A Catholic View of Israel

130 thoughts on “A Catholic View of Israel”

1. Are you familiar with John Leary’s “Prepare for the Great Tribulation and the Era of Peace” books? My mom and younger brother read them. My mom got them a few years ago. she told me and my brothers about the things in them. I was a teenager at the time. The things she told me really scared me. one part that still scares me is the part about micro-chip implants and the possibility that those things are the mark of the beast predicted in the Book of Revelation. It sounds similar because they things are implanted in the forehead and arm. I am so afraid that it might be true. Do you know if the Vatican has approved of this or not? I don’t know if I’m interfering with God or not,but I’ve prayed that the government would ban these things and that the FDA wouldn’t approve them,something like that. Just today,the FDA approved of a micro-chip implant that holds all your health information that your doctor can look up if you’re unconsious. Privacy concerns have been raised. This microchip thing sounds like something in the Left Behind series. This whole thing has me afraid of what the future is going to be like. Could you help me? This micro-chip thing is almost always on my mind and won’t leave me alone.

2. Many traditionalists have a different point of view.

3. Isn’t it basic Catholic dogma that the Church is the New Israel, and the blessings of the temporal Promised Land was provisional, and have been superceded by the Christian covenant; and further, that modern-day Judaism is not the lawful continuation of Biblical Judaism, and that today’s Jews do not have a Divine right to Israel?
   I thought this was orthodox, Patristic Christianity 101?

4. Eric-
   Actually supercessionism isn’t Catholic dogma at all but has been definitely revoked by Vatican II and Nostra Aetate, which affirms that God’s gifts and calling to the Jewish people are irrevocable (quoting Rom 11). One may say that Israel’s continued role in God’s plan has been a huge ‘blind spot’ in the eyes of most of the Fathers and even most theologians in Christian history. But supercessionism was more like the absence of official doctrine than ever a authoritative one. Jimmy is right that one must be cautious as Catholics to not fall into dispensationalism, but there is certainly room for Catholics to legitimately adopt a moderate Zionist position, and without falling into absolute ‘right or wrong attitudes’ as Jimmy mentioned. See the attached URL – Catholics for Israel.

5. Er, oops, I see that this discussion occurred more than a year ago… a bit of a tardy reply on my part. Well Jimmy, if you read this, I would be interested in your comments about israelcatholic.com.

6. Both sides, Israel and their enemies (Hamas, Hezbollah, Palestinians, Iran, etc.) should stop fighting and instead declare peace. It’s not worth killing people over this little piece of land. Peace is much better for everyone involved because then nobody dies. I think Islam, Judaism and Christianity all say be good and don’t kill anybody and make peace right?

7. Rich,
   Man is basically evil so his natural tendency is toward evil. There will never be peace until Christ returns. Even the Bible predicts in the last days that there will wars and rumor of wars. So don’t hold your breath waiting for world peace.
   Furthermore it is very doubtful that the Jews currently residing in Israel have any relationship to the Jews of the Old Testament. Some people refer to modern Israel as the land of the Ersatz-Jews.

8. Dear Frankie,
   You wrote:
   Man is basically evil so his natural tendency is toward evil.
   When did man stop being made in the image and likeness of God? Would God have sent his only son to rescue a form of life that is basically evil? St. Paul said that Christ died while we were sinners. That is a far different thing form being basically evil. Man is fallen. That is not the same thing as being evil. You are getting a little too close to dualism, there.
   Man is fallen by virtue of the sin of Adam. His basic nature is still good, but his intelligence has been so darkened and his will so weakened that he often choses the bad while seeking the good and he often misdefines the good and goes off to seek what only appears good. This does not make man basically evil, but rather, weak.
   It is true that wars are started because of this disordering of appetites due to the Fall and there probably will not be universal peace before the second coming, but that does not mean that we do not have an obligation to seek peace and try to develop.
   As to whether or not the Jews in Israel are the Jews of the Old Testament, are you saying that there is a hidden remnant still out there, because the Jews have to remain until Christ returns and if those in israel are not Jews, there where are they. If you know, tell us.
   The Chicken

9. Chicken,
   I think this reveals the difference between Catholics and Protestants. Protestants believe that everyone deserves to go to Hell and that man is basically evil. Contrary to what most Protestant or Catholic laymen and Catholic Apologists like to project, the difference Protestants and Catholics is great. But I will avoid a Theological discussion lest someone gets all upset and bans me from posting. Furthermore I am NOT a Dispensationalist.
   I don’t see any reference in the Bible that says the Jews need to return to Israel before Jesus returns. Most Jews from the 1st century were either slaughtered or converted to Christianity by the 4th century. Another portion of Jews such as the Khazars of Russia are Ersatz-Jews that adopted a monotheistic religion of Judiasm in the 8th century. Similarly many German Jews are also converts to Judaism. Finally Judaism became a ‘dead religion’ after the destruction of the Temple in 70AD.

10. “Protestants believe…that man is basically evil.”
    To believe that is to believe either: (1) That man is NOT made in the image and likeness of God; or (2) That man IS made in the image and likeness of God, and that God is evil.

11. “But I will avoid a Theological discussion lest someone gets all upset and bans me from posting.”
    If you have spent any time at all reading this blog, you know that NO ONE has ever been banned for stating his theological beliefs or defending them. People have only been banned for breaking Da Rulz. You will find a permapost listing them in the left-hand column.

12. frankie, insofar as anything exists, it is good. So for example, insofar as Satan exists, Satan is good. This is traditional Catholic doctrine.
    It is also contrary to sound philosophy and theology to believe otherwise. It’s also contrary to scripture to believe otherwise. All creatures are sustained in existence by God per scripture. Then insofar as they exist (have being), they are sustained in existence (in that being) by God. If some things insofar as they exist (have being) are (partly) evil, then that would mean God sustains in existence (in that being) somethings that are evil, i.e. that he sometimes sustains evil. But pure and perfect good cannot sustain (hold in being) evil.
    Even many Catholics are ignorant of this traditional Catholic doctrine and I suspect some here will object to what I wrote above as regards Satan, but any Catholic who has had even a modicum of proper catechesis would recognize it as traditional Catholic doctrine. Unfortunately, these days, the catechetical landscape is desolate (as evidenced by for example recent confusion here as regards the Nestorian heresy and the hypostastic union)

13. The Masked Chicken, just so you know, there has been a post by “Eric G.” which I presume stands for “Eric Giunta” (as “Eric Giunta” has posted as such here before) in this thread. You may not have been aware of that and I wanted to let you know as I have found “Eric Giunta”/”Eric G.”‘s posts to often be full of wisdom. Since it was a post from some time ago, you may have missed it; “Eric G.” seems to have inclinations similar to yours on this issue. “Eric G.” if you are reading this, while I am not sure I agree with your post above, I found it quite thought-provoking. Thank you Eric Giunta and also thank you Masked Chicken for your own thought-provoking post.

14. Technically only Adam and Eve were created in the Image of God. Everyone else was created from the loins of Adam hence the doctrine of Original Sin. Once a being sins it is inherently evil. Thus Satan, the rebellious Angels and sinful man are inherently evil. Because of this condition Protestants reject any doctrine that states ‘grace perfects nature’.

15. What I always find amusing is that Catholic like to often quote Church fathers as their authority for a particular doctrine. However, many church fathers blatantly contradicted other fathers, themselves, and often said completely heretical things – Origen, Tertullian and Augustine being prime examples. Hence Protestants prefer to stick to the Bible and the decisions of the first 6 Councils. Notice Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox can not agree on which was the 8th council.

16. Dear Frankie,
    Thanks for hanging in there.
    What Scripture really says is:
    {Masoretic Text, with pointing]
    וַיֹּאמֶר אֱלֹהִים נַֽעֲשֶׂה אָדָם בְּצַלְמֵנוּ כִּדְמוּתֵנוּ וְיִרְדּוּ בִדְגַת הַיָּם וּבְעֹוף הַשָּׁמַיִם וּבַבְּהֵמָה וּבְכָל־הָאָרֶץ וּבְכָל־הָרֶמֶשׂ הָֽרֹמֵשׂ עַל־הָאָֽרֶץ׃
    Gen 1:26 And God said, Let us make man in our image, after our likeness: and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over the fowl of the air, and over the cattle, and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creepeth upon the earth. [I used the KJV]
    There are two operative words, here. The first is ‘adam, אָדָם
    which is used as a marker for man, in general, not simply Adam, because the same word can be found later in the Old Testament to represent a group of men. For instance in Isa 29:19:
    The meek also shall increase [their] joy in the LORD, and the poor among men shall rejoice in the Holy One of Israel.
    the phrase, “poor among men,” (literally, “the needy of men”) is rendered ‘anav ‘adam. Since Isaiah is fairly late in the OT, the term is obviously not referring to the original Adam. It is true that the word ‘adam does not have a plural form, in and of itself, but context indicates that it is a marker word. Thus, it is unclear from the text of Gen 1:26 whether or not God intended to make only those possessing Adam’s pre-fall characteristics as in his image. Once an image breaks, it no longer reflects the original, however, and one would not assume that the inspired text of later generations of OT writers would have included this term if it no longer served at least part of the original purpose. Since it cannot refer to Adam’s original state of sinlessness, it must refer to something that existed in the original Adam that is still intact that marks Adam as unique from other animals. Thus, it could not be his animal nature, which is shared with all of the other animals. The only thing that sets Adam apart beyond his preternatural gifts, his original sinlessness is his rational nature. Since God is a rational creature and this is the usual understanding of making man in his image, that sense is retained for men after the Fall.
    Secondly, the word image, tselem, has the original sense of the word, “shadow”. Now, since God is light and in him there is no darkness, then the original Adam was created as a shadow of God. What does a shadow do? It follows the original object and does what it does. That is the sense of “image” used in Genesis. What does God do? He exists sinlessly, yes, and the original Adam was meant to image this, but he failed. Just as a shadow does not entirely fade when a cloud passes over the sun, however, so when Adam fell and was no longer able to image the sinlessness of God, the image, while faded, did not disappear. Adam retained his rational nature, otherwise, he would not have known that he sinned. If his future generations also could recognize this, then the rational nature must have been retained in his subsequent offspring, but no longer able to control the appetites as it once did. Thus, the image was weakened, but not lost.
    Next, you wrote:
    Once a being sins it is inherently evil.
    This is a contradiction, because to be inherently something means to be of it from its nature. Adam, once he sinned, did not become inherently evil. He was good, from the beginning and thus, not possibly inherently evil. To inherit sin means what? What is the nature of original sin? When one sins, does one cease having a rational nature? Does one cease seeking what is good? Does one cease loving? Jesus said, no. In the Sermon on the Mount he said:
    Mat 7:11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him? [KJV]
    The word evil is a translation of the Greek, poneros, which has the sense of physically hard labor or physically diseased and by extension, ethically diseased or evil. The sense in which Jesus was using the term was not as people who are inherently evil, but as people who are inherently diseased, having difficulty in doing what is right. This coincides with the loss of original innocence in Adam and supports the Catholic contention that man is disordered, but not inherently evil.
    Your thinking is close to the notion of dualism that states that there is a separate light and dark, good and evil principle. God created man and God cannot create anything inherently evil, since God does not, himself either know or participate in evil. God only knows evil by its lack of good. Thus, when you say that man is inherently evil, in a sense, you insult the nature of God. I know this is not your intention, but this is the implication of such a statement.
    The Chicken

17. Another thing:
    You wrote:
    However, many church fathers blatantly contradicted other fathers, themselves, and often said completely heretical things – Origen, Tertullian and Augustine being prime examples.
    The Church does not use either Origen or Tertullian (post-Montantist) as guides, but rather as historical witnesses. They do report on trends of the time and this aspect of their writings is invaluable. Thus, neither Origen or Tertullian are recognized as being Fathers of the Church.
    The Chicken

18. Chicken,
    I appreciate your long discourse and understand your perspective, since I used to hold a similar position. To avoid a long diatribe let me just say that Protestants believe that philosophy and formal logic are inadequate tools in explaining theological principles. Protestants are not Dualists and to even propose such an idea shows the weakness of using philosophy to understand theology. God is Good and can not sin. Protestants state that anyone who has sinned is not good and thus has a nature that gravitates toward evil. Whoever has sinned deserves Hell. Thus a sinful beings nature has been corrupted and cannot be corrected via ‘grace perfecting nature’.
    This outlines the fundamental difference between Protestants and Catholics. The nature of man is, has been and always will be the dividing line between Protestants and Catholics.

19. Ruse –
    You are correct that existence is good, and therefore anything that exists is good to that extent. Therefore, whatever existence Satan has is from God and is a positive good.
    But this reasoning may be faulty;
    “If some things insofar as they exist (have being) are (partly) evil, then that would mean God sustains in existence (in that being) somethings that are evil, i.e. that he sometimes sustains evil. But pure and perfect good cannot sustain (hold in being) evil.”
    It is faulty only in as much as “things” are not “evil”… they DO evil. Evil is only the absence of some good, and so evil – as such – does not exist. It is anti-existence… annihilation. Evil could be described pretty precisely as the absence of the influence and sustenance of God.
    God, having made us with free will, makes it possible for us to choose evil (to withdraw from him in some way), but his influence is only ever good.
    There are some other points in your recent posts that I would like to address – your assertion that boycotts are immoral (they aren’t) and your assertion that any communication (I would guess you would say any involvement at all) with an individual must always be primarily ordered for their good (this *may* be true in certain private communications, but in a public forum it ain’t necessarily so).
    These need discussion because you present them as if they are obvious truisms, which they aren’t. But that is for another post.

20. “…let me just say that Protestants believe that philosophy and formal logic are inadequate tools in explaining theological principles.”
    Interestingly enough, I was reading Chesterton’s biography of St. Thomas Aquinas last night. Aquinas would, I think it is safe to say, disagree with your view.

21. Chicken,
    I would like to make one other comment. Augustine talked about a Visible( saved and unsaved) and Invisible(saved) church. Protestants believe that the invisible church has broken free from the prevailing dominant Visible church to create a new visible church at various time throughout history.
    Notice that You quoted, Mat 7:11 If ye then, being evil, know how to give good gifts unto your children, how much more shall your Father which is in heaven give good things to them that ask him? [KJV]
    The key words are ..ye then, being evil…, even Jesus recognizes that their nature is evil. Even Satan whose nature is evil understands what is good.

22. Tim,
    I would agree that Aquinas would disagree with me. Furthermore I would state Aquinas would have modified his doctrine had he been able to read Greek and Hebrew and exposed to the philosophy of Plato.

23. Dear Freddie,
    You wrote:
    Protestants state that anyone who has sinned is not good and thus has a nature that gravitates toward evil.
    To state something does not make it true. This is the fallacy of ipse dixit.
    What is the proof offered. St. Peter would ask for a reason.
    You also wrote:
    This outlines the fundamental difference between Protestants and Catholics. The nature of man is, has been and always will be the dividing line between Protestants and Catholics.
    Perhaps, but it is likelier that the fundamental difference is in an understanding of God and his relationship to man. I submit that most heresies can be traced back to a faulty understanding of the Incarnation and perichoresis. I am not attempting to prove this, just offering it as my observation.
    The Chicken

24. Chicken,
    You said,
    Perhaps, but it is likelier that the fundamental difference is in an understanding of God and his relationship to man. I submit that most heresies can be traced back to a faulty understanding of the Incarnation and perichores.
    I think this was true for the first 7 or 8 Church councils. However, the battlefield has moved on to new ground. This battlefield is defined by what is the ‘nature of man’.
    Frankie

25. That’s the difference between *some* Protestants and Catholics. Other Protestants, reading the same Bible, have contradictory beliefs.

