[Upper Room] The Gospel According to Roman Catholicism

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Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:31

Of my salvation. No assurance whatsoever. And that wasn't a bug in the Roman Catholic system. That was a feature. Because it was presumption. That's what I always heard from people to think that I would go to heaven when I died. You know, it really depends. You know, can you keep the rules? Can you obey? Can you do what you're supposed to do? Then you'll go to heaven. And I just, you know, anytime I was in catechism class or in church, and I heard them talk about sin, like, these are the venial sins, these are the mortal sins. They'd list the sins and like done that one, done that one, done that one. And there was no pardon, there was no gospel forgiveness, there was no assurance. And eventually, I'm 17 years old. I'm like, I've spent my whole life listening to these people tell me the various and sundry reasons why I'm going to hell. So, alright, I may as well live like it. Eat, drink, and be merry, for tomorrow I die. So I left the Roman Catholic Church when I was 17. I didn't come back to the faith until I actually encountered the gospel when I was 23 years old.

SPEAKER_01 1:36

And you got bonked on the head by a speaker.

SPEAKER_00 1:38

And I got bonked on the head by a speaker. Yeah, but that's another part of the story. So, you know, and I bring that up because we don't have, you know, when we are contending with Roman Catholic friends, and you know, I don't want to assume that Roman Catholics are automatically unbelievers. There are many believers in the Roman Catholic Church, in spite of the Roman Catholic Church's teaching. Now I got no problem saying that, but when we're arguing with people, we're not just contending with them, we're contending for them. And one of those things we're contending for is, you know, don't you see what you have in Christ? Don't you see what God has done for you? Don't you see you don't have to keep running on the hamster wheel that is works righteousness when Jesus already paid it all. And you can have everything you desire simply by grace through faith in Christ. So that's kind of, you know, that's the goal. That's what we want tonight when we think about uh our how we engage our Roman Catholic friends. So we're gonna talk about commonalities. We're gonna what we're gonna do is we're gonna look at ten commonalities very quickly between Catholicism and Reformed Protestantism. Then we're gonna look at three key differences. Without cheating and looking at your sheet, just to kind of prime our pump a little bit, what would you say that the differences are between the Roman Catholic Church and the Protestant Church?

SPEAKER_01 3:10

They believe that the bread and blood actually turns into Jesus.

SPEAKER_00 3:15

Yeah. Transubstantiation. Transubstantiation. We'll talk about that. Yeah, that's right. I know I'm I'm yo-yoing a little bit. Differences, commonalities, differences, but there's a method to my maths. Centralized people authority. Centralized people authority. Just say the poet.

SPEAKER_02 3:46

There we go.

SPEAKER_07 3:50

This is fair. I saw it on the sheet, but I had this before I walked in here. How you become saved. What's that? How you become saved. Salvation? Yeah. Alright.

SPEAKER_03 4:00

Tradition is to the word God.

SPEAKER_00 4:09

I'm gonna put that next to Pope, and I'm gonna say authority. And that'll make sense later, I hope.

unknown 4:17

Because that it's a question of authority.

SPEAKER_00 4:19

What authority does scripture have? What authority does tradition have?

SPEAKER_04 4:22

And how do those two things align? Right? I guess it's sided in salvation with justification. That was the hinge that the Reformation term.

SPEAKER_06 4:31

So it's quite trivial, but um they have extra books in the Bible.

SPEAKER_00 4:42

Yeah, the Apocrypha.

SPEAKER_03 4:47

We'll just say come on, it's not that hard.

SPEAKER_00 4:49

We'll say can't. No, no. I was gonna put Apocrypha slash deuterocanonical literature, and I didn't want to write all that. So can't you?

SPEAKER_08 4:58

Pamela. Saints. Saints. People who have been, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 5:02

Yeah. Do we have saints in the in the Protestant church? Who are the saints? Who are the saints? Brenda.

unknown 5:11

Icons.

SPEAKER_00 5:12

Icons. Icons, yeah. A little different, yeah. Interesting. Okay.

SPEAKER_08 5:19

Purgatory.

SPEAKER_00 5:20

Purgatory. That goes along with salvation, so we'll do that one. Yeah? Purgatory. Uh Robin.

SPEAKER_08 5:30

Okay, don't get mad at me for saying this, but Jesus is still on the cross for them. That's transubstantiation.

SPEAKER_00 5:36

Yeah. Well, no, it's not transubstantiation. It's a common Protestant misunderstanding of the Mass that Christ is re-sacrificed every Sunday. It's not actually not the official teaching of the Roman Catholic Church. It's um it's more Christ is represented as crucified. So it's it's almost a distinction without a difference, but if you say that to a Catholic who knows their stuff, they're gonna be like, well, we don't teach that.

SPEAKER_08 6:05

Well, say I don't know anything about the.

SPEAKER_00 6:08

Yeah. Well, it really, because of the way it's represented and kind of redramatized in the Mass every week, and because of the way in which Christ is kind of present in the church, like the church is the body in an inclusive kind of way in Roman Catholicism. So there is a sense in which the sacrifice is ongoing. Um my favorite is uh celebrate priests.

unknown 6:32

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:33

Yeah, yeah.

unknown 6:34

Uh ease, I should say. Yeah, we'll just do celibacy and everybody will know what we're talking about. That's nothing to celebrate. Yeah. Hey yeah.

