you who sent me here, but God; and he has made me a father to Pharaoh, and lord of all his house and ruler over all the land of Egypt” (Gen. 45:8).

Job indicates he played a fatherly role with the less fortunate: “I was a father to the poor, and I searched out the cause of him whom I did not know” (Job 29:16). And God himself declares that he will give a fatherly role to Eliakim, the steward of the house of David: “In that day I will call my servant Eliakim, the son of Hilkiah . . . and I will clothe him with [a] robe, and will bind [a] girdle on him, and will commit . . . authority to his hand; and he shall be a father to the inhabitants of Jerusalem and to the house of Judah” (Isa. 22:20–21).

This type of fatherhood applies not only to those who are wise counselors (like Joseph) or benefactors (like Job) or both (like Eliakim); it also applies to those who have a fatherly spiritual relationship with one. For example, Elisha cries, “My father, my father!” to Elijah as the latter is carried up to heaven in a whirlwind (2 Kgs. 2:12). Later, Elisha himself is called a father by the king of Israel (2 Kgs. 6:21).

A Change with the New Testament?

Some Protestants argue that this usage changed with the New Testament—that while it may have been permissible to call certain men “father” in the Old Testament, since the time of Christ, it’s no longer allowed. This argument fails for several reasons. SLIDE: WHY DO CATHOLICS CALL PRIESTS “FATHER”?

First, as we’ve seen, the imperative “call no man father” does not apply to one’s biological father. It also doesn’t exclude calling one’s ancestors “father,” as is shown in Acts 7:2, where Stephen refers to “our father Abraham,” or in Romans 9:10, where Paul speaks of “our father Isaac.”

Second, there are numerous examples in the New Testament of the term “father” being used as a form of address and reference, even for men who are not biologically related to the speaker. There are, in fact, so many uses of “father” in the New Testament, that the objection to Catholics calling priests “father” must be wrong, as we shall see.

Third, a careful examination of the context of Matthew 23 shows that Jesus didn’t intend for his words here to be understood literally. The whole passage reads, “But you are not to be called ‘rabbi,’ for you have one teacher, and you are all brethren. And call no man your father on earth, for you have one Father, who is in heaven. Neither be called ‘masters,’ for you have one master, the Christ” (Matt. 23:8–10).

The first problem is that although Jesus seems to prohibit the use of the term “teacher,” in Matthew 28:19–20, Christ himself appointed certain men to be teachers in his Church: “Go therefore and make disciples of all nations . . . teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you.” Paul speaks of his commission as a teacher: “For this I was appointed a preacher and apostle . . . a teacher of the Gentiles in faith and truth” (1 Tim. 2:7); “For this gospel I was appointed a preacher and apostle and teacher” (2 Tim. 1:11). He also reminds us that the Church has an office of teacher: “God has appointed in the church first apostles, second prophets, third teachers” (1 Cor. 12:28); and “his gifts were that some should be apostles, some prophets, some evangelists, some pastors and teachers” (Eph. 4:11). There is no doubt that Paul was not violating Christ’s teaching in Matthew 23 by referring so often to others as “teachers.”

Fundamentalists themselves slip up on this point by calling all sorts of people “doctor”; for example, professors and scientists who have Ph.D. degrees (i.e., doctorates). What they fail to realize is that “doctor” is simply the Latin word for “teacher.” Even “Mister” and “Mistress” (“Mrs.”) are forms of the word “master,” also mentioned by Jesus. So if his words in Matthew 23 were meant to be taken literally, Fundamentalists would be just as guilty for using the word “teacher” and “doctor” and “mister” as Catholics for saying “father.” But clearly, that would be a misunderstanding of Christ’s words.

So What Did Jesus Mean?

Jesus criticized Jewish leaders who love “the place of honor at feasts and the best seats in the synagogues, and salutations in the market places, and being called ‘rabbi’ by men” (Matt. 23:6– 7). He was using hyperbole (exaggeration) to show the scribes and Pharisees how sinful and proud they were for not looking humbly to God as the source of all authority and fatherhood and teaching, and instead setting themselves up as the ultimate authorities, father figures, and teachers.

Christ used hyperbole often, for example when he declared, “If your right eye causes you to sin, pluck it out and throw it away; it is better that you lose one of your members than that your SLIDE: WHY DO CATHOLICS CALL PRIESTS “FATHER”? whole body be thrown into hell” (Matt. 5:29, cf. 18:9; Mark 9:47). Christ certainly did not intend this to be applied literally, for otherwise all Christians would be blind amputees! (cf. 1 John 1:8; 1 Tim. 1:15).

Jesus is not forbidding us to call men “fathers” who actually are such—either literally or spiritually. He is warning people against inaccurately attributing fatherhood—or a particular kind or degree of fatherhood—to those who do not have it.

As the apostolic example shows, some individuals genuinely do have a spiritual fatherhood, meaning that they can be referred to as spiritual fathers. What must not be done is to confuse their form of spiritual paternity with that of God. Ultimately, God is our supreme protector, provider, and instructor. Correspondingly, it is wrong to view any individual other than God as having these roles.

Throughout the world, some people have been tempted to look upon religious leaders who are mere mortals as if they were an individual’s supreme source of spiritual instruction, nourishment, and protection. The tendency to turn mere men into “gurus” is worldwide.

This was also a temptation in the Jewish world of Jesus’ day, when famous rabbinical leaders, especially those who founded important schools, such as Hillel and Shammai, were highly exalted by their disciples. It is this elevation of an individual man—the formation of a “cult of personality” around him—of which Jesus is speaking when he warns against attributing to someone an undue role as master, father, or teacher.

He is not forbidding the perfunctory use of honorifics nor forbidding us to recognize that the person does have a role as a spiritual father and teacher. The example of his own apostles shows us that.

