Connecting the Dots Between the Early Church and Catholicism, Part V

217

Eucharist 

And she [Wisdom] has furnished her table [Prov. 9:2] . . . refers to his [Christ’s] honored and undefiled body and blood, which day by day are administered and offered sacrificially at the spiritual divine table, as a memorial of that first and ever-memorable table of the spiritual divine supper [i.e., the Last Supper]" (Hippolytus, Fragment from Commentary on Proverbs). 

220: 

Centralized Authority

The Council of Carthage that can be dated between 220 and 230 was the first Western assembly about which we are well informed. Bishop Cyprian of Carthage provides information that the participants confronted issues surrounding the legal rules of baptism. He also mentions another council that condemned Privatus, the bishop of Lambaesis, for his crimes. From the time of St. Cyprian general synods came to be the wonted resource of Church administration. 

Chair of Peter

Was anything withheld from the knowledge of Peter, who is called ‘the rock on which the Church would be built’ [Matt. 16:18] with the power of ‘loosing and binding in heaven and on earth’ [Matt. 16:19]?" (Demurrer Against the Heretics 22). 

[T]he Lord said to Peter, ‘On this rock I will build my Church, I have given you the keys of the kingdom of heaven [and] whatever you shall have bound or loosed on earth will be bound or loosed in heaven’ [Matt. 16:18–19]. . . . What kind of man are you, subverting and changing what was the manifest intent of the Lord when he conferred this personally upon Peter? Upon you, he says, I will build my Church; and I will give to you the keys" (Tertullian, Modesty 21:9–10). 

221

Be it known to you, my lord, that Simon [Peter], who, for the sake of the true faith, and the most sure foundation of his doctrine, was set apart to be the foundation of the Church, and for this end was by Jesus himself, with his truthful mouth, named Peter. (Letter of Clement to James 2). 

[Simon Peter said to Simon Magus in Rome:] ‘For you now stand in direct opposition to me, who am a firm rock, the foundation of the Church’ [Matt. 16:18]. (Clementine Homilies 17:19). 

Be it known to you, my lord, that Simon [Peter], who, for the sake of the true faith, and the most sure foundation of his doctrine, was set apart to be the foundation of the Church, and for this end was by Jesus himself, with his truthful mouth, named Peter. (Letter of Clement to James 2). 

225

Tradition, Succession, Authority

Although there are many who believe that they themselves hold to the teachings of Christ, there are yet some among them who think differently from their predecessors. The teaching of the Church has indeed been handed down through an order of succession from the apostles and remains in the churches even to the present time. That alone is to be believed as the truth which is in no way at variance with ecclesiastical and apostolic tradition. (Origen, The Fundamental Doctrines 1:2). 

233

Intercessory Prayer

But not the high priest [Christ] alone prays for those who pray sincerely, but also the angels . . . as also the souls of the saints who have already fallen asleep" (Origen, Prayer 11). 

248

Origen (ten years later Cyprian) explicitly say that confession is to be made to priest. 

Albeit hard and laborious [is] the remission of sins through penance, when the sinner . . . does not shrink from declaring his sin to a priest of the Lord and from seeking medicine, after the manner of him who say, ‘I said, "To the Lord I will accuse myself of my iniquity. (Homilies on Leviticus 2:4). 

Authority of Peter

Look at [Peter], the great foundation of the Church, that most solid of rocks, upon whom Christ built the Church [Matt. 16:18]. And what does our Lord say to him? ‘Oh you of little faith,’ he says, ‘why do you doubt?’ [Matt. 14:31]" (Origen, Homilies on Exodus 5:4). 

Regeneration at Baptism and Eucharist

Formerly there was baptism in an obscure way . . . now, however, in full view, there is regeneration in water and in the Holy Spirit. Formerly, in an obscure way, there was manna for food; now, however, in full view, there is the true food, the flesh of the Word of God, as he himself says: ‘My flesh is true food, and my blood is true drink’ [John 6:55]" (Origen, Homilies on Numbers 7:2). 

Infant Baptism

Every soul that is born into flesh is soiled by the filth of wickedness and sin. . . . In the Church, baptism is given for the remission of sins, and, according to the usage of the Church, baptism is given even to infants. If there were nothing in infants which required the remission of sins and nothing in them pertinent to forgiveness, the grace of baptism would seem superfluous" (Origen, Homilies on Leviticus 8:3). 

The Church received from the apostles the tradition of giving baptism even to infants. The apostles, to whom were committed the secrets of the divine sacraments, knew there are in everyone innate strains of [original] sin, which must be washed away through water and the Spirit" (Origen, Commentaries on Romans 5:9). 

