I am a former Roman Catholic, and now I am a believer in salvation by grace alone, through faith alone in Christ alone. I was once a follower of the visions of Mary at Fatima, Guadalupe and Lourdes, among others, but I no longer believe those visions were from God. My passion is to warn Christ's sheep of the danger of Roman Catholicism, and to equip them to defend the faith and refute Rome's many errors.
Roman Catholicism was 300 years too late to be “the stone that … became a great mountain, and filled the whole earth” (Daniel 2:35).
[This is the third installment of a three part series.]
When former Protestant, Taylor Marshall, wrote Eternal City, he sought to explain why Christianity is necessarily Roman. “The Church,” he wrote, “receives the Roman empire” from its previous custodians. But in concluding this, Marshall has mistakenly transposed two kingdoms—both of which Daniel addressed, and both of which Daniel set against the background of the rise and fall of four world empires. One kingdom is of earth and the other of heaven, and Marshall has unfortunately confused the two. Continue reading One Kingdom Too Late→
The Eucharist literally comes to life and demands that it be worshiped.
[This is the second installment of a three part series.]
As we have elsewhere noted, the Roman Catholic religion teaches that the bread of the Lord’s Supper literally becomes the body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ, and therefore must be worshiped. The worship of the bread, the Eucharist, is the highest form of worship a man may offer to God. Therefore, the Roman Mass is the highest form of worship, and the moment when the bread is transubstantiated into “Jesus” is the highest point in the Mass. The “True Presence” of Christ in the Eucharist is what makes Eucharistic Adoration obligatory, and Eucharistic Adoration, therefore, is the chief objective of Roman religion. Roman Catholics worship the Eucharist. Everything else in the religion is merely prologue to the act of adoring the bread. That is not to say that every Roman Catholic has been persuaded of this doctrine on its merits. Sometimes a miracle—a Eucharistic Miracle—is required to reinforce the practice. Continue reading If This Bread Could Talk→
The Apparitions of Mary are known for their ability to bring the sun down to earth for their audiences
[This is the first installment of a three part series.]
This week, two “Marian” Popes are to be canonized as saints of the Roman Catholic church: Popes John XXIII and John Paul II. Both were very public about their devotion to Mary and frequented the sites of Marian apparitions. John XXIII was particularly devoted to the apparition of Mary at Lourdes, and emphatically commended “her” message to the faithful. In 1959, at the close of the 100-year anniversary celebration of the Apparitions of Mary at Lourdes, John XXIII said:
John Paul II was also devoted to the apparitions of Mary, and believed that Mary of Fatima had protected him throughout his papacy. On a papal visit to Fatima on May 13, 2000, a message from John Paul II was read to the faithful gathered there:
On this solemn occasion of his visit to Fatima, His Holiness has directed me to make an announcement to you. As you know, the purpose of his visit to Fatima has been to beatify [two of the visionaries]. Nevertheless he also wishes his pilgrimage to be a renewed gesture of gratitude to Our Lady for her protection during these years of his papacy. (Announcement by Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Secretary of State)
In that same message, John Paul II had it announced that he would finally make public the “third secret of Fatima,” a prophecy that had been delivered to the popes from the vision of Mary through the visionary, Lucia.
Augustine was worried that what was about to happen… was about to happen.
There is a tendency in some Christian circles to view all things eschatological through the lens of current events. This was epitomized in the late 1980s and early 1990s by a popular T-shirt that read, “If you want to understand the Book of Revelation, just read the headlines!” Every earthquake, every war, every powerful new politician was understood as evidence that the end times were now upon us. This method of interpretation is nothing new.
The purest form of religion on earth, says Rome, is to bow before a piece of bread and worship it.