The Apostles Show the Way

The New Testament is filled with examples of and references to spiritual father-son and father- child relationships. It is worth quoting some of them here.

Paul regularly referred to Timothy as his child: “Therefore I sent to you Timothy, my beloved and faithful child in the Lord, to remind you of my ways in Christ” (1 Cor. 4:17); “To Timothy, my true child in the faith: grace, mercy, and peace from and Christ Jesus our Lord” (1 Tim. 1:2); “To Timothy, my beloved child: Grace, mercy, and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Lord” (2 Tim. 1:2).

He also referred to Timothy as his son: “This charge I commit to you, Timothy, my son, in accordance with the prophetic utterances which pointed to you, that inspired by them you may wage the good warfare” (1 Tim 1:18); “You then, my son, be strong in the grace that is in Christ Jesus” (2 Tim. 2:1); “But Timothy’s worth you know, how as a son with a father he has served with me in the gospel” (Phil. 2:22). SLIDE: WHY DO CATHOLICS CALL PRIESTS “FATHER”?

Paul also referred to other of his converts in this way: “To Titus, my true child in a common faith: grace and peace from God the Father and Christ Jesus our Savior” (Titus 1:4); “I appeal to you for my child, , whose father I have become in my imprisonment” (Philem. 10). None of these men were Paul’s literal sons. Rather, Paul is emphasizing his spiritual fatherhood with them.

Spiritual Fatherhood

Perhaps the most pointed New Testament reference to the theology of the spiritual fatherhood of priests is Paul’s statement, “I do not write this to make you ashamed, but to admonish you as my beloved children. For though you have countless guides in Christ, you do not have many fathers. For I became your father in Christ Jesus through the gospel” (1 Cor. 4:14–15).

Peter followed the same custom, referring to Mark as his son: “She who is at Babylon, who is likewise chosen, sends you greetings; and so does my son Mark” (1 Pet. 5:13). The apostles sometimes referred to entire churches under their care as their children. Paul writes, “Here for the third time I am ready to come to you. And I will not be a burden, for I seek not what is yours but you; for children ought not to lay up for their parents, but parents for their children” (2 Cor. 12:14); and, “My little children, with whom I am again in travail until Christ be formed in you!” (Gal. 4:19).

John said, “My little children, I am writing this to you so that you may not sin; but if any one does sin, we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous” (1 John 2:1); “No greater joy can I have than this, to hear that my children follow the truth” (3 John 4). In fact, John also addresses men in his congregations as “fathers” (1 John 2:13–14).

By referring to these people as their spiritual sons and spiritual children, Peter, Paul, and John imply their own roles as spiritual fathers. Since the Bible frequently speaks of this spiritual fatherhood, we Catholics acknowledge it and follow the custom of the apostles by calling priests “father.” Failure to acknowledge this is a failure to recognize and honor a great gift God has bestowed on the Church: the spiritual fatherhood of the priesthood. SLIDE: ISN’T THE CATHOLIC CHURCH THE RESULT OF CONSTANTINE PAGANIZING IT BY MAKING IT THE OFFICIAL IMPERIAL RELIGION?

It’s almost unfathomable to me that in this day and age Fundamentalists still have not learned to verify the validity of their anti-Catholic arguments. But then again, with so many websites making claims like “Constantine founded the Catholic Church” living on in cyberspace, it’s no wonder some folks still cling to what blogger Mark Shea refers to as “pseudo knowledge.”

It would be nice if this falsity were confined to Fundamentalist circles, but sadly it is not. As atheist podcast host and blogger David Smalley explains on his website:

The Bible was ‘canonized’ around 325 C.E. (about 275+ years after Jesus’ death) with Constantine in charge. . . . At the time Constantine was overseeing the or ‘building’ of the Bible, if he didn’t agree with the text, it was thrown out. There are tons of ‘scriptures’ that did not make it in. A quick research on the Council of Nicaea will prove this.

There’s no doubt that Constantine was favorable to Christianity. Still, many people mistakenly believe that he not only favored it but that he made it the state religion. He did not. He signed the Edict of Milan in 313 AD which made it legal to practice Christianity and ordered that the Christians’ confiscated property be returned to them.

Then there is the claim that Constantine introduced pagan elements into what was “pure” Christianity up to that point. Many Fundamentalists will claim that doctrines like transubstantiation, the communion of saints, or the sacrifice of the Mass were pagan ideas. But all of these teachings and more can be traced back to the time of the Apostles through the writings of the early Christians.

There are two glaring errors in this view of Church history, made popular by Lorraine Boettner’s Roman Catholicism. First, the emperor Constantine did not make Christianity the official religion of the Roman Empire. Constantine did enact the Edict of Milan in A.D. 313, but that only granted legal toleration of the Faith. Christianity did not become the official religion of the empire until the reign of the Theodosius I in 380.

Second, Boettner ignores the fact that “heathen ideas” like the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist or the necessity of baptism can be seen in the writings of early Church Fathers such as Justin, Irenaeus, Cyprian, Tertullian, and others who lived long before Constantine’s reign. Even Protestant scholars admit that the doctrine of baptismal regeneration, or the teaching that baptism actually removes the stain of original sin, was promulgated long before the time of Emperor Constantine. According to Reformed apologist William Webster:

The doctrine of baptism is one of the few teachings within Roman Catholicism for which it can be said that there is a universal consent of the Fathers . . . From the early days of the Church, baptism was universally perceived as the means of receiving four basic gifts: the remission of sins, deliverance from death, regeneration, and the bestowal of the Holy Spirit (The Church of Rome at the Bar of History, 95-96). SLIDE: ISN’T THE CATHOLIC CHURCH THE RESULT OF CONSTANTINE PAGANIZING IT BY MAKING IT THE OFFICIAL IMPERIAL RELIGION?