Mary, Ever Virgin

The Book [the Protoevangelium] of James [records] that the brethren of Jesus were sons of Joseph by a former wife, whom he married before Mary. Now those who say so wish to preserve the honor of Mary in virginity to the end, so that body of hers which was appointed to minister to the Word . . . might not know intercourse with a man after the Holy Spirit came into her and the power from on high overshadowed her. And I think it in harmony with reason that Jesus was the firstfruit among men of the purity which consists in [perpetual] chastity, and Mary was among women. For it were not pious to ascribe to any other than to her the firstfruit of virginity" (Commentary on Matthew 2:17). 

OT Canon Septuagint

Of this same thing in the Wisdom of Solomon [it says], ‘Although in the sight of men they suffered torments, their hope is full of immortality . . .’ [Wisdom. 3:4]. Of this same thing in the Maccabees [it says], ‘Was not Abraham found faithful when tested, and it was reckoned to him for righteousness’ [1 Macc. 2:52; see Jas. 2:21–23]" (Cyprian of Carthage, Treatises 7:3:15). 

So Daniel, too, when he was required to worship the idol Bel, which the people and the king then worshipped, in asserting the honor of his God, broke forth with full faith and freedom, saying, ‘I worship nothing but the Lord my God, who created the heaven and the earth’ [Dan. 14:5]" (Letters 55:5; Daniel 14 is not in the Protestant Bible). 

230-250: 

Heresy 

Christian councils of Rome were held to decide questions and to represent the “whole Christian name” (repraesentatio totius nominis Christiani). The exact nature of these assemblies has been debated, but there can be no doubt that they promulgated norms and made decisions for Christian communities. There are references to assemblies in Asia Minor at Iconium (235--heretical baptisms invalid) , Synnada, (About 230-5 a council on the rebaptizing of heretics)

240-250: Christian councils of Carthage

251

On Confession to Priest

The apostle [Paul] likewise bears witness and says: ‘ . . . Whoever eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord unworthily will be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord’ [1 Cor. 11:27]. But [the impenitent] spurn and despise all these warnings; before their sins are expiated, before they have made a confession of their crime, before their conscience has been purged in the ceremony and at the hand of the priest . . . they do violence to [the Lord’s] body and blood, and with their hands and mouth they sin against the Lord more than when they denied him. (Cyprian of Carthage, The Lapsed 15:1–3). 

Of how much greater faith and salutary fear are they who . . . confess their sins to the priests of God in a straightforward manner and in sorrow, making an open declaration of conscience. . . . I beseech you, brethren, let everyone who has sinned confess his sin while he is still in this world, while his confession is still admissible, while the satisfaction and remission made through the priests are still pleasing before the Lord" (ibid., 28). 

[S]inners may do penance for a set time, and according to the rules of discipline come to public confession, and by imposition of the hand of the bishop and clergy receive the right of Communion. [But now some] with their time [of penance] still unfulfilled . . . they are admitted to Communion, and their name is presented; and while the penitence is not yet performed, confession is not yet made, the hands of the bishop and clergy are not yet laid upon them, the Eucharist is given to them; although it is written, ‘Whosoever shall eat the bread and drink the cup of the Lord unworthily, shall be guilty of the body and blood of the Lord’ [1 Cor. 11:27]" (Letters 9:2). 

And do not think, dearest brother, that either the courage of the brethren will be lessened, or that martyrdoms will fail for this cause, that penance is relaxed to the lapsed, and that the hope of peace [i.e., absolution] is offered to the penitent. . . . For to adulterers even a time of repentance is granted by us, and peace is given. (ibid., 51[55]:20). 

But I wonder that some are so obstinate as to think that repentance is not to be granted to the lapsed, or to suppose that pardon is to be denied to the penitent, when it is written, ‘Remember whence thou art fallen, and repent, and do the first works’ [Rev. 2:5], which certainly is said to him who evidently has fallen, and whom the Lord exhorts to rise up again by his deeds [of penance], because it is written, ‘Alms deliver from death. [Tobit 12:9]" (ibid., 51[55]:22). 

On the primacy of Peter

The Lord says to Peter: ‘I say to you,’ he says, ‘that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of hell will not overcome it. And to you I will give the keys of the kingdom of heaven . . . ’ [Matt. 16:18–19]. On him [Peter] he builds the Church, and to him he gives the command to feed the sheep [John 21:17], and although he assigns a like power to all the apostles, yet he founded a single chair [cathedra], and he established by his own authority a source and an intrinsic reason for that unity. Indeed, the others were that also which Peter was [i.e., apostles], but a primacy is given to Peter, whereby it is made clear that there is but one Church and one chair. . . . If someone does not hold fast to this unity of Peter, can he imagine that he still holds the faith? If he [should] desert the chair of Peter upon whom the Church was built, can he still be confident that he is in the Church? (Cyprian, The Unity of the Catholic Church 4; 1st edition [A.D. 251]). 

