All About Faith

[YourTruthGod]

What is your agenda here?


He usually writes something down informing everyone who reads it that it is an ex cathedra statement.


How recent?

At least the Eastern Orthodox refuses to have a 'pope' over them.

 

[MennoSota]

It isn't conjuring up faith on your own, it is doing the way the Lord says to do it.

Follow the manual. Steps 1 through 12 and if you say the correct incantations on each step you will have created the faith God wants for you. Failure to follow these steps exactly will result in horrible consequences.
Tell me, YTG, where is the grace by which we are saved?

 

[Arsenios]

Name six.


Not very often.


Aside from canonising saints I can't think of any in the last 10, 50, but maybe one in the last 100.
Here is some of the text relating to it. Published in 1950.

9. In this pious striving, the faithful have been associated in a wonderful way with their own holy bishops, who have sent petitions of this kind, truly remarkable in number, to this See of the Blessed Peter. Consequently, when we were elevated to the throne of the supreme pontificate, petitions of this sort had already been addressed by the thousands from every part of the world and from every class of people, from our beloved sons the Cardinals of the Sacred College, from our venerable brethren, archbishops and bishops, from dioceses and from parishes.

10. Consequently, while we sent up earnest prayers to God that he might grant to our mind the light of the Holy Spirit, to enable us to make a decision on this most serious subject, we issued special orders in which we commanded that, by corporate effort, more advanced inquiries into this matter should be begun and that, in the meantime, all the petitions about the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into heaven which had been sent to this Apostolic See from the time of Pius IX, our predecessor of happy memory, down to our own days should be gathered together and carefully evaluated.(3)

11. And, since we were dealing with a matter of such great moment and of such importance, we considered it opportune to ask all our venerable brethren in the episcopate directly and authoritatively that each of them should make known to us his mind in a formal statement. Hence, on May 1, 1946, we gave them our letter "Deiparae Virginis Mariae," a letter in which these words are contained: "Do you, venerable brethren, in your outstanding wisdom and prudence, judge that the bodily Assumption of the Blessed Virgin can be proposed and defined as a dogma of faith? Do you, with your clergy and people, desire it?"

12. But those whom "the Holy Spirit has placed as bishops to rule the Church of God"(4) gave an almost unanimous affirmative response to both these questions. This "outstanding agreement of the Catholic prelates and the faithful,"(5) affirming that the bodily Assumption of God's Mother into heaven can be defined as a dogma of faith, since it shows us the concordant teaching of the Church's ordinary doctrinal authority and the concordant faith of the Christian people which the same doctrinal authority sustains and directs, thus by itself and in an entirely certain and infallible way, manifests this privilege as a truth revealed by God and contained in that divine deposit which Christ has delivered to his Spouse to be guarded faithfully and to be taught infallibly.(6) Certainly this teaching authority of the Church, not by any merely human effort but under the protection of the Spirit of Truth,(7) and therefore absolutely without error, carries out the commission entrusted to it, that of preserving the revealed truths pure and entire throughout every age, in such a way that it presents them undefiled, adding nothing to them and taking nothing away from them. For, as the Vatican Council teaches, "the Holy Spirit was not promised to the successors of Peter in such a way that, by his revelation, they might manifest new doctrine, but so that, by his assistance, they might guard as sacred and might faithfully propose the revelation delivered through the apostles, or the deposit of faith."(8) Thus, from the universal agreement of the Church's ordinary teaching authority we have a certain and firm proof, demonstrating that the Blessed Virgin Mary's bodily Assumption into heaven- which surely no faculty of the human mind could know by its own natural powers, as far as the heavenly glorification of the virginal body of the loving Mother of God is concerned-is a truth that has been revealed by God and consequently something that must be firmly and faithfully believed by all children of the Church. For, as the Vatican Council asserts, "all those things are to be believed by divine and Catholic faith which are contained in the written Word of God or in Tradition, and which are proposed by the Church, either in solemn judgment or in its ordinary and universal teaching office, as divinely revealed truths which must be believed."(9)​

The defined doctrine says - essentially - that 40. Hence the revered Mother of God, from all eternity joined in a hidden way with Jesus Christ in one and the same decree of predestination,(47) immaculate in her conception, a most perfect virgin in her divine motherhood, the noble associate of the divine Redeemer who has won a complete triumph over sin and its consequences, finally obtained, as the supreme culmination of her privileges, that she should be preserved free from the corruption of the tomb and that, like her own Son, having overcome death, she might be taken up body and soul to the glory of heaven where, as Queen, she sits in splendor at the right hand of her Son, the immortal King of the Ages.(48)

Thanks, MC...