Critics like Boettner also fail to understand that the Church, guided by the Holy Spirit, is capable of baptizing pagan rites and using them in service of the gospel. This is called , which is a process that Pope St. John Paul II describes in this way:

Through inculturation the Church makes the gospel incarnate in different cultures and at the same time introduces peoples, together with their cultures, into her own community. She transmits to them her own values, at the same time taking the good elements that already exist in them and renewing them from within.Through inculturation the Church, for her part, becomes a more intelligible sign of what she is, and a more effective instrument of mission (Redemptoris Missio 52).

In the nineteenth century, Henry Cardinal Newman pointed out that many rituals in the Church have a non-Christian origin. The following quote that is attributed to him can be found on multiple Fundamentalist websites:

Temples, incense, oil lamps, votive offerings, holy water, holidays and season of devotions, processions, blessing of fields, sacerdotal vestments, the tonsure [of priests and and ], images . . . are all of pagan origin.

If the Catholic customs of using incense, candles, and chants contain an unforgivable infusion of “heathenism” into the Church, then Protestant churches that use fog machines, stage lights, and rock and roll music are just as heathen. Baptist harvest festivals celebrated on or just after Halloween would be another example of Protestant inculturation, since they celebrate morally good or morally neutral activities such as communal fall festivities or giving out candy without endorsing morally evil things like the occult.

John Paul II taught that using cultural elements in service of the gospel is not wrong as long such elements “in no way compromise the distinctiveness and integrity of the Christian faith” (Redemptoris Missio 52).

This answer comes from: https://www.catholic.com/tract/the-anti-catholic-bible https://www.catholic.com/magazine/online-edition/constantine-has-been-beaten-to-death

SLIDE: DOES BAPTISM REGENERATE, OR IS IT ONLY A SYMBOLIC WASHING OF THE SOUL? Taken from: https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/baptismal-regeneration

Most Fundamentalists believe that baptism is only a symbolic washing – an ordinance, not a sacrament. Catholics believe that baptism is a sacrament instituted by Christ which wipes away all sin, original and actual, and infuses us with the life of God (sanctifying grace). Thus we say that the person is “born again” of water and the Holy Spirit (John 3:5).

The baptism of Jesus is fundamentally different from John’s baptism. John’s was only a symbolic washing. However, John said that Jesus’ baptism would give the Holy Spirit whereas his own did not. (Matthew 3:11) At the time of the Reformation, many Protestants rejected baptism as a sacrament of regeneration because it did not fit with their notion of justification by faith alone.

Jesus would not have made baptism a condition for entering heaven if it were only symbolic.

Perspicuity of Scripture

Now, if it were true that Scripture was crystal clear and easy to understand, then they would be able to agree upon the nature of Baptism. But, in fact, Scripture is so unclear about the nature of Baptism, that Protestants have come up with several contradicting teachings on Baptism. And they base all of these teachings upon their own personal twist of the Bible alone.

Therefore, Lutherans believe in Baptismal Regeneration. They believe the Bible teaches that Baptism regenerates the soul. In what way, is unclear, since they simultaneously believe that justification is only forensic. In other words, that they are only covered over with the righteousness of Christ, but otherwise, remain sinners.

Presbyterians believe in Covenantal Baptism. They believe that Baptism is a sign a covenant with God and seal of righteousness, the way that circumcision was in the Old Testament. In what way it is a sign, is unclear. Since they also believe in forensic justification and therefore, that there is no change in the soul.

The Churches of Christ proclaim Salvation Occasion Baptism. Although they have no agreed upon doctrines that they must hold, someone came up with the idea that it is in Baptism that one is saved. They have merely replaced the “altar call” of other Protestant confessions, with water Baptism.

Baptists hold to a Believer’s Baptism. This is the belief that one is saved by a profession of faith. And then the Baptism is simply done in obedience to Christ.

And of course, there are many Protestants who don’t believe that water Baptism is, at all, necessary. SLIDE: AREN’T WE SAVED BY FAITH ALONE AS ST. PAUL SAYS IN ROMANS 3:28? Taken from: https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/faith-and-works-0

“Protestants believe in faith alone, while Catholics believe in faith and works.” You hear both Protestants and Catholics say this all the time.

But it’s a misleading oversimplification. If you tell a typical Evangelical, “You believe in faith alone, but we Catholics believe in faith and works,” you will cause him to think that the Catholic Church teaches something that, in fact, it says is false.

Here’s why . . .

The justification connection

The discussion of faith and works doesn’t take place in a vacuum. It occurs in a specific context—the doctrine of justification.

The New Testament uses the word justification to refer to one of the things that God does for us by his grace. Unfortunately, there is considerable disagreement about what justification involves.

The way typical American Evangelicals use the term, when God justifies someone, he declares that person’s sins forgiven and proclaims the person righteous. This is occurs at the beginning of the Christian life, when a person first turns to God.

As far as it goes, this description is accurate. Catholic theology would say that there is more to justification than that, but it is true that at the beginning of the Christian life God forgives a person’s sins and declares him righteous.

Faith alone

When Protestants use the phrase “faith alone,” they are describing how we are justified. The idea is that in order to come to God, be forgiven, and be declared righteous, you don’t need to do anything to earn your place before God except have faith in Jesus Christ.

In practice, Protestants give different meanings to the “faith alone” formula. Lutherans, for example, don’t see the idea that baptism grants salvation as conflicting with this.

In his Small Catechism, Martin Luther asks, “What does baptism give? What good is it?” His answer: “It gives the forgiveness of sins, redeems from death and the devil, gives eternal salvation to all who believe this, just as God’s words and promises declare.”

Various Protestants—including some Calvinists, Anglicans, Methodists, and others—believe baptism plays a role in salvation, but others sharply disagree. Some—particularly — claim that if baptism were to play a role in salvation it would violate the “faith alone” formula. They thus understand this formula in a way that excludes baptism. This is the most common position in American . SLIDE: AREN’T WE SAVED BY FAITH ALONE AS ST. PAUL SAYS IN ROMANS 3:28?