There is one God and one Christ, and one Church, and one chair founded on Peter by the word of the Lord. It is not possible to set up another altar or for there to be another priesthood besides that one altar and that one priesthood. Whoever has gathered elsewhere is scattering" (Cyprian, Letters 43[40]:5). 

There [John 6:68–69] speaks Peter, upon whom the Church would be built, teaching in the name of the Church and showing that even if a stubborn and proud multitude withdraws because it does not wish to obey, yet the Church does not withdraw from Christ. The people joined to the priest and the flock clinging to their shepherd are the Church. You ought to know, then, that the bishop is in the Church and the Church in the bishop, and if someone is not with the bishop, he is not in the Church. They vainly flatter themselves who creep up, not having peace with the priests of God, believing that they are secretly [i.e., invisibly] in communion with certain individuals. For the Church, which is one and Catholic, is not split nor divided, but it is indeed united and joined by the cement of priests who adhere one to another. (ibid., 66[69]:8). 

251 

Council of Carthage  to establish rules for reconciling those Christians who had abandoned their faith because of persecution. During the next year he gathered 67 bishops to treat questions of reconciliation again and infant baptism. 

253

Tradition and Authority of Rome 

[T]he Church is one, and as she is one, cannot be both within and without. For if she is with Novatian, she was not with [Pope] Cornelius. But if she was with Cornelius, who succeeded the bishop Fabian by lawful ordination, and whom, beside the honor of the priesthood the Lord glorified also with martyrdom, Novatian is not in the Church; nor can he be reckoned as a bishop, who, succeeding to no one, and despising the evangelical and apostolic tradition, sprang from himself. For he who has not been ordained in the Church can neither have nor hold to the Church in any way" (Cyprian of Carthage, Letters 75:3). 

But what is his error . . . who does not remain on the foundation of the one Church which was founded upon the rock by Christ [Matt. 16:18], can be learned from this, which Christ said to Peter alone: ‘Whatever things you shall bind on earth shall be bound also in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth, they shall be loosed in heaven’ [Matt. 16:19]" (collected in Cyprian’s Letters74[75]:16). 

[Pope] Stephen [I] . . . boasts of the place of his episcopate, and contends that he holds the succession from Peter, on whom the foundations of the Church were laid [Matt. 16:18]. . . . [Pope] Stephen . . . announces that he holds by succession the throne of Peter" (ibid., 74[75]:17). 

Infant Baptism

As to what pertains to the case of infants: You [Fidus] said that they ought not to be baptized within the second or third day after their birth, that the old law of circumcision must be taken into consideration, and that you did not think that one should be baptized and sanctified within the eighth day after his birth. In our council it seemed to us far otherwise. No one agreed to the course which you thought should be taken. Rather, we all judge that the mercy and grace of God ought to be denied to no man born" (Cyprian of Carthage, Letters 64:2). 

If, in the case of the worst sinners and those who formerly sinned much against God, when afterwards they believe, the remission of their sins is granted and no one is held back from baptism and grace, how much more, then, should an infant not be held back, who, having but recently been born, has done no sin, except that, born of the flesh according to Adam, he has contracted the contagion of that old death from his first being born. For this very reason does he [an infant] approach more easily to receive the remission of sins: because the sins forgiven him are not his own but those of another" (ibid., 64:5). 

Intercession of Saints

Let us remember one another in concord and unanimity. Let us on both sides [of death] always pray for one another. Let us relieve burdens and afflictions by mutual love, that if one of us, by the swiftness of divine condescension, shall go hence first, our love may continue in the presence of the Lord, and our prayers for our brethren and sisters not cease in the presence of the Father’s mercy" (Cyprian of Carthage, Letters 56[60]:5. 

256 

Council of Carthage: September eighty-seven bishops assembled from the three provinces still maintained their attitude against Baptism by heretics. While maintaining the right of bishops to think for themselves, he still clung to the necessity of unity in the Church, and would not break the revered bond with Rome.

264

Council of Antioch (264-272); and the Fathers seem to have rejected Homoousion. 

Primacy of Peter’s Chair in Rome

In this chair in which he himself had sat, Peter in mighty Rome commanded Linus, the first elected, to sit down. After him, Cletus too accepted the flock of the fold. As his successor, Anacletus was elected by lot. Clement follows him, well-known to apostolic men. After him Evaristus ruled the flock without crime. Alexander, sixth in succession, commends the fold to Sixtus. After his illustrious times were completed, he passed it on to Telesphorus. He was excellent, a faithful martyr . . . " (Poem Against the Marcionites 276–284). 

[In the second] year of the two hundredth and fifth Olympiad [A.D. 42]: The apostle Peter, after he has established the church in Antioch, is sent to Rome, where he remains as a bishop of that city, preaching the gospel for twenty-five years" (Eusebius of Caesarea, The Chronicle). 

Peter, the first chosen of the apostles, having been apprehended often and thrown into prison and treated with ignominy, at last was crucified in Rome. (Peter of Alexandria Penance, canon 9). 

