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t d wombat View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 17:46

SteveG wrote:

If we were together, we could all sing Kumbaya. But we are not. This is a volatile subject at the best of times and always seems to bring out the worst in us, instead of the best. So, it's time for me to pass.

What ? Not even if we get Wakeman to supply the keyboards ?

Anywho, I'm with you. If we keep at it we'll all be drowned in a sea of Ivan's red and blue. A shame to some extent cos a knock 'em down and drag 'em brawl on the true origins of the church would be fun. Not to mention that the reformation then led on to Cromwell, probably the most evil b*****d of the lot of them and we havn't even touched on Intelligent Design nor how the Wombats managed to get back to Australia from Mt Ararat post flood. Big smile

Edited by t d wombat - July 17 2015 at 18:26

Andrew B

“Outside of a dog, a book is a man's best friend. Inside of a dog it's too dark to read.” ― Julius Henry Marx

Ivan_Melgar_M View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 17:23

Didn't wanted to be dragged here, but well, history and Theology fascinate me

AlanB wrote:

Wow, this thread has really taken off hasn't it? I log on in the morning and there are multiple postings to read through, pretty much all concerned with the lyrics of one album. So can I put my two pennyworth in?

Everybody is free to give an opinion.

AlanB wrote:

I don't see hatred in the lyrics of Sola Scriptura, and certainly not towards the present day Roman Catholic Church. The criticism is levelled against the corrupt medieval church, and against any church today that goes against the Word of God. The language used (harlot, Babylon, dragon etc) is lifted from the Book of Revelation. In fact the whole album is predicated on an interpretation of Revelation chapter 12, where a woman and child are pursued into the desert by a dragon, and this period lasts 1260 days. Exponents of this interpretation claim that the Bishop of Rome held political power over Europe from the fall of the Roman Empire to an edict of Napoleon removing the Pope's political power - this period is said to have lasted from 538 AD to 1798 AD - a period of 1260 years. This is where Sola Scriptura's lyrics are coming from.

1.- The hatred is evident for anybody who doesn't share his bigot view

2.- There's no excuse for saying that the Church is a whore that all our doctrine is blood.

3.- Exponents of this interpretation are wrong.

It's easy to make interpretations of prophecies of te past, because pro´phesies are vague, and they adapt random successes, and claim that the prophecy was right

For example, the Grand Pyramid Prophesies were IMPECCABLE, when people read the book, really believed the world was ending in 2005

The problem rises the day after the book was released....NO OTHER PROPHESY WAS FULFILLED.

It's easy to say a Prophesy fulfilled in the past, when you adapt any random success to a prophesy.

Now, lets talk about the 1,260 days that mysteriously turned into 1,260 years

a) The year 538 AD makes no sense. The power of the Church in Europe started in the year 380 AD when the Edict of Thessalonica made the Catholic Church official in Rome and in almost all Europe.

b) 1798 AD makes no sense either, because he Church kept all the control until 1870, when Victor Manuel deprived the Church of each and every meter of territory except the Saint Peter's basilica including the Pontifical States.

c) So, 1870 - 380 = 1490....So the Church had power in Europe for 1,490 years not 1260.

So, everything is wrong

AlanB wrote:

Now, going back further in history, the Christian religion went from being a persecuted sect to the state religion after the conversion of the Emperor Constantine.

FALSE

1.- Constantine converted in the year 337 when he was baptized before dying.

2.- Constantine made the Catholic Church legal in 313 (Edict of Milan) at that point he was still a pagan.

3.- The Catholic Church was made official by the Thessalonica Edict (380 AD)

By the point the Catholic Church was made legal, they were no longer a small sect, but an organized church with 32 popes