Regardless of how they interpret the “faith alone” formula, there is one thing that Protestants agree would violate this formula: works. “Works”—whatever they may be—are precisely the thing that the “faith alone” formula is meant to exclude.

Much can be said about what “works” are in the Bible, but, for reasons of space, we won’t be going into that here. It will do for our purposes to note that most Evangelicals understand the term to mean “good works” (feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, etc.). Some understand it even more broadly to mean anything that you do. Both groups commonly envision works as somehow earning our place before God.

Faith and works?

If a Catholic tells a Protestant, “We believe in justification by faith and works,” it will cause the Protestant to believe something about Catholic doctrine that is not true.

Remember: Protestants use the term justification to refer to an event at the beginning of the Christian life where God forgives us and declares us righteous. As a result, a Protestant will think that the Catholic is saying that we need to do works in order to come to God and be forgiven.

This will confirm his biases against the Church and play into all those stereotypes left over from the Reformation—the ones where Catholics are depicted as holding a false gospel according to which we need to earn our place before God by our own efforts. But the Catholic Church does not teach this.

Trent Speaks

Following the Protestant Reformation, the Catholic Church held an ecumenical council in the Italian city of Trent to deal with the theological questions that were being debated. The Council of Trent issued the Decree on Justification (DJ), which set forth the Catholic position on the subject.

In the heat of the times, Protestant leaders painted the Council of Trent as a great villain that simply reiterated the Church’s false teachings and its false gospel. That characterization is still found today in a lot of Protestant literature on the subject. But if you read what Trent says, you find it actually denies much of what is attributed to it. This is the case with the idea that we need to earn our place before God by doing works—particularly at the beginning of the Christian life when we are first justified.

According to Trent, “none of those things that precede justification, whether faith or works, merit the grace of justification. ‘For, if by grace, it is not now by works, otherwise,’ as the Apostle says, ‘grace is no more grace’” (DJ 8, quoting Rom. 11:6).

When we come to God and are justified, it happens without any merit on our part. Neither our faith nor our works—nor anything else—merits justification. Trent thus denies the very thing our Protestant brethren fear it asserts—and that we lead them to believe if we tell them simply that we believe in “justification by faith and works.” SLIDE: AREN’T WE SAVED BY FAITH ALONE AS ST. PAUL SAYS IN ROMANS 3:28?

Isn’t that our language?

Given how common the “justified by faith and works” language is in some Catholic circles, the idea that we should be careful using it with Protestants may seem unfamiliar. “Isn’t the language we use when summarizing our beliefs about justification?” one might ask.

It depends on whom you mean by “we.” Many Catholics use this as a kind of top-level summary of justification, but you don’t find the magisterium—the Church’s teaching authority—using it that way.

If you go through Trent’s Decree on Justification, or the section on justification in the Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC 1987-1995), you won’t find the phrase “faith and works.” And you won’t find the word works at all in the Catechism’s section on justification.

This may be surprising, but the fact that the magisterium does not express its teaching in this way is a signal that we need to look more closely at what it says.

What about James?

A key question at this point is how the magisterium handles James 2:24, which says that we are “justified by works and not by faith alone.”

In popular discussions, this verse is often presented to Protestants as if it proves that we are justified by faith and works, with nothing more to be said. Confronted with this claim, the Protestant may respond, “But that’s not the kind of justification that James is talking about.”

Before dismissing this claim, a Catholic should be aware of one thing: The magisterium agrees with it. At least, the magisterium doesn’t quote James 2:24 in connection with the justification that occurs at the beginning of the Christian life. Instead, it refers it to something else.

Growth in righteousness

Earlier we mentioned that Protestants tend to conceive of justification as an event that occurs at the beginning of the Christian life where we are forgiven and declared righteous by God, and we said that this understanding is true as far as it goes.

But in the Catholic view, there is more to justification than this. In the first place, God doesn’t simply declare us righteous. He also makes us righteous in justification. Thus the Council of Trent defined justification as “not only a remission of sins but also the sanctification and renewal of the inner man” (DJ 7).

So at the beginning of the Christian life, God forgives our sins and gives us the gift of righteousness. But he’s not done with us. He wants us to grow in righteousness over the course of the Christian life, and, if we cooperate with his grace, we will. Catholic theology refers to this growth in righteousness using the term justification, so, in Catholic language, justification isn’t SLIDE: AREN’T WE SAVED BY FAITH ALONE AS ST. PAUL SAYS IN ROMANS 3:28? something that happens just at the beginning of the Christian life. It happens over the course of the Christian life.

The righteousness connection

The reason the Church refers to this growth in righteousness as a form of justification is a little unclear in English. This is because the English vocabulary draws on both German and Latin roots. As a result, the same underlying concept can appear under more than one English term.

That’s the case with righteousness and justice. They are two different words in English, but they both represent the same underlying term in Latin, Greek, Hebrew, etc. As a result, you sometimes see Catholic works in English translated so that they speak of God giving us the gift of “justice” (i.e., righteousness), of us growing in justice, and thus of us being further justified.

This sounds unusual in English, and both Protestant and Catholic scholars have lamented that we don’t have the vocabulary to say things like “God gives us the gift of righteousness, we grow in righteousness, and thus we are further righteoused.” As a result, we have to keep in mind the way that righteousness and justification are related.

Trent on James

This leads us to what the Council of Trent had to say about James 2:24.

After discussing the justification that occurs at the beginning of the Christian life, Trent quotes several passages from St. Paul on how Christians grow in virtue by yielding our bodies to righteousness for sanctification. It states that by good works we “increase in that justice received through the grace of Christ and are further justified” (DJ 10).

It is in the context of this growth in righteousness—and in this context only—that Trent quotes James 2:24: “Do you see that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only?”

