tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5596708332568087278.post15345122853994402..comments2024-01-24T10:39:27.668-05:00Comments on Coming Untrue: The Commentariat Speaks (7)Dr. S. L. Andersonhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06303707167715370504noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-5596708332568087278.post-53328397170592165852017-01-04T08:54:53.019-05:002017-01-04T08:54:53.019-05:00Don't concede too much ground to modern Cathol...Don't concede too much ground to modern Catholicism on this. It's worth keeping in mind that Catholicism would claim the events of Matthew 16 as the inception of the Catholic church - Peter there becoming, so they claim, the very first Pope. Of course Peter never referred to himself as Pope, was not treated as Pope, was not infallible ex Cathedra, didn't teach about purgatory or indulgences, the formal church process to become a "saint", the immaculate conception of Mary or her assumption and so on and so forth. All these things and many more were added later, sometimes much later, and without biblical authority. Despite being called Catholic now, Peter would not have understood the title Catholics give him. To Peter, there was a church. One. It was not Catholic with a capital C. And it was very, very simple.<br /><br />What we now have as the Catholic church is built on a long series of accretions over time. Councils and traditions added bits and the formal teaching of Catholicism changed quite dramatically. Some Councils were largely good, some rather awful. <br /><br />Over time, faithful adherents left the mainstream of Catholicism and returned to the simplicity of first century Christianity. They operated under different names in different places, but they left Catholicism as their consciences and the Spirit of God prompted them to do so. I would argue that it is these splinter groups, not the mainstream called Catholicism, that are the true Church. I suspect you and I would have a very great deal in common with first century so-called Catholics, very little in common with the modern variety.<br /><br />So who can lay claim to having "given" us the Bible? You're right of course - it's divinely given. But how "Catholic" was the Council of Nicaea in the first place way back in 325? Those in attendance there would barely recognize many of the current Catholic doctrines and it was not that Council that canonized the Apocrypha - that didn't happen until 1546. So which Bible do modern Catholics now want to lay claim to having "given"? The one from 325 which was largely a formality recognizing what was already the fact on the ground? Or the new one from 1546 which adds to it? Were they wrong then or are they wrong now? Berniehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/11964708678887990251noreply@blogger.com