I understand that the Marian dogmas, especially that of the I/C, are more recent...
But not that of the assumption, of course...
That is a belief held by the EOC from the beginnings...
We have never dogmatized it...

So your post got me to asking: "Why dogmatize?"

Your post said:

"Do you, venerable brethren, in your outstanding wisdom and prudence,
judge that the bodily Assumption of the Blessed Virgin
can be proposed and defined as a dogma of faith?
Do you, with your clergy and people, desire it?"

Is that the criteria for dogmatizing?
eg
Is a belief dogmatically justifiable, and is it commonly desired?

Normally, ex-Cathedra is a phrase that many Catholics I have talked with down-play as not done any more to speak of...

Above, it is presented as a Papal supplication to his advisors?

Anyway, thanks for the reply...


Arsenios

 

[zecryphon_nomdiv]

Of course it is about what Jesus has done. Jesus came and gave a New Testament, a New Covenant. Pit my works against the wrath of God? Trusting what God says and doing it is not ever wrong. God warns people not to call what is good 'evil'.

You believe that we have to do something in order to be saved. That is not what Scripture teaches. One problem you have is that you think repentance is something you actively do, in order to receive something from God.

Repentance is passive. It is a response to God's grace and the gift of faith.
There is nothing we do that causes God to save us. You, however, reject this. The second someone says that we can not save ourselves or play a part in our salvation, you automatically falsely accuse them of saying we don't have to obey God.

 

[Arsenios]

You do debate, but you don't want to admit it. What you do here is debating. Debate is not a bad word. The Apostle Paul debated.
James says to contend for the faith. Do you know what a contender is?

Isn't he the guy who loses?

I mean, there are champions and contenders, right??


Arsenios.

 

[Arsenios]

Not Christian, you say, what are you talking about?

Old Testament pre-Christian Salvation was by the Holy Spirit's visitation on the OT Saints...

Moses, for instance, encountered God on the mountain, and his face shone so bright he had to hide it...

Elijah brought the widow's son back to life...

Called down fire...

But Christian Salvation is different...

It is not mere visitation by God...

eg Saul was not Saved on the Road to Damascus...

He was blinded...

His Salvation came later...


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

You do debate. Maybe you should tell me what about the word debate that you want to deny.

I debated in high school...

It involves persuasion...

Marshalling and interpreting facts...

I do not remember well enough...

And debating does not save anyone...

But God does...

So I pray for others...

And besides, debate is ego-centered...

Me right, you wrong!

Right smashes wrong!

Everyone gets in a lather...

And since when is proving one's self right denial of self, which is the essential of Salvation...??

Naaaaaggghhh...

But we can talk...


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

Arsenios likes to gossip.

I liked your pluck there, and I like it here...

Get over it!


Arsenios

 

[Arsenios]

He said he prays for me, but what he was saying he would pray for is based on his false judgments of me.

So you say you pray for yourself all the time and hardly anything good ever happens...why is that?

Well ya gotta be careful...

I mean, you are right -

Menno loves to pray for God to get me to agree with Menno!

I NEVER pray for some specific outcome like that...

I simply pray: "Lord have Mercy on Menno..."

Period...

I really get gun-shy about telling God what to do about changing the other guy's mind...


Arsenios

 

[YourTruthGod]

I don't agree with YTG's statement.
He says "You must, in order to get." That is not grace.
The problem is that YTG sees salvation as an object to attain. He sees it like a toy at Christmas that a child wants and in order to get it he has to be good so that Santa will bring him the toy he wants.
He doesn't realize that salvation is an action of God that is not predicated on the recipient doing something to get it. Salvation is an action where the helpless person receives help whether he calls for it or not.
Yesterday a house in St Paul exploded. There was an elderly gentleman in the house and two neighbors rushed into the house and saved him. The neighbors did so because they chose to go in and because they knew the man and cared about his salvation. Without the action of the two neighbors, the man would have burned in the flames.
Should the man recover, he will respond kindly to his neighbors who graciously did what they were not obligated to do.
That is a picture of God's salvation. God chooses to save us, apart from anything we do, by his grace, and under no requirement or compulsion. He saved us from certain death because we could not save ourselves.
So I reject YTG's statement. It is laden with works before God can act. There is no grace in his statement.

You said it doesn't matter if we call on God or not.

What you say is not true.

Acts 9:14 And now he is here with authority from the chief priests to arrest all who call on Your name.”