Trent thus relates James’s statement not to the initial justification that occurs when we first come to God but to the growth in righteousness that occurs over the course of the Christian life.

Thus, a Protestant objecting that James is talking about a different kind of justification than the one the Protestant has in mind would be correct. James isn’t saying that you need to do good works in order to be forgiven. And neither is the Catholic Church.

From a Protestant point of view

If this were explained to many Protestants, they would likely be somewhat relieved and somewhat perplexed.

They would be relieved to hear that the Catholic Church doesn’t teach that we need to do good works to come to God and be justified, and they would be relieved to hear that the Catholic Church relates James 2:24 to later events in the Christian life. SLIDE: AREN’T WE SAVED BY FAITH ALONE AS ST. PAUL SAYS IN ROMANS 3:28?

On the other hand, they’d likely still have some differences, at least on the level of terminology. Though Protestants acknowledge that God sanctifies and renews the inner man when one is initially justified, they don’t tend to include this under the term justification. Instead, they treat it as a separate but simultaneous event.

And, although they acknowledge that by cooperating with God’s grace and doing good works we grow in righteousness as Christians, they don’t use the term justification for this process, either.

An open-minded Protestant might say, “Well, we don’t use the term justification that way, and we might not agree about the interpretation of particular verses, but we can acknowledge that what Catholics are saying here is true, even if they express it differently.”

Still, such a Protestant might wonder how far we can agree. He might ask: “Didn’t Trent condemn ‘faith alone’ with an ?”

The anathema

Canon 9 from Trent’s Decree on Justification states: “If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, so that he understands that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the action of his own will, let him be anathema.”

This is widely misunderstood.

One reason is that the term anathema is often glossed in Protestant circles to mean something like “damned by God,” and the canon is represented as condemning Protestants to hell.

It isn’t. At that time in history, the term anathema referred to a form of excommunication that could be imposed by a Church court for certain serious offenses. It was performed with a special ceremony, and its purpose was to motivate people to repent. When they did repent, it was also lifted with a special ceremony. It was seldom imposed and was eventually abolished.

The anathema did not sentence people to hell, it did not take effect automatically, it was never applied to all Protestants as a group, and it doesn’t apply to anyone today. The use of the term does, though, imply an authoritative rejection of the “faith alone” formula—when it is used to mean a specific thing.

The canon doesn’t say, “If anyone says that the sinner is justified by faith alone, let him be anathema.” Instead, it rejects a particular use of the formula, whereby someone “understands that nothing else is required to cooperate in order to obtain the grace of justification, and that it is not in any way necessary that he be prepared and disposed by the action of his own will.”

Trent is therefore concerned to reject “faith alone” when it’s used to say that you don’t need to in any way cooperate with God’s grace, that a merely intellectual faith would save you. SLIDE: AREN’T WE SAVED BY FAITH ALONE AS ST. PAUL SAYS IN ROMANS 3:28?

And that’s correct. Merely agreeing with the truths of the theology is not enough to be saved. As James puts it: “You believe that God is one; you do well. Even the demons believe—and shudder” (James 2:17).

A Catholic “faith alone”?

If Trent didn’t reject all uses of “faith alone,” could the formula have an acceptable use from a Catholic point of view?

It might come as a surprise, but quite a number of the Church Fathers used it (see Joseph Fitzmyer, Romans, 360). Even Thomas Aquinas used it(Commentary on 1 Timothy, ch. 1, lect. 3, Commentary on Galatians, ch. 2, lect. 4).

The fathers of the Council may have known that some Catholics sources used the formula, and this may have been one reason why they only rejected certain interpretations of it.

Since the time of the Council, Catholic theologians have explored the senses in which the formula might be compatible with Catholic teaching. Specifically, they have pointed out that the theological virtue of charity (the supernatural love of God) unites us to God, and so, if one has faith combined with charity, then one has “faith working through love,” which is what Paul says counts in Christ (Gal. 5:6).

That kind of faith, which Catholic theologians refer to as “faith formed by charity,” would—of itself—unite one to God spiritually.

Benedict XVI on “faith alone”

Pope Benedict XVI taught: “Luther’s phrase ‘faith alone’ is true, if it is not opposed to faith in charity, in love. Faith is looking at Christ, entrusting oneself to Christ, being united to Christ, conformed to Christ, to his life. And the form, the life of Christ, is love; hence to believe is to conform to Christ and to enter into his love. So it is that in the Letter to the Galatians in which he primarily developed his teaching on justification St. Paul speaks of faith that works through love” (General Audience, Nov. 19, 2008).

It thus seems that the “faith alone” formula can have an acceptable meaning. Does this mean that Catholics should start using it?

Reasons for caution

There is a big difference between it being possible for a formula to be given an acceptable meaning and it being prudent to use it in common practice.

There are several reasons why Catholics should not do the latter.

First, the formula is not the language that Scripture uses to describe how we are justified. The phrase “by faith alone” (Greek, ek pisteos monon) appears only once in the New Testament, in SLIDE: AREN’T WE SAVED BY FAITH ALONE AS ST. PAUL SAYS IN ROMANS 3:28?

James 2:24, where it is rejected. Using this formula, whatever meaning it is given, creates an automatic tension with the language that Scripture itself uses, and that’s bound to cause confusion.

Second, the formula is inherently open to confusion. In common speech, the term faith is a synonym for belief. When coupled with the word alone and used to describe the method of our justification, it communicates to most people the erroneous idea that we can be saved by intellectual belief alone—the view that Trent rejected.

Third, though there are precedents for its use in Catholic history, it is not the primary or even a common way that Catholic theology expresses itself on justification.

Fourth, the magisterium does not use the expression on a regular basis. If you look in the Catechism of the Catholic Church, you will not find it. Neither will you find it used regularly in other magisterial documents. There are a handful of such documents that acknowledge that the formula can have a Catholic sense, but there are none that use it regularly or recommend that Catholics use it.