300  

Assumption of Mary

If therefore it might come to pass by the power of your grace, it has appeared right to us your servants that, as you, having overcome death, do reign in glory, so you should raise up the body of your Mother and take her with you, rejoicing, into heaven. Then said the Savior [Jesus]: ‘Be it done according to your will’" (Pseudo-Melito, The Passing of the Virgin 16:2–17). 

310  

Council of Elvira or Illiberis, Spain is the earliest council for which we have a set of legislative decrees. Although the 81 canons commonly attributed to the council may be the product of several Iberian councils from later in the century, it is clear that the focus of the canons was on the sexual mores of the clergy and laity. Elvira was the first Western council to dictate that priests should be celibate. Its canons, however, did not circulate widely.

Relics in Early Christianity

We took up his bones, which are more valuable than precious stones and finer than refined gold, and laid them in a suitable place, where the Lord will permit us to gather ourselves together, as we are able, in gladness and joy and to celebrate the birthday of his martyrdom. (Harnack, History of Dogma, tr., IV, 313). 

314 

Heresy

Council of Arles issued 25 canons that dealt with a variety of recent problems in the church. These canons dealt with the discipline of the clergy, the alienation of ecclesiastical property, chastity, adultery, murder, and magic. 

Lactantius

Primacy of Rome

When Nero was already reigning, Peter came to Rome, where, in virtue of the performance of certain miracles which he worked . . . he converted many to righteousness and established a firm and steadfast temple to God. (The Deaths of the Persecutors 2:5). 

In the fourth century the great biblical scholar, Jerome, declared, "We do not worship, we do not adore, for fear that we should bow down to the creature rather than to the creator, but we venerate the relics of the martyrs in order the better to adore him whose martyrs they are" (Ad Riparium, i, P.L., XXII, 907). 

Did the Emperor Constantine found the Catholic Church?

The inquisition began as it began almost everyday of her life since her conversion to the Catholic Church. Questions, questions. For most Protestant Grand Inquisitors, the questions are not really to understand Catholicism, but in order to open up a confrontative conversation in which the Protestant can prove his scriptural knowledge superior and expose the Catholic Church for the treacherous fiend it really is and save the poor duped and ignorant Catholic. 

(Please don't think I am pointing at you if you are not one of those people. She really can tell just who those people are....)

And when they found out she converted from Protestantism? No! Can’t be. Impossible. No one that seemingly smart could be that gullible. Sometimes this is where a little smirk comes on their faces, a little bitter sarcasm leaks out into the conversation. The questions always seem to lead to this statement:

“The Catholic Church started in AD 300 with Constantine.”

Out of love for her Protestant brethren she answers using scripture, Christian history and the Church Fathers. The person almost always disapproves of the answer. As if they both didn’t already know the Protestant wasn’t Catholic and somehow the disagreement was a great shock. The Protestant then feels the Catholic woman has no real right to be Catholic unless she could, in one answer, convince the Protestant.  

Well, the author will soon come out with a very lengthy answer indeed to that question, but for those who can't stick around for that, please accept this: 

http://youtu.be/oqLBeCmyaKY

Did the Emperor Constantine found the Catholic Church? | Catholic Answers

Good bye dear Papa! May every moment until you go to see Jesus be one filled with the rich treasures of your service and may the angels and saints be near to you giving you peace and joy.

The Truth about God

As many times as I have insisted on it, there remains a majority of Adventists who will not believe me. 

[I think once you leave the SDA church you are by default untrustworthy because you have either fallen prey to deception or you are a defiant rebel wearing a Christian disguise. So Adventist tend to be suspicious of your motives or diagnose you as being unable to understand your own heart. That judgement doesn’t upset me because, if I can do some of my own analysis, it is a survival posture for them.]

Nevertheless, I will once again repeat and insist, I care about doctrines, not about hypocrites.

I want a religion that tells me the truth about God. That’s it.

I didn’t leave the Seventh-day Adventist church because of people or hurts or the hypocrites. I left because of doctrines. The doctrines of the Seventh-day Adventist Church did not tell me the full truth about God. The Adventist people, at least the ones I have known and currently know are wonderful, generous, many of whom love the Lord with a passion. In every single church I attended, from the SDA to the Baptist, to the Methodist, to the Disciples of Christ, to the Lutherans, to the Anglican, to the Orthodox (and I many years worshipping with them all!) I found the people to be wonderful, sincere who told me some truths about God and some things that just didn’t seem right when I compared it with scripture and Christian history. 