St. Peter (32-67)
St. Linus (67-76)
St. Anacletus (Cletus) (76-88)
St. Clement I (88-97)
St. Evaristus (97-105)
St. Alexander I (105-115)
St. Sixtus I (115-125) Also called Xystus I
St. Telesphorus (125-136)
St. Hyginus (136-140)
St. Pius I (140-155)
St. Anicetus (155-166)
St. Soter (166-175)
St. Eleutherius (175-189)
St. Victor I (189-199)
St. Zephyrinus (199-217)
St. Callistus I (217-22) Callistus and the following three popes were opposed by St. Hippolytus, antipope (217-236)
St. Urban I (222-30)
St. Pontain (230-35)
St. Anterus (235-36)
St. Fabian (236-50)
St. Cornelius (251-53) Opposed by Novatian, antipope (251)
St. Lucius I (253-54)
St. Stephen I (254-257)
St. Sixtus II (257-258)
St. Dionysius (260-268)
St. Felix I (269-274)
St. Eutychian (275-283)
St. Caius (283-296) Also called Gaius
St. Marcellinus (296-304)
St. Marcellus I (308-309)
St. Eusebius (309 or 310)
St. Miltiades (311-14)

Don't you guys check historical books before you repeat what you are told probably by a pastor with an agenda?

AlanB wrote:

There is an argument made by some that the church incorporated some of the pagan beliefs at that time in order to make the change from a pantheistic belief system to a monotheistic one. The assimilation of the Roman feast of Saturnalia as the Christian festival of Christmas is an obvious one.

FALSE

a) Saturnalia was celebrated on December 17, not in December 25

By the beginning of December, writes Columella, the farmer should have finished his autumn planting (De Re Rustica, III.14). Now, with the approach of the winter solstice (December 25 in the Julian calendar), Saturnus, the god of seed and sowing (Latin satus) was honored with a festival. The Saturnalia officially was celebrated on December 17 (XVI Kal. Jan.) and, in Cicero's time, lasted seven days (counting inclusively)—from December 17 to 23. Augustus limited the holiday to three days, so the civil courts would not have to be closed any longer than necessary (Macrobius, Saturnalia, I.10.4), and Caligula extended it to five (Suetonius, Life of Caligula, XVII; Dio, Roman History, LIX.6.4), the fifth day restored by Claudius after it had been abolished at one time (Roman History, LX.25.8). Still, everyone seems to have continued to celebrate for a full week, extended, says Macrobius, by celebration of the Sigillaria on the last day of Saturnalia, so named for the small earthenware figurines (sigillaria) that were sold then (Saturnalia, I.10.24).

http://penelope.uchicago.edu/~grout/encyclopaedia_romana/calendar/saturnalia.html

b) The Christmas date exists before the Church was accepted in Rome in 313

Hyppolitus of Rome wrote about deceber 25 i the year 204 AD (109 years before the Church was made legal in Rome)

Although the date of Christ’s birth is not given to us in Scripture, there is documented evidence that December 25 was already of some significance to Christians prior to A.D. 354. One example can be found in the writings of Hyppolytus of Rome, who explains in his Commentary on the book of Daniel (c. A.D. 204) that the Lord’s birth was believed to have occurred on that day:

For the first advent of our Lord in the flesh, when he was born in Bethlehem, was December 25th, Wednesday, while Augustus was in his forty-second year, but from Adam, five thousand and five hundred years. He suffered in the thirty-third year, March 25th, Friday, the eighteenth year of Tiberius Caesar, while Rufus and Roubellion were Consuls.

http://www.catholic.com/blog/jon-sorensen/why-december-25

c) Since the movie Zeitgeist, people stopped talking about Saturnalia because it was obvious that it was celebrate in December 17, and started to talk about "Sol Invictus" but this was even more wrong,l because the cult of Sol Invictus (December 25), was invented by Aurelian in 274 AD...In other words, 70 years after the first evidence of Christmas on december 25 can be traced.

We know that Christ wasn't necessarily born in December 25th, because we don't know the day, but it was celebrated that day for a mistake in thecounting of the Easter days.

As a fact this error was made official in the VI Century by a monk named Dionysus Exiguus, who was asked by the Pope John I to confirm Christmas day and he repeated the mistake

Dionysius Exiguus, a monk from Russia who died about 544, was asked by Pope John I to set out the dates for Easter from the years 527 to 626. It seems that the Pope was keen to produce some order in the celebration of Easter. Dionysius decided to begin with what he considered to be the year of Jesus’ birth. He chose the year in which Rome had been founded and determined, from the evidence known to him, that Jesus had been born 753 years later.