26. Dear Frankie,
    Sorry, for calling you Freddie. I put my brain in the shop for a tune-up, so I’m using a loner.
    Actually, St. Thomas probably did know classical Greek as, according to Drane, he was able to correct a translation that he had asked William of Moerbeke, O. P., to do of Aritsotle’s works from the Greek into Latin.
    The Chicken

27. Tim, what you said about God’s not sustaining evil was, more or less, exactly what I was saying; you were, more or less, agreeing with me. My point to frankie was that if what you and I are saying is indeed true, then it cannot be said, for example that humans — as Frankie seems to contend at least as devil’s advocate — are “basically evil” nor can it be said of any other being, including as I mentioned, Satan, for all beings are “basically good.” But I’m not clear on what frankie means by “basically” as it relates to being “good.” I took “basically” to mean, more or less, “ontologically” (as in “of being” or “of the nature of being”) or in the alternative to mean, more or less, “fundamentally” (as in, “of that which is fundamental”) … but negative properties (absences) cannot be more fundamental to a being than positive properties (that which properly speaking actually inheres in the being as being), so either way, no one, no human, no devil, is “basically evil.”
    As regards boycotts, I don’t think you understood me. I think boycotts can be fine depending on the circumstance. I don’t think the circumstance surrounding amazon’s “happy holidays” policy as it extends to its gift cards is a circumstance that would rightly call for a boycott. Boycotts much like, frankly, wars, should only be used as a last resort (that’s the only comparison I make here; I don’t mean to import anything else into it).
    As regards speech, I am glad you seem to agree with me there as regards private correspondence. It seems you are then approaching it from a consequentialist angle (that the moral dimension consists at least in terms of addressing this particular question, entirely of what good or bad effects speech may have). But I would hold that the truth as regards private correspondence is due not to the fact that there could not possibly be (or is unlikely to be) good effects on persons other than one’s interlocuter, but rather on the nature of the correspondence itself, namely its being addressed to that person. When in speech, you address a person, then that indicates an expression of good will to that person at least if that speech is to be truthful in the Anselmian sense; therefore, speech insofar as it addressed to a person and does not order itself to that person’s good, so willed such that it is never sacrificed for some other good, is untruthful in the Ansemlian sense and goes against the nature of what speech is or is meant to be (which is how Anselm defines untruthful speech, an extension of his broader conception of truth as being or doing that which is teologically indicated).
    I don’t think I presented it as a “truism”, though I’m not sure how you are using that term. I have noted in connection with this, perhaps you missed it, that as regards the wrongness of lying that some Catholic theologians (especially Franciscans) regard it as intrinsically evil and a violation of the nature of speech whereas as other Catholic theologians (especially Jesuits) have regarded it as wrong only in terms of its social context and thus do not affirm it is always and everywhere in every circumstance evil to speak something that doesn’t correspond to the way the world is. I believe I noted that SDG had expressed uncertainty in this regard (in particular SDG expressed uncertainty as to whether pro-life individuals who lie in order to achieve some purportedly pro-life end are engaging in moral or ethical behavior). In the history of the new Catechism, the older English edition used language as regards lying that led some to feel it was not coming down on the side of school associated especially with some Franciscans, that lying is intrinsically evil and so forth. However, when that edition was revised, the Catechism as it exists today, seemed to take the view that lying is indeed intrinsically evil.
    Anyway, I would urge people when inform their moral conscience to not get suckered into a consequentualist mentality so prevalent in contemporary culture. According to Catholic doctrine, we cannot injure God (i.e. the divine or the divinity) and we cannot give the divinity any benefit; God is not lessened by anything we are or do nor is he added to by anything we are or do. What we can do in the traditional formulation is “honor” God or “insult” God (not as in hurt his feelings — that we cannot effect in God greater or lesser joy or sadness per his impassibility — but as in objectively dishonor the way someone would have been insulted by something objectively even if she were not in the room and never would have heard of the insult). If our honoring of God is to not solely consist of social relations and also in properly speaking the virtue of religion, then it would seem that the moral dimension cannot be grounded as regards honoring God solely in any harm or benefit.

28. Masked Chicken,
    God stopped creating after the sixth day. He rested on the 7th day. So you and I were created from the loins of Adam who now had dominion over the earth. Therefore we are all sinners worthy of death, eternal punishment, and dead in our trespasses.
    Catholics tend to spend much time speaking about ethical issues which is good, however these things will not change a heart bent on evil. Protestants on the other hand spend their efforts on preaching that man is incapable of following moral law because of the wickedness of his heart. Only by the change of the heart through justification by faith can the culture wars be one, which the Bible calls being born again.
    Bill912,
    Never forget that the early Popes rejected the Assumption and later Popes accepted the Assumption. This issue among several others is what caused me to question the integrity and continuity of the Catholic Church.

29. frankie, Catholic doctrine holds that the natural man is incapable of supernatural virtue, i.e. of doing things out of love for goods not proper to how the natural man is constituted. So the good of God cannot be loved by the natural man. What goods can be aspired to by the natural man are goods such as patience or the pleasure of food or the sustenance of food and so forth.
    I don’t think that is something that Protestants would disagree with. For some reason however some Protestants insist on saying that none of these natural goods and pursuit thereof amount to something that can be properly termed moral good. But unless Protestants decide to explicate what signficance metaphysically they are reading into their usage of “moral”, the dispute comes to be on this particular point, purely terminological and marked by that kind of stubborness and useless argumentation which scripture enjoins (forbids … “enjoins” is my least favorite word in the English language as it can assume the meaning of command as well as forbid).

30. Early popes did NOT reject the Assumption. But, if he had had any evidence to back his assertion, I’ll bet he would have provided it.

31. frankie
    Most Jews from the 1st century were either slaughtered or converted to Christianity by the 4th century. Another portion of Jews such as the Khazars of Russia are Ersatz-Jews that adopted a monotheistic religion of Judiasm in the 8th century. Similarly many German Jews are also converts to Judaism.
    I don’t know what your historical sources are for those three statements. Y Chromosome studies have confirmed that Ashkenazi (Eastern European) Jews are predominantly of Middle Eastern ancestry with some European input.
    New York Times summary May 9, 2000
    The results accord with Jewish history and tradition and refute theories like those holding that Jewish communities consist mostly of converts from other faiths, or that they are descended from the Khazars, a medieval Turkish tribe that adopted Judaism.
    Hammer et alProceedings of the National Academy of Science USA. 2000 Jun 6;97(12):6769-74.
    Despite their long-term residence in different countries and isolation from one another, most Jewish populations were not significantly different from one another at the genetic level.
    …
    Admixture estimates suggested low levels of European Y-chromosome gene flow into Ashkenazi and Roman Jewish communities.
    …
    The results support the hypothesis that the paternal gene pools of Jewish communities from Europe, North Africa, and the Middle East descended from a common Middle Eastern ancestral population, and suggest that most Jewish communities have remained relatively isolated from neighboring non-Jewish communities during and after the Diaspora.
    Nebel et al. European Journal of Human Genetics. 2005 Mar;13(3):388-91.
    Recent genetic studies, based on Y chromosome polymorphic markers, showed that Ashkenazi Jews are more closely related to other Jewish and Middle Eastern groups than to their host populations in Europe.

32. Dear Frankie,
    You wrote:
    God stopped creating after the sixth day. He rested on the 7th day. So you and I were created from the loins of Adam who now had dominion over the earth. Therefore we are all sinners worthy of death, eternal punishment, and dead in our trespasses.
    This entirely non sequitor. You confuse God’s primary act with his secondary actions. This is very much a Kantian view: that God created the world and stepped back. That we are descended from Adam means that we are descended from Adam by God’s permission and active cooperation. Does Adam infuse a soul into his offspring? Does Adam get to determine what kind of soul that is? The moral principle of man is his soul which is related to his rationality.
    If you are arguing that we are all sinners, fine, I will agree; if you are arguing that we are sinners because of Adam’s sin, I will agree; if you are arguing that Original Sin is a kind of death, I will agree; if you are arguing that man is not restored to Original Innocence and Life in Baptism, then I will disagree and so does St. Peter, who argues (1Pet 3:21) that:
    Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a clear conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ,
    and St. Paul, who argues (Col 2:12) that:
    and you were buried with him in baptism, in which you were also raised with him through faith in the working of God, who raised him from the dead.
    Now, how can one have a clear conscience if one is still in sin? How can one be raised to life by baptism if one is still dead?
    No, death entered the world through one man, but life entered the world and is available to all through one man, Jesus. This life is true life, not a put-on mask of imputed life.
    The Chicken

33. Bill912,
    “….the Roman Church has embraced and is responsible for promoting teachings which originated, not with the faithful, but with heretical writings which were officially condemned by the early Church. History proves that when the Transitus teaching originated the Church regarded it as heresy….In the list of apocryphal writings which are to be rejected Gelasius signifies the following work: Liber qui apellatur Transitus, id est Assumptio Sanctae Mariae, Apocryphus….This specifically means the Transitus writing of the assumption of Mary….Pope Gelasius explicitly condemns the authors as well as their writings and the teachings which they promote and all who follow them. And significantly, this entire decree and its condemnation was reaffirmed by Pope Hormisdas in the sixth century around A.D. 520….These facts prove that the early Church viewed the assumption teaching, not as a legitimate expression of the pious belief of the faithful but as a heresy worthy of condemnation.” – (Carol Mariology, volume 2, page 152)
    Other reasons for not believing in Assumption. Irenaeus, Jerome, Augustine, Ambrose and the others church fathers never once mentioned the Assumption. ‘Writing in 377 AD, the church father Epiphanius states that nobody knows Mary’s end. Furthermore the Eastern Orthodox reject the Assumption of Mary'( see Wikipedia). Thus the oldest Traditions reject the Assumption of Mary.

34. Dear Frankie,
    Do you read Latin? The quote says the following:
    Liber qui apellatur Transitus, id est Assumptio Sanctae Mariae, Apocryphus….
    Translation:
    The book that is called, Transitus, that is, The Assumption of Saint Mary, is [obscure, hidden, dubious].
    This means that the book itself is of doubtful origins, not the doctrine it contains.
    The Chicken

35. Furthermore, according to wikipedia (probably quoting the Catholic Encyclopedia):
    Decretum Gelasianum
    The most famous of pseudo-Gelasian works is the list de libris recipiendis et non recipiendis (“books to be received and not to be received”), the so-called Decretum Gelasianum, supposed to be connected to the pressures for orthodoxy during the pontificate of Gelasius and intended to be read as a decretal by Gelasius on the canonical and apocryphal books, which internal evidence reveals to be of later date. [i.e., a forgery or mis attribution, my point] Thus the fixing of the canon of scripture has traditionally been attributed to Gelasius[6] and a non-historical Roman synod of 494 has been invented as the supposed occasion. [also fictitious]
    The Chicken

36. Chicken,
    First we must understand the limitations of the Latin understanding of man. The RCC teaches that man is composed of body and soul, while the Bible teaches that man is composed of body, soul, and spirit.
    When man sins his spirit dies. Only by being born again can his spirit be regenerated. Thus both the body and soul return to dust upon physical death. In Heaven we receive a new Body and Soul but keep our regenerated spirit. Therefore anyone who does not have a regenerated spirit will go to Hell because his/her name is not written in the Lambs book of life.
    Regarding Adam and even animals. Each responsible for reproducing after its kind( thus refuting evolution). Adam is responsible for reproducing soul and body ( demonstrated by genetics and emotional traits going from generation to generation)
    Colossians and 1 Peter were written to Christians. Paul was giving them an apologetic to defend their faith. Thus the initial condition is that the Colossians were already Christians. Baptism did not make them Christians. Baptism, removes the OLD-MAN from the regenerated spirit. This is an example of not understanding the audience of the Epistles. Only Gospels are written to unbelievers.
    Unfortunately Catholic Hermeneutics steeped in mysticism of Alexandria has not properly understood baptism and many other doctrines. The average seminary student has a better command of the Bible then any of the Church fathers except for maybe Jerome or Origen.
    Frankie

37. Leo,
    I am aware of this genetic research. However, many scholars refuted this research. The Historical evidence about Khazar( a Turkish tribe) Jews is well documented.
    Frankie

38. Chicken,
    Again I go to my original question how does one determine which teaching authority is correct. The Eastern, Roman, Coptic, and Protestant churches all claim to be correct. Eastern, Roman, Coptic all have a history that can be traced back to at least the 3rd century. So how does one determine which teaching authority is correct? After a 10 year journey from Roman to Eastern to Coptic I finally ended up with the Protestants.

39. Dear Frankie,
    You wrote:
    The average seminary student has a better command of the Bible then any of the Church fathers except for maybe Jerome or Origen.
    Does that include Ignatius of Antioch, who probably knew both St. John and St. Peter? I think he must have known the Bible exceedingly well from the mouth of one of the authors.
    The word, “command,” is not really clear in this context. The Church Fathers certainly were closer to the events and therefore had access to either primary data or more contemporary interpretation than we do. Older sources outweigh newer sources in historical studies. Certainly, the older Church fathers were in direct line of knowledge.
    You also ignored or missed my point about Pope Gelasius, above.
    As to body and soul, this distinction goes back before the bible and its use was already known in biblical times. There are not two different sets of interpretations of the terms, one for the Church and one for philosophers. There is no historical evidence to support such a split. The use of the term in philosophy of the word soul is as the generative principle and relates to moral attributes, as well.
    The Chicken

40. I am trying to get my course notes together for class next week, so I won’t be able to respond fully until later today, but regarding the four so-called magesteria, you never answered my question about flay earth claims, above. The answer to your question is contained, there.
    The Chicken

41. Chicken,
    I can read some Latin and am aware of it Gnostic nature. The point being that this heresy was a perfect time for the church to formulate a doctrine of the Assumption – but she did not!
    The Arian controversy helped solidify the doctrine of the Trinity. So using apostolic tradition and the tradition of Eastern Orthodox there is no case for the Assumption of Mary.
    This innovation is what caused me to reject the teachings of the Assumption and as a result the doctrine of ex cathedra(Papal Infallibility). This then brought me into the hands of the Eastern Orthodox.

42. The Chicken,
    I did not respond to the Flat Earth Theory because I don’t understand the question. The FET can be refuted by reading the Bible, ancient science, and modern science.
    As a Protestant, I refer to Schaff you stated that ALL Ignatian Epistles are forgeries. Ignatius like so much hagiography has been embellished by subsequent generations.
    The Church in Antioch used the Historical-Grammatical approach to interpretation of scripture. The Alexandrian used the 4 Allegorical methods. As a Protestant I refer to the following quote by St. Basil.
    “What then? After all these efforts were they tired? Did they leave off? Not at all.
    They are charging me with innovation, and base their charge on my confession of three hypostases, and blame me for asserting one Goodness, one Power, one Godhead. In this they are not wide of the truth, for I do so assert. Their complaint is that their custom does not accept this, and that Scripture does not agree. What is my reply? I do not consider it fair that the custom which obtains among them should be regarded as a law and rule of orthodoxy. If custom is to be taken in proof of what is right, then it is certainly competent for me to put forward on my side the custom which obtains here. If they reject this, we are clearly not bound to follow them. Therefore let God-inspired Scripture decide between us; and on whichever side be found doctrines in harmony with the word of God, in favour of that side will be cast the vote of truth.” (Basil, Letter 189, 3)
    According to Earl Cairnes( Christianity Through the Centuries) the church began to go astray as soon as it mixed philsophy with theology.