Acts 22:16
And now what are you waiting for? Get up, be baptized and wash your sins away, calling on his name

Paul began to preach in the synagogues that Jesus is the Son of God. All those who heard him were astonished and asked, “Isn’t he the man who raised havoc in Jerusalem among those who call on this name? And hasn’t he come here to take them as prisoners to the chief priests?

Acts 9:21 But all that heard him were amazed, and said; Is not this he that destroyed them which called on this name in Jerusalem, and came hither for that intent, that he might bring them bound unto the chief priests?

Romans 10:14 How then shall they call on him in whom they have not believed? and how shall they believe in him of whom they have not heard? and how shall they hear without a preacher?

1 Corinthians 1:2 Unto the church of God which is at Corinth, to them that are sanctified in Christ Jesus, called to be saints, with all that in every place call upon the name of Jesus Christ our Lord, both their's and our's:

2 Timothy 2:22 Flee also youthful lusts: but follow righteousness, faith, charity, peace, with them that call on the Lord out of a pure heart.

 

[YourTruthGod]

I liked your pluck there, and I like it here...

Get over it!


Arsenios

Hmmm...I have to think about that some more.

 

[YourTruthGod]

I debated in high school...

It involves persuasion...

Marshalling and interpreting facts...

I do not remember well enough...

And debating does not save anyone...

But God does...


Arsenios

I can't tell you how much I love talking about the scriptures and trying to show others what Jesus revealed to me.

Hebrews 4:12 For the word of God is alive and active. Sharper than any double-edged sword, it penetrates even to dividing soul and spirit, joints and marrow; it judges the thoughts and attitudes of the heart.

 

[YourTruthGod]

Old Testament pre-Christian Salvation was by the Holy Spirit's visitation on the OT Saints...

Moses, for instance, encountered God on the mountain, and his face shone so bright he had to hide it...

Elijah brought the widow's son back to life...

Called down fire...

But Christian Salvation is different...

It is not mere visitation by God...

eg Saul was not Saved on the Road to Damascus...

He was blinded...

His Salvation came later...


Arsenios

Okay, I think I would agree with that.
Interesting though...

1 Corinthians 10:4 and drank the same spiritual drink; for they drank from the spiritual rock that accompanied them, and that rock was Christ.

 

[YourTruthGod]

Isn't he the guy who loses?

I mean, there are champions and contenders, right??


Arsenios.

God always blesses me for contending for the faith, even when it looks like no one cares about what I say and just beats me up.

 

[Arsenios]

Sometimes you are so right!

Just a temporary snit-fit...

Nothing habitual, mind you...!!


Arsenios

 

[YourTruthGod]

You believe that we have to do something in order to be saved. That is not what Scripture teaches. One problem you have is that you think repentance is something you actively do, in order to receive something from God.

Repentance is passive. It is a response to God's grace and the gift of faith.

How can repentance be a passive response?

There is nothing we do that causes God to save us.

That's not what God says.

You, however, reject this. The second someone says that we can not save ourselves or play a part in our salvation, you automatically falsely accuse them of saying we don't have to obey God.

Jesus says that he saves those who obey him. You say no to that---that is going against obeying him.

 

[Arsenios]

So you say you pray for yourself all the time
and hardly anything good ever happens...
why is that?

The Parable of the Unjust Judge...

And more than that, God is always giving us exactly what we need...

So why would I ask for other than that for myself?

All I do is pray for His Mercy...

If my toe hurts, I don't pray for an analgesic...

Though sometimes I might buy one...


Arsenios

 

[YourTruthGod]

Follow the manual. Steps 1 through 12 and if you say the correct incantations on each step you will have created the faith God wants for you. Failure to follow these steps exactly will result in horrible consequences.
Tell me, YTG, where is the grace by which we are saved?

You are making it harder than it is. Just get Jesus' teachings and do what he says, and you will see.

 

[YourTruthGod]

The Parable of the Unjust Judge...

And more than that, God is always giving us exactly what we need...

So why would I ask for other than that for myself?

All I do is pray for His Mercy...

If my toe hurts, I don't pray for an analgesic...

Though sometimes I might buy one...


Arsenios

You pray for mercy and are thankful for having it, or you are not sure you have it?

 

[zecryphon_nomdiv]

How can repentance be a passive response?


That's not what God says.



Jesus says that he saves those who obey him. You say no to that---that is going against obeying him.

How can it not be? We repent because the Holy Spirit is working in us, convicting us of the truth of God's law, which accuses us. Of being sinners who hate God and also revealing to us that what God declares in the Gospel is true, Jesus Christ has taken the punishment we earned and deserve. If we have been saved, we respond by repenting of our past sins, thanking God for saving us and asking Him to show us how to live the new life we have been given in Christ.