He was almost certainly acquainted with a suggestion by Hippolytus (170–236) that the date of Jesus’ birth was December 25, but the trouble was that Hippolytus had not backed up this claim with sound arguments. Dionysius, however, had just the argument:
His contemporaries claimed that God created the earth on March 25.
It was inconceivable that the son of God could have been in any way imperfect.
Therefore Jesus must have been conceived on March 25.
This meant that he must have been born nine months later—December 25

http://www.westarinstitute.org/resources/the-fourth-r/dionysius-exiguus/

Isn't history fascinating when you know just a bit?

AlanB wrote:

Another is the replacement of the Roman Gods with saints who can intercede with God on behalf of people on Earth.

Do you have any evidence of this?

Please, you can't make a statement so emphatic without having any source, which by the way doesn't exist, the concept of Saints is in the Bible 67 times and he singular Saint is one time.

AlanB wrote:

This idea is not in the Bible, in fact the Bible states that there is only one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. Purgatory is another concept that you won't find in the Bible, but its addition to church doctrine proved a useful money raising tactic in the Middle Ages when people could reduce their time there by buying indulgences. It is this sort of thing that Morse is railing against in Sola Scriptura, and when you understand the basis in Revelation which he is starting from, you can understand why he is using such language.

FALSE AGAIN

It's in the Bible.

When Luther creted the 5 solas, he noticed that the Bible didn't supported this idea, so he eleated every book or passage that could interfere, as a fact he wanted to eliminate James because he said that faith without acts is dead faith, and his explantion was absolutely anti Semitic

"We should throw the epistle of James out of this school, for it doesn't amount to much. It contains not a syllable about Christ, except at the beginning. I maintain that some Jew wrote it who probably heard about Christian people but never encountered any. Since he heard that Christians place great weight on faith in Christ, he thought, "Wait a moment! I'll oppose them and urge works alone.'"

Martin Luther LW54,424-425

He also eliminated Maccabees I and II which talk about prayers for the death, purgatory an saints, despite that the 7 books deleted by Luther are in the Septuagint.

AlanB wrote:

As an Evangelical Protestant I obviously share Morse's world view, but there is one concern that I have. He includes the doctrine of the Trinity in his list of doctrines which came out of the "false church" of the Middle Ages, and rejects that idea too. This came out in interviews which he did around the time of Sola's release, and it does disturb some Christians who otherwise admire his music and lyrics.

I couldn't expect less

You support Morse when he attacks the Catholic Church, but when his doctrine collisions with your beliefs, you stop supporting him.

That's called double standard..The enemy of my enemy is my friend, unless he disagrees with me

AlanB wrote:

Finally, regarding Luther's anti-Semitism, Morse is on record as saying that he was made aware of this during the recording of Sola, and actually considered pulling the whole project because of it. I think this is referred to in the liner notes, but as I only have a download I'm not 100% sure of that.

Not correct either

Morse said that he only discovered Luther's Antisemitism when recording the album, something that is absurd because:

a) He's not an ignorant, he's a cult man who had to know this

b) It's impossible to make a research about Luther's life and not know that he was beyond the level of Hitler

Then he never really thought of leaving the project, he said something ambiguous but he refused to even mention it because it could affect Luther's credibility.

Double morality

BTW: I have the quote

When I wrote this album I was unaware of Martin Luther's anti-Jewish statements, and I considered scrapping it, but I feel that the main point is that the way God used him to protest false religion is still a good example of courage and boldness for a Godly cause.

Neal Morse

Edited by Ivan_Melgar_M - July 17 2015 at 17:30

dr wu23

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 16:26

I agree with you Steve,.....'Religion' tends to bring out the worst in people more often than their best.

One does nothing yet nothing is left undone.
Haquin

SteveG

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 15:35

If we were together, we could all sing Kumbaya. But we are not. This is a volatile subject at the best of times and always seems to bring out the worst in us, instead of the best. So, it's time for me to pass.