43. Frankie
    This ought to be an “ordinary” question. But anti-semites have used the alleged primary Khazar lineage to separate modern-day Jews from those at the time of Jesus for their own malicious purposes. I’m not saying you have that intention.
    I don’t think anyone denies that at least some Khazars were or became Jews. I understand that there is scholarly debate as to the numbers and scale of any conversion.
    The Y Chromosome research I cited shows that Ashkenazi Jews are not primarily descended from Khazars. In questions like this, genetic evidence seems stronger than documentary evidence. You say that “many scholars refuted this research” – please enlighten me.

44. “while the Bible teaches that man is composed of body, soul, and spirit.”
    Not it doesn’t, not in the sense you mean. The bible speaks of man’s body, soul and spirit, but that doesn’t mean that the extension of man’s spirit is not (in part) coextensive with man’s soul or for that matter, man’s body. I can speak of man’s body, soul, and feet. That doesn’t mean that I am saying that a man’s feet is separate from a man’s body.
    It is from a faithfulness to his created nature, that man comes to know God in revelation; a faithfulness to his reason, a faithfulness to what his heart desires, a faithfulness to opening his mind to unexpected truth. Even after becoming a Christian, man furthers his knowledge of God through that same faithfulness to his created nature, in for example applying diligently good historical or literary criticism of the bible, in taking care that he does not come to his conclusions from a state of bias, and so forth — when man is faithful to himself in that faithfulness his by that very fact of faithfulness, being faithful to God and as it relates to revelation, God’s revelation. Thus to discard philosophy in favor of scripture is to place faithfulness of man to his created nature in opposition to faithfulness to God, an opposition that is false.

45. Ruse,
    What you wrote was a convoluted mess. As a Catholic you are forced to use 2000 years of wrong theology and misapplied philosophy to something defined as ‘Tradition’. As a Protestant I can leave that mess of ‘Tradition’ behind and rederive the theology of body,soul, and spirit from the Bible.
    Leo,
    I am not an anti-semite. I also know that Jews are under extreme pressure to show their Mid-East origin to continue obtaining financial support from the West. The Muslims have armies of scholars promoting the Khazar theory. Consequently, I believe the truth is somewhere in the middle.

46. What you wrote was a convoluted mess. As a Catholic you are forced to use 2000 years of wrong theology and misapplied philosophy to something defined as ‘Tradition’. As a Protestant I can leave that mess of ‘Tradition’ behind and rederive the theology of body,soul, and spirit from the Bible.

    You are mistaken on several counts.
    First, Ruse is not forced to do any such thing. AFAICT, he has always stood and continues to stand well outside the mainstream of any sort of orthodoxy, and as knowledgeable as he is he appropriates only what he chooses to. That approach has its problems, but not the one you here attribute to him.
    Second, while Ruse is certainly as capable of convoluted messes as anyone I’ve ever met, he is also capable of accurate analysis and clear thinking. That may make his more muddled moods all the more worrisome, but in this case it is he who is in the right and you who are mistaken.
    As a Protestant, far from leaving behind the “mess of Tradition” and deriving everything from scripture, you are beholden to Tradition even for the canon of scripture.
    Your “authority” for the claim that the Ignatian epistles are “all forgeries” is a 19th-century intellectual heir of Schleiermacher? Don’t you know that the excessive skepticism of 19th-century German scholarship has largely been eclipsed by recent scholarship? Do you know any scholars today, particularly Evangelicals, who take seriously the claim you attribute to Schaff? Anyway, did Schaff even say that? Obviously the “longer” versions of the Ignatian letters are indicative of the embellishing trend you mention, but I’m not aware of any school of thought in modern patristic study that doesn’t credit the shorter editions as basically authentic.

47. Leo,
    The problem with the CMH( Cohen Modal Haplotype) is that it proves that Jews are closely related to Kurds and Turks. Well so are the Khazars. CMH has no genetic data from Aaron, King David, or anyone before 1900. The only data available is from the people currently alive. CMH matches well with certain African, Yeminitie, and Kurdish tribes. So many scientist think its conclusions are not definitive.
    But let me bring it back to the Bible. Dispensationalists are the ones who first promoted all this Jews must be regathered in Israel nonsense. Now this faulty doctrine affects the thinking of many Protestants and Catholics.
    BTW I have no animosity of prejudice towards Jews and try to teach them about Jesus, because only through Christ can they be saved.
    Interestingly enough Cardinal Newman stated that Jews were very non-sacramental in their religious tradition, while the pagans where all sacramental. After grasping this I left both the Catholic and Orthodox churches, since God always creates a ‘type’ in the Old Testament before fulfilling it in the New Testament. If there were no Old Testament sacraments, then there is no case for New Testament sacraments. Thus sacraments are evidence of the tradition of men and not the hand of God.

48. SDG,
    I don’t want to get into a debate about the Ignatian Epistles but lets just say that
    http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/ignatius.html is an interesting link.
    The fact that 8 of the Epistles are considered forgeries by Catholics and Protestants puts the other 7 on questionable footing. Especially since there are some glaring inconsistencies( see link).
    As stated before I believe the Canon of the Bible was defined by 95 AD. It took the state church 300 more years to figure out what was known by 95AD.

49. SDG,
    I don’t want to get into a debate about the Ignatian Epistles but lets just say that
    http://www.geocities.com/b_d_muller/ignatius.html is an interesting link.
    The fact that 8 of the Epistles are considered forgeries by Catholics and Protestants puts the other 7 on questionable footing. Especially since there are some glaring inconsistencies( see link).
    As stated before I believe the Canon of the Bible was defined by 95 AD. It took the state church 300 more years to figure out what was known by 95AD.

50. frankie, you mistakenly assume there were no Old Testament sacraments. I won’t speak to what Newman may or may not have believed, but here is Thomas
    http://www.newadvent.org/summa/4060.htm
    (article 2)
    “Reply to Objection 2. Some things pertaining to the Old Testament signified the holiness of Christ considered as holy in Himself. Others signified His holiness considered as the cause of our holiness; thus the sacrifice of the Paschal Lamb signified Christ’s Sacrifice whereby we are made holy: and such like are properly styled sacraments of the Old Law.”
    (article 6)
    “Reply to Objection 3. As Augustine says (Contra Faust. xix), the sacraments of things present should be different from sacraments of things to come. Now the sacraments of the Old Law foretold the coming of Christ. Consequently they did not signify Christ so clearly as the sacraments of the New Law, which flow from Christ Himself, and have a certain likeness to Him, as stated above. Nevertheless in the Old Law, certain words were used in things pertaining to the worship of God, both by the priests, who were the ministers of those sacraments, according to Numbers 6:23-24: “Thus shall you bless the children of Israel, and you shall say to them: The Lord bless thee,” etc.; and by those who made use of those sacraments, according to Deuteronomy 26:3: “I profess this day before the Lord thy God,” etc.”
    This doctrine of Thomas (and others) is probably not widely known and I suspect (to be frank) that very few if any here would be acquainted with it. Your apparent nescience of it should IMO lead you to consider the possibility that other aspects of what you presume as regards Catholic tradition or patrimony may not be as you presume them to be … we can approach the word of God (meaning God’s revelation to us, whatever form it may take) with an attitude of grand knowledge and theories of history or we can approach it with the view that it can never be encapsulated in any human knowledge nor framed within any human theory. FWIW, I sense in your writing a desire to make God’s word fit into neat human concepts (just as one might have such a desire wrt to a mystery of faith). Desiring so might be admirable in certain ways, perhaps, but it is also something that might make the truth to which God calls us and the word which God makes known to us obscured.

51. As stated before I believe the Canon of the Bible was defined by 95 AD. It took the state church 300 more years to figure out what was known by 95AD.

    What evidence supports your belief that a NT canon was “known by 95AD”?

52. SDG,
    I have only read A Shorter Summa by Kreeft, which makes me far from an expert on Aquinas. Nevertheless, I think Aquinas strained to transpose his Aristotelian and Sacramental framework on the Old Testament.
    After my 10 year quest for truth it became clear how certain religious groups went off the rails. The foundational teaching of the Bible is that God operates through covenants, ie Adamic, Abraham, Moses, Davidic, and finally New Testament. Thus the Protestants went amok when they chose a Dispensationalist framework and the Catholics went amok when they chose a Sacramental framework. The only framework that is consistent is a Covenantal framework, that can only be interpreted using the Historical-Grammatical approach – not a literalist, not a Historical-Critical, not a 4 senses of Allegory or any other Hermeneutic.
    Intially Sacraments were defined as Mysteries. A mystery is something that cannot be formally defined( as my Eastern Orthodox Priest would say.)
    Furthermore the Scholastic St. Hugo of Victor enumerated 30 sacraments. This shows that sacraments have always been a nebulous concept waiting for Aquinas to give some formal definition to the word/concept. So if Aquinas had been a better theologian he would have understood that God moved through covenants not dispensations or sacraments.
    Now a simple question: Do you believe in that a man named Noah in the Bible is literally true or just allegory?

53. SDG,
    I will answer your question on my evidence for a canon by 95 AD if you answer me the following question.
    How do I know which of the 4 teaching bodies, Catholic, Orthodox, Coptic, Protestant is correct?

54. Dear Frankie,
    Just to break in, in order to start the ball rolling to answer your question (which is not really phrased correctly), first a thought question: if the American Association for the Advancement of Science says that the world is 3-d and the flat earth society says it is 2-d, how doe you know which organization is correct?
    The Chicken

55. Dear Frankie,
    Please forgive me if this seems rude, but your statement sounds an awful lot like a childish cop-out. You replied to SDG:
    “I will answer your question on my evidence for a canon by 95 AD if you answer me the following question.
    How do I know which of the 4 teaching bodies, Catholic, Orthodox, Coptic, Protestant is correct?”
    To be frank, you need to take some responsibility and back up your statement, as you made such a claim quite apart from any sort of discussion on “teaching bodies. Thus, the proof of such a claim shouldn’t be contingent on anyone answering your question. You set the canon at 95 AD, and SDG called your bluff. Now it’s time for you to show your cards. Either you’ve got a winning hand or you’ve got nothing.
    FWIW, I think your question is somewhat misworded. From my perspective, the question shouldn’t be which one of the 4 groups is correct, but which one has the Authority to teach as the Body and therefore the herald of Christ. I make such a distinction because someone or something can be correct without having authority. For example, I might be correct in stating that traffic laws exist in Australia, but I certainly am not an authority on Australian law or traffic courts.
    After rewording your question, it seems to me that the answer is rather simple in practice. How do we know which one of those groups has authentic teaching authority? Well, we look at them, of course! So let’s take a look at the contenders that you’ve put forward and see what we can see…
    The first thing that comes to my mind is that you’re creating a sort of error in categorizing the four contenders themselves. To my knowledge, the Orthodox and Protestant churches are by no means unified in the sense that the Catholic Church is unified. What is the Protestant “teaching body”? On one hand I can count five different denominations with five different bodies of doctrine: “Presbyterian, Baptist, Lutheran, Methodist, Evangelical “Free”…” While they largely agree on the “Mere Christianity” tenets and others as well, they wildly disagree within themselves on many others, even to some extend on the Authority and function of Scripture itself. To be blunt, I see no Protestant teaching body.
    Within the Orthodox church, things look a lot better, but you still have a few quirky problems. For one thing, there are different branches of the Orthodox Church (Russian, Greek etc.) which at times have excommunicated each other (IIRC) or basically snubbed each other for political reasons. Sure, the teachings might look identical, but once again, IIRC, the Russian and Greek orthodox churches aren’t really buddy-buddy in the sense that the Catholic and Melkite churches are in communion. Plus, a hallmark of the Authoritative Church has been the ability to convene an Ecumenical Council. I think the last one the Orthodox participated in was in the 9th century. I don’t think they could hold one today even if they wanted to. I believe the last one for the Catholic Church was 40 years ago. This should serve as a pointer to one of the necessary criteria for Authoritative teaching: communion with the See of Peter.
    As for the Copts… Well, once again relying on my possibly-faulty memory… Aren’t they pretty much limited to Egypt (outside of a few external diocese here and there), and don’t they accept a difference scriptural canon than about 90% of Christianity? I’m just asking because I have limited knowledge of the Coptic Church, and so I’m not even sure if they claim to have a teaching authority… Their website, or lack thereof…doesn’t really provide much information… Perhaps having been a Coptic Christian yourself, you could fill me in?
    That said, I’m out of time for writing, but I’m sure someone can pick up where I left off and fill in the rest of the story… (if not, then I’ll get to it later)…
    Pax.

56. I don’t really want to break in here (Chicken is far more capable than I), but it seems to me , frankie, that you are making an elementary mistake in thinking that since there may be multiple claims to an authoritative teaching authority, they must all be equally false.
    The first question to settle is to look at whether such a teaching authority is likely to exist at all. This must come before anything else. In my studies, I became convinced (and was given the grace to believe) that such a teaching authority was not only likely but an absolute necessity.
    After that, it becomes a matter of making careful comparisons and looking at the evidence to determine which claimant has the strongest historical and biblical case.
    You can’t simply look at the question and throw up your hands, saying, “They all claim to have the Truth, so that must mean they’re all wrong”. This makes no sense.
    If I came out tomorrow and announced that in fact *I* was the locus of the real, authentic teaching authority of the Church, you and everyone else (I would hope) would reject such a thing out of hand… NOT because of the nature of the claim itself (that there may exist such an authority), but because of the ridiculous lack of evidence to support it.

57. Ha! Looks like Vladimir beat me to it.

58. Frankie
    In the Torah, God seems to promise that the priestly (Cohen) line of Aaron, and by implication Jews, will last throughout history:
    The priesthood is theirs by a lasting ordinance. In this way you shall ordain Aaron and his sons. (Exodus 29:9)
    Their anointing will be to a priesthood that will continue for all generations to come. (Exodus 40:15)
    He and his descendants will have a covenant of a lasting priesthood. (Numbers 25:13) (all NIV transl).
    God has not taken back any of His promises from the Jewish people, but has generously extended them in Christ and His Church.
    The problem with the CMH (Cohen Modal Haplotype) is that it proves that Jews are closely related to Kurds and Turks. Well so are the Khazars.
    I was not quoting from CMH studies. I am aware of some Jewish-Kurdish genetic overlaps, but not Jewish-Turkic ones. The Khazar language was Turkic. But language and genetics do not always overlap eg Yiddish, historically spoken by most Ashkenazim, is essentially a Germanic (not Turkic) language written in a Hebrew script. I don’t think it is clear who the present-day descendants of the Khazars are, so comparisons are difficult. Only 4% of Jews are Cohanim.
    Two other factors blur identification.
    – The tolerant Khazar kingdom was probably a magnet for Jewish immigrants from less tolerant areas.
    – Jews have been the most persecuted people in history, and there are descendants of Jews who abandoned their religious and cultural identity who are completely unaware of their Jewish ancestry.
    According to Nebel
    In the present study of … Ashkenazim, … 11.5% were found to belong to R-M17.
    … R-M17 chromosomes in Ashkenazim may represent vestiges of the mysterious Khazars.
    If Ashkenazi Jews were primarily descended from originally-gentile Khazars the genetic evidence would probably look very different to Hammer and Nebel.
    I believe that the genetic evidence points towards today’s Jews being mainly descended from Jewish populations at the time of Jesus, with only a minority input from other groups such as the Khazars. Jews were already mixed to some degree following the Babylonian exile. Even Jesus’ lineage in the gospels includes non-Jews. The idea of a “pure race” is unscientific and dangerous.
    Your post of Jan 1, 7:25:44 PM suggests that you also believe that today’s Jews are at least partly descended from Jews at the time of Jesus. In which case we risk quibbling over details.
    Shalom.