Speaking the truth in love

There are many points on which Catholic and Protestant thought differs, including on the subject of justification, but we should be precise about these and not create additional confusion. A careful look shows that it is problematic to frame the Protestant-Catholic discussion of justification simply in terms of “faith alone” verses “faith and works.” This is an oversimplification that will lead Protestants to think that the Catholic Church teaches things that it does not.

The way that the Church approaches the issue is more careful and more sophisticated. Communicating it is therefore more difficult. It’s always easier to reduce two positions to a pair of slogans and pit them against each other, but the Church doesn’t call us to do what’s rhetorically easy. It calls us to speak the truth in love (Eph. 4:15), and that means taking the care to explain what the Church teaches with both accuracy and charity. SLIDE: CAN YOU LOSE YOUR SALVATION ONCE YOU ACCEPT JESUS AS YOUR LORD AND SAVIOR? Taken from: https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/once-saved-always-saved

The Bible says in Romans 10:9 that if you confess with your lips that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. So, when I accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior, I was saved. It’s a done deal.

When a Catholic hears the above assertion, his fist inclination is to immediately launch a litany of verses that emphasize that salvation can be lost. Usually this causes the other person to present just as many verses that speak of salvation as a completed event. Both parties feel as if they have offered plenty of evidence, but no progress has been made.

There’s a better way to go at it. Concede that the Bible does speak of salvation as a past-tense event. Offer some verses of your own, such as Ephesians 2:8–9: “For by grace you have been saved through faith.” From there, add that Scripture also speaks of salvation as a present- tense event. In Philippians 2:12, Paul exhorted us to “work out your own salvation with fear and trembling.”

Just as we cannot deny that salvation is a past- and present-tense event, the Evangelical Protestant cannot deny that Scripture also speaks of it as a future-tense event. For evidence of this, verses such as Romans 13:11 might be offered: “our salvation is nearer than when we first believed” (Rom. 13:11; cf. 1 Cor. 3:15; 5:5).

When you emphasize that salvation can be lost, the Protestant often hears, “You have not yet been saved.” He knows that the Bible speaks of salvation as a past-tense event, and so no matter how many verses you offer, you will not be able to prove this to be false. The way to move beyond this impasse is to offer the big picture of salvation: past, present, and future. The Evangelical will then not feel as if you are trying to prove that he has not been saved, but will perhaps be more open to look at salvation in a broader—and more biblical—context. Once you have reached this point, it’s time to offer the evidence that the free gift of salvation can be just as freely forfeited.

The first person to espouse the idea of “once saved, always saved” was John Calvin in the mid- sixteenth century. Even Martin Luther didn’t subscribe to the theory. Prior to Calvin, the unanimous consent of the early Christians was that a person is capable of losing his salvation by committing mortal sin, as John spoke about in 1 John 5:16–17.

In the first century, the Didache, commonly known as the Teaching of the Twelve Apostles, said “Watch for your life’s sake. Let not your lamps be quenched, nor your loins unloosed; but be ready, for you know not the hour in which our Lord comes. But you shall assemble together often, seeking the things which are befitting to your souls: for the whole time of your faith will not profit you, if you be not made complete in the last time” (Didache 16 [A.D. 70]).

Such consistent testimony could be given from the dawn of Christianity until today, and no suggestion of “once saved, always saved” can be found on the lips of any Christian before Calvin. SLIDE: HASN’T THE CATHOLIC CHURCH CHANGED ITS DOCTRINES THROUGH THE YEARS? Taken from: https://www.catholic.com/magazine/print-edition/is-it-a-doctrine-or-a-discipline

“Doctrine” might be one of the least understood words in the Catholic vocabulary in addition to the differences between the words “change” and “development.” One textbook said that “doctrines can possibly change." Properly explained, this notion would have been acceptable. For example, the book might have clarified that doctrines can and do develop over time, but they do not change in the sense that the Church flip-flops on issues.

What’s the Difference between “Doctrine” and “Discipline?

When discussing our Catholic faith, we must understand the difference between doctrine and discipline and be able to distinguish which of the two any particular matter may be.

Our Sunday Visitor’s Catholic Encyclopedia defines “discipline” as an “instruction, system of teaching or of law, given under the authority of the Church [which] can be changed with the approval of proper authority, as opposed to doctrine, which is unchangeable” (334).

Discipline, then, is man-made and can be changed as often as the Church desires. This is not to say that the authority to enact discipline is man-made. In fact, Scripture itself records the Church’s God-given authority to enact discipline: “[W]hatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven” (Matt. 18:18; see also 16:19). Now, this power to bind and to loose extends beyond discipline, but it certainly includes the authority to enact discipline as well.

Doctrine, on the other hand, is the teaching of the Church on matters of faith and morals. All such teaching—or at least the basis for it—was handed down to the Church by Jesus and the apostles prior to the death of the last apostle. Scripture refers to doctrine as “the faith which was once for all delivered to the saints” (Jude 1:3). As mentioned before, doctrine can develop over time as the Church comes to understand it better—but it cannot change. No one—not even the pope—has the authority to change doctrine.

Subject to Future Change

That the Church possesses both doctrines and disciplines might seem simple enough on the surface; however, distinguishing between the two is not always a simple task—even when discussing matters with fellow Catholics. The poorly chosen example in the confirmation textbook shows just how difficult.

Another common example within the Church today concerns the changes to the way the Mass is celebrated that were promulgated by Pope Paul VI in the late 1960s. There are some today who question the pope’s authority to institute the liturgical changes he did because they claim that in 1570, Pope St. Pius V defined certain elements of the Mass’s celebration as doctrine. Pius’ directives were promulgated “in perpetuity” and are said by some to be unchangeable doctrine.