SPEAKER_00 6:47

Yeah, uh we'll put penance there because that is part of the penitential system. Right? That's part of the, you know, we do uh confession of sins in our service and an assurance of pardon, right? That's and the assurance of pardon is not the elder or the pastor absolving you of your sin, it's declaring the truth of scripture over you that you have already been forgiven of your sin at the cross. Whereas the priest and the confessional, they kind of have a system, like if you know, if you have the right amount of contrition in the right way, then they'll kind of prescribe you a number of Hail Marys and our fathers, and you do that, and you've done your penance, and that's you've restored to a state of grace.

SPEAKER_01 7:27

Uh indulgences.

SPEAKER_00 7:31

Indulgences, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:32

Good one, good one.

SPEAKER_00 7:33

Yeah, indulgences, correct? You sell me some of those? Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 7:39

Why would I sell you a snowboard if you come to my neighborhood?

SPEAKER_03 7:44

Yeah. Tony, the belief that they are the true church. Yeah, the true church.

SPEAKER_00 7:51

Yeah. True church. Yeah, and we as Protestants are since Vatican II, they're a little lighter on that. We we're faith communities, and we can be saved insofar as grace somehow extends to us from the one true mother church. Right. That's kind of a dispensation of God's mercy, leniency. Wendy.

SPEAKER_06 8:16

Our our view on baptism, especially the way they view infant baptism and the way grace.

SPEAKER_00 8:24

Yeah, that ties in with salvation. I mean, sacrament salvation, yeah, it ties in with grace, what they believe grace is, and how we get grace. So we'll talk about that, Roy.

SPEAKER_07 8:35

This is underlying authority because this is more than just the Pope, where when I talk when we talk to a Catholic person, their authority is like they go to a priest or something like that to explain something where we would go to the Bible.

SPEAKER_00 8:50

Yeah. When we talk about scripture, that is definitely part of it because it's a three-legged stool: scripture, tradition, and the magisterium, which is the priest, the bishops, and the pope.

SPEAKER_08 9:00

Is it Mariology?

SPEAKER_00 9:02

Mariology, yeah. Yeah, that's a big difference. We you will be surprised if you read the Protestant reformers how much respect and admiration and appreciation they have for Mary. Historically, she is held out as a model of faith. And that's straight out of the we talked about that earlier this year. But the Roman Catholic Church raises it to a whole other level in terms of the Marian dogmas, the Immaculate Conception and the uh yeah, all that kind of stuff. Perpetual virginity built.

SPEAKER_04 9:31

I like to add art after icons.

SPEAKER_00 9:34

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 9:34

The way that we use art.

SPEAKER_03 9:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:38

Uh Tony, last one.

SPEAKER_03 9:40

Um the veneration of Marian. Um the veneration of relics. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 9:47

That's kind of yeah, we could put that with icons. Yeah. Yeah, so do the Lutherans.

