Darryl Hart has a thought-provoking post today on Rick Warren’s recent comments about what Rome and Protestants have in common. Warren’s comments are a sterling reminder of the importance of knowing our church history. Yes, Christians of all the major traditions receive . . . Continue reading →
Romanism
Imputation Works Both Ways
Even so, the magisterium has some explaining to do if you can swallow the idea that humans come into the world with the guilt of Adam’s sinful estate and then object to Protestants drawing a line between the imputation of Adam’s sin . . . Continue reading →
Honoring But Not Venerating
Obj. 1. The saints, on account of their virtues, are to be honored with the worship either of adoration (λατρεια) or of veneration (δουλεια). But it is not in the former sense that they are to be worshipped; because this form of . . . Continue reading →
Heidelberg 29–30: No Other Name (3): All Or Nothing
Since the garden humans have faced the temptation to listen to an authority claiming to compete with God’s authority. Since the beginning voices have questioned, “has God really said?” Since the beginning voices have raised doubts about whether there is really one . . . Continue reading →
The Babylonian Captivity Of The Papacy
On February 28, 2013, Pope Benedict XVI abdicated the papacy. Six days later, Jorge Mario Bergoglio, a Jesuit priest and archbishop of Buenos Aires, was elected by the College of Cardinals and installed as Pope Francis I, bringing to a conclusion a remarkable series . . . Continue reading →
The Cadaver Synod
“…this see of St. Peter always remains unblemished by any error”—Vatican I, Session 4 (July, 1870), cap. IV.6. …A man of exceptional intelligence, exemplary life, and strict asceticism (the only fault alleged against him was ambition), Formosus had bitter and relentless foes . . . Continue reading →
John Paul II, Sister, & Billy Sunday
Yet with Rome, the grandeur and spectacle of it all somehow overwhelms and masks the fact that its trading on fundamentally the same motive that drives TMZ. It’s easy to make fun of the extremes of Americana religion, with Sister Aimee riding . . . Continue reading →
The Pope’s Magic Beads
Pope Francis confessed Thursday that he took the rosary cross of his late confessor from his casket and wears it to this day in a fabric pouch under his cassock. He said he did so telling the late priest, “Give me half . . . Continue reading →
Rome: “Pay Now Or Pay Later”
(HT: Dabney Olguin) More On This Topic Selling Indulgences In Case You’re Worried About Purgatory Indulgences Are Back Has The Roman Doctrine of Justification Changed? The Treasury Of The Church
Justification And Sanctification: Conjoined, Coherent, But Distinct
For he means, that not an individual among mankind will be found in whom the promise of salvation may be accomplished, if it involves the condition of innocence; and that faith, if it is propped up by works, will instantly fall. This . . . Continue reading →
Calvin: Rome Is A Bird With Borrowed Feathers
Having ascertained Paul’s meaning, let us return to the Papists. First, by applying this eulogium to themselves, they act wickedly; because they deck themselves with borrowed feathers. For, granting that the Church were elevated above the third heaven, I maintain that it . . . Continue reading →
Christ Is The Mark
…Christ is the mark whereat faith must aim; and, therefore, men’s minds do nothing else but wander when they turn aside from him. Therefore, no marvel if all the divinity of Popery be nothing else but an huge lump and horrible labyrinth; . . . Continue reading →
Black Friday, Subjectivism, And Christian Liberty
On 24 November, the Roman Bishop, Francis, issued a document, Evangelium Gaudii which the Vatican classifies as an “Apostolic Exhortation.” It’s a book, a really long (217 pages) sermon. Rome is a complicated creature with seemingly endless categories of offices, canons, decrees, laws, . . . Continue reading →
Where Was Our Church Before Luther And Zwingli? (10)
From the confession of our opponents, who cannot deny that before Luther and Zwingli, there were innumerable persons who professed our faith and protested publicly against the papal errors. See what is related of the Waldenses and Albigenses, Hussites, Wycliffites, Lollards and . . . Continue reading →
You Are What Rome Says You Are Even If She Openly Contradicts Herself
On every front, then, the Council redrew the boundaries of what had seemed to 1959 a fixed and immutable system. For some Catholics, these changes were the long-awaited harvest of the New Theology, the reward of years of patient endurance during the . . . Continue reading →
What Is True Faith? (3) The Romanist Condemnation Of True Faith
In part 2 we considered the nature of assent. There is a third aspect to the Reformed definition of faith: trust. This is the crux of the disagreement between Rome and the Reformation over nature of faith in the act of justification. . . . Continue reading →
Crums! You Mean Rome Isn’t Completely Unified?
So just when Jason and the Callers thought they had escaped the unsatisfying clutches of Protestantism, they entered a communion riven by the same kind of divisions that characterized the modernist-fundamentalist controversy. One side wants the church to continue to adapt to . . . Continue reading →
We Find It In The Gospel
One of the more frustrating things about getting older is that I seem to spend more time looking for things. It’s such a waste of time. It would be great if someone would just tell me where my keys are. Because we . . . Continue reading →
Where Was Our Church Before Luther And Zwingli? (9)
From the conformity of our church to the primitive apostolic Church. For since no one can deny that the primitive church was instituted by Christ and the apostles neither can it be denied that our church, if it is conformed that both . . . Continue reading →
Digital Indulgences
The UK Guardian reported yesterday that Rome has reached a new low in reaching out to the Romanist equivalent of low-information voters. Low-sanctity penitents perhaps? Rome is now offering plenary indulgences to Romanists who follow Pope Francis’ tweets from Catholic Youth Day . . . Continue reading →