59. Tim and Vladimir,
    If a centralized teaching authority was necessary for the continuation and stability of the church, I think Paul or some other Apostle would have written about its requirement in the New Testament.
    Since the Bible gives no case for a central teaching authority it seems that such a concept is not required. Furthermore Constantine sent letters to 1500 bishop/elders for the first Ecumenical council. This would indicate that there existed 1500 independent churches at a minimum in the Roman Empire. Notice no church called for the need of a council unlike the one in Jerusalem mentioned in Acts.
    Evangelical Protestants did have a council in Chicago that required a belief in the Historical-Grammatical Hermeneutic, and numerous other cardinal Protestant doctrines. So Evangelical Protestants are probably more united than you think. I speak with Baptists, Reformed, Assembly of God, and Evangelical Free( my denomination) on a regular basis.
    However, I am interested to hear SDG’s comments.

60. Chicken,
    To address how I would decide the validity of 3d or 2d earth, I would refer to primary documents and scientific analysis. So I would study what the ancients believed on the 3d earth, quickly leading me to Eratosthenes of Cyrene (200BC). Then I would research what the Medieval Romans and Spaniards had to say. In all this research, I would rederive ever argument from the ‘claimed'( 2d or 3d) authorities.

61. Dear Frankie,
    You wrote:
    Since the Bible gives no case for a central teaching authority it seems that such a concept is not required.
    a. What do you thing the apostles were doing if not functioning as a central teaching authority?
    b. Since Peter was given the keys to the kingdom, what does that mean?
    c. Why should I care what the Bible says with regards to a central teaching authority? First establish that it has the right to make such a claim. Don’t tell me its the word of God? I will then ask you how you know, since the Bible cannot be self-authenticating without being provably not from God (a matter in logic related to self-referential things).
    The Chicken
    The Chicken

62. More its trouble, above. It should be it’s.
    The Chicken

63. Dear Frankie,
    You wrote:
    To address how I would decide the validity of 3d or 2d earth
    I did not ask you to decided the validity of a 3-d or 2-d, but how to decide which group, the AAAS or Flat Earth Society, should be listened to in making their pronouncements.
    The Chicken

64. Leo,
    Yes we are saying the same thing. I was pointing out that the Jews have done a lot of intermarriage over the centuries and that it is difficult to define who is a pure Jew. The Aaronic priesthood promise is based on birth and I think there would be very few Jews left, if any, who could trace their lineage back to Aaron.
    I was also stating that all this talk about Jews returning to Israel as fulfillment of prophecy as bunk.

65. Chicken,
    I never trust any institution that can not be independently verified. So I have no idea how I would choose between 3d and 2d societies.

66. Chicken,
    1. The keys were given to Peter and all the Apostles and to all who believe. Keys were not unique to Peter. Thus all born-again believers have access to the KEYS.
    2. The Apostles, like the Prophets before them, defined what is canonical and complete teaching. They insured that the teachings of the universal church were fully documented in the New Testament. Thus any form of church government not consistent with Acts, the Epistles, Timothy, Titus is NOT Biblical. The only model for church government allowed is Presbyterian. Episcopal and Congregational models are not Biblical.
    3. The problem when a church Magisterium says it is the final authority of doctrine, one commits the fallacy of circular reasoning. The say the doctrine says they are the Magisterium and then the Magisterium goes and creates the doctrine. Thus the only checks and balance must be from a different source. Using History as an arbitrary of teaching authority is flawed because much of ancient literature is a forgery or gnostic.
    Listen to this great quote from Dr. Robert L. Wilken, the first Protestant scholar to be admitted to the staff of Fordham University(a Catholic Institution), wrote: “Eusebius wrote a history of Christianity in which there is no real history. Eusebius was the first thoroughly dishonest and unfair historian in ancient times”.

67. “The keys were given to Peter and to all the Apostles and to all who believe.”
    Evidence? (No doubt he’ll answer my question after I–or SDG–or TMC–or somebody answers his question. IOW, he’ll cop out again.)
    “The Apostles, like the Prophets before them, defined what is canonical and complete teaching.”
    And where in the Bible does one find evidence of the this? (Well, I haven’t answered his question, so he can cop out on this one, too.)
    “‘Eusebius wrote a history of Christianity in which there was no real history. Eusebius was the first thoroughly dishonest and unfair historian in ancient times.'”And his evidence was? (Oh,yeah, I forgot: I haven’t answered his question, so he can cop out here, too. How convenient!)
    He isn’t interested in any honest discussion. He’s being contrary just to be contrary. That’s his Hobby Horse.

68. Dear Frankie,
    You wrote:
    The problem when a church Magisterium says it is the final authority of doctrine, one commits the fallacy of circular reasoning.
    Not necessarily. If the Church established itself as its own authority, then the reasoning would be circular. The Church did not establish its own authority. In fact, you cannot accept the Bible as any kind of authority without the Church or some outside agency to verify it. The Bible cannot authenticate itself. The apostles did not write a Bible. They wrote gospels and occasional letters. That is not a Bible. I have to go right now, but I will be back later to explain why there must be a Magisterium in order to accept the Bible. Then, the matter becomes how to know which Magesteria to accept.
    The Chicken

69. The keys were given to Peter and to all the Apostles and to all who believe.

    No, Jesus mentions giving “keys” only in connection with Peter, using the singular second person (“I give thee the keys”). In view of the parallel in Isaiah 22:22, it seems reasonable to see the keys of Matthew 16:19 as a token of authority held by one person at a time.

70. The Catholic Encyclopedia admits:
    It is comparatively seldom that the Fathers, when speaking of the power of the keys, make any reference to the supremacy of St. Peter” (Joyce G.H. Transcribed by Robert B. Olson. Power of the Keys. The Catholic Encyclopedia, Volume VIII. Copyright © 1910 by Robert Appleton Company. Online Edition Copyright © 2003 by K. Knight. Nihil Obstat, October 1, 1910. Remy Lafort, S.T.D., Censor. Imprimatur. +John Cardinal Farley, Archbishop of New York).
    Some Catholic writers believed that the authority granted in Matthew 16:19 was not limited to Peter. For example:
    St. Augustine in several passages declares that the authority to bind and loose was not a purely personal gift to St. Peter, but was conferred upon him as representing the Church (Power of the Keys. The Catholic Encyclopedia).
    Even in 21st century, the Roman Catholic Church recognizes the legitimacy of churches of the Eastern Orthodox based in cities such as Constantinople, Jerusalem, and Alexandria who were founded by someone other than the Apostle Peter (which tradition states were founded by the Apostles Andrew, James, and the gospel-writer Mark, respectively).
    Hence the Catholic church basically admits that Peter is not the unique custodian of the keys.
    Note to Bill912: It is interesting that all you can offer to a conversation is disparaging remarks, so please hold your tongue.

71. I rest my case.

72. Dear Frankie,
    I notice you still haven’t provided that little snippet of proof for your assertion of the 95 AD Canon. I only mention it so that we can keep it in view and remind ourselves of questions that need answering.
    Now that I have a little more time, I’d like to give my two-cents sketch of what the Biblical teaching Authority looks like, and why it resides in the Catholic Church. I’ll try to utilize and intersperse your more recent comments as best I can, while also attempting to keep this brief, as one of my biggest sins is pride, and thus I like to ramble…
    To begin, let’s start with the concept of Authority and whether it’s necessary in the Church. You say:
    “If a centralized teaching authority was necessary for the continuation and stability of the church, I think Paul or some other Apostle would have written about its requirement in the New Testament.”
    I think that’s a damaging statement to make, because I assume even Protestants would admit that there is a central teaching authority. What they would dispute is that this authority rests in the Church which contains and reveres the scriptures, and not in scripture alone. I guess my point here is: Don’t dig your own grave. Either teaching authority is centralized in the Magisterium, or in the Scriptures themselves, but the concept of a centralized teaching authority IS mission critical to the survival of the Church. To deny this is like cutting off the nose to spite the face…
    “Since the Bible gives no case for a central teaching authority it seems that such a concept is not required.”
    I don’t think we see eye to eye on what the Bible IS. I’m sure we’d both agree that it’s the infallible Word of God, but I think we’d come to loggerheads when you imply that the Bible is like an exclusive checklist for all things required and necessary to be a healthy Christian Church. But, rather than belabor the point, I’ll just ask: Can you show me the Bible verse that effectively says “All required concepts meant for inclusion in the Church are explicitly stated in the Bible”.
    But… I do hold that the concept of teaching Authority flows intuitively out of the writings of St. Paul as well as the other Apostles. You see, St. Paul repeatedly refers to the Church as the Body of Christ (Romans 12:5, 1 Corinthians 12:12-27, Ephesians 3:6 and 5:23, Colossians 1:18 and 1:24 etc…) in order to stress the relationship between Christ and His Church. Elsewhere, he refers to the Church as the Bride of Christ and the Head of the Body (Ephesians 5:23-31 again, for example). As with all of Scripture, these references are never made without deep theological significance.
    So what can we pull from all of this: Well, several things… First we can see that the relationship between the true Church and Christ is one of physical bodies. In other words: Christ always remains the Word become flesh. Second, this incarnational nature of Christ in His Church is deeply connected to the true relationship between a husband and wife. The two become one flesh. St. Paul then furthers this notion by telling us that Christ is not only the Church’s spouse, but that he is the head of his Church as well.
    That’s all well and good, but we now need to work out precisely what this means when synthesized… Well, if the Church is the Bride of Christ, then she is brought into her embodiment and incarnation of our Lord through (comm)union with Christ. Thus, through the act of the Eucharist, the Body of Christ, she is assumed into the one-flesh union of Christ. By the virtue of such an act, she receives Christ as her head and in a sense brings new meaning to St. Paul’s exhortation “Let this Mind be in you” (Phil 2:5), for it is now the Mind of Christ that motivates and guides her.
    So I ask you: why would the one-flesh Body of Christ, who lovingly receives Christ as her head and mind, who stands as the perfect model for all human marriages around the world, who is firmly rooted in scripture, NOT be able to speak authoritatively with His voice?
    If, as scripture attests, Christ and his Church are the perfectly mysterious model of the one flesh union between husband and wife, and wives are, as scripture attests, to be submissive to their husbands, then it only stands to reason that as the perfect incarnational bride of Christ, the Church completely submits to his headship, mind and will, and thus speaks only as he bids her. She speaks as He speaks out of reverent submission. They speak as one flesh. And because it is Christ who vocalizes His own self, his word, through his bride the Church that she speaks infallibly and with his Authority.
    In fact such an act of vocalization, of preaching the Word of God, draws from the type of the true incarnation itself. For as the Body breathes in the Holy Spirit in order to Preach and teach the Gospel found in the Word of God, she gives flesh to that same Word found in the Sacred Scriptures, and thus creates for them a Body in which they dwell in this world. Through her act of preaching, the word is spoken into flesh, is made flesh, and dwells among us. Through the act of communing with and acquiring the Mind of Christ, the Church conceives of the Sacred Gospel and bears the message to the ends of the earth.
    But wait… there’s more!
    Let’s look at Ephesians 5:23 a little closer: “For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the savior of the body.”
    While I admit I’m very far from anything like a scripture or Greek scholar, I do happen to be a fan of cross-referencing English scripture translations with the Greek online. Thus, I found the following little gem. The word used for “head” in this passage is Kephale. I think that’s awesome in light of Matthew 16:18. IIRC, Matthew uses the Aramaic Kepha in pointing out Peter’s “rockiness”, and if I’m not mistaken, we can hear and see clear overtones of Kepha in Kephale. While my small observation is far from decisive, this small point seems to reinforce another concept found within the Biblical portrait of the Church: She has a pecking order. Surely you’ll concede that the Bishops mentioned in scripture have authority over their flock? If so, then it seems they would need to have authority to teach their flock, no? Thus, you’re quite right in citing the Catholic observation that teaching Authority resides with all Bishops, but that is not what is conveyed in Matthew 16:18. In that specific passage, Jesus does something extraordinary. He names Peter “kepha”, stone or rock, upon which He as kephale (head) will found His Church.
    Herein we find a fitting reflection of Genesis in the creation of the Church. Just as God the Father sculpted the primordial stones into the shape of a Man bearing his Image, so here does God the Son sculpt primordial Peter into the shape of His flesh. In both instances, the Holy Spirit is breathed into the recipient “kepha” stone to receive a new life. The Spirit enters the dead stone of Genesis to make living Adam, and that same spirit enters the living kepha of Peter to make him a seat of the everliving Kephale, Christ. What was dust gave way to Man, and what is Man gives way to the Son of Man. Peter is effectively transformed from the natural stone of man’s intellect to the supernatural headship of the Church in union with Christ.
    Thus, all things considered, I can see several terraced requirements for a Church to claim the true teaching Authority. First, a Church needs an ecclesial structure. You can’t have a body without a bunch of different body parts. Especially not a human body, which was created in God’s image and is thus his mode of choice for incarnation. Second, that Body must be visible. Christ’s Body was not and never shall be an invisible Ghost. That’s the Holy Spirit’s gig. Third, the Church needs to have Sacramental communion. Without a real “this is my body” from the top to the bottom, the chain is broken and the Church fails to be a real “body”. Fourth, there must be a teaching office. Christ’s Body needs a voice to speak its mind, the Word of God. Finally, there needs to be a visible representation of kephale, of the supernaturally transformed see of Peter. No communion with the See of Peter, no authentic interpretive authority. As far as I can tell, only the Catholic Church fits this bill.
    Hope that helps.
    Sorry for the length. 🙁 From now on all subsequent posts shall be 2 para’s in length. Promise…
    Pax.

73. Frankie: Your argument depends on sleight of hand. “The power of the keys” is a traditional phrase, not a biblical one, and customarily refers to what the NT calls “binding and loosing.” This “power” was given to the college of the Twelve (though not to “all believers” as you suggest).
    That doesn’t change the fact that the NT speaks of the gift of “the keys of the kingdom,” as distinct from general references to “binding and loosing,” in connection with Peter alone, in keeping with the background in Isaiah 22:22.

74. frankie,
    I think you confused something I had written to have been written by SDG
    chicken,
    c. Why should I care what the Bible says with regards to a central teaching authority? First establish that it has the right to make such a claim. Don’t tell me its the word of God? I will then ask you how you know, since the Bible cannot be self-authenticating without being provably not from God (a matter in logic related to self-referential things).
    OK, it’s not clear what you are saying here. Since I’m not clear on what particular mathematics you are applying, it’s not totally clear that you are misapplying it. One possibility is that you are saying that the Bible or rather the set of sentences which the bible asserts and the rules of inference that the bible proposes (or that we presuppose) together forming a system we shall call BL cannot prove (in the formal sense of proof theory) that each member of the theory (set of sentences) entailed by BL is true, with the truth predicate having been given a suitable definition. Well, that’s simply not true. Let me show you an example of a simplified system which can do just that, which system we will call PL, presupposing certain rules of inference and a suitable definition of the truth predicate.
    P1 God is God
    P2 Every sentence provable in PL is true
    So the theory entailed by PL would include sentences of the form “”God is God” is true” as well as “”Every sentence provable in PL is true” is true” and so forth.
    Perhaps by “self-authenticating” you are referring to something other than asserting of each sentence in the theory that the sentence is true. Perhaps you have in mind some consistency claims and are (mis)applying Godel’s incompleteness results. Those results only apply to certain kinds of theories. I don’t see any reason to believe that a believer in sola scriptura would (A) attribute to the bible, a theory of such a sort; or (B) believe that his epistemic relation to the bible need be confined to the mathematical domain of the sort required for those results to apply. If for example, the bible were conceived of not as translatable and formalizable, rightly, into a certain class of mathematical language and theory and rather, one’s epistemic relation to the bible were conceived of as Bible PLUS — namely Bible PLUS religious experience … where that religious experience leads one to interpret sentences in one way or another, then depending on what one believes epistemologically about that religious experience, one can easily for example have a situation where the Bible were to consist of but a lone sentence but due to the manifold things the spirit may be taken to assert through that one sentence, that sentence may via religious experience be essentially like God’s mouth piece or a magic box out of which through religious experience (arguably malfunction of the hypothalmus) one ends up in principle being able to generate any relevant answer.
    IIRC, (though this is not particularly relevant to what I wrote above), you seem to assume that the data of revelation should be in some manner complete. I don’t think it’s necessarily true that the data of revelation need be sufficient to answer any question that might arise from said data, let alone from questions that might simply arise from our curiousity (be it with the aid of teaching authority or otherwise — I don’t really see how a teaching authority as such helps for this particular issue as a teaching authority is for our purposes no more than a middle man between you and the data of revelation; what might be more productive to explore is what role living tradition inclusive of teaching authority and inclusive of in the broad sense the scriptures as well as all that is passed down organically in the church can play). So for example, the concept (relation) of “grandchild” is in the data of revelation. And the object (name) “Joseph (father of Jesus)” is likewise in that data of revelation. This doesn’t mean that the data of revelation (be it appropriated under a Catholic approach or any other) need give an answer to the question of whether:
    For some x, x is the grandchild of Joseph (father of Jesus).
    Yet that sentence could be formulated from the formalized language in which some of the data of revelation inheres in. Perhaps I am not recollecting what you had previously opined correctly, but I felt it opportune to point this out.