In actuality, Pius V’s Apostolic Constitution Quo Primum concerned disciplinary matters, not teachings on faith or morals. Evidence of this is that teaching on faith or morals would not— SLIDE: HASN’T THE CATHOLIC CHURCH CHANGED ITS DOCTRINES THROUGH THE YEARS? indeed, could not—allow for such exceptions as “unless approval of the practice of saying Mass differently was given” or “unless there has prevailed a custom of a similar kind” or “We in no wise rescind their above-mentioned prerogative or custom.” Such matters of Church discipline always remain subject to future change by equal or greater authority. In light of this, wording such as “in perpetuity” must be understood as “from now on, until this or another equal or greater authority determines otherwise.” Pope Paul VI certainly held equal authority to that of Pope St. Pius V. Therefore, changes to the Mass under his authority were licit and valid and were an example of disciplinary changes, not doctrinal changes.

If doctrinal and disciplinary matters can be so confusing among Catholics who have the tri-part authority of Sacred Scripture, Sacred Tradition, and the Magisterium to guide us, how much more confusing must such matters be for our non-Catholic brothers and sisters who rely entirely on their own interpretations of Scripture alone?

Authority Delineates Discipline

A similar problem arises when one considers the dictates of the as recorded in the Book of Acts. Paul and Barnabas, having been confronted in Antioch with an argument between Jewish converts and Gentile converts about whether the Gentiles must observe certain Jewish laws (especially concerning circumcision), went to Jerusalem to discuss the matter with the other apostles. The council concluded with the following statement in a letter: “[I]t has seemed good to the Holy Spirit and to us to lay upon you no greater burden than these necessary things: that you abstain from what has been sacrificed to idols and from blood and from what is strangled and from unchastity. If you keep yourselves from these, you will do well” (Acts 15:28- 29).

Here we have what seems to be the apostles teaching, at a Church council, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, that it is immoral, among other things, to consume blood or to eat the meat of an animal which has been strangled. Yet, how many Christians are cautious enough to be certain that their food does not contain blood or that the animal they are consuming was not killed by strangulation? Doesn’t their Bible teach that they should?

They have unknowingly subscribed to the idea that the apostles imposed these requirements as disciplines which could later be changed. Other examples could be cited, but the point is clear: Scripture itself is not always sufficient to distinguish between authentic Christian doctrine and authoritatively imposed discipline. Quite simply, the Bible is not the single-source answer to all questions concerning the Christian faith. One must look also to Sacred Tradition and Magisterial teaching. One must look to the Catholic Church.

We as Catholics, too, must recognize within our own Church the authority to teach doctrine, impose discipline, and discern between the two. SLIDE: PURGATORY

Taken from: https://www.catholic.com/tract/purgatory

The Catechism of the Catholic Church defines purgatory as a “purification, so as to achieve the holiness necessary to enter the joy of heaven,” which is experienced by those “who die in God’s grace and friendship, but still imperfectly purified” (CCC 1030). It notes that “this final purification of the elect . . . is entirely different from the punishment of the damned” (CCC 1031).

The purification is necessary because, as Scripture teaches, nothing unclean will enter the presence of God in heaven (Rev. 21:27) and, while we may die with our mortal sins forgiven, there can still be many impurities in us, specifically venial sins and the temporal punishment due to sins already forgiven.

Two Judgments

When we die, we undergo what is called the particular, or individual, judgment. Scripture says that “it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment” (Heb. 9:27). We are judged instantly and receive our reward, for good or ill. We know at once what our final destiny will be. At the end of time, when Jesus returns, there will come the general judgment to which the Bible refers, for example, in Matthew 25:31-32: “When the Son of man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, then he will sit on his glorious throne. Before him will be gathered all the nations, and he will separate them one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats.” In this general judgment all our sins will be publicly revealed (Luke 12:2–5).

Augustine said in The City of God that “temporary punishments are suffered by some in this life only, by others after death, by others both now and then; but all of them before that last and strictest judgment” (21:13). It is between the particular and general judgments, then, that the soul is purified of the remaining consequences of sin: “I tell you, you will never get out till you have paid the very last copper” (Luke 12:59).

Money, Money, Money

One argument anti-Catholics often use to attack purgatory is the idea that the Catholic Church owes the majority of its wealth to the doctrine of purgatory. But the numbers just don’t add up.

When a Catholic requests a memorial Mass for the dead—that is, a Mass said for the benefit of someone in purgatory—it is customary to give the parish priest a stipend, on the principles that the laborer is worth his hire (Luke 10:7) and that those who preside at the altar share the altar’s offerings (1 Cor. 9:13–14). In the , a stipend is commonly around five dollars; but the indigent do not have to pay anything. A few people, of course, freely offer more. This money goes to the parish priest, and priests are allowed to receive only one such stipend per day. No one gets rich on five dollars a day, and certainly not the Church, which does not receive the money anyway.

But look at what happens on a Sunday. There are often hundreds of people at Mass. In a crowded parish, there may be thousands. Many families and individuals deposit five dollars or more into SLIDE: PURGATORY the collection basket; a few give much more. A parish might have four or five or six Masses on a Sunday. The total from the Sunday collections far surpasses the paltry amount received from the memorial Masses.

A Catholic “Invention”?

Fundamentalists may be fond of saying the Catholic Church “invented” the doctrine of purgatory to make money, but they have difficulty saying just when. Most professional anti-Catholics—the ones who make their living attacking “Romanism”—seem to place the blame on Pope Gregory the Great, who reigned from A.D. 590 to 604.

But that hardly accounts for the request of Monica, mother of Augustine, who asked her son, in the fourth century, to remember her soul in his Masses. This would make no sense if she thought her soul would not benefit from prayers, as would be the case if she were in hell or in the full glory of heaven.