“The Eucharist is ‘the source and summit of the Christian life,’ ” and “is the heart and the summit of the Church’s life,” says the Catechism of the Catholic Church (1324, 1407). And “the prayer of thanksgiving and consecration,” is “the heart and summit of the celebration” (1352). It is at the utterance of the consecration, the priest’s words, “This is My body,” and “This is the cup of My blood,” that the bread and wine are said to be “transubstantiated” into the actual body, blood, soul and divinity of Jesus Christ:
By the consecration the transubstantiation of the bread and wine into the Body and Blood of Christ is brought about. Under the consecrated species of bread and wine Christ himself, living and glorious, is present in a true, real, and substantial manner: his Body and his Blood, with his soul and his divinity. (1413)
Because the body, blood, soul and divinity of Christ is said to be present under the species of bread, the Roman Catholic Church has determined that it is unnecessary to administer the Lord’s Supper to the sheep under both species—bread and wine—so members of the flock typically receive the supper under the species of bread alone: “Since Christ is sacramentally present under each of the species, communion under the species of bread alone makes it possible to receive all the fruit of Eucharistic grace” (1390).
It is in this manner that Roman Catholicism “honoureth Me with their lips” (Matthew 15:8) by “this do[ing] in remembrance of me” (1 Corinthians 11:24), while at the same time “making the word of God of none effect” (Mark 7:13) by nullifying His Words which also say, “this do ye, as oft as ye drink it, in remembrance of me” (1 Corinthians 11:25).
The visions of Mary have a long-standing, two-way, verbal relationship with the Papacy.
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Last week, we discussed the propensity of Roman Catholics to rely on visions of Mary “to improve or complete Christ’s definitive Revelation” despite the clear instructions of the Catechism of the Catholic Church not to do so (paragraph 67). Taylor Marshall relied on several visions of Mary to bolster his argument that Jesus was born on December 25th, and Fr. Livius relied on a private revelation to help him determine the meaning of the writings of several Church Fathers. But as apologist Fr. William Most has said, “In public revelation, the Church has the promise of divine protection in teaching,” while on the content of private revelation, including apparitions, “the Church does not have such a commission.” Thus it is true that while Roman apologists cite apparitions of Mary to bolster their arguments, it is also true that Roman Catholics “can refuse assent to such revelations … provided this is done … for good reasons.” It is not uncommon (in our experience) for a Roman Catholic on the one hand to cite the many examples of apparitions as evidence that Roman Catholicism is the true church, and then, on the other hand—when the actual content of the visions is brought forward—to dismiss those same apparitions “because we are not required to believe them anyway.”
The visions of Mary provide additional revelation that is outside the original “Deposit of Faith.”
According to the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church, everything that is to be known and taught by the Church is to be found in the original “Deposit of Faith,” beyond which, “no new public revelation is to be expected before the glorious manifestation of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Catechism, p. 66).
As we have discussed elsewhere, Mary is alleged to have appeared many times and in many places over the last 2,000 years. During those appearances, the visions of Mary leave behind explicit instructions and other information: one provided a design for a medal for a particular form of devotion; another provided the design for an image to be venerated; others have provided private messages for the pope; and others have left behind prophecies of things to come. These visions of Mary, or what we call “apparitions of Mary,” have very much to say. “However,” warns the catechism, “They do not belong … to the deposit of faith“: Continue reading Mother Mary Speaks to Me (part 1)→
There is a reason the Scriptures never refer to Aaron’s Rod Blossoming as a figure for Jesus.
In Rome’s unwavering efforts to honor Mary with the accolades of immaculacy, the mantle of inviolable purity, the admiration of angels and the veneration of men, there is an unfortunate tendency to see Mary in every reference in the Bible. It would seem that there is not a verse in the Old Testament that does not prefigure her: she is the “land of Havilah” in Genesis 2:11. She is, at once, Noah’s Ark, the dove he released, and the olive branch it returned. She is Aaron’s Rod Blossoming, from which the Almonds of Jesus grew. She is Jesse’s Rod from which the branch of Jesus sprung (for “rod” in Latin is “virga,” which must refer to the Virgin), and she was present when the Spirit blew upon the seas at creation (for the Latin word for “seas” is “maria,” which must refer to Mary). She is the virgin soil from which Adam was made, and she is the cloud that led the Hebrews out of Egypt. She is Gideon’s fleece, the temple, the tabernacle, the ark, as well as the golden urn containing the manna within it. When David danced, he danced for her, and what Moses saw in the burning bush prefigured her—she was at the same time the flame and the unconsumed wood of the bush. She is even prefigured in the rotting manna, and Jesus is prefigured by the worms that fed on it.