Ivan_Melgar_M View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 15:30

timothy leary wrote:

The "infallible" role models

Pope Stephen VI (896–897), who had his predecessor Pope Formosus exhumed, tried, de-fingered, briefly reburied, and thrown in the Tiber.^[1]
Pope John XII (955–964), who gave land to a mistress, murdered several people, and was killed by a man who caught him in bed with his wife.
Pope Benedict IX (1032–1044, 1045, 1047–1048), who "sold" the Papacy
Pope Boniface VIII (1294–1303), who is lampooned in Dante's Divine Comedy
Pope Urban VI (1378–1389), who complained that he did not hear enough screaming when Cardinals who had conspired against him were tortured.^[2]
Pope Alexander VI (1492–1503), a Borgia, who was guilty of nepotism and whose unattended corpse swelled until it could barely fit in a coffin.^[3]
Pope Leo X (1513–1521), a spendthrift member of the Medici family who once spent 1/7 of his predecessors' reserves on a single ceremony^[4]
Pope Clement VII (1523–1534), also a Medici, whose power-politicking with France, Spain, and Germany got Rome sacked.

A pope is infallible

ONLY IN MATTERS OF FAITH AND CHRISTIAN MORAL DOCTRINE AND WHEN SPEAKING EX CATHEDRA TO EACH AND EVERY CATHOLIC IN THE WORLD

Papal infallibility is a dogma of the Catholic Church that states that, in virtue of the promise of Jesus to Peter, the Pope is preserved from the possibility of error "When, in the exercise of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, in virtue of his supreme apostolic authority, he defines a doctrine concerning faith or morals to be held by the whole Church.

But that's not all, he must speak Ex Cathedra:

According to the teaching of the First Vatican Council and Catholic tradition, the conditions required for ex cathedra papal teaching are as follows:

"the Roman Pontiff"
"speaks ex cathedra" ("that is, when in the discharge of his office as shepherd and teacher of all Christians, and by virtue of his supreme apostolic authority....")
"he defines"
"that a doctrine concerning faith or morals"
"must be held by the whole Church"

For a teaching by a pope or ecumenical council to be recognized as infallible, the teaching must be:

A decision of the supreme teaching authority of the Church (pope or College of Bishops)
Concern a doctrine of faith or morals
Bind the universal Church
Be proposed as something to hold firmly and immutably

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Papal_infallibility#Ex_cathedra

In their personal lives, they are as fallible as everybody else in the whole planet.

If Pope Francis tells you to bet on San Lorenzo de Almagro for the Libertadores Cup (He's a fan of the club), don't recommend you to put money, because the team sucks lately and his opinion is not protected by infallibility.

They can be sinners (And all humans are) and they can commit the same mistakes as us

Why do people speak without knowing?

Edited by Ivan_Melgar_M - July 17 2015 at 15:33

SteveG

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 15:03

^The book known to historians as Luke-Acts is a homogenized and harmonized white wash of early Christianity. 'Real Christianity' does not reside there. For a better look at 'real' Christianity (warts and all), refer to the authentic Pauline letters such as Galatians.

Edited by SteveG - July 17 2015 at 15:28

timothy leary View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:59

The original church can be found in the book of acts. It was called the Way and the leader was James, not Peter.

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:57

terramystic wrote:

Moogtron III wrote:

I wish that the ecumenical path would be taken more often.

In my (small) city, as the pastor of the protestant church, I'm head of the city council of churches.

That council includes the Roman-Catholic church, the protestant church, the Roman-Catholic ecumenical Focolare movement and an evangelical congregation.

Together we come in each others' church services, we do diaconal projects together, we respect each other in each other's traditions.

And we learn from each other.

I miss more of this ecumenical spirit between churches.

Thank you, terramystic!
I'm lucky to be in such a surrounding, I'm well aware.

SteveG

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:56

Friday13th wrote:

SteveG wrote:

dr wu23 wrote:

SteveG wrote:

Ok, sorry to break up all this a up, but I'm curious to know how many Christian believers know of the true origins of the Christian faith such as a parallel church in Jerusalem run by Jesus's brother James, the entire esoteric Christian gnostic movement and it's persecution, and the insane debate between Catholic Christians and the Christian Arians who contested if Christ was indeed 'of one substance' with the father.

Knowing the entire story casts this religion, like all others, in a different light.

Some good points you brought up there regarding origins.....and who or what is the authentic 'Church'.