SPEAKER_00 10:00

No, that's that's that's a difference of biblical interpretation. The Pope. The Pope says this is the way it's gonna be. Right. Uh all right, good. So yeah, we're different. All right. What's that? Yeah, we can keep going with all the differences. Yeah. Yeah, there are a lot, right? We're very different, okay? Now that we're primed to think that we're so different, let's talk about the things that are the same. I can think so. And you'll be surprised. Okay, but we have them on the sheet, so we're gonna talk about the ones on the sheet. So, the um the Catholic tradition, right? Some people, when they think about the Protestant Reformation, they think about it in terms of Rome is rubbish, and we're gonna start a new church. That is not at all what the Reformers were trying to do. They were very much trying to reform the church. And they tried hard. Martin Luther had no desire to be excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church. He wanted to deal with specific issues that were wrong and bring about reform. And, you know, Calvin in a lot of ways, too, right? But as time went on, and especially the pressure of the Counter-Reformation, so the Council of Trent and all of that, it became very clear that there would be no reconciliation. Even so, right? There's one wing of the Protestant Reformation, the Radical Reformation, where you get Anabaptists and Quakers and Shakers and that whole brethren, that whole wing. It was very much uh like, let's get rid of all of it and let's do something new. Uh and it got pretty wild in some circumstances, pretty cultish in a lot of ways. And the magisterial reformation, kind of our stream, it was always very much like centuries of tradition have crept in and eclipsed the word of God. And we have all of these abuses, we have all of these contradictions, and what we need to do is get back to the true tradition of the church, which is scripture as authoritative, but also the church fathers in their reading scripture. Not that the church fathers trump scripture, but read Calvin. Read how often he quotes Augustine and Bonaventure and all these early church fathers, and their argument is saying, hey, we are more in agreement with the church fathers than you are, Rome, and you say you're the heirs of the church fathers and tradition. So we have the we have the purchase on the tradition. And what does the tradition tell us? Go back to the Bible as our chief authority. Right? So I tell the story in that way to remind us that there was a lot that has been handed down to us through the Catholic tradition that the reformers were like, yep, this is biblical, this is true, we're not going to reinvent this wheel. And we see that in the list that I give you on the sheet there. Like the doctrine of the Trinity. The doc Caesar, I'll get you in a little bit. The doctrine of the Trinity that we have articulated in the Nicene, Nicene Constantinopolitan creeds, uh, the Apostles' Creeds, these ecumenical creeds of the church, there's basically no daylight between what we believe in terms of the Trinity and what the Roman Catholic Church officially teaches. Doctrine of God, in terms of God being infinite, eternal, and unchangeable, and as being wisdom, power, holiness, justice, goodness, and truth. Again, that's pretty much lockstep with the Catholic tradition. And we are very much indebted for our doctrine of God stuff, especially to people like Thomas Aquinas, who's the heavenly doctor of the Roman Catholic Church. There's a lot of Aquinas in the Protestant Reformation, and especially in the post-Reformation, all the people that we love who give us the Westminster Confession, maybe not all, but darn near all of them read and appreciated Thomas Aquinas. Not so much on salvation, but on a lot of other stuff. God's self-revelation. The fact that God has revealed himself generally in the world and specially in Scripture, again, we agree with Catholics on that, and they agree with us. They're going to parse that a little different in terms of authority that we'll talk about in a little bit. But the fact that God has revealed himself, we agree. The person of Christ, articulated in the Chalcedonian Creed. He's uh, you know, one person in two natures, fully God, fully man, without confusion, without change, without conversion, without separation. Again, lockstep. The work of Christ in terms of his obedience, the terms of his crucifixion, his atonement, again, a lot of agreement. How it's applied to us and how salvation works out and how grace works out, there are going to be some big differences there. But the person and work of Christ were very much in agreement with Catholics. The Holy Spirit, the identity, the deity, the works of the Spirit and creation and redemption, very similar. Humanity, the fact that we're created in the image of God, the fact that we're a kind of dual being composed of body and soul, the fact that Adam and Eve were the original pair, original parents, original sin, these kinds of things. There's some differences that we will in terms of Roman Catholic anthropology that we won't get into tonight, but those basic particulars, the same. Grace, in the sense that God initiates salvation, right? Roman Catholics agree. Cash it out differently, we'll get there. But Roman Catholics do not, in a crass sense, they don't believe we save ourselves. They believe that we cooperate with the grace of God, which goes first, and thereby merit our justification. Again, it's a fine distinction. And practically at the end of the day, it's kind of the same thing. But again, if we're going to be talking to Roman Catholics about what they believe, we kind of want to understand a little bit about what they believe. The church. The four traditional uh attributes of the church articulated in the Nicene Creed. The church is one holy Catholic Apostolic. Again, we agree, yes, that's re-articulated in the Westminster Standards. We agree with the Catholic Church that that is the case. Another view of where we find that one holy Catholic Apostolic Church, but at least we agree in the essence of it. And finally, hope. The personal redemption, cosmic redemption, the things we confess when we we confess the Apostles' Creed together, what is our ultimate hope? We look to the forgiveness of sins, the resurrection of the body, the life everlasting alongside the Catholic Church. So those are pretty significant commonalities, right? We have big differences, right? We don't want to downplay those big differences, but we've got a lot in common with Roman Catholic believers and the official teaching of the Roman Catholic Church, Caesar.

SPEAKER_01 17:02

When like the Roman Catholic Church that we I know start to evolve?

SPEAKER_00 17:10

That's a great question. That's a great question.

SPEAKER_08 17:13

What's this question? Can't hear you.

SPEAKER_00 17:16

When did the Roman Catholic Church as we know it today start to evolve into what it is today? I think probably the best way to answer that question is to say the Council of Trent. Now there have been councils since the Council of Trent, like Vatican I and Vatican II, that have changed the trajectory in some ways and the shape of the Roman Catholic Church today. But at the Council of Trent, you really have an articulation of what Roman Catholics believe in distinction from Protestants. And sometimes that's just how it goes. We are we define ourselves by what we're not and who we're not. We individuate in that way.

SPEAKER_01 17:57

Like before the Council of Trent.

SPEAKER_00 17:59

Before the Council of Trent?

SPEAKER_01 18:00

When did from around the Middle Ages? A little like post-Jesus, easier's time on earth, but before the Council of Trent.

SPEAKER_00 18:12

So, you know, before the Reformation, there was before 1015. So there's a lot of history packed in the answer to that question. I know you love history, so I will I won't go too deep into it because I want to make sure we keep going. But you know, the seeds of the Roman Catholic Church are in the earliest church, right? In the early church. What you have happening is like there was a view of tradition where tradition and scripture were one and the same. Because they just have what's hand being handed down by the apostles. But as you get centuries removed from that early apostolic church, you start to have the Bible over here, and then you have like this unwritten body of tradition over here. Like, you know, we did it's not in the Bible, but John told Polycarp, who told Irenaeus, who told this guy, that this is how we do it in the church. So he got it from John, it's just not written in the Bible. And I'm oversimplifying the story, but that sort of move where it's like we're trying to negotiate between that unwritten tradition and that written scriptural tradition, it just the tension becomes harder and harder and harder. And that's one of the things that leads to the Protestant Reformation. But a lot of like the system of government in the Roman Catholic Church, even the evolution of the papacy itself as the apostolic successor to Peter, all that was happening by way of that unwritten tradition that's being handed down. So short and incomplete answer to your question. Now we've talked a lot about commonalities. You got a list of ten on of them on your sheet. We could probably talk about more. But why would we why would we make it a point to emphasize that? Why is it important that we highlight these commonalities between the Roman Catholic Church and between us as Reformed Protestants?