Roman Catholics would do well to believe that Abraham and Rahab were justified by their works, instead of just saying it.
The Roman Catholic position on James 2:24 is well known and ancient. “Ye see then how that by works a man is justified, and not by faith only.” By these words, the Roman Catholic system of “gracious merit” for salvation by works is established, and those who believe the Roman gospel, “by those very works … have truly merited eternal life” (Council of Trent, 6th Session, Decree on Justification, Chapter 16). By James 2:24 the foundation of the Protestant religion collapses, for if “justification by faith alone” is the article upon which the Church stands or falls, says the Roman Catholic, then the Protestant religion is in vain.
But James himself says differently. It is truly remarkable that an epistle that is about authentic faith has become the centerpiece of the Roman Catholic doctrine of a final justification by works “before the judgment-seat of our Lord Jesus Christ” (Council of Trent, 6th Session, Decree on Justification, Chapter 7). But as we shall see, James was talking about something very, very different. Continue reading Justification by Works→
Roman Catholicism teaches that Justification by Words is the same as Justification by Works. They are not the same thing.
When Jason Stellman converted to Roman Catholicism, one of the bible verses that convinced him was Matthew 12:36-37,
But I say unto you, That every idle word that men shall speak, they shall give account thereof in the day of judgment. For by thy words thou shalt be justified, and by thy words thou shalt be condemned.
Stellman believes that this text supports a future justification based on works, and was persuaded that he could no longer read it through a Protestant lens. So in his words, he switched glasses, started reading it through a Roman Catholic lens, and concluded that there will be a future justification based on works. But a closer reading of Matthew 12, as we shall see, reveals that he missed something very important. Jesus actually gave two examples of what He was talking about, and it is not what Stellman thinks. Continue reading Justification by Words→
We should read Romans as if Paul was trying to make the Jews jealous. Because he was. (Romans 11:11-14)
We have spent the last week or so talking about interpreting Romans through the lens of the Jealousy Narrative. The Jealousy Narrative is imposed on salvation history by God Himself, Who said that, because the Jews had made Him jealous “with that which is not God,” He would make them jealous “with those which are not a people” (Deuteronomy 32:21). The Jealousy Narrative is seen in many places in Scripture. For example: Continue reading Why We Should Read Romans Jealously→
The Jews thought it was unfair for God to “render to each according to his deeds.”
In Romans 2:6-10, we read what appears to be an explicit statement of salvation by works: God will render to each according to his deeds—eternal life to those who do well and “worketh good,” and wrath to those who “doeth evil” and disobey. Roman apologist Tim Staples of Catholic Answers explains the Roman Catholic interpretation:
Paul made very clear in Romans 2:6-8 that good works are necessary for attaining eternal life.
He cites James 2:24, as well. As we noted, Jason Stellman, a recent convert to Roman Catholicism, made the same point in his response to our post, “Romans 2:13 and the Jealousy Narrative.” There is a simple answer to Rome’s interpretation here, but to understand Paul and James, we will spend a few moments with Ezekiel, because both apostles appeal to him so explicitly. They both implore us to be doers of the law, and not hearers only (Romans 2:13, James 1:23-24), and they get this from Ezekiel:
… they sit before thee as My people, and they hear thy words, but they will not do them: for with their mouth they shew much love, but their heart goeth after their covetousness. … for they hear thy words, but they do them not. (Ezekiel 33:31-32)
They are not mine because they look like me. They look like me because they are mine.
