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Am I Safe from Rome’s Anathemas?
A pseudonymous blogger under the penname Reginald de Piperno (RdP), responding to my opening post in my series on Trent (link to post), stated: For example, TF claims that he is under the anathema of Trent. But unless he is or was formally Catholic, this is flatly impossible. I do not understand the seeming fondness…
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Augustine on the "We Gave You the Scriptures" Argument
One argument that we sometimes hear from Roman Catholic apologists is an argument that Roman Catholicism gave us the Scriptures, in the sense of preserving them for us over the centuries. This claim is, of course, anachronistic (the folks who preserved the Scriptures from the 4th decade to the 4th century, for example, could hardly…
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Not Everything Trent Says about Justification is Wrong
Before I get into the bad parts of what Trent says about Justification, it is worth noting that not everything Trent says in its canons on Justification is bad: CANON I.-If any one saith, that man may be justified before God by his own works, whether done through the teaching of human nature, or that…
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Guilty Consciences at Trent?
I’m about to embark on a short series of posts on the topic Trent’s canons and decrees regarding justification. It’s worth noting that my series will be bringing me under the anathema of that council. I’ll come under its anathema because I’ll be taking the position that the the Roman Catholic doctrine on Justification derogates…
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Bad to Quote Lactantius?
Roman Catholic reader Mike Burgess commented on yesterday’s post (link), which quoted from Lactanatius, thus: St. Jerome, whom you enjoy quoting when the occasion suits, said of Lactantius, “If only Lactantius, almost a river of Ciceronian eloquence, had been able to uphold our cause with the same facility with which he overturns that of our…
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Forbidding to Marry
There is a very old error that derogates marriage and attempts to forbid marriage. In its extreme form, it forbids marriage of all Christians. In a less extreme form, it forbids marriage of office holders. It is that form that we see in the Roman Catholic church today. Introduction 1 Timothy 4:1-3 Now the Spirit…
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Natural Family Planning and the Traditional View on Sexual Relations
The introduction of and widespread insistence on a celibate priesthood seems to have led to a number of views in the Nicene era (give or take a hundred years), which continued to hold sway for a few generations after the Reformation. Thus, for example, it was believed that virginity was – in itself – a…
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Augustine vs. Rome – Definition of Grace
“Mercy and judgment I will sing to thee, O Lord, for it is only through unmerited mercy that anyone is freed, and only through deserved judgment that anyone is condemned.“(Augustine, On Faith, Hope, & Charity, as provided in Fathers of the Church, Volume 2, p. 447) The Reformed doctrine of grace, because it is drawn…
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Offered Often or Once?
We’re sometimes told that it an incorrect “either/or” mentality that causes us to reject the sacrifices of the mass on the basis that Christ was offered only once and not often. Yet Scripture itself has that mentality. Hebrews 9:24-2824 For Christ is not entered into the holy places made with hands, which are the figures…
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What About King Saul?
In response to my post regarding the one true shepherd (Christ) as contrasted with the Roman bishop who seeks essentially to usurp that role (link to my post) I have received a rather typical response. Rather than beginning by characterizing the response, let me provide it to you: In my reading of Catholic literature, I…