Nor does ascribing the doctrine to Gregory explain the graffiti in the catacombs, where Christians during the persecutions of the first three centuries recorded prayers for the dead. Indeed, some of the earliest Christian writings outside the New Testament, like the and Thecla and the Martyrdom of Perpetua and Felicity (both written during the second century), refer to the Christian practice of praying for the dead. Such prayers would have been offered only if Christians believed in purgatory, even if they did not use that name for it. (See Catholic Answers’ tract The Roots of Purgatory for quotations from these and other early Christian sources.)

Why No Protests?

A study of the history of doctrines indicates that Christians in the first centuries were up in arms if anyone suggested the least change in beliefs. They were extremely conservative people who tested a doctrine’s truth by asking, Was this believed by our ancestors? Was it handed on from the apostles? Surely belief in purgatory would be considered a great change, if it had not been believed from the first—so where are the records of protests?

They don’t exist. There is no hint at all, in the oldest writings available to us (or in later ones, for that matter), that “true believers” in the immediate post-apostolic years spoke of purgatory as a novel doctrine. They must have understood that the oral teaching of the apostles, what Catholics call tradition, and the Bible not only failed to contradict the doctrine, but, in fact, confirmed it.

It is no wonder, then, that those who deny the existence of purgatory tend to touch upon only briefly the history of the belief. They prefer to claim that the Bible speaks only of heaven and hell. Wrong. It speaks plainly of a third condition, commonly called the of the Fathers, where the just who had died before the redemption were waiting for heaven to be opened to them. After his death and before his resurrection, Christ visited those experiencing the limbo of the Fathers and preached to them the good news that heaven would now be opened to them (1 Pet. 3:19). These people thus were not in heaven, but neither were they experiencing the torments of hell. SLIDE: PURGATORY

Some have speculated that the limbo of the Fathers is the same as purgatory. This may or may not be the case. However, even if the limbo of the Fathers is not purgatory, its existence shows that a temporary, intermediate state is not contrary to Scripture.

“Purgatory Not in Scripture”

Some Fundamentalists also charge, “The word purgatory is nowhere found in Scripture.” This is true, and yet it does not disprove the existence of purgatory or the fact that belief in it has always been part of Church teaching. The words Trinity and Incarnation aren’t in Scripture either, yet those doctrines are clearly taught in it. Likewise, Scripture teaches that purgatory exists, even if it doesn’t use that word and even if 1 Peter 3:19 refers to a place other than purgatory.

Christ refers to the sinner who “will not be forgiven, either in this age or in the age to come” (Matt. 12:32), suggesting that one can be freed after death of the consequences of one’s sins. Similarly, Paul tells us that, when we are judged, each man’s work will be tried. And what happens if a righteous man’s work fails the test? “He will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire” (1 Cor 3:15). Now this loss, this penalty, can’t refer to consignment to hell, since no one is saved there; and heaven can’t be meant, since there is no suffering (“fire”) there. The Catholic doctrine of purgatory alone explains this passage.

Then, of course, there is the Bible’s approval of prayers for the dead: “In doing this he acted in a very excellent and noble way, inasmuch as he had the resurrection of the dead in view; for if he were not expecting the dead to rise again, it would have been useless and foolish to pray for them in death. But if he did this with a view to the splendid reward that awaits those who had gone to rest in godliness, it was a holy and pious thought. Thus he made atonement for the dead that they might be freed from this sin” (2 Macc. 12:43–45). Prayers are not needed by those in heaven, and no one can help those in hell. This verse so clearly illustrates the existence of purgatory that, at the time of the Reformation, Protestants had to cut the out of their Bibles in order to avoid accepting the doctrine.

Prayers for the dead and the consequent doctrine of purgatory have been part of the true religion since before the time of Christ. Not only can we show it was practiced by the Jews of the time of the Maccabees, but it has even been retained by Orthodox Jews today, who recite a prayer known as the Mourner’s Kaddish for eleven months after the death of a loved one so that the loved one may be purified. It was not the Catholic Church that added the doctrine of purgatory. Rather, the Protestant churches rejected a doctrine that had always been believed by Jews and Christians.

Why Go to Purgatory?

Why would anyone go to purgatory? To be cleansed, for “nothing unclean shall enter [heaven]” (Rev. 21:27). Anyone who has not been completely freed of sin and its effects is, to some extent, “unclean.” Through repentance he may have gained the grace needed to be worthy of heaven, which is to say, he has been forgiven and his soul is spiritually alive. But that’s not sufficient for gaining entrance into heaven. He needs to be cleansed completely. SLIDE: PURGATORY

Fundamentalists claim, as an article in Jimmy Swaggart’s magazine, The Evangelist, put it, that “Scripture clearly reveals that all the demands of divine justice on the sinner have been completely fulfilled in Jesus Christ. It also reveals that Christ has totally redeemed, or purchased back, that which was lost. The advocates of a purgatory (and the necessity of prayer for the dead) say, in effect, that the redemption of Christ was incomplete. . . . It has all been done for us by Jesus Christ, there is nothing to be added or done by man.”

It is entirely correct to say that Christ accomplished all of our salvation for us on the cross. But that does not settle the question of how this redemption is applied to us. Scripture reveals that it is applied to us over the course of time through, among other things, the process of sanctification through which the Christian is made holy. Sanctification involves suffering (Rom. 5:3–5), and purgatory is the final stage of sanctification that some of us need to undergo before we enter heaven. Purgatory is the final phase of Christ’s applying to us the purifying redemption that he accomplished for us by his death on the cross.

Nothing Unclean

Catholic theology takes seriously the notion that “nothing unclean shall enter heaven.” From this it is inferred that a less than cleansed soul isn’t fit for heaven. It needs to be cleansed or “purged” of its remaining imperfections. Sanctification is thus not an option, something that may or may not happen before one gets into heaven. It is an absolute requirement, as Hebrews 12:14 states that we must strive “for the holiness without which no one will see the Lord.”