My wife and I are both blonde, and our kids received that attribute from us. We often dine out with another family, of which both parents and all children are brunettes. We usually get separate checks, yet our families are mixed together at the table, so we make it easy for the waiter: “The blonde kids are all on our ticket.” If the waiter separated the ticket based on which side people were seated, our bill would include the dinner of some brunettes, and their bill would include some blondes. In an environment where there are two types of people that need to be distinguished, it is easier to highlight their outward attributes than their inward ones.
But it would be a mistake to say that I pay for their dinner because they are blonde. I pay for their dinner because they are mine, and you can tell they are mine by the color of their hair. There is no causal link between their hair color and my provision for them. Continue reading “The Blonde Kids Are On Our Ticket”→
Paul wrote the letter to the Roman Gentiles in order to make the Jews jealous. (Romans 11:12-14)
Late last week, we observed that Jason Stellman, a former Presbyterian minister turned Roman Catholic, succumbed to Roman arguments on the meaning of Romans 2:13, which says “the doers of the law shall be justified.” Stellman expressed in his conversion testimony that he had to rethink his exegesis in light of Roman Catholic arguments, and could no longer justify the exegetical gymnastics he used to perform in order to force Romans 2:13 to fit into his “faith alone” paradigm. After conversations with Roman apologists, Stellman could no longer deny the plain meaning of the passage, and agreed that justification cannot be by faith alone. In that post, we agreed to provide an exegesis that shows that Romans 2:13 is much simpler to expound than Stellman realizes. The sheep of Christ must not be led astray by Stellman’s inability to see what the passage states so plainly.
To understand Romans 2:13, let us go all the way back to Moses, and the rampant idolatry of the Israelites: “They provoked Him to jealousy with strange gods, with abominations provoked they Him to anger” (Deuteronomy 32:16). Because of their idolatry, Moses prophesied, God would one day stir the Jews to jealousy by a foolish nation: Continue reading Romans 2:13 and The Jealousy Narrative→
Roman apologists accuse Protestants of painting the target after we’ve already shot the arrow.
Some time ago I listened to the conversion testimony of Jason Stellman, a former Presbyterian (PCA) pastor who converted to Roman Catholicism. His conversion story is rather unremarkable, and I am not surprised by his inability to withstand Rome’s overtures. The modern Christian church spends entirely too much energy trying to prevent Christians from criticizing Rome, and hardly any energy equipping the saints to resist and destroy Rome’s untenable epistemology.
Stellman is a product of an anemic church, and his inability to withstand the follies of Rome is entirely unsurprising. If Stellman cannot understand Romans 2:13 Continue reading Painting a target around the arrow→
Escher’s Drawing Hands is illustrative of Rome’s self-validating Tradition.
M. C. Escher’s Drawing Hands shows two drawn hands drawing each other, each hand getting its power to draw from the other. True to Escher’s style, a paradox is presented to the eye of the beholder, and the paradox is never resolved—the eye must continually move from one object to the other. Each time the eye settles on an apparently solid 3-dimensional object that can make sense of the rest of the picture, the paradox reappears. The search for the original, “authoritative” hand never ends.
We believe this is a good illustration of Roman Catholicism’s view of Tradition because Tradition is based on what Rome teaches, and what Rome teaches is based on Tradition. We gave an example of this in our recent post, All the Way Back. In that post, Roman priest and Marian devotee, Fr. Thomas Livius, showed the origins of Marian doctrines from the Fathers of the first six centuries. When he arrived at the teachings of Origen, Basil and Cyril—that the sword that pierced Mary’s soul (Luke 2:35) was the sword of doubt and unbelief—rather than accept that the early church understood that Mary was sinful, Livius spends his next three pages correcting Origen, as well as Basil and Cyril who agreed with him.
Roman Catholics believe that it is an infallible fallible infallible fallible teaching of the Church that Mary is the one who crushes the serpent’s head.