I want to know the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about God. And I am willing to conform my thinking and my religious practices to it. If I can find the truth about God by kneeling quietly saying a rosary with the Mother of Jesus or by bathing in yellow paint and squawking like a chicken while eating jasmine on a mountain trek through the Himalayas, that is what I will do. I will do what it takes to know the truth about Him, seeking first the Kingdom of Heaven even if it means forsaking all, taking up my cross and following Him. Whatever the form of worship it requires--if that’s candles and incense, confession and penance or worshipping with nothing but a Bible and in my pajamas in a quiet corner of my house. I will do it His way in order to get the truth about Him.

That is my attitude.

In order to prove the corruption of the Catholic Church, I am reminded on a daily basis about the sins of Catholics....the inquisition, the anti-popes, the selling of indulgences, the Catholics involvement in WWII’s Croatian genocide, the priests’ sex scandal, and how the person addressing me left the Catholic church because of a horrible priest or nun. And that makes me want to puke and it makes me want to tear out my hair and throw myself in hot ashes and fast until I die, but it doesn’t make me want to leave Catholicism. Horrible, wicked, unfathomable actions by horrible wicked unfathomable people do not change the truth about God. And if the Catholic Church tells us the truth about God, the fullest truth about God, then it is no wonder that the kingdom of heaven suffers violence from every soul that hates Him; no wonder it is holding back the gates of hell and being assaulted on every side, including inside.

If every single demon of hell joined the Catholic Church and tried to burn down the whole world (and they did and it didn’t work) that would not hurt the Truth.  Oh, the demons did some real damage with the Inquisition, the priestly sex scandal, they even wormed their way into Peter’s Chair and tried to change the doctrines, but they didn’t. The demons were too busy with fleshly distractions to distort doctrine. 

Like Job and like Peter, the devil asked God to give over to him His leaders and saints so that he may sift them like wheat. And, though they were tortured and tried, the core was not touched. 

The Church’s very nature of being he Bride of Christ was left bruised and bleeding but still structurally intact. Or like His mother Mary, the Catholic Church has suffered watching the devil try to re-crucify Christ through His Church, and yet the fullness of Truth about God is still there as it was from the beginning.

Of course, I could go to any Christian church for some truth, and I am blessed by so many of them. Goodness pours forth from the communities of faith who love Christ. And they too have their human struggles with sin. I expect people to sin. I am not looking for a church with sinless people, because, after all, the Lord said that His Kingdom would be full of wheats and tares and if the church is full of perfect people, I am not in the right church.

It’s all about doctrine. Truth about God is found in true doctrine and if a nuclear bomb of sin and corruption were to be detonated at the Vatican or the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops or a plague of evil was to infect every priest alive, as long as the doctrine held, then I am where God wants me to be. I have clung to the Truth about God.

What I find most interesting is that so many people who tell me they left the SDA church because of doctrine are the very ones to point out to me the failures of Catholic leadership and ask me how I can be part of a church with such a history of failures.

Well, for me it is about... doctrines... not hypocrites. I go back to the Bible and the early church and the doctrines are Catholic. I would rather be in a church that tell me the fullness of truth about God and everyone fails to live up to the truth, rather than an easy church where people all live up to their beliefs and it isn’t true.

There is some connection in people’s brain with how the Christian acts and what he believes. We are revolted by hypocrisy, and hypocrisy can tempt us to turn from truth. And I think we are hard-wired to make the assumption that we should act as we believe. A  monstrous problem within Christianity is that very few people are on the road to sainthood and we render the gospel powerless through our inability as the Body of Christ to be a truthful representation of Christ. So rather than suffer and sacrifice to prevent public hypocrisy, we create mega-churches with theatre seating that preach the prosperity gospel. The church of entertainment has no hypocrites. And in the end, even that sales pitch is returned for being defective because most Christians suffer and don’t live in mansions.

The church of God should be realistic. It should be embracing the sinner, teaching the truth of grace that imparts holiness as it escorts the sinner along the path to seeing God face to face. On this journey you encounter faltering popes, bishops, priests, nuns and brothers and sisters. The vital question is: Are they faltering because they are on the wrong road or are they faltering because they are weak?  

So, let’s be clear (smile!). If you want to show me the errors of Catholicism, don’t point out a bad pope, some bad bishops or a cadre of rotten priests, monks, friars, nuns or lay Catholics. Don’t show me the catastrophic failure of the church to live up to the truth. 

Show me how the Catholic Church is not the church Christ started using both the Catholic Bible and the early church fathers. Show me that break in the line from the point where Christ promised His Bride these things and then divorced her:

So they [Christ and His Bride] are no longer two but one flesh. What therefore God has joined together, let not man put asunder." Matt. 19: 6 

What therefore God hath joined together, let no man put asunder. Mark 10: 9

And:

You are Kephas (Peter) and upon Kephas I will build my church and the gates of hell cannot prevail against it. (Matt. 16:18)

And:

I will ask the Father, and he will give you another Counselor, who will never leave you. (John 14:16)

And:

Never will I leave you; never will I forsake you."  (Heb. 13:5)

And:

Then the eleven disciples went to Galilee... Then Jesus came to them and said, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me. Therefore go and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, and teaching them to obey everything I have commanded you. And surely I am with you always, to the very end of the age." (Matt. 28: 16-20)

To convince me that I am in the wrong church, you will have to show me where in the New Testament where Christ or His Apostles prophesied that His Bride would be corrupted to the point that He would leave her and forsake her and break all His promises to His church about being with her to the very end. 