SPEAKER_09 20:06

They're not the enemy.

SPEAKER_00 20:08

They're not the enemy. I don't know if I agree. Yes. I didn't know.

SPEAKER_07 20:17

It helps when you talk to them to come on some common ground and start there and then and then an obstacle people who would do better than I and they would have the Catholic who get their Catholic Bible and open up and take them down like a Roman road of salvation or something like that. Right?

SPEAKER_03 20:37

We don't help you to understand that there are Christians who live in the Catholic Church. Yep.

SPEAKER_04 20:44

Yeah, we the reformers were not starting a revolution. Yeah. They were truly reforming the church out of a love for the church. And I think that's kind of the basis of it. We're not Americans.

SPEAKER_00 21:06

Yeah, that's good. Yeah, these I mean that's that's essentially it, right? We want to understand who we are, we want to understand who they are, and we want to be able to approach from a place not of ignorance or fear, but of knowledge. I mean, if you got, when you're striking up a relationship with somebody, you typically try to find common ground, right? You don't come at them gums blazing about all the things where you disagree. It's like, you know, we we find points of contact. We have an abundance in terms of points of contact with Roman Catholic believers. And these are, you know, you're talking to somebody on an on an airplane, it's like, you know, hey, what do you what do you what do you guys believe about the Trinity? Oh cool, that's what we believe about the Trinity. What do you guys believe about Jesus? Oh cool, that's what we believe about Jesus. What do you believe about the work of Jesus? Yeah, his is yeah, we totally believe that his shed blood atones for our sins. And that it's kind of like you build on commonality, and as you're discussing commonality, the cracks start to show. We kind of have a different view of how Jesus' blood atones for our sins and how we cooperate with that. Oh, interesting. And then you can kind of take the conversation from there. It's not immediately adversarial, it's kind of like proceeding on common understanding. And seeing where we go. Those are the commonalities. Let's talk about the differences. Let's talk about the stuff that we get in fights over. First one on your sheet there, the scripture. And I put scripture and tradition. Because, like I mentioned before, Roman Catholics, and when I say Roman Catholics believe, what I mean for the purposes of tonight is that this is what the Roman Catholic Church teaches, as officially stated in the Catholic Catechism. So we know that there are lots of Roman Catholics who believe lots of different things. So I might say something like Roman Catholics believe this, like, oh, my you know, my buddy Tom, he's a Catholic, and he would say it differently. Yeah, maybe. Tom might be a bad Catholic, right? It's it's but but this is the official teaching of the church we're looking at. So when it comes to scripture and tradition, the Roman Catholic Church basically looks at it like a three-legged stool. One is sacred, one leg of the stool is scripture itself, right? We agree that it's inspired, we agree that it's authoritative, we agree that it's inerrant. Now, the Roman Catholic Church has had their issues with liberal biblical scholarship that denies biblical inerrancy, just like Protestants have had their issues with those sorts of denials. That's in there. But in terms of the Roman Catholic Church, they believe the Bible is what we say it is. What they disagree about is the sufficiency of Scripture. So the formal principle of the Protestant Reformation is sola scriptura. That we believe that the Bible is the highest court of authority, that in all matters of doctrine and devotion and church government and all of that, they all submit to Scripture. So that's the formal principle of the Reformation. The Roman Catholic Church says, well, look at all you Protestants. I mean, how many different interpretations of the Bible do you have? Y'all can't even agree about what it says. What you need is a pope. What you need, well, let me get ahead of myself. What you need is two more legs of the stool. Tradition and the magisterium. So tradition being what's handed down from the apostles, and the magisterium being the official teaching, authority structure of the church, with the Pope at the head. So Catholic Catechism, question 82. It says the church to whom the transmission, interpretation, uh, and interpretation of revelation is entrusted does not derive her certainty about all revealed truths from holy scriptures alone. Both scripture and tradition must be accepted and honored with equal sentiments of devotion and reverence. Okay, so that's tradition, right alongside scripture. And here comes the magisterium in question 85. The task of giving an authentic interpretation of the Word of God, whether in its written form or in the form of tradition, has been entrusted to the living teaching office of the church alone. This means that the task of interpretation has been entrusted to the bishops in communion with the successor of Peter, the Bishop of Rome. So that's a little different than sola scriptura, right? Slightly. Slightly, right? Understatement. And we want to throw out the baby with the bathwater. And we don't, and we want to discount tradition and just say, me and my Bible. But again, that wasn't the view of the Protestant reformers. And it has not been the view of the majority of our tradition. Tradition is a good thing. Tradition is, you know, a historian by the name of Yerosov Pelican said that traditionalism is the dead faith of the living. Tradition is the living faith of the dead.

SPEAKER_08 26:46

That's what the church is built from.

SPEAKER_00 26:49

Yeah, we have an inheritance that's been passed down to us. We're not the first people to read our Bibles. And just like we know when we go into a small group Bible study, that when the saint who's been walking with Jesus for 60 years opens their mouth to talk about what they've learned from Scripture, we shut up and listen because that would be wise. We do that on a bigger scale when we look at church history. The key difference is, you know, that that tradition is infallible. Or sorry, that tradition is not infallible. It is fallible. Right? So we hold all of that tradition captive to the word. Now, let's say you're having a conversation with your Roman Catholic friend and they articulate this three-legged stool of authority. How do you respond to them? Like you want to lovingly push back a little bit. What do you say?