75. FWIW, I think it might be fruitful to look at the use of singular vs. plural in the (original) language as regards “you.” (don’t read more into that than what it says)
    I also think SDG is not quite correct. Though one can certainly choose to interpret the keys as having been given to Peter alone. Many interpret the keys, the Gospel portrayal notwithstanding, to have in some sense been given also to the twelve. (For ex. John Michael Talbot in a song wrote of how Jesus gave the keys “to Simon Peter and to all of the twelve” … and IIRC this accords with his more theological writings … as opposed to songs as well). Many also interpret the keys, the Gospel portrayal and other theological issues notwithstanding, to have in some sense been given to the Church as a whole. To be fair, some of those who have in history interpreted it this way did so at a time when the Church was often conceived of in a more hiearchical or juridical fashion than it is today (as opposed to for ex. the We are Church movement’s conception of the church or the various, or certain of the, models of the church that Avery Dulles proposes in the book by the same name or the conception emphasized in the Small Christian Communities movement and so forth)
    This article
    http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/08631b.htm
    is worth a read. Contrary to what SDG seems to be saying, the “power of the keys” is not a concept that is divorced from the Gospel narrative which mentions the keys. Here’s an enlightening excerpt:
    “The expression “power of the keys” is derived from Christ’s words to St. Peter (in Matthew 16:19). The promise there made finds its explanation in Isaiah 22 (…) In the Fathers the references to the promise of Matthew 16:19, are of frequent occurrence. Almost invariably the words of Christ are cited in proof of the Church’s power to forgive sins. The application is a natural one, for the promise of the keys is immediately followed by the words: “Whatsoever thou shalt bind upon earth”, etc. Moreover, the power to confer or to withhold forgiveness might well be viewed as the opening and shutting of the gates of heaven. (…) It is comparatively seldom that the Fathers, when speaking of the power of the keys, make any reference to the supremacy of St. Peter. When they deal with that question, they ordinarily appeal not to the gift of the keys but to his office as the rock on which the Church is founded. In their references to the potestas clavium, they are usually intent on vindicating against the Montanist and Novatian heretics the power inherent in the Church to forgive. Thus St. Augustine in several passages declares that the authority to bind and loose was not a purely personal gift to St. Peter, but was conferred upon him as representing the Church. The whole Church, he urges, exercises the power of forgiving sins. This could not be had the gift been a personal one (…) From these passages certain Protestant controversialists have drawn the curious conclusion that the power to forgive sins belongs not to the priesthood but to the collective body of Christians (…) St. Augustine merely signifies that the power to absolve was to be imparted through St. Peter to members of the Church’s hierarchy throughout the world.”
    The author goes on to note a tiny minority (ex. Origen) that placed the promise of the keys as signifying some primacy or privilege peculiar to Peter. In terms of the Scholastics, the author notes:
    “The view which is now universally accepted is exposed at length by Suárez (De Poenit., disp. xvi). According to him, the phrase as employed by Christ in His promise to St. Peter denotes the gift of ecclesiastical authority in its widest scope. This authority was to be in a sense peculiar to St. Peter and his successors in the chief pastorate; for they alone were to possess it in its fullness. But it was to be exercised in due measure by the other members of the Divinely instituted hierarchy according to their several degrees. Thus understood, the potestas clavium includes
    * the power of order, namely power exercised in regard to sacrifice and sacrament,
    * the power of jurisdiction, and
    * the power to define in questions of faith and morals.
    “The various powers thus conferred upon the Church were held to belong either to the clavis potentioe or to the clavis scientioe, the latter of these two being understood to signify the power to teach, while the other departments of authority pertained to the clavis potentioe. The distinction is, however, a theological refinement, and is not involved in the expression itself. As Francisco Suárez urges, Christ, when using the plural form, did not intend to indicate that the gift was twofold.”
    So it is not only bishops but also priests who share in the authority of the keys (and who incidentally despite the lacuna in the catechism, share in the ministry of the magisterium)
    In any event, AFAIK early Church history does not support Protestant ecclesiology. So you have a situation where evangelical Christianity is akin to Mormonism in supposing some kind of mass scale apostasy or departure from (at least) ecclesiological truth. I don’t know of any evangelicals (unlike Mormons) who suppose that the great apostasy in scripture was meant to be prophetic to this. So in that respect, evangelical Christianity is in an even less credible position than Mormon Christianity.

76. SDG,
    If the power for binding and loosing is conferred on the twelve Apostles +Paul this must be done with some of keys of the kingdom. So Peter does not have exclusive domain of the keys.
    Protestants believe that all Christian churches have the power for binding and loosing and hence the keys apply to the local church level.
    Further the scripture of Isa 22:22 has no application to Matt 16.

77. Chicken,
    Let me be brief. NO Evangelical Protestant believes the scriptures were given by the church. The Apostles collected the scriptures and said this is canonical. The church had no authority in determining what was canonical or non-canonical this was the exclusive domain of the Apostles. This is the Protestant model. Similarly the Torah was given by Moses, the Israelites(a type of church) had no say in the matter. It has never been the responsibility of the church to define what is canonical. So a Protestant believes a Magisterium is unnecessary and unbiblical, because the Apostles did not define a Magisterium.
    Frankie

78. Vladmir,
    I will answer your questions tomorrow. It will require a lot of detail so please be patient.
    But I would like to ask a question. What are the consequences of belonging to the wrong church?

79. Dear Frankie,
    “But I would like to ask a question. What are the consequences of belonging to the wrong church?”
    That’s a fair question, though I think I want to pick at your wording again. Within Christendom, I think it’s safe to say that anyone who has childlike faith in Christ doesn’t belong to the “wrong” church, but they are in communion in varying degrees of fullness with the Catholic Church. Full communion with the Catholic Church is like a full glass of milk, a full helping of grace as God intended it. Participation in say, a Presbyterian Denomination doesn’t make one full of a “wrong beverage” like lemonade, but less full of milk than the Catholic Church. We’re saved by our faith in Christ, after all, and not our degree of doctrinal comprehension.
    Keeping that in mind, I think the first answer that pops into my mind is that the person who is in less full communion with the true Body of Christ misses out on the fullness of Grace that’s presented in that Church. It’s simple, if your glass is less full of milk than your brother’s… then you get less milk than him. That said, I’ll stop short on prognosticating on the fate of any given Christian’s soul, but I think one’s salvation CAN be contingent on one’s denomination if, say, that person deliberately denies the truth he knows in his heart for reasons of spite, pride etc. Aside from those things, I can’t really think of many more effects that I can be sure of, as I’m not God and I don’t get to decide on eternal consequences. Let’s just agree that it’s always better to be on the side of the fullness of truth!
    Pax.

80. Dear Frankie,
    A few more for kicks and giggles on a Friday night. In writing:
    “Furthermore Constantine sent letters to 1500 bishop/elders for the first Ecumenical council. This would indicate that there existed 1500 independent churches at a minimum in the Roman Empire. Notice no church called for the need of a council unlike the one in Jerusalem mentioned in Acts.”
    You sorta pave the way for this later statement of yours:
    “Protestants believe that all Christian churches have the power for binding and loosing and hence the keys apply to the local church level.”
    Let me just point out that if the President sent out 100 letters of invitation to all the US Senators tomorrow, it wouldn’t imply that the US is made up of 100 independent little countries. The distinction I think we’re missing is found in the definition of a Bishop. Christ named His Church Body and Bride, not Amoeba and Gas Cloud. There’s an order and skeletal structure implied in the analogy. Plus, there’s only one Body with one brain, one voice and one gospel to proclaim. Christ is not a polygamist, and he damn well didn’t intend to give his bride multiple-personality disorder when He created her. One Church. One unified Bride. That’s the analogy we’re given. No amoebas allowed.
    Thus when you say:
    “NO Evangelical Protestant believes the scriptures were given by the church.”
    I feel like replying: “No Catholics believe that either. We believe that the Scriptures were given THROUGH the Church.” It is Christ who speaks through His Body. (Weren’t the Apostles, Paul included, members and the bedrock of the Body, after all???) If then the Scriptures are nothing but Christ writing us love letters through His Body, then why would he not endow that same Body with the capability to read them aloud, teach from them and clarify them? The Faith is incarnational!
    Ok, I’ll shut up now…
    Pax.

81. Contrary to what SDG seems to be saying, the “power of the keys” is not a concept that is divorced from the Gospel narrative which mentions the keys.

    Since you are too smart to think that “divorced” is really an accurate word for what I am saying, why are you seemingly deliberately trying to muddy the waters?
    Obviously Matthew 16:19 indicates a close relationship between “the keys of the kingdom” and the power of “binding and loosing.” One who bears the keys is able to bind and loose. However, it is not necessarily the case that all who share in authority to bind and loose equally bear the keys. In the Davidic kingdom, the son of David had many stewards or ministers who exercised authority in their sphere, and in that sense shared in authority to “bind and loose.” But the specific image of the “keys of the household” in the Davidic kingdom is uniquely associated in Isaiah 22:22 with the chief steward or prime minister, who holds first place under the son of David.
    The fact that Jesus later ascribes to all the apostles authority to “bind and loose” means that they are all his stewards, his ministers. That he ascribes the gift of the keys to Peter and Peter alone indicates Peter’s role as chief steward or prime minister under the true and final Son of David.

    In any event, AFAIK early Church history does not support Protestant ecclesiology. So you have a situation where evangelical Christianity is akin to Mormonism in supposing some kind of mass scale apostasy or departure from (at least) ecclesiological truth.

    Quite right.

    If the power for binding and loosing is conferred on the twelve Apostles +Paul this must be done with some of keys of the kingdom.

    Saying so doesn’t make it so. See above.

    Protestants believe that all Christian churches have the power for binding and loosing and hence the keys apply to the local church level.

    Thus validating Ruse’s point above about how Protestants must assume a Mormon-like “great apostasy” with Protestantism as the recovery of long-lost truth — contrary to the NT promises of the church’s perseverence.

    Further the scripture of Isa 22:22 has no application to Matt 16.

    Lots of Protestant commentators disagree with you, e.g., F. F. Bruce, R. T. France and Jeremias. In fact, I don’t know of any notable Protestant commentator who would support your claim (not to say there isn’t one, but I haven’t run across it).

82. Vladmir,
    BTW are you Russian? I will agree with you that one wants to be in the church that practices the most fullness of Christ. It believe( as do 800 million others) that such a Church is best represented by an Evangelical Protestant Church. Like you I believe that Christ only gave us one Universal Church. However we differ in the definition of local Church. I believe that the number of local churches can wax and wane in number and location.
    Example: Paul wrote two Epistles to Timothy, who was the Bishop of the church in Ephesus. The Church in Ephesus no longer exists, so has God violated His Word? No, because the Universal Church will never be destroyed. The names and locations may have changed however the visible church has always been in operation.
    Protestants say we have always had a visible thread back to the first church in Jerusalem, even if those in the 21st century can not name the proto-Protestant churches of 150AD. It only matters that they existed and Protestants are direct decendants of them.
    As an aside name me the location of all the Catholic churches in the France, Germany, or Spaiin in 150 AD.
    Frankie

83. BTW are you Russian?

    FWIW, “Vladimir Soloviev”‘s handle is taken from a brilliant Russian convert from Orthodoxy to Catholicism.
    Your reasoning seems to confuse the distinction between particular local churches and separate communions.

    As an aside name me the location of all the Catholic churches in the France, Germany, or Spaiin in 150 AD.

    What is this question supposed to prove? I can give you examples of Christian writers who attest a faith substantially the same as my own in A.D. 150, 350, 750, 950, 1150, 1350 and any other century you care to name. Can you say the same?

84. SDG,
    I disagree with your interpretation of Isa 22:22. Clarke, Barnes, Gill, Henry, and Keil & Delitzsch would state there is no correlation between Isa 22:22 and Matt 16. Isa 22 details the Destruction of Jerusalem and the transfer of power from the treasurer/mayor Shebna, a great officer at court, and the preferring of Eliakim to a place of honor. This is similar to the expression giving someone the ‘keys to city’.
    Clarke has the following to say about Isa 22:22:
    “And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder – As the robe and the baldric, mentioned in the preceding verse, were the ensigns of power and authority, so likewise was the key the mark of office, either sacred or civil. The priestess of Juno is said to be the key-bearer of the goddess, κλειδουχος Ἡρας· Aeschyl.” So this was a common idiom in antiquity.

85. Clarke, Barnes, Gill, Henry, and Keil & Delitzsch would state there is no correlation between Isa 22:22 and Matt 16.

    Uh huh. Do you want to reference any scholarship from the last century or so? Just wondering.
    To pick the one source you actually cite, I don’t see that Clarke denies a correlation between Isa 22:22 and Matt 16:18. What he does say is that the “keys” are a “mark of office,” in this case that of “chief steward” or prime minister, just as I said.
    Until you produce actual quotations attesting the denial you wish to support, I conclude nothing from your other references.
    For my part, I would be happy to produce quotations from Bruce, France or Jeremias, if you’d like.

86. Dear Frankie,
    BTW are you Russian?
    Nope, I picked my handle yesterday because I thought we’d be discussing more “Catholic-Orthodox” issues than “Catholic-Protestant” ones, but now I can see I was way off in approximating the course of this discourse. I picked Solovyov because I wanted an excellent Orthodox convert as my patron for a handle… in retrospect I think “Peter Canisius” would have been a better choice. Le sigh. Hindsight is always 20-20, right?
    “I believe( as do 800 million others) that such a Church is best represented by an Evangelical Protestant Church… I believe that the number of local churches can wax and wane in number and location.”
    I think you may be surprised to find that Catholics also agree with you here as well. SDG makes a good point in saying that you’re likely confusing particular local churches and separate communions. Catholics believe that local Churches can operate with governing power to an extent, like how my stomach or heart operates without me consciously telling them to do so. We also agree that local Churches can depart from this earth like the Church of Ephesus. What we DISagree with is that those same local Churches all have equal Magisterial or interpretive authority. That authority, as I have shown, rests in the full Body of Christ and is delegated to the specific teaching “organ” of the Body held by the Bishops, insofar as they are in communion with the Spirit transformed human head of the bride, the Chair of Peter.
    No offense, but Protestantism is anything but a unified Body. It consists of many little churchlets that all act to govern themselves and rarely collaborate. For instance, there’s a heck of a difference between the Orthodox PCA and the Episcopal Church. They disagree on major, essential points of theology and doctrine. I don’t think it can be argued that they are both part of the same body, unless you want to posit that the Body of Christ is really Siamese twins.