You would have to show me in scripture or in the Church Fathers where your personal interpretation of God’s word, or the Reformers, or Ellen White is more authoritative than the Catholic Church’s. One person, or one groups proof-texting against another groups proof-texting is just a battle of interpretation of scripture and prove nothing.

I am not being snarky or confrontative, I am being sincere. It is on the basis of Truth, doctrines, that I believe something. You would have to show me where in scripture that God handed the authority to teach and interpret the scripture to the individual rather than the corporate church--that the Truth, is up to each of us to decide from our personally-appointed source of truth. That is the only way we can debate Catholicism.

The Atonement: A Catholic Understanding

Many who describe themselves as post-Christian, object to the barbaric idea of a loving God requiring His Son to die on a cross. This theology of a wrath-filled God satisfied, His anger appeased by a bloody sacrifice is a horror to them. I understand that perspective. That does not describe the Catholic model of atonement. 

Note: The Catholic Church does not have a dogma about exactly what the atonement did. It is still an open question. While we have a general belief, there are nuances that are not settled, so keep this in mind as you read. Catholics are free to disagree with my model... but it was argued and accepted as a possible explanation by the Scholastics in the Middle Ages.

Did God require a bloody sacrifice of an innocent victim to satisfy His wrath and atone for sin? 

To answer, I wish to return to the birth of evil:

/\

Before the age of man, the wondrous Prince of the angels, allowed into the inner machinations of the Master Designer, emerged with a word of horror. This seraph, commander of powers and principalities for aeons, claimed that the God of the universe was no longer God. This deceiver claimed that He-who-ruled-the-infinite was unjust and could no longer be trusted. 

The darkened seraph broke with the Trinity clouding with sin the unseen deep. And the shadow of corruption curled its way into the cosmos threatening all that exists. The heavens,
a third of the spiritual entities---now violated and abused by the Father of Lies--was ensnared. 

The cries of infinite pain reeled and agitated in a cosmos of uncertainty. Unthinkable thoughts, ideas never conceived in the heart of any being for all existence awoke and brought a nightmare to which we have yet to awaken.  Questions of who is trustworthy, the unseen Spirit who has always been know as God or the archangel to whom the spirits pledged fidelity? A brother or a Creator? Who do we obey? No hint or breath of rebellion had ever entered the thoughts or hearts of any created being until now. Darkness and light warred. Turmoil marred heaven before it even touched earth.

/\

Then, precious man, the apple of God’s eye, the only creature in  the Almighty’s creation made in His likeness and in His image also disobeyed and began to distrust God.  Man too became abused by sin and fell under the darkness of lies. 

The rebellion did not catch God unawares. Understanding the heart of man, the plan of Salvation had been conceived from the beginning. Restoring universal paradise and eradicating sin forever, God must dispel Satan’s myths and restore trust.

Salvation wasn’t about a Great Controversy between Christ and Satan as if they were equal warriors trying to defend their kingdoms. Redemption had nothing to do with the Devil’s rights over fallen man. Satan stood guilty and deserved nothing but eternal damnation. The solution took no note of Satan, nor needed to satisfy any devilish demand. 

Divine Justice must be satisfied but there was no great infinite law that required a sacrifice. This wasn’t about blood lust. The Trinity was not forced to choose the Cross, in fact, God could have chosen to forgive without a need for Divine satisfaction. The Cross was not literally our punishment, our verdict of death, that Christ took upon Himself.

Do not misunderstand. The verdict of sin was death. Scripture is clear about that. But that was God's decision. It wasn't from some law that hung over God forcing His hand. 

The Cross was chosen to restore our intimate unity with the Trinity and to deliver us from the deceit and destruction of sin. Our Heavenly Father embraced a miraculous rescue plan of infinite and eternal potency--more powerful than faith, greater than hope, a force of such magnitude that could annihilate with one expiring breathe all the sins of humankind--

He chose love. 

†

How does the Cross show love? 

Many people do not feel love when they look at the crucifixion; they feel disgust.  How does God coming and suffering torture and death for us show love? Let's look at a couple of typical lives:

The sleepy darkness is again disrupted for the tiny girl as poppa reels and stumbles home, his whiskeyed breath replaying the same quarrel with momma. One day, a divorce tears her family apart and the little girl will spend a lifetime atop an emotional rampart with bow in hand in a disoriented battle, never understanding this suffering stems from fear of abandonment and a desperate need for intimacy. 