SPEAKER_02 27:49

Which would be we're the authority to say that that is the authority. Right. Yes.

SPEAKER_00 27:56

Yeah. And then you get into an infinite regress.

SPEAKER_02 28:01

Well, you do, but um, go back to some basis which says authority. You have the same discussion with uh Jews or even Muslims who use tradition outside of their official book as well. It's like where we're preaching the authority to do that.

SPEAKER_00 28:17

Catholics actually wield a form of that argument against Protestants. In one way, it has to do with the multiple interpretations, like how do you guys deal with that? And also it has to do with, well, how do y'all know what's actually in the Bible without the church to tell you?

SPEAKER_02 28:35

I read it.

SPEAKER_00 28:36

Well, you yes, you read it, right? So what the Reformers argued for was the self-authenticating witness of the Holy Spirit. We don't need a Pope to tell us what's in the Bible. Because when we look in tradition, we see the church recognizing the Bible for what it is. At no point, actually, until the Council of Trent, do we see the church making an authoritative pronouncement that says, this is canon, abide by it. We see the church recognizing what is canon by virtue of the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. So that's that's a big difference. Where do we get the authority? Where do you get the authority to know that this Bible you read is the authoritative word of God? Well, I get it from God. I get it from the witness of the Holy Spirit, as opposed to the Roman Catholics, who the Catholic will say, Well, we get it from the Spirit too, whom God has given us to Pope to speak authoritatively for. So bring it around though. The same question stands. Your Roman Catholic friend articulates this view of scripture, tradition, the magisterium. How do you respond? Again, if you want to lovingly push back, if you want to maybe put them on their heels a little bit.

SPEAKER_08 29:58

I would question do they know the history of the papacy throughout history and how corrupt it's been.

SPEAKER_00 30:03

See, that's a good question. Like, which Pope?

unknown 30:06

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:06

Which Pope is in charge? Because at one point in history there were three. So which one are we supposed to listen to? Yeah. That's a good question. You might not be to be as salty and as antagonistic as we were just there, but right? But that is a that's a good question. It's a fair question, right?

SPEAKER_08 30:22

Yeah, because there's some pretty rough stories of popes of what they did and how immoral some of them. Yeah. Yeah. So it's like it's supposed to be an equative scripture at person.

SPEAKER_07 30:35

This is a question. Yeah. Have any of the pubs uh come back and said another pope was wrong?

SPEAKER_09 30:41

Right.

SPEAKER_07 30:42

I don't know. Oh wait, that's happened. I don't know how because I'm the one that keeps the line that keeps running through my head was when one of them said, yes, animals will be there in heaven too. The Bible doesn't speak to that. Yes. That's getting out there.

SPEAKER_00 31:02

So yeah, well that that why that what you guys are knocking on the door of raised an important line of questions, right? What do you do when popes disagree? Uh whether at the same time or across history? What do you do with when tradition disagrees? What do you do with when councils disagree with one another? And here's here's the good one. Here's a good one in, you know, don't ask it from a place of antagonism. Ask it from a place of curiosity and actual concern for the person. What do you do when scripture and tradition disagree? So, Catholic Catechism 969 on Mary. Taken up to heaven, she did not lay aside this saving office, but by her manifold intercession continues to bring us the gifts of eternal salvation. Therefore, the Blessed Virgin is invoked in the church under the titles of advocate, helper, benefactress, and mediatrix, which is the feminine version of mediator. Okay, that's official Catholic teaching, official tradition sanctioned by the Roman magisterium. Can anyone think of any specific ways in which that contradicts scripture? No, don't yes. So don't just ask where it is in Scripture, but where is it explicitly contradicted by Scripture? 1 Timothy 2.5, there is only one mediator between God and man, the man Christ Jesus. He didn't say two, he didn't say Jesus and his mom. Also, Hebrews 7.25. Consequently, Jesus is able to save to the uttermost those who draw near to God through him, since he always lives to make intercession for them. There's one mediator who accomplished one act of salvation, one high priest who stands at the right hand of God and prays for his people. His name is Jesus. Again, it's not Jesus and his mom. Right, so there we can do this with a lot of official teachings of the Catholic Church. You can pile them up. You can read books like, you know, I put these on the board there, but like Roman Catholic theology and practice. They'll pile all of these things up for you. And this is a shorter, more merciful read. You could take it down in an afternoon or two. The unfinished reformation. Right? They will pile these things up and just kind of show you. It's like, well, we we got a real problem here, because if you got a three-legged stool, two of the stools aren't agreeing with each other and you're about to fall on your face, Tony.

SPEAKER_03 33:38

But but aren't we just asking Mary to talk to Jesus or to say, you know, that's a son?