87. SDG,
    Clearly the word keys is used in Matt and Isa. But to say they reference similar concepts is denied by all of the scholars listed. Isa 22:22 does not say that Shebna or Eliakim has keys to the kingdom.

88. “Protestants say we have always had a visible thread back to the first church in Jerusalem, even if those in the 21st century can not name the proto-Protestant churches of 150AD.”
    Forgive me for saying so, but I don’t buy this… It seems like a dodge based on the fact that there’s no evidence of proto-Protestant churches anywhere. Imagine what life would be like if we let that pass as a logical argument. For example:
    “UFO enthusiasts say we have always had visible confirmations of UFO sightings throughout all of history, even if those in the 21st century cannot name the locations, times, people involved, or documentation for any of these proto-sightings.”
    Well of course they do! Elsewise they wouldn’t be UFO enthusiasts.
    “As an aside name me the location of all the Catholic churches in the France, Germany, or Spaiin in 150 AD.”
    I see what you’re trying to say here, namely that Christianity hadn’t reached those regions at that point, and thus that the Catholic Church couldn’t have been what it is today and therefore isn’t real… But in light of the distinction we made above between local churches and separate communions, and the fact that Catholicism is perfectly fine with these local churches opening or closing, your point really has no effect. To reinforce my point: The Church is a Body. It’s allowed to grow and change just like a real body. Thus the Catholic Church was only in her childhood at 150, and it would be weird to say that her adult Body today wasn’t the same (in a sense) as her Body in 150 just because it grew. Likewise, if I got a hold of a picture of you when you were a child losing teeth, and made the argument that you and the person in that picture couldn’t possibly be the same because of the difference in size and number of teeth, you’d rightfully call me a loony.
    Pax.

89. But to say they reference similar concepts is denied by all of the scholars listed.

    Saying so doesn’t make it so. Evidence, please.

90. The conclusion of our debate is who we trust as our authority. I studied science and theology so I put my trust in things that are based on laws – such as Physical laws and the plenary inspiration of Scripture. Since I like to disprove things by the mathematical principle of ‘proof by contradiction’, I have applied this to Catholicism. If the Magisterium contradicts in one doctrine over 2000 years than all doctrine must be reevaluated from first principles. The Assumption was the doctrine that broke the camels back for me. The Assumption contradicted the teachings of the Orthodox and apostolic tradition. This, like an onion peeled, negated the doctrine of ex cathedra.
    So by rigorous study, and a 10+ year quest, my theme verse has become:
    Colossians 2:8 “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.”
    This scripture as applied to Catholicism would be:
    1. deceptive philosophy – sacraments and transubstantiation
    2. human tradition – Assumption, other Marian dogma, hagiography, Magisterium, etc.

91. Never let it be said that I wouldn’t ask of someone else what I wouldn’t be willing to do myself. Herewith quotations from what solid recent Protestant scholarship has to say about the “keys of the kingdom” in Matthew 16.
    R. T. France: “Peter’s ‘power of the keys’ declared in 16:19 is not so much that of the doorkeeper, who decides who may be admitted to the kingdom of heaven, but that of steward (as in Is. 22:22, generally regarded as the Old Testament background to the metaphor of the keys here), whose keys of office enable him to regulate the affairs of the household.” (Matthew: Evangelist and Teacher, p. 247)
    Note that France indicates general acceptance of the connection. This is not an unusual or minority view, here.
    F. F. Bruce: “What about the keys of the kingdom? The keys of a royal or noble establishment were entrusted to the chief steward or major domo; he carried them on his shoulder in earlier times, and there they served as a badge of the authority entrusted to him. About 700 B.C. an oracle from God announced that this authority in the royal palace in Jerusalem was to be conferred on a man called Eliakim: “I will place on his shoulder the key to the house of David; what he opens no one can shut, and what he shuts no one can open” (Is 22:22). So in the new community that Jesus was about the build, Peter would be, so to speak, chief steward” (Hard Sayings of the Bible, p. 385)
    Joachim Jeremias: “The keys of the kingdom are not different from the keys of David … Handing over the keys does not imply appointing a porter … Handing over the keys implies appointment to full authority.” (Theologial Dictionary of the New Testament, vol. 3, pp. 749-750)
    The citations given are illustrative, not exhaustive. I repeat, I am aware of no Protestant scholarship, recent or otherwise, that denies this connection. (To be fair, since France says the connection is “generally” accepted, that would seem to suggest that it may not be universally accepted, so perhaps there is a contrary minority view, though again I haven’t run into it. Then again, I suppose it’s not impossible that France could have been engaging in cautious scholarly understatement.)

92. Vladmir,
    Episcopalian are not considered Evangelical Protestants but Catholics without a Pope. The TRUE church must practice covenant theology( non-sacramental, only believer baptism, and only believers communion), have a Presbyterian( non Episcopal, non Congregational) form of government. Optional teachings include baptism in Holy Spirit( ex Assemblies of God). Name of the Organization or Denomination is irrelevant. Church can be autonomous like my church or part of a loose federation like the Assemblies of God.
    The Proto-Protestant church was in its infancy in 150 AD thus it could not be as well defined as the Catholic church in France in 150 AD. Protestant claim that the Irish where Proto-Protestants from 100 AD to 1100 AD and sending missionaries to the Continent. The Waldensians 1100 AD to 1500 AD where also proto-Protestants. So we claim that there is continuous history since Pentecost.

93. Episcopalian are not considered Evangelical Protestants but Catholics without a Pope.

    Not considered by whom? What Evangelical Protestant pope up and declared that one? J. I. Packer, Alister McGrath, R. T. France, N. T. Wright and John R. W. Stott, among countless others, would be surprised to learn that they are “not considered Evangelical Protestants.”

94. Protestant claim that the Irish where Proto-Protestants from 100 AD to 1100 AD and sending missionaries to the Continent.

    On what evidence? Which specific Irish writers attest something that looks like Protestant faith to you?

95. The conclusion of our debate is who we trust as our authority.

    Is this your way of changing the subject and admitting that even the pre-20th century scholarship you referenced without citations (or without on-point citations) doesn’t really deny a Matt 16 – Isa 22 connection?

    I studied science and theology so I put my trust in things that are based on laws – such as Physical laws and the plenary inspiration of Scripture. Since I like to disprove things by the mathematical principle of ‘proof by contradiction’, I have applied this to Catholicism.

    Methodological skepticism can be a powerful corrosive. Arbiting what is or isn’t a contradiction can be a convenient way of retaining or rejecting what one has already decided to retain or reject.
    I seriously doubt that whatever you “applied to Catholicism” in order to disprove it to your own satisfaction was ever “applied” in the same way and under the same intellectual conditions to your faith in the plenary inspiration of scripture … or, conversely, that whatever faith you may have had to lose regarding the Catholic Church was ever comparable to your faith regarding the Bible.
    You may say different, of course. But as we’ve seen more than once, saying so doesn’t make it so.

96. Dear Frankie,
    Once again, I ask your forgiveness if this seems blunt, but you seem to state a lot of things without having any proof. Then, when people press you for that proof, you jump to a different subject. I answered all your questions. Can you do the same courtesy for us Catholics?
    “Episcopalian are not considered Evangelical Protestants but Catholics without a Pope.”
    Um… but us Catholics consider them Protestant. Not just because of the Pope, but because of all their other doctrines they hold in “protest” against the Church. So, they’re protestants. What if I chose Methodists instead? Heck, even my Methodist friends have trouble figuring out what their Church teaches… Protestantism isn’t unified.
    “The TRUE church must practice covenant theology( non-sacramental, only believer baptism, and only believers communion), have a Presbyterian( non Episcopal, non Congregational) form of government. Optional teachings include baptism in Holy Spirit( ex Assemblies of God). Name of the Organization or Denomination is irrelevant. Church can be autonomous like my church or part of a loose federation like the Assemblies of God.”
    Now where does it say any of that in the Bible? And I thought Catholics were supposed to be the ones who “added” things to the Scriptures… 🙂
    “The Proto-Protestant church was in its infancy in 150 AD thus it could not be as well defined as the Catholic church in France in 150 AD. Protestant claim that the Irish where Proto-Protestants from 100 AD to 1100 AD and sending missionaries to the Continent. The Waldensians 1100 AD to 1500 AD where also proto-Protestants.”
    Do you have any evidence of this? Again, just because you say something doesn’t make it true. In fact… I’m not even sure that the Church had reached France by 150…
    PS. Why is 150 AD such a magic number? Did something happen then that I’m not aware of?
    “So we claim that there is continuous history since Pentecost.”
    And I claim I’m the Archbishop of Canterbury. Doesn’t make it true.
    Pax.

97. “…you seem to state a lot of things without having any proof. Then, when people press you for that proof, you jump to a different subject.”
    “If the questions aroused by any one story proved at all difficult to answer, the speaker simply dropped that story and instantly began another.”–C.S. Lewis, “Perelandra”, page 107; the Unman tempting Tinidril.

98. Again for Frankie,
    The conclusion of our debate is who we trust as our authority.
    Right, notice who I’ve pegged as the Catholic’s authority: Christ speaking through His Body. Our Authority is the Word of God made flesh, Jesus Christ.
    Let’s do a study of the rest of your paragraph and see what we can discern about your trusted Authority:
    “I studied science and theology so I put my trust in things that are based on laws – such as Physical laws and the plenary inspiration of Scripture. Since I like to disprove things by the mathematical principle of ‘proof by contradiction’, I have applied this to Catholicism. If the Magisterium contradicts in one doctrine over 2000 years than all doctrine must be reevaluated from first principles. The Assumption was the doctrine that broke the camels back for me. The Assumption contradicted the teachings of the Orthodox and apostolic tradition. This, like an onion peeled, negated the doctrine of ex cathedra.”
    I count the word “I” four times and and “me” once. You’re applying the methods, you’re interpreting the Orthodox and apostolic tradition. You’re also interpreting the results. Sure, you may apply the Scriptures to life and be an honest, God-fearing man. I assume you are! But you rely solely on yourself to interpret things.
    So when we get to:
    “Colossians 2:8 “See to it that no one takes you captive through hollow and deceptive philosophy, which depends on human tradition and the basic principles of this world rather than on Christ.”
    I feel compelled to point you to the humor found in the fact that you just told us that you like to apply the basic principles of this world (mathematics and physical laws) as you interpret the scriptures and you discern which church is the “correct” one. In a real way, you start with yourself and attempt to work up to the Body by your own volition. The Catholic Church starts with its eyes on Christ and what He has said. He asked for a Body and a Bride. Those terms have meaning. He asked for Bishops and Presbyters and Deacons. He got em. He asked for the Chair of Peter. He got that too. He said “This is my Body” and we say Amen.
    Pax.

99. “If the Magisterium contradicts in one doctrine over 2000 years than all doctrine must be reevaluated from first principles.”
    frankie,
    First of all, the magisterium does not claim that every doctrine ever espoused by the magisterium is necessarily true or certainly true. Different theologians will have different understandings of to that which infallibility extends. Though perhaps some extreme theologians were inclined to extend that to every utterance of the pope qua pope at one time, AFAIK, no one today espouses such a theory.
    Today the doctrine of infallibility is not understood in itself nor applied uniformally. For ex., some consider canonizations to be infallible; other’s don’t. Among those who do, some consider it infallible both as to the peculiar sanctity as well as to the heavenly destination; while others limit it to the heavenly destination. Some “conservative” theologians tend to emphasize an infallibility that somehow springs into existence from a doctrine simply having been repeated many times, especially with seriousness, by the pope (so that’s one extreme). A more moderate view of “moderate infallibilism” I shared before you joined us here:
    Dulles’ paper “Moderate Infallibilism” appeared as a contribution to a Lutheran-Catholic dialogue document “Teaching Authority and Infallibility in the Church”. Greg Krehbiel comments
    “Dulles has clearly argued that the hierarchical infallibility of the church is conditioned by its reception among the faithful — even the faithful outside the institutional borders of the Roman Catholic Church.”
    http://www.crowhill.net/journeyman/Vol1No3/dulles.html
    The full picture of Dulles’ self-described “moderate infallibilism” is perhaps better explained in “The Convergence of Theology” (Paulist Press) which (p.81-2) describes Dulles’ position so:
    “moderate infallibilism” takes into account not only the limitations and conditions that were acknowledged by Vatican I but also others that follow from sound principles of Catholic theology but were not mentioned in the conciliar definition. Among these latter limitations and conditions, the first described by Dulles is that a papal definition must be in agreement with scripture and tradition (…) [Dulles] “a valid defintion could not be in violation of the true meaning of the Scripture or contrary to previous infallible pronouncements.”
    The second is that a papal definition must be in agreement with the present faith of the church. (…) Dulles concludes: “If in a given instance the assent of the Church were evidently not forthcoming, this could be interpreted as a signal that the pope had perhaps exceeded his competence and that some necessary condition for an infallible act had not been fulfilled.”
    The third condition is agreement with the universal episcopate (…) He draws the conclusion: “If the bishops with moral unanimity held the contrary, one would be put on notice that the conditions for a genuinely infallible act on the part of the pope might not have been fulfilled.”
    The fourth condition Dulles describes as “sufficient investigation.” Here one deals with a question on which the majority and the minority at Vatican I were deeply divided (…) In the aftermath of Vatican I, many bishops of the minority found in this sentence [“… sounding out the mind of the Church …. using other helps … have found consonant …”] the help they needed to be able to give their assent to the dogma, insisting that what the popes had done in the past they would continue to do, and indeed could not fail to do. Dulles expresses his agreement with them, saying: “Perhaps in our day, thanks to a greater appreciation of the many ways in which the Spirit instructs the Church, we should recognize that adequate investigation of the sources of revelation is a true condition for an infallible teaching. This view, proposed by the minority at Vatican I, could, I believe, be integrated into a moderate infallibilism.”
    OK, now with that lens of “moderate infalliblism”, we can show that your supposed “contradiction” would not be a problem here. For under “moderate infallibilism” if a purported infallible doctrine were, as Avery Dulles puts it, “in violation of the true meaning of the Scripture or contrary to previous infallible pronouncements”, then for that very reason it would not be infallible in character. (FWIW, then Ratzinger, espoused something at least in some respects similar to “moderate infallibilism” in “Das neue Volk Gottes: Entwurfe zur Ekklesiologie” p.144)
    WRT to the Gospel narrative itself and the related data of revelation, I think it important to realize that our primary task in appropriating said narrative and digesting said data is not in employing them for apologetic purposes or for the purposes of shoring up our own epistemological edifice. Our primary call there is to see what this reveals about God and to thus advance in our interior contemplation of god. For ex., it may reveal something about God’s tender care for his church (perhaps the rehabilitation of Peter would better be an example of this, but I think you get my point) and that might give us better insight theological and cause both our minds and hearts to draw closer to god, to the Divine. It may reveal something about our own nature or our the social reality of ecclesial communion in which we inhere or participate and that understanding far from being opposed to contemplation of God would be divine contemplation in self-contemplation as gift of God or as bride of God if you prefer. God’s word is not an axe of apologetics to wield in verbal battle, but where in our encounter with it, the light of divine economy is able to transform our very being. In an apologetic context, I think it should be kept in mind the ordering of any passage or datum to truth and to goodness and to beauty. We seek to remove that which might obscure the truth found or more whole in Catholic tradition, primarily because that truth itself is of intrinsic value in being revelatory of the True, the Good, the Beautiful, which is God, revelatory by way of the music of divine economy. IMO, subordinating that truth (even in preservation of it), by way of instrumentalizing data of revelation and the scriptures in association with them, to the good of effecting a social communion (conversion to the church) is wrong. As John Paul II taught, we preach the Gospel not primarily to gain converts but primarily for the sake of the glory of God, [only the preceding is to be attributed to the pope] which glory is revealed in every morsel of the bread of life, from heaven, that is the word of God.