In a quest to find manhood, this young, dashing lad targets vulnerable women for a night of pleasure, and as the years go by each encounter enslaves him in selfish darkness and asphyxiates the protector knight inside, eventually leaving a chasm of loneliness between he and his wife.  

The story of each human bears the wounds of Satan’s deception. Where we wander pursuing comfort or pleasure or money, we find ourselves caught in the trap of a self-centeredness thralldom, cursing the unforeseen fate of divorce, betrayal, hatred, jealousy, addiction, greed, broken promises, lies. Humanity is crippled, tormented with the catastrophic failure of our choices. And we find ourselves, as the race of Adam, unable to trust. How does one know, see, feel love in a world gone mad with the pursuit of personal happiness?

How can we restore love and trust?

Believe it or not, we discover love in sacrifice.

The little girl must see her father struggle to overcome his alcoholism and determine to be a good father and husband. The young man must find his manhood in determined, self-sacrificing choices, disciplining his sexual desires for the woman who will one day be his wife. Love and trust can only be restored by a husband fighting the temptation of adultery and pornography, a woman taking the responsibility of motherhood and devoting herself to her children instead of herself. 

The world is in need of a good fight. Not a fight to win power, comfort, money or fame. The world is in need of seeing a fight, a struggle of sacrifice for us to show us we are worth it. 

Love is not proven through words of promise or soft whispers of sweet feelings, not proven through quality time spent together, or gifts, or fun times. Love faithfully battles to give birth, to provide food, shelter, to remain true to one’s promises. Love faces hell and absorbs the enemies blows and if necessary sacrifices all its earthly desires, treasures and resources for the beloved. Self-sacrifice is the essence of love. 

This is the reason for the Cross. 

God could have forgiven Adam and Eve without need of Divine reparation. Justice could have been meted out with a stern lecture. Yet, the Creator knew that once sin wormed its way into existence and planted doubts and mistrust into the hearts of man, that love would have to be proven through the fires of Christ’s passion--the suffering of the Cross. Love is a battle for the beloved drawing the slings and arrows of pain and injustice into oneself to protect the Beloved. 

God hated sin. And He would do whatever it took to convince us that sin would wipe out the smallest sign of life if left unchecked. Sin had to be seen for what is was, God had to be seen for Who He Was. 

The full measure of sin and the full measure of Love were displayed at Christ’s death.

All the destructive, frenzied demonic forces of the universe converged at the Cross to wreck creation. Desiring to murder the Greatest of all Innocence and Purity, and yet fearful of the results of His death; rather, the hellish forces were willing to spend all eternity shredding the human flesh of Life and Love itself. The horror of sin, the depravity and depths of its ugliness were shown to the cosmos. 

Christ, our Savior, handed His soul freely to death, that we might look upon His sacrifice and trust Him. His reached out His hands and embraced us through the Cross that we might never question His goodness and His love for us--that we might never despair of our importance to God, question if He is love or fear the confusion of who we are to obey. Our heavenly Father, looking upon His Son on the Cross was seeing the greatest display of love ever known and it was beautiful and pleasing in His sight. 

The Cross isn’t about blood and offerings to satisfy an angry God, it is about proving for all time that Love is more powerful, and bigger than sin. And in God’s omniscience, the Cross was the best and most effective way to show this. Love captured and enveloped sin; it’s fire destroyed it. Catholics teach that through the Cross, the world can see that love won.

This Atonement theology found at the Catholic Encyclopedia 

http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/02055a.htm

LISTEN!! (Attention is kindly requested...)

All my life I have been told to calm down and say things without emotion and I would be taken seriously. These bouts I had of hysteria weren't about being a drama queen. I was terrified for my friends and I was trying--- as a fifth grader (up to.... the present time) to help! You see I grew up in the 1970's when Mayberry was being invaded by Woodstock and it upset me terribly. All these parents had no idea what was going on with their children and I wanted to warn them. So I sounded the alarm when my friends started experimenting with drugs. The wide-eyed smiles of the parents or teachers turned patronizing as they placed their hand on my shoulder and tole me to calm down.

"Honey, I think you are probably exaggerating. Calm down, everything is okay. Do we need to take you to a counselor? Are you taking drugs?"

When my friends were having sex, cheating or even when they admitted they were suicidal or that they were being sexually molested by someone... I would do just what everyone now says to do... I told someone... teachers, pastors, parents and basically nothing was ever done. I was always told to "calm down" and I would be more likely to be listened to with seriousness.

So when I became actively involved in the pro-life movement and I spoke at schools, universities, on radio shows and in church, I learned to speak with clarity, rationally and with utter dispassion. I calmly presented cold, harsh facts. Some people even told me that I needed more passion or else I wouldn't be listened to.