SPEAKER_00 33:47

Who else will be closer to you? According to the Catholic Church, when you ask her, she personally delivers the gifts of salvation to you. So again, this is you might have Catholic friends who say, I don't believe that. And you say, Well, your church does. Right? And that's right. Alright, so that's scripture. Let's talk about salvation. On a Roman Catholic view, you could summarize salvation as faith working through love. And the way this works, again, to very much simplify it, it starts with baptismal regeneration. So in baptism, an individual, when they receive the water of baptism, the grace of God works through the waters of baptism in such a way that they are made inwardly just. That's justification. That's initial justification. It's something different than what we say when we say someone is justified. When we talk about justification, we are talking about a legal and forensic declaration that God says not guilty concerning this or that individual. When a Roman Catholic talks about justification, what they are talking about is an internal transformation effected by God's grace that actually gives us a different constitution. So it's not a legal thing, it's an ontological thing, it's a metaphysical thing. God actually changes us in some way. And the process begins with baptismal regeneration. And then from there we cooperate with God's grace. Catholic Catechism 1993. Justification establishes, and you think ours is bad with 107. There are thousands in the Catholic Catechism. Justification establishes cooperation between God's grace and man's freedom. On man's part, it is expressed by the ascent of faith to the Word of God, which invites him to conversion. And in the cooperation of charity with the prompting of the Holy Spirit who precedes and preserves his ascent. So God infuses you with his grace, he makes you initially just, and then you get to work on becoming actually just. And through that process, you come to merit eternal life. You can't merit the initial grace of justification. Only God can do that. But that's the beginning of conversion. From then, it's on you to cooperate with God's grace. Catholic Catechism 2010. Moved by the Holy Spirit and by charity, we can then merit for ourselves and for others the graces needed for our sanctification, for the increase of grace and charity, and for the attainment of eternal life. Alright, so God starts the process, we take it from there. Alright.

SPEAKER_07 36:47

Well, there's a question that's creaming out to me, and you may be getting to it, and that is the word sanctification.

SPEAKER_00 36:53

Yeah. No, you're not. So this is one of the key differences. We as Protestants believe that in justification, you are forensically declared to be righteous, not guilty, because of the righteousness of Christ imputed to you. At the same time, you are actually made righteous in that you are sanctified. And that being made righteous is actually a process that works out by God's grace between the moment of your conversion and the day when you enter into glory. So you are progressively being made righteous in conformity with the declaration of justification and righteousness that happened when you put your faith in Jesus. We break those things apart so as to protect the understanding of how salvation works, how grace flows, and what merit really looks like. For the Roman Catholic, they keep them together. It's basically the same thing. And the quibble, and really the full-on critique that Roman Catholics have of Protestants is they call our doctrine of justification a legal fiction. Because God doesn't actually change you. He just declares you to be righteous. And if God just declares you to be righteous, why should you actually be righteous? You get your fire insurance, Billy Graham style, and you're just going straight to heaven, regardless of whether you live like hell for the rest of your life. And that's a caricature of our position, of course. As Protestants, we want to push back and we say, no, good works matter. We were created for, we were saved for works, but we are not saved by works. So now this view of Catholicism, that we are initially justified by God's grace, and then we cooperate with that grace in order to merit our justification. Don't talk about justification in like initial, ongoing, and then final. So at the final judgment, we come before God's throne, and then he measures us up. And if we've done it enough, if we're sufficiently justified, we merit eternal life. Right? That's that's kind of how it works. Now, can you think of any scripture that would directly contradict that sort of view? Anyone 2, 8 and 9. Okay. Yeah? For by grace you have been saved through faith, and this is not your own doing, for it is the gift of God, not a result of works, so that no one may boast.

SPEAKER_04 39:24

You brought up the, you know, to summarize their view of salvation as, you know, by faith working through love. Well, that's straight out of Galatians 5. Yes. And yet the entire book of Galatians is Paul writing to these Christians who have been twisted by or who are convinced by Judaizers, but they still have to do things.

SPEAKER_00 39:45

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 39:46

So which is very interesting that they would pull that from Galatians 5.6, and yet, even just the beginning portion, either circumcision nor uncircumcision pass for it. So it's very interesting.

SPEAKER_00 39:59

Galatians 3.3. Are you so foolish? Having begun by the Spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? That's a good place to have a conversation with your Roman Catholic friend. How is this not that? They might have some things to say, but it's an opportunity to push, and not just in a sort of esoteric, like, let's parse Greek words and biblical interpretation and stuff, but it's like, let's really think about what grace is and how grace works. And if you're meriting your salvation, in what sense is Jesus actually your savior? If he only starts the process, what kind of assurance do you have that he'll actually finish the process? How do you know you're not getting off this train at some point? Because in your heart of hearts, if you're honest, there are some moments when you feel like getting off the train. So that's a good place to critique, that's a good place to have a conversation. Last difference that we'll talk about. And of course, there's so much more we can say about all of this, and we can talk more after. But the last one, the sacraments. And we'll speak specifically about the number, necessity, and nature of the sacraments. How many sacraments do Catholics have?

SPEAKER_06 41:22

Seven.

SPEAKER_00 41:23

Seven. What are they? I don't know. What are they? Anybody care to name them?

SPEAKER_06 41:29

Marriage is one.

SPEAKER_00 41:30

Holy matrimony, yeah. Extreme unction or the anointing of the sick, yeah. Confession. Confession. Actually, the confession is part of penance, but yeah. The Eucharist.

SPEAKER_06 41:46

Baptism.

SPEAKER_00 41:47

Baptism. What are we up to? We are up to five.

SPEAKER_06 41:54

Five.

SPEAKER_00 41:55

Two more.

SPEAKER_06 41:57

Death.