100. “Christ is not a polygamist”
     Vladimir,
     FWIW, Peter Kreeft in his book “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Heaven (But Never Dreamed of Asking)”, says in speaking of the topic of “sex” in heaven, which “sex” he understand broadly and fundamentally spiritual (though as it relates to man, still bodily) — so while he ultimately affirms the obtaining of “sex” in heaven, he remains ultimately agnostic on whether coitus would be the form it would take and skeptical as to whether it would somehow be the most preferable expression of sex (this is not in preference to other earthly forms, but in preference to forms not known presently to us) — that as regards earth and its circumstances, polygamy is something not commended unto us that polygamy of spirit as would prevail in heaven would be a great virtue. You’ll have to read the book (the website doesn’t cover everything that the book does on this matter) to do justice to his ideas. I can’t fully explicate it in this forum.
     Anyway (and now this following conclusion is my own interpretation, not necessarily Kreeft’s), if polygamy of spirit would be a virtue, then it would seem to me that as regards Christ having multiple spiritual brides or metaphorical brides that that could not be rightly criticized as less than ideal. Regardless, in Catholic tradition, nuns are sometimes referred to as Brides of Christ and even dress in a way on certain days in the course of their vocational pursuit that bears some resemblance to bridal imagery (in ordinary weddings). Nuns also sometimes speak of their being wedded to Christ in their peculiar vocation in consecrated life.
     Of course, also, outside of those customs which are arguably not merely customs but part of the patrimony of Tradition, there is the spiritual teaching that any Christian — even males — can be mystically married to God, to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. This is mystical marriage in a more metaphorical and spiritualized sense.
     Anyway, I don’t think it’s authentic to argue against a multiplicity of sects on the basis of some indictment against polygamy. Besides, as to polygamy itself, though it is enjoined by the New Law, it was permitted in the Old. And I’m not sure that Christ would be considered bound by positive law. As to polygamy and natural law, FWIW, St. Thomas teaches as regards polygyny that while not directly contrary to natural law that it is not conducive to adherence to natural law (based on his view that polygyny would tend to not encourage friendship which was a critical element in his understanding of marriage)
     Also, someone educate me if I am wrong, but the slogan “Christ is not a polygamist” in the context of dealing with sects outside of Catholic orthodoxy or communion, was not employed by the church fathers. AFAIK, it’s something that’s been popularized (to the extent it has been) relatively recently.
     What I am objecting is not so much actually the factuality behind the slogan but its moral dimension. In any event, AFAIK, virtually all Christians acknowledge that there is one catholic church. Indeed Lutherans and others proclaim it so in their liturgical celebrations. What some evangelical Christians maintain however is that the oneness of this church need not be constituted in a hiearchical oneness centered around the pope. That much ISTM is true since after all we do not always have a pope and the catholic church does not cease to exist nor cease to be one during an interregnum.
     Within Catholic tradition there is variance in ecclesiology as it relates to the church catholic versus the church local. Cardinal Walter Kasper advanced the view that the local church has some kind of logical or ontological priority to the church catholic; then Cardinal Ratzinger disagreed and advanced the view that the church catholic was prior in some way to the local church. This debate was public and included in publications.
     frankie:
     perhaps if you acquaint yourself more with Cardinal Kasper’s ecclesiology you would become better acquainted with the variance within Catholic ecclesiology as well as be more open to other things Catholic. On forums such as these and probably on the internet generally (on any subject, even not religious), you are likely to gain a more narrow than warranted impression of the state of affairs. I would recommend picking up Avery Dulles’ book Models of the Church which is only about ten dollars on amazon and if you don’t have access to a library with it, usually free through inter-library loan which networks libraries nationwide.

101. FWIW,
     My own view of the keys, is that the keys of the kingdom of God (“heaven” is arguably interchangeable with “God” here) refer to the keys of the kingdom of God versus the powers that be in the “kingdom of Satan” (or the kingdom of heaven versus the kingdom of the netherworld). “Kingdom of Satan” is a phrase traditional in Catholic spirituality with some measure of theological richness. This accords with some of the context in terms of the gates of the netherworld (associated with Satan) not prevailing against the church. In terms of binding and loosing, that could be in reference to binding and loosing as regards angelic (i.e. demonic) power and also as regards the parallel of loosing and binding sins (in John) — both would be examples of an exercise of the power that pertains to the kingdom of God as received by the Church catholic. I think the primary meaning is that the Church catholic has that power of the kingdom of God. This doesn’t necessarily mean that every Christian would be wise to be an exorcist, for example — that only priests can be exoricists would not mean that the power of exorcism was not proper to the Church catholic. Ditto for the other more contentious issues. To use a secular analogy, the power to wage war is proper to the American nation, even if it be so that the power is only duly exercised by the American nation in the institutions per its historical constitution of the Congress or Presidency.
     Jesus in promising that power to Peter may be honoring him and this may obliquely indicate a certain primacy of honor (honor doesn’t necessarily exclude other kinds of primacy) but I think the church fathers (with the very few exceptions) were right to turn to other scripture (ex. Peter as rock) in defending Peter’s primacy.
     So I think more than a question of whether the keys or power of the kingdom of heaven versus the kingdom of the netherworld is proper to the church catholic — on that I think we should all agree — the real difference in ecclesiology is found in how that church catholic is (divinely or by Jesus or the apostles) constituted. If it is constituted in a hiearchical fashion, then the fact that the power of the keys is proper to the church catholic (per Augustine) does not necessarily mean that it would be duly exercized by every member of the church. FWIW, I think a secular ideal of democracy, or its secular root, has colored our discussion in various ways, and in so doing obscured the truth.
     Let’s consider something less controverted. The power or authority to teach the gentiles is given to the church catholic. That doesn’t mean however that every Christian would be right in taking upon himself to teach since Paul says that some are called to be teachers whereas others are not so called. The hiearchy would consist of those who have answered a calling to teach with a certain authority, to forgive with a certain authority, and so forth. I think that aspect of call and the hierachy as comprising of Christians who have simply answered that call would be fruitful in this discussion to contemplate as well.

102. I am not posting in this thread, today, because I am grumpy and my sleep cycle has become all weird (I got 10 1/2 hours of sleep, but I am still tired). Rather than post things that might not be helpful, I will sit back and read the discussion, for once, rather than stick my nose it. I hope to be back in shape next week, but I think it wise to let the other posters speak. I am not required to post. Sometimes, sitting back and watching the narrative can be better, especially since the posts are meant to be helpful. All you would learn from me is that posting without adequate rest not only harms spelling, but syntax, as well.
     I trust the Catholic Faith will be well represented, here, anyway.
     The Chicken

103. A ruse by any other name would still smell as fake…
     Take care and God bless,
     Inocencio
     J+M+J

104. SDG,
     Everyone of the scholars that you quoted regarding Isa 22:22 I would agree with. The are analyzing how the word key is used as a metaphor. You need to prove to me that Isa 22:22 speaks of Petrine Authority.
     Vladimir + SDG,
     Everyone makes a private interpretation and I spent quite some studying the veracity of scripture before I appealed to scripture as my final authority. This was done by attending Seminary learning Greek + Hebrew and reading the Bible in German. I also had 1.5 years of Latin in college. I think I have done sufficient homework.
     Again you ask for proofs, however I am limited by the size of the comboboxes( lest the Rulz nip me in the bud). I don’t want to write a dissertation on every topic because this would defeat my purpose. The data
     on every topic is readily available for the serious reader.
     Interestingly every Catholic uses the Church fathers as their source for the Catholic model of church. The Reformers used these same Church Fathers to justify the Protestant model. Scholarship has improved so much that the Catholic church was forced to redefine what the definition of church was during Vatican II. I find it amazing that a 2000 year old institution is not sure what is exactly the church.

105. “Everyone makes a private interpretation…”
     LOL!

106. Everyone of the scholars that you quoted regarding Isa 22:22 I would agree with.

     Wow, that’s a switch. Before you said “the scripture of Isa 22:22 has no application to Matt 16,” which is exactly the opposite of what the scholars I quoted said. Have you had a change of heart?

     You need to prove to me that Isa 22:22 speaks of Petrine Authority.

     Um, no, I don’t have to prove that, because I don’t believe it, because it isn’t true.
     What Isa 22:22 speaks of is not Petrine authority, but the office of chief steward in the OT household of the Davidic king. The point is not that Isaiah was prophesying the papacy, or something, but rather that Jesus deliberately invoked the OT institution of the Davidic king’s chief steward in order to illustrate and explain the role of Peter in what he, the true and final Son of David, was now building.
     IOW, Jesus is essentially saying, “The Davidic kings had their chief stewards; in my kingdom, you, Peter, will be chief steward.” That’s more or less what the scholars I quoted recognize is happening here. Is that what you now accept as well?

     Again you ask for proofs, however I am limited by the size of the comboboxes( lest the Rulz nip me in the bud).

     Nice try, but at this point you’re a lot more likely to get dinged for throwing out inflammatory claims without backing them up than you are on word count. Go on, start throwing out some evidence and let me worry about whether you’re getting too verbose.

     Interestingly every Catholic uses the Church fathers as their source for the Catholic model of church. The Reformers used these same Church Fathers to justify the Protestant model. Scholarship has improved so much that the Catholic church was forced to redefine what the definition of church was during Vatican II. I find it amazing that a 2000 year old institution is not sure what is exactly the church.

     Wrong, wrong, wrong. Cardinal Newman’s Essay on the Development of Doctrine is all the rebuttal these misguided sentences need (including the bit on the Reformers “using the Church Fathers” to justify the “Protestant model [sic!].”

107. “(E)very Catholic uses the Church fathers as their(sic) source for the Catholic model of church.”
     I didn’t know that. In fact, I don’t know of ANY Catholic who uses the Church Fathers as his source for this.

108. To those to whom my preferences matter an iota:
     There’s been at least three jokes now made on my name Ruse as it relates to “rose”. Maybe it was funny the first time, but it is getting tiresome and frankly annoying (to me, if that should matter to you) If this continues, then I will have to think of a new name.
     frankie:
     FWIW, my interpretation of what SDG said wrt to you in terms of hanging yourself on your own rope was not an expression by SDG of an eagerness to find you in violation, let alone an expression of desire to provide ample temptation that you might violate.
     If you fear it will be too long, why not at least give some inkling of it and then we can proceed from there. Or alternatively you could just host the material in some other place, give a summary of it here, and provide a link for those who wish to delve deeper.

109. FWIW,
     I think the use of “sic” to indicate substantive disagreement (for ex. with Pantheism being compatible in any variant with Christianity or their being a single model of the church in Protestantism) is fine. But using “sic” to make manifest errors of syntax (or spelling), especially without elucidation, is usually something gratuitous and not so in a good way — usually, it’s obnoxious and sometimes (not above) a piling on. I have found that it is more common when one is deriding someone than it is when one is praising someone … so that leaves me to wonder whether there might not be a motivation other than pure elucidation there.
     In the interests of “full disclosure”, I used “sic” wrt to something in an article recently, but I did so in the context of presenting the article as praiseworthy as well as in the same post praising the author.
     Since I don’t value my opinion here as important (or rather the underlying matter to be that important), I don’t anticipate sharing it again if for nothing less than to out of courtesy not be more redundant than I already tend in the speech of frankenstein — if you will — to be.

110. SDG,
     Regarding Isa 22:22 we will just have to disagree. Clearly Protestant interpretation is not the same as Catholic otherwise Protestants would be submitted to Rome. Even F.F. Bruce, who was a strong Evangelical does not agree with your interpretation.

111. Ruse,
     I would not worry about. SDG is one of the great hypocrites on this site. He comes across as more holy than thou, but has a hidden hostility that reveals a serious character deficiency.
     Frankie

112. I will admit that my grammar and spelling are not very good. I am a scientist good with Mathematical formulas but not the greatest with English. My German is actually better than my English.

113. …SDG is one of the great hypocrites on this site.

     That’s very ungrateful of you, given that he’s probably the only person here who doesn’t want you to be banned.

114. Years ago I read a book whose primary thesis was that the primary cause for the Reformation. By having the Bible printed it allowed a much larger audience of readers to study the Bible. Therefore Bible scholarship is better today than anytime since the 3rd century. Since Christianity is based on Christ and the Bible is His Word and not beholden to speculative history. Protestants have therefore rederived all Theology again from the Bible.
     Catholics can continue to use their historical and Magisterial model, which I argue is a postulate that is unprovable.
     One of my favorite Questions is to ask a Catholic to prove to me that Peter ever ministered in Rome using historically verifiable sources( crucifixion excluded. The Eastern Orthodox state he was the Bishop of Antioch at the same time that Catholics say he was Bishop of Rome.

115. “…to prove to *me*…”
     The highlighted word would be the key one.

116. “SDG is one of the great hypocrites on this site.”
     The manners of a barbarian.

117. Regarding Isa 22:22 we will just have to disagree. Clearly Protestant interpretation is not the same as Catholic otherwise Protestants would be submitted to Rome. Even F.F. Bruce, who was a strong Evangelical does not agree with your interpretation.

     In other words, you haven’t got a clue how to proceed with the argument. All you know is, you disagree with me — but you can’t even say what exactly you disagree with, i.e., whether you agree or disagree that Isa 22 is the background for Matt 16.

     SDG is one of the great hypocrites on this site. He comes across as more holy than thou, but has a hidden hostility that reveals a serious character deficiency.

     Why, Frankie, is this a tactical retreat to more personal attacks and generalized moral condemnation in an effort to bait me into disinviting you, so that you won’t have to admit the bankruptcy of your argument?
     If so, would the more charitable thing be to put you out of your misery — and prevent you from using this blog for further acts of injustice and uncharity, to your own detriment — or to keep you on the hook and make you face up to your errors?
     If I thought there were any chance of the latter outcome, I would give that a try. But no, I think we have enough data now to be pretty sure that you don’t know how to admit a mistake. And the bankruptcy of your views is by now apparent to everyone else.
     So, consider yourself disinvited from further participation. If you want to object, feel free to use my Decent Films contact form.