Will the real Christianity please stand up?

ps: does this have anything to do with Morse and his mediocre solo albums..?

Excellent questions, Doc. The 'real Christianity' is what historically inclined persons like myself are trying to find out.

As for this having anything to do with Morse and his boring albums, that's perhaps a stretch. But it does keep the discussion from being boring.

Have you tried...The New Testament? Big smile

Yes. They're not there, either.

Moogtron III View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:55

Ivan_Melgar_M wrote:

Moogtron III wrote:

That's the proper way to say it and I very much appreciate that you say it like that.

My church, the protestant church, also has its black pages and they should be mentioned as well.

The Hollywood picture of Luther (from Eric Till) shows him as someone who abhors violence, which is of course falsification of history.

A bit of a missed chance, really. A more realistic picture would have been more fruitful for our understanding of the historic development of theology as well as our understanding of history.

Lets be honest, most of the violence in both churches was a product of a violent era, a time when the plague, the wars, etc created tortured religious leaders who were pawns of the emeperors and princes.

There were more violent ones like Calvine (Who hated Luther as much as the Pope) or Zwingli, but all of them were manipulated by greedy rulers.

There was a lot of anti-semitism, but lets be honest, the only ones who got real benefit of the expulsion of the jews were kings with great debts who threw the Jews out of their territories to avoid paying what the owed.

The 1492 edict of expulsion is taught like a religious edict, but the truth was that Isabella and Ferdinand had economic reasons

And we likewise give license and faculty to those said Jews and Jewesses that they be able to export their goods and estates out of these our said kingdoms and lordships by sea or land as long as they do not export gold or silver or coined money or other things prohibited by the laws of our kingdoms, excepting merchandise and things that are not prohibited.

They owed money to the Jewish people, so they expelled them and kept their gold, silver and coins, they gave IOU's that were never paid, avoided paying and blamed the Church

I'm sure that part of the hatred of Luther was caused because he received pressure of the Germanic princes.

So churches always get the blame, but their leaders were used by greedy rulers.

Important factors. Yes, it's more complex than you'd think at first sight, and lust for power and greed, banal as they are, are always playing leading roles in history, sadly enough.

SteveG

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:55

timothy leary wrote:

SteveG wrote:

^Ok, are you done now? I guess it takes wit to interpret humor. My bad.

So you are saying I lack wit rather than admitting your joke was lame. Now that my friend is funny.

Tim, are you done now? I'm tired of this, and I might say something that I certainly won't regret. At least not in this life. I'm not sure if there's another to worry about.

timothy leary View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:49

SteveG wrote:

^Ok, are you done now? I guess it takes wit to interpret humor. My bad.

So you are saying I lack wit rather than admitting your joke was lame. Now that my friend is funny.

Friday13th View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:46

SteveG wrote:

dr wu23 wrote:

Knowing the entire story casts this religion, like all others, in a different light.

Some good points you brought up there regarding origins.....and who or what is the authentic 'Church'.

Will the real Christianity please stand up?

ps: does this have anything to do with Morse and his mediocre solo albums..?

Excellent questions, Doc. The 'real Christianity' is what historically inclined persons like myself are trying to find out.

As for this having anything to do with Morse and his boring albums, that's perhaps a stretch. But it does keep the discussion from being boring.

Have you tried...The New Testament? Big smile

SteveG

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:45

^As an agnostic, I'm quite impressed with Pope Francis. If that means anything.

Friday13th View Drop Down

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:44

Summed up, infallibility of the Papacy has to do with the the formation of official doctrine only. Catholics acknowledge the atrocities that the Popes committed. For example, all those terrible acts by Popes would be examples of terrible sins against his belief system of not murdering, doing unto others, etc.

I will say that Pope Honorius I officially allowed some beliefs about Jesus that were later condemned as heresies. Catholics will say he just didn't make a decision on the issue, but when I looked it's pretty clear he said "eh okay."

Here's an article from the positive perspective:

http://www.catholic.com/tracts/papal-infallibility

SteveG

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Posted: July 17 2015 at 14:42

^Ok, are you done now? I guess it takes wit to interpret humor. My bad.

Edited by SteveG - July 17 2015 at 14:43