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Sola Scriptura?

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    #62
    kelly1
    Registered Users Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    antiskeptic wrote: »
    What strikes me as rank nonsense is the reliance on slivers of scripture to support massive doctrines.
    Again, you're assuming Sola Scriptura as true. Some doctrines are not explicitly laid out in Scripture e.g. the Immaculate Conception of Mary, but there are many verses to support it. The same goes for Purgatory and apostolic succession.


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    #63
    kelly1
    Registered Users Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    antiskeptic wrote: »
    The Catholic position, being posited in this thread, is like that: church fathers, division, it's always been this way, chopped up Bibles, pebbles/rocks, One True Church, God would have ensured an authority...
    ....
    Where is the beginning though? What is the thing which gets this all going - and where does it come from? Where is the starting point, from which all else is pulled, like rabbits from a hat?
    The Catholic position is that God revealed all truths about Himself through Jesus. Jesus taught the apostles and in turn gave them the authority to teach others (Mt 28:20). The apostles then ordained others e.g. Matthias, the Church Fathers etc who also had the authority to teach and interpret scripture.

    Noting too surprising or mysterious there.


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    #64
    antiskeptic
    Registered Users Posts: 9,555 ✭✭✭antiskeptic


    kelly1 wrote: »
    The Catholic position is that God revealed all truths about Himself through Jesus. Jesus taught the apostles and in turn gave them the authority to teach others (Mt 28:20). The apostles then ordained others e.g. Matthias, the Church Fathers etc who also had the authority to teach and interpret scripture.

    Noting too surprising or mysterious there.

    Your position not the Churches position. Whats your starting point for evaluating the RC position.


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    #65
    kelly1
    Registered Users Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    antiskeptic wrote: »
    Your position not the Churches position. Whats your starting point for evaluating the RC position.
    Same as the RCC; I start with Jesus. Jesus founded the Universal Church, which later became known as the Catholic Church.


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    #66
    antiskeptic
    Registered Users Posts: 9,555 ✭✭✭antiskeptic


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Same as the RCC; I start with Jesus. Jesus founded the Universal Church, which later became known as the Catholic Church.

    How did you access this Jesus? Via own interpretation? Via personal encounrer. Via the RC position?

    If the latter then your starting point for evaluating the RC position is to accept the RC position as true. This is circular


    Is it the case that you find the RC position makes sense to you? That it seems to to to 'fit'. That it strikes you as logical.

    If so, your starting position is "that which makes sense to me".


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    #67
    kelly1
    Registered Users Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    antiskeptic wrote: »
    How did you access this Jesus? Via own interpretation? Via personal encounrer. Via the RC position?
    There wasn't any one moment where I first consciously encountered Jesus. I was loosely raised Catholic and in my teens drifted away from the Church into all sorts of spirtual dead-ends. After a trip to Lourdes in 2004 I had a strong urge to learn more about Christianity. So from reading the bible I came to understand more about Jesus and I was impressed by His love, truth and authority. From the biographies of the saints I came to learn how deep a relationship it's possible to have with Him. I love my encounters with Him in Mass, Holy Communion and Confession.


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    #68
    antiskeptic
    Registered Users Posts: 9,555 ✭✭✭antiskeptic


    kelly1 wrote: »
    There wasn't any one moment where I first consciously encountered Jesus. I was loosely raised Catholic and in my teens drifted away from the Church into all sorts of spirtual dead-ends. After a trip to Lourdes in 2004 I had a strong urge to learn more about Christianity. So from reading the bible I came to understand more about Jesus and I was impressed by His love, truth and authority. From the biographies of the saints I came to learn how deep a relationship it's possible to have with Him. I love my encounters with Him in Mass, Holy Communion and Confession.

    And I have no issue with that being an authentic way to meet Jesus and progress with him. I don't suppose my own way or the ways of others are without flaw, but suppose that God can meet us and us him, despite the flaws in our approach.

    You, however, suppose that you've arrived at truth-beyond-compare: that God initiated the RCC to function in the global way it does: God's representative on earth.

    You don't seem to realise that your view can be heavily influenced by yourself: it's a view made in your own image and likeness: raised a Catholic, finding yourself back there and reading within that framework. And because you find God there you suppose your track must be the right one - which is understandable enough since that's what we're all doing.

    I realise though, that I can accept/construct/adopt a theology in my own image and likeness. Because I understand that's the case, I'm forced to take the path of being open to adaptation. That whatever I think fixed now is open to being modified in the future.