118. You’re right, Matheus. I admire SDG’s patience.

119. OTOH, to paraphrase Ecclesiastes, there is a time for patience, and a time to unsheath Glamdring.

120. frankie,
     Besides the recommendation already given, I would recommend “The Church” by (Lord/Reverend/Father) Richard McBrien. It has been praised as a “balanced” appraisal and it goes into things like the history of ecclesiology or the church’s self-understanding. It may help you in your search.
     Perhaps, it would have been better to communicate your moral appraisal of SDG in private. I believe he provides a way for individuals to contact him so on his decentfilms website. As someone who himself has been the victim of public comments as to my moral character (for ex. my name was taken from the suggestion affirmed as certain (or sufficiently certain to be asserted without qualification) by one, affirmed as plausible by another, that my posts to the extent that they seem to espouse good will are nothing more than a ruse; as another ex. one individual used to suggest repeatedly that I was a patron of prostitutes, though he ceased doing so after Tim J shared his opinion that it was bad form). IMO, all individuals, this side of perfection, are to one extent or another hypocritical, especially depending on how one defines “hypocrisy.” Certainly all individuals espouse and speak of a moral theory that they themselves do not perfectly follow. So to charge Christians for example with “hypocrisy” for not practicing as they might preach IMO is not that significant a charge. What I personally find significant is when an individual presents himself as being something other than he is as it relates to the moral dimension. So a Christian who preached something and claimed perfect adherence to that preaching when in fact he faltered or deviated from it, would be doing something rightly to be criticized. AFAIK, SDG has not done that or done that anymore so than would the average man. In fact, SDG, to his credit or the credit of God’s grace working in him, apologized to me for those occasions in which he might not have been faithful or perfect in his fairness or charity.
     I would hope btw that no one wishes evil (privation of good) on another individual.
     I am not sure to what good end or what intrinsic good your statement regarding SDG is supposed to serve or be a participation in. As I have suggested here, to the extent that your opinion might serve the good of SDG, ISTM to have been better expressed in private. So if the good was instrumental to your statement as opposed to inhering within your statement, then I am not sure how your statement is supposed to serve my good or the good of any other reader. Perhaps you thought it would aprise us of something so that we might not be misled by the views of SDG on say theological or political or artistic matters. I think being swayed by “celebrity” and “authority” would be a valid concern; I can’t speak for anyone else and indeed I fear not all approach things in this manner, but I try (and sometimes fail) to be swayed or not simply by the words before me and not by the person who happens to utter them. To his credit, Scott Hahn, once and I’m sure on other occasions as well not known or recollected by me, on Catholic Answers spoke of how he was reluctant to share his opinion on a certain matter (under discussion) due to issues surrounding people giving more weight to his opinion — owing to its source — than might deserve. I would hope that all persons who engage the public, be it in a tiny backwater of the internet or a larger scale, would emulate that humility of Scott Hahn. I was impressed by other acts of humility by this man which I will leave for a more opportune time, if ever, to share.

121. frankie,
     I apologize that my post was put up following your disinvitation. At the time of writing such had not obtained; however I should perhaps have anticipated its probability and for that lack of foresight for which I may perhaps have been quasi-consciously culpable, I apologize. Good luck and I hope the books I recommended help you.

122. Confidential to Frankie: I really, really hope that comment at Decent Films was really from you. If so, peace, and feel free to write again if you feel inclined. (Peace anyway, actually.)

123. Dear Ruse,
     Thanks for your thoughts. I’ve both read and heard Dr. Kreeft on Heaven, Sex and all permutations thereof. I think he’d likely disagree with the notion of “Polygamy of Spirit” for many reasons, the most obvious being the fact that our individual marriage to Christ in “spirit” is directly contingent on our incorporation in the Body, and our communion with others in that Body, pseudo-sexual or otherwise, is likewise contingent on that same incorporation. We commune with Christ on an individual level insofar as we are incorporated in the Bride, and at least in my view, it is only within that context that we become His true “spiritual spouse”. In other words, as I understand it, it’s only through said incorporation that we take on the flesh of the true and perfect visage of humanity, and only thus are our individual selves brought in turn to embody the truly perfected image of God required for any sense of an “individual marriage”. I think this is in line with some of the more organic verses like “I am the vine and you are the branches”. In embracing the whole “tree” of the Bride, he does embrace each individual branch, but only in the context of the whole tree.
     Plus, I think he’d agree that sex is about the closest thing to this communion this side of the eschaton, but that it vastly pales in comparison to the true notion of what communion within the Body really entails on the other side. Thus, it’s not really valid to suppose a very concrete and describable practice such as polygamy is somehow moral based on a completely transcendental and indescribable notion such as heavenly communion.
     And yes, I do agree that Lutherans et al. do only concede one Body. I don’t think they spend a lot of time contemplating what that context of a Body means though, and thus their theology (as expressed here by frankie) is flawed. Simply put, you can’t have a functional Body with multiple brains. If each local church has the same Authority, and those same local churches bicker incessantly about everything… then it leads me to one of two conclusions: A) Christ wasn’t talking about a human, structured Body (which then raises issues about marriage) or B) There really are a bunch of Bodies, whether they recognize it or not. Both are false.
     And… for what it’s worth, I think Cardinal Ratzinger has the better argument regarding Ecclesiology. While I respect Cardinal Kasper and the great work he’s done for the Church, I just don’t think his view is very coherent in this respect.
     But my opinion counts for diddly-squat in terms of Theology, so I’m sure Cardinal Kasper wouldn’t be too troubled to know I disagree.
     While I’m on the subject of disagreement… I respect your opinion, but I vociferously disagree with your recommendation of Fr. McBrien. I think folks like frankie already have enough of a dissenting opinion all their own, and there’s no sense in fuddling them with confusion…
     Thanks to all and God Bless, it’s been a fun conversation!
     Pax.

124. Frankie 2009 = “As stated before I believe the Canon of the Bible was defined by 95 AD. It took the state church 300 more years to figure out what was known by 95AD.”
     “We are obliged to yield many things to the Papists (Catholics) that they possess the Word of God which we received from them otherwise we should have known nothing about it.” (Martin Luther c. 1529 from Commentary on St. John ch.16)

125. “Plus, I think he’d agree that sex is about the closest thing to this communion this side of the eschaton…”
     Bollox. That sentence should be considered true EXCEPT for the Eucharist, which is better, if not always as rapturous communion of persons.

126. Vladimir,
     Kreeft’s own idea is as I had described, namely that “polygamy of spirit” is a “virtue” amongst the blessed in heaven or the world to come. Those are his own words, verbatim. To be clear, he himself uses the phrase, verbatim, “polygamy of spirit” and he himself describes that as, verbatim, a “virtue”, in the realm of heaven or the world to come. He writes of this in the book I mentioned in the context of affirming that sexual relations (of some fashion) obtain in that realm and that unlike is ordered on earth, that “polygamy of spirit” there would be a “virtue” (it’s verbatim as to the word; he may have said “virtuous” instead of “virtue” — “polygamy of spirit” I am virtually 100% sure is verbatim to the letter.
     I recommend you pick up the book I mentioned. Evidently you have not read it (perhaps you have merely read what is available on his website or other books) since it is within that book that, again, Kreeft, describes in relation to heavenly sexual communion, that “polygamy of spirit” is (in contrast to certain earthly circumstances) a “virtue” — again these are his own terms. If I haven’t already mentioned it, Kreeft considers sex to be fundamentally a spiritual reality and as having its ontological grounding in God. The website is not a full reproduction of what is in the book; you should read the book 🙂
     However, it would appear that Kreeft uses language just like yourself in saying Christ was not a polygamist wrt to the church. I did clearly distinguish between Kreeft’s own idea and what I made of it as it relates to your statement. Prescinding of what should or shouldn’t be made of his idea in indirect application to my critique of your statement, I also relied on certain sacred customs IIRC.
     In any event, it’s not all that important, but I just feel that we are using statements that are more geared to shock another person’s intellect into submission if you will (ex. Christ was not a polygamist or the Holy Spirit was not a dead-beat father) rather than tuning our words as closely as possible to truth. Perhaps that is just a difference of style. Regardless, it’s not all that important, if amenable to you, let’s move on to other things (if you have any questions on Kreeft, I think it better just to read the book I mentioned).
     The way I understand Kasper’s position which can be confusing to read is that Kasper holds that the church catholic is ontologically grounded in the various local churches, the relata among them, the metaphysically positive properties that inhere with respect to the communion catholic of local churches, and the relata among this catholic communion, the various local churches, and/or the relata among the various local churches (so this would employ a higher order logic). At least that is how I would cash it out in terms of a more formal and analytic philosophical approach to which I would be more accustomed. This is obviously not the language that Kapser himself uses and of course he might not agree with my interpretation of him, but I think this account (in particular the subtle terminological novelity I introduced in distinguising — for the sake of the definition if nothing else — between the communion catholic of local churches and the church catholic sheds light on Kasper’s view, deficiencies in Ratzinger’s (which to me frankly is rather bizarre) and perhaps some ways in which they may have talked past each other or not fully communicated with each other for some other reason. One of the things analytic philosophy is often admired for is its clarity of terminology and elucidation of concept. FWIW, Kasper has criticized, at times, Ratzinger of caricaturizing his position. For all I know, he might consider my own characterization to be even worse 😉

127. Dear Ruse,
     Thanks again for your input. I have actually read “Everything You Ever Wanted to Know About Heaven (But Never Dreamed of Asking)”, and there’s a copy sitting on my shelf right now. Unfortunately, I don’t have the memory for names and books that you seem to wield, and thus I don’t remember specific passages verbatim. In any event, I don’t think my point in the last post hinges on whether or not, verbatim, Dr. Kreeft used the exact, verbatim, words, verbatim, “polygamy of Spirit” verbatim and virtue verbatim. (verbatim.) He clearly uses such terminology metaphorically to describe in part an incomprehensible communion of persons in the eschaton. To take such a wording and attempt to extract from it the validity of a worldly and very comprehensible relationship such as the idea of Christ having more than one earthly Bride is, well… specious.
     Dr. Kreeft also uses the metaphor “Big Mommy” to describe our innate feelings toward the Ocean. But I think it’d be a stretch to say that because the Ocean contains many seas, then it seems futile to condemn the thought that Children have more than one biological mother. Turning the metaphor for the indescribable into a rule for the describable just doesn’t seem ok. And it’s definitely not what Dr. Kreeft would have intended.
     That said, while I think the Polygamy statement does have shock value, I think the shock draws from the fact that it is revelatory of the truth. Like I said above: It’s a Body. Drawing from that, the only seemingly coherent version of the communion within the Church is the Catholic one.
     With regard to Cardinals Kasper and Ratzinger, I think your sketch of Kasper’s argument is a decent one, though my understanding is considerably limited. I still side with the Pope for a number of reasons. First among them, I find his exegesis of Acts 2 compelling and sound (again, not that my approval means anything) second, I think the apostolic Kerygma supports his thesis much better, and third, it never seemed to make sense to me to give logical primacy to an accidental property of the Church in contrast to her ultimate and non-local creation and destiny. (If she’s forever becoming intimately united with the word made flesh, and therefore the embodiment of truth, she must therefore be an apocalypse of this truth as it were, and thus must by definition be universal from inception, regardless of her physical location). Furthermore, I think while Analytical Philosophy is an awesome tool for exploring and learning, it ultimately, like all other logical tools of philosophy, breaks down when presented with the transcendental and completely Other nature of God. The Church is created and revealed to us. Thus, we must start with the seeds of revelation, the kerygma, we are given. I think Cardinal Ratzinger is absolutely correct in this respect. But again, I’m a lot like the deaf man saying he enjoyed the symphony, so what do I know…
     Anyway, I’ve got a ton to do today, as I’m sure you do as well. If you like, you may have the last word here, but I don’t think I’ll have time to get back to you. Thanks for the conversation, and God Bless!
     Pax.

128. Vladimir, my point was not that Christ had more than one bride (my point in case you didn’t understand was not the factuality of your statement but its moral propriety — see the “shock value” stuff below) nor do I think my reasoning is or frankly polite to be characterized as specious; it would have sufficed to call it fallacious. I don’t think btw, that Christ’s relationship with the church qua bride is “very comprehensible” and I am fairly sure that would be if not in flat contradiction to, in great tension with Catholic doctrine in terms of understanding the church to be a mystery (in the sense of not being well, comprehensible) … and since we are dealing with the church as she relates to christ, the mysterious nature of that relation will be all the more mysterious as the relation itself pertains to christ and not just to the church. In case you missed my saying so, Kreeft himself, as I later found out, uses the same apologetic language you do — so you are, if you like Kreeft, in good company in that respect. WRT to “polygamy of spirit” more so than any particular acts or expressions, the impression I had in my reading was that he was focused on it being “virtue” as it relates to affection … he has this whole idea that some individuals are more sexually oriented to each other affectively than others, and that this is a spectrum of chemistry, if you will … so in case those who have not read his book be misled, I think it’s worth noting that by “polygamy of spirit” Kreeft wasn’t indicating an indiscriminate situation where everyone’s sexual affection to any other (of the opposite sex) is exactly equal.
     I am surprised and glad that you acknowledge the “shock value” nature of that kind of apologetic language. I am saddened however, that in full realization of its nature, you nevertheless defend it. I would just invite you to give it a second thought. We persuade intellects by the persuasive power of truth no? It seems to me, then that to the extent a statement is of “shock value” — even if the statement correspond to fact — that it seeks to persuade not by the attractiveness of truth to one’s interlocuter’s intellect but by a (partial) instrumentalization of one’s interlocuter’s passions, that a certain kind of commotion of passion might lead a change of belief to be effected in him. Traditionally, all authentic human activity is to be ordered through the intellect, in teh intellect’s apprehension of good. ISTM that a human person who would be governed in his intellectual activity (belief formation) in part by a commotion of passion (the “shock value”) would be in that respect be disordered. Working to achieve a good end (right belief in another) by means (partially) of effecting such a disorder, seems to me to be intrinsically evil. As you can see my moral opinion here centers around the human person and what authentic human nature means and the respect we are to have for that in each other. It is just my fallible opinion and others hold to a different view.

129. On his website, Kreeft says of the heavenly order that “promiscuity of spirit” is a “virtue.” So, while I don’t have the book to check at the moment, it is likely that I misrecalled “promiscuity” for “polygamy” I just thought I’d set the record straight on that one, to the extent that one might call it that.

130. OK, I was able to look it up in the book (through Google) and verify the above. Also apparently, much of the text of the book is reproduced faithfully on his website (though I think some material is still missing; the entirety of the book, I doubt is on his webste). The reason for my minor misrecollection was apparently, Kreeft’s use of “promiscuity of spirit” in heaven versus “monogamy” that “is for earth” … so I think, obviously, that the meaning was not obscured by that .. though I suppose “promiscuity” has a more free-spirited ring to it. In any event, to the extent that anyone would care, I apologize for the minor error. Here’s an excerpt for those interested:
     It could certainly be spiritual intercourse—and, remember, that includes sexual intercourse because sex is spiritual. This spiritual intercourse would mean something more specific than universal charity. It would be special communion with the sexually complementary; something a man can have only with a woman and a woman only with a man. We are made complete by such union: “It is not good that the man should be alone.” And God does not simply rip up His design for human fulfillment. The relationship need not be confined to one in Heaven. Monogamy is for earth. On earth, our bodies are private. In Heaven, we share each other’s secrets without shame, and voluntarily. In the Communion of Saints, promiscuity of spirit is a virtue.
     The relationship may not extend to all persons of the opposite sex, at least not in the same way or degree. Ifit did extend to all, it would treat each differently simply because each is different—sexually as well as in other ways. I think there must be some special “kindred souls” in Heaven that we are designed to feel a special sexual love for. That would be the Heavenly solution to the earthly riddle of why in the world John falls for Mary, of all people, and not for Jane, and why romantic lovers feel their love is fated, “in the stars”, “made in Heaven”.
     But this would differ from romantic love on earth in that it would be free, not driven; from soul to body, not from body to soul. Nor would it feel apart from or opposed to the God-relationship, but a part of it or a consequence of it: His design, the wave of His baton. It would also be totally unselfconscious and unselfish: the ethical goodness of agape joined to the passion of eros; agape without external, abstract law and duty, and eros without selfishness or animal drives.
     http://www.peterkreeft.com/topics/sex-in-heaven.htm
     http://books.google.com/books?id=qVqJetnPT4QC&pg=PA129&lpg=PA129

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