SPEAKER_00 41:59

It's not death.

SPEAKER_06 42:02

Last rites.

SPEAKER_00 42:03

Yeah, that's that's along with extreme unction, anointing of the sit. What's that?

SPEAKER_03 42:07

Saint Indulgence, nothing.

SPEAKER_00 42:11

Confirmation. Oh, and holy orders. So what we did today, ordaining and installing ruling elders, I mean they would the Catholic Church would never do that like we did it. But they would consider that a sacrament, right? When you ordain someone to the office of bishop or priest, you mark them with an indelible mark that gives them official sanction to administer the sacraments in the Roman Catholic Church. We'll talk more about what that means in a couple minutes. How many sacraments do Protestants have?

SPEAKER_05 42:48

Two. Well, it depends.

SPEAKER_00 42:53

It depends on what?

SPEAKER_01 42:55

Which church?

SPEAKER_00 43:00

Are there Protestant denominations that have more than two sacraments? Some would consider the washing of feet something like a sacrament.

SPEAKER_04 43:07

You said polluck this morning.

SPEAKER_00 43:09

What's that?

SPEAKER_04 43:09

Pollucks.

SPEAKER_00 43:10

Potlucks, yeah, that's true. That's true. Yeah, they're honorary sacraments. So our shorter catechism, or we have two, right? At least, and we can narrow it some, excluding outliers that I don't know. In the PCA, we have two. In the entire Reformed Presbyterian tradition, we have two. And why do we only have two? Is that because we're only dime store Catholicism?

SPEAKER_08 43:39

They're instituted by Christ. We only need two.

SPEAKER_00 43:42

We only need two? Why? Who said?

SPEAKER_06 43:44

They're instituted by Jesus.

SPEAKER_00 43:46

Yeah. Yeah, all right. Shorter Catechism 92. What is a sacrament? A sacrament is a holy ordinance instituted by Christ, wherein by sensible signs and seals, Christ and the benefits of the new covenant are represented, sealed, and applied to believers. So they're sensible signs instituted by Christ Himself. They're not deliverances of tradition. They're also not, you have things like you might say, well, marriage. Marriage is in the Bible. It's given by God. Marriage is a creation ordinance given to human beings as human beings. It is an institution that's ordained for everyone. It applies to everyone. It's not a sacrament, it's not institutional. Instituted by Christ as a sign and seal of our partaking of the covenant of grace. So we only have two, and we only have two for a very specific reason. Now, that's the number of sacraments, the necessity of sacraments. Can you be saved? Answer this like a Reformed Protestant. Can you be saved without partaking of the sacraments? Yes. Yes. But not all denominations don't believe that. No, I don't care about them. So they don't call it ordinances. Yeah, they do just call them ordinances. So, you know, what's your prime example of that?

SPEAKER_06 45:08

The thief on the cross.

SPEAKER_00 45:10

The thief on the cross, right? And so in our so the sacraments are really important for us, right? They are not to be neglected. And yet, our standards say they are not so inextricably tied up with salvation that we cannot be saved without them. Because in the sacraments, you know, Robert Bruce said of the Lord's Supper, in the supper, I don't get a better word, I get the word better. And what he meant by that is that everything that is represented to us, signed and sealed in the sacraments, we already have it in Christ. And we already have it communicated for us in Scripture. And so the sign is important. Again, it's instituted by Christ. We don't want to neglect that, we don't want to disobey Jesus. And he gave it to us for a reason, alright? But again, they're not necessary for salvation. Now in the Roman Catholic Church, they're necessary for salvation. We talk about baptismal regeneration, how it starts the train going, right? It's that initial infusion of grace that merits that, or brings about that initial justification. And the reason why the sacraments are necessary are because they're the means by which grace is dispensed in the church by the authorized magisterium. Those bishops and priests and popes that have been ordained and given that indelible mark. And in the Catholic Church, it's very different in terms of how they think about grace. We as Protestants believe that grace is God's unmerited favor toward us in Christ. Grace is a disposition. Grace is God moving toward us even in spite of the fact that we deserve nothing from God. That's what grace is. In a Roman Catholic Church, they believe that grace is a substance. Grace is a medicine. Grace is the medicine that God infuses into our souls in order to make us well again. And so the medicine comes in, it makes us stronger, it gives us what we need in order to do the things that we're supposed to do, to obey God, to cooperate and work with that grace so that we can do the good works that merit our justification. So in this grace, it's dispensed to us in the church through the sacraments in a way that's darn near automatic. This is called ex opera operata. Out of the working worked. By the sheer fact of the child being baptized or the communicant partaking of Eucharist, they're actually receiving the grace of God. It's being infused into them. And that's why it's necessary. Right? Yeah, that's all I'll say about that because we got to talk about the thing that several people mentioned earlier is transubstantiation. So we differ in terms of number, we differ in terms of nature of the sacraments, we di or necessity, we also differ in terms of the nature of them. Baptism, I just explained the differences there. But our differences with the Lord's Supper actually go much further than that. So the official Roman Catholic view is the view known as transubstantiation. Anyone care to hazard a guess what that view states about the supper, what happens at the Eucharist? Roy?

SPEAKER_07 48:48

Even though if you cut the person open right after you get blood and wine back out, it still has miraculously become the body of Christ and the blood of Christ within you.