Last week, we highlighted the attempts by Fr. William G. Most to extract an infallible teaching from the Magisterium of the Roman Catholic Church. (The Magisterium is essentially the pope and the bishops who are in communion with him.) By studying the teachings of the Magisterium, William Most thought he had discovered how to arrive at an infallible teaching. By way of example, to prove that it is an infallible teaching of the Roman Catholic Church that Mary’s physical virginity was uncompromised when Christ was born, all Most had to do was demonstrate repetition by popes and councils. Surely, Fr. Most thought, repetition is evidence of an intent to teach infallibly:
A doctrine taught with multiple papal approval plus that of Vatican II should be called infallible, for these texts show the intention to make it definitive by their repetition.
By this standard, we can conclude that it is an infallible doctrine of the Roman Church that it is Mary who will crush the head of the serpent in Genesis 3:15. After all, multiple popes and at least one council have confirmed this. The Council of Trent made Jerome’s translation of the Vulgate the official translation of the Roman Catholic Church. Jerome’s translation of Genesis 3:15 indicates that it is Mary who will crush the head of the serpent. Here is the English rendering of the Roman Catholic translation of that verse: Continue reading Why “Infallibility” Doesn’t Work→
The cadaver of infallible Pope Formosus was put on trial in 897 AD, and found guilty of perjury, among other charges.
In 897 AD, Pope Stephen VII had Pope Formosus’ body exhumed and put on trial at the infamous Cadaver Synod, during which the corpse was found guilty, and stripped of his papal vestments. Pope Theodore II later convened a synod and overturned Pope Stephen’s findings, as did Pope John IX after him. But later, Pope Sergius III overturned the rulings of Theodore II and John IX, and reaffirmed the conviction of Formosus. Perhaps Formosus’ corpse will find some little comfort in the knowledge that it is still—at least for now—listed on Rome’s “unbroken line of popes” currently on display at the Vatican.
We find a papal corpse a particularly fitting background image for this post on infallibility’s fatal flaw. The Roman Pontiff, in order that the Church may share in Christ’s infallibility, says the Catechism, “enjoys this infallibility in virtue of his office.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 891). But there is one problem: nobody knows when the Pope is speaking infallibly, nobody knows how often a pope has spoken infallibly, and nobody knows what the criteria are for when a pope is speaking infallibly. Continue reading Infallibility’s Fatal Flaw→
Cardinal Newman taught that sincerely believing a well-crafted fabrication is as good as believing the truth.
The sincere Roman Catholic will no doubt bristle at our summary of Tradition in our previous post:
The pattern for Rome is this: “we already know this to be true, so there is no error in creating evidence to support it.” This is why I call ‘Tradition’ the historical revisionism that it clearly is.
It is nonetheless a true, and verifiable statement. John Henry Cardinal Newman, one of the most famous converts to Rome from the Church of England, was a prolific writer and, after his conversion, a staunch apologist for Rome. He provides one of the best examples in recent memory of an apologist who was committed to the circularity of Roman epistemology: “we already know this to be true, so there is no error in creating evidence to support it.” When commenting on A Legend of St. Gundleus, Newman not only allows for adding fictional dialogues to the gospel narrative—he insists that it is necessary. Continue reading “Truth” received on no authority at all→
“All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine, for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness: That the man of God may be perfect, throughly furnished unto all good works.” (2 Timothy 3:16-17)
The Christian who must wrestle with Roman Catholic apologists (trained and untrained) will often hear them appeal to the ancient, non-scriptural, sources as proof of what the Apostles taught. We dealt with a part of that issue in a prior post about going all the way back to the written Word, instead of just going back to the first few post-apostolic generations. We acknowledge that some foundational Roman Catholic errors emerged early in the post-apostolic era, as Paul predicted they would (Acts 20:30-32), but we deny that those errors must be canonized along with God’s revelation to us in the Holy Bible. Ancient unbiblical teachings do not become more biblical with the passage of time.
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