    Sure, it would be great if there was indeed a One Verifiable Truth which I could spend my time navigating. But I don't know how I could arrive at such a thing when it's always open to being a construct in my own image and likeness.

    Much of what we have argued back and forth, afterall, is based on what we think is reasonable to us. And your reason needn't be at all reasonable to me.

    Sola scriptura is reasonable for someone who doesn't suppose a single verifiable truth possible or even necessary. Reasonable for someone who finds he can walk with the God he has experienced to more beneficial degree without RCC than he could with RCC. Reasonable to someone who doesn't see division as fatal to the progress of God's mechanism of both salvation and sanctification.


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    #69
    antiskeptic
    Registered Users Posts: 9,555 ✭✭✭antiskeptic


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Again, you're assuming Sola Scriptura as true. Some doctrines are not explicitly laid out in Scripture e.g. the Immaculate Conception of Mary, but there are many verses to support it. The same goes for Purgatory and apostolic succession.

    The whole of the Catholic church stands on a foundation of apostolic succession. It stands too on the notion of tradition. Weak scriptural support for these things mean weak foundations.

    Remember what I said about not being fooled when folk skirt over the beginnings. It matters less what you pull subsequently out of your hat. What matters is the foundation on which the hat is placed.

    Scripture doesn't provide the level of support that such foundations require. There is no place else to get that support - unless the founding fathers simply assumed apostolic succession / tradition based on what made sense to them.


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    #70
    kelly1
    Registered Users Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    Antiskeptic, what do you make of this excerpt from an epistle from Clement of Alexandria? Do you think the office of bishop is a fabrication?

    “And thus preaching through countries and cities, they appointed the first-fruits [of their labours], having first proved them by the Spirit, to be bishops and deacons of those who should afterwards believe. Nor was this any new thing, since indeed many ages before it was written concerning bishops and deacons. For thus saith the Scripture a certain place, ‘I will appoint their bishops in righteousness, and their deacons in faith.’… Our apostles also knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, and there would be strife on account of the office of the episcopate. For this reason, therefore, inasmuch as they had obtained a perfect fore-knowledge of this, they appointed those [ministers] already mentioned, and afterwards gave instructions, that when these should fall asleep, other approved men should succeed them in their ministry…For our sin will not be small, if we eject from the episcopate those who have blamelessly and holily fulfilled its duties.” Pope Clement, Epistle to Corinthians, 42, 44 (A.D. 98)


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    #71
    antiskeptic
    Registered Users Posts: 9,555 ✭✭✭antiskeptic


    kelly1 wrote: »
    Antiskeptic, what do you make of this excerpt from an epistle from Clement of Alexandria? Do you think the office of bishop is a fabrication?

    “And thus preaching through countries and cities, they appointed the first-fruits [of their labours], having first proved them by the Spirit, to be bishops and deacons of those who should afterwards believe. Nor was this any new thing, since indeed many ages before it was written concerning bishops and deacons. For thus saith the Scripture a certain place, ‘I will appoint their bishops in righteousness, and their deacons in faith.’… Our apostles also knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, and there would be strife on account of the office of the episcopate. For this reason, therefore, inasmuch as they had obtained a perfect fore-knowledge of this, they appointed those [ministers] already mentioned, and afterwards gave instructions, that when these should fall asleep, other approved men should succeed them in their ministry…For our sin will not be small, if we eject from the episcopate those who have blamelessly and holily fulfilled its duties.” Pope Clement, Epistle to Corinthians, 42, 44 (A.D. 98)

    Who is this Clement fellow and from whence doth he obtain any absolute authority/insight?

    I'm not looking for a biography. I'm looking for a compelling argument


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    #72
    kelly1
    Registered Users Posts: 5,026 ✭✭✭kelly1


    antiskeptic wrote: »
    Who is this Clement fellow and from whence doth he obtain any absolute authority/insight?

    I'm not looking for a biography. I'm looking for a compelling argument
    Clement was the 3rd successor of St Peter and be got his authority through ordination. The thing is, Clement isn't the only one who wrote about apostolic succession. You'll get the same message from any of the Church Fathers. So you can dismiss all this as fabrication or have the courage to educate yourself about the truth.

    http://www.churchfathers.org/category/the-church-and-the-papacy/apostolic-succession/

    Denying apostolic succession really amounts to wilful ignorance.


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