And in the end, when I spoke with confidence and assurance and calmness, no one listened to me. For a while I blamed it on my gender and my build. I am a small female and the problem was male chauvinism. In the end, that really wasn't it. Women didn't listen either.

They were wrong about speaking with less emotion and they were wrong when they told me to speak with more emotion. 

And I figured out why. Luke 16.

A rich man clothed in purple daily feasted sumptuously. At his gate lay poor, sickly and starving Lazarus who died and was carried by the angels to Abraham's bosom. When the rich man died and went to hell, in his torment he cried out to Father Abraham, "I beg you, father, to send Lazarus to my five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they also come into this place of torment." Abraham replied, 'They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.' And he said, 'No, father Abraham; but if some one goes to them from the dead, they will repent.' He said to him, 'If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if some one should rise from the dead.'"

There's the answer.

The cold, sterile rational, unemotional written law could not convince the rich man's brothers. Theatrics, high drama, hysterics, even the miracle of raising someone from the dead cannot open the eyes and ears of those who do not wish to see or understand.

Jesus himself, telling this parable, understood all to well when His own disciples failed to comprehend who he was and the miracles He performed.

The Holy Spirit needs to have made a crack in someone's heart and mind. And then, what I have discovered, is that it doesn't matter if you are hysterical, emotional or clumsy with words or nerdy with your dispassionate dissertation of the facts. If the person wants to hear it, they will. The Holy Spirit will interpret the message in the hearer's heart.


God uses all of us, no matter how we say it to reach those who are yearning for truth. Pray for the Holy Spirit and then say it the best way you can and leave the rest to God. Some of the seed will fall on healthy soil, some will fall on hard soil and rarely will you get to stick around and watch the growth. Speak it with love, act it with love and then lift it up to God as a sacrifice to Him and He will turn it into what He wants it to be for His glory.

Where Is Daddy? Michael Voris

How the Sacraments Make Men

After the London Male Fashion week where models were wearing dresses...well... I think this post is germane:

_________________________

The world needs courageous Christian men with a passion for God, a passion for holiness; masculine men, who initiate; who are responsible and steadfast men, strong and faithful, disciplined and add to that a dash of kind.

What our culture is growing are boys of ease who want to be men of ease. It is a culture of Wikipedia, the microwave and the bell curve. Survivor Man, a fishing channel, and Sunday football televise recreation. Now men are so passive that when they get hungry watching other men be active, all they have to do is tear upon a bag of chips. Their testosterone chooses to stay-at-home and become a hero in a video game or pursue anime women instead of getting out and initiating a conversation with an actual woman. And Christian guys often choose the comfort of a stay-at-home church or a church so casual that the strain of tucking their t-shirt into their old jeans isn’t required. 

Ever since Adam blamed Eve, God seems to spend a lot of His time making cowards into men. God violently confronted Moses and Jacob getting into a physical fight before making them His leaders. He knew they needed to be able to take a punch to be heroes and saints.

Interestingly, one of the great side effects of being a Catholic is that if you start your boys out young being faithful to the sacraments, they will do a lot to infuse masculine traits. For, not only will they receive passive, imputed grace making them like Christ, but the personal initiation and struggle of the will to do the sacrament is an active grace. The sacraments are heavenly discipline, spiritual bootcamp.

Think about it.

If a man is baptized and confirmed as an adult, it requires a lifelong commitment--that in an act of the will that moves into an act of the body. He must go through RCIA. That’s one step in the right direction. Even if baptized as a newborn, the child will then go through the steps to confirmation. The sacrament of baptism and confirmation requires commitment.

The sacrament of reconciliation teaches a boy to be a man through self-examination. It requires him to regularly think about what he had done wrong, why, and then have the humble courage and emotional strength to admit it, out loud, to another man. All that analysis can cause you to realize that not only are you not so good, so you better not judge others, but you are not so bad and all that learning of self-forgiveness can bleed into forgiving others and learning some sense of humor. So the sacrament of Penance/Reconciliation develops: courage, humility, faithfulness, commitment, kindness, humor, discipline and wisdom. That sacrament alone, if you teach your sons what it means and take him to it from an early age will do a great deal to make him a man.

When you go to the sacrament of the Eucharist daily or weekly, we teach an active grace of faithfulness, self-denial and steadfastness. 

Then if your son’s vocation is marriage or holy orders, these sacraments can take them to another step of active, manly grace. For whether they make a life-long commitment to a woman or the church, they will develop courage, faithfulness, kindness, discipline, and even physical strength being a good husband or priest. As the years go by and they have to make decisions that may cause suffering for them or their families or parishes, they learn wisdom and humility.

Even the sacrament of Anointing the Sick can make a man more humble and give him the courage to face serious illness or death.

God gave us a type of Divine GPS to help boys find their way into manhood and once there continue honing his masculinity until he becomes the ultimate hero--a saint--and that is through the sacraments.