SPEAKER_00 48:59

It actually becomes the body and blood of Christ before it gets in you. Before. It comes with the words of institution. When the priest utters the words of institution, they believe that the body and the blood, just like Jesus at the Last Supper, this is my body, this is my blood, it actually becomes the body and blood of Christ. That's why after a Roman Catholic Mass, the leftovers need to be locked in a very special box inside of a very special vault. You can't just go and snack on it. Or you can't just put it in the freezer or whatever we do with the. I got a quick question.

SPEAKER_07 49:32

So is that is that how about the Episcopal Church that seems Catholic or something like that? Is that only the Catholic Church that they have to lock away? Because I've been to these, I've been to services in the military where, you know, they're supposed to be for all faiths, and I see them finish off the wine and the bread afterwards.

SPEAKER_00 49:50

Yeah, it's only the Roman Catholic Church who believes that. Uh even Lutherans who have a much closer to Rome view than we do don't believe that the body and blue that the bread and wine become the actual body and blood. They just believe that Christ is present in with and under the elements.

SPEAKER_05 50:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 50:08

So transubstantiation, essentially the view that Roy just articulated. So the view it has some roots in the early church, uh, picked up some steam in the 9th century, was articulated in the most systematic way that endures it today by Thomas Aquinas in the 12th century. And it's a view, transubstantiation. So just a little bit of Aristotelian metaphysics here, so the philosophy of Aristotle. He made a distinction. Aristotle was great for distinguishing categories, categories of analysis, so we could understand our world around. And he made a distinction of a thing in terms of substance and accidents. So the substance of a thing is what makes the thing the thing. The accidents are the things that attach to the thing that could or could not be there. So, like, me, Kenny, I possess the substance of Kenniness. I have the accidents of brown hair, two arms, two legs, all of that. If you take my arm away, am I still Kenny?

SPEAKER_06 51:15

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 51:15

If you take this arm, am I still Kenny?

SPEAKER_06 51:17

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 51:18

So these are accidental properties of me. They could be otherwise, and I can maintain my substance. So Aquinas takes that distinction from Aristotle and he applies it to what happens in the supper when the priest utters the words of uh I forget what they are. I want to say transmutation, but I think that's magic. He utters the words of institution. And but they call it something else. A change happens. The bread and wine are changed into the body and blood of Christ, not according to their accidents, but according to their substance. So you hold the bread in your hand, and it feels like bread, it looks like bread, it's got all the properties of bread. Same thing with the wine, but in terms of what it really is, it's the body and blood of Christ. So that that's that's what transubstantiation is. And it was elevated to the uh the status of official church dogma, I want to say at like the Fourth Lateran Council in the 13th century, something like that. I could be off on that. But that's the view, Tony.

SPEAKER_03 52:30

So, you know, Catholics are going to bring up what Justin Warner said.

unknown 52:35

Around 151 AD. For not as common bread as a common drink to be received.

SPEAKER_03 52:41

But the food which has been made into the Eucharist by the change of, which our blood and flesh is nurtured, is both the flesh and the blood of that incarnated Jesus.

SPEAKER_00 52:53

How do you what do you say to that? Justin Martyr also said that Plato and Aristotle were Christians. I mean, the early church fathers, they got a lot of stuff right, but they also got a lot of stuff wrong. Alright, so we have to be careful because they're not authoritative. We want to show them deference in how they read scripture, but sometimes they interpret things the way they interpret them because they're operating with a worldview, a metaphysic, a philosophy that isn't always exactly in line with scripture. It drives them in different directions for different reasons. And I think you hear some of the influence of that Greek stuff coming out in that. I mean, a lot of this boils down to a misreading of what's going on when Jesus institutes the supper and also of what he talks about in John 6. So if you remember John 6, Jesus is talking about, hey, if you want a piece of me, you actually need to have a piece of me, right? You need to eat my flesh and drink my blood. And the Roman Catholic Church is kind of like, well, there it is. They sort of miss what Jesus said in John 6.63. It's the Spirit who gives life. The flesh is no help at all. The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life. So when Jesus is talking about feeding on his flesh and drinking his blood, he's using a very vivid way of articulating a reality of actually sharing in him by way of faith in his words. The institution of the supper, right? He holds up the bread, he says, This is my body. And holds up the cup, this is my blood. And they're taking, like, there, he's transforming it into his body. It's like, well, he's holding the bread up like this, and he's here, so which is the body of Christ? He's holding up the wine here and saying, This is my blood, so which is the blood of Christ, right? Clearly, he's engaging in some kind of symbolic sacramental act that's creating a very close connection, a sacramental union, but at no point do we really have any reason to think that Jesus is saying that the elements are being magically transformed into his actual body and blood. Now, as Roman Catholics sometimes, you know, they'll they'll push back against Protestants in our view of this, our view of the supper. Where it's like, you know, we have this high view of the Lord's Supper. Then we go to a Protestant church and y'all have crackers in a basket at the back of the sanctuary and little cups of juice, and you tell people to just like take them on their way in or on their way out is their communion. It's like, I don't know what that is, but I'm just gonna go ahead and stick with what we got. I mean, a lot of Protestants have really bad views of the Lord's Supper, and they really do it horrible injustice in the way they practice it in their churches. It's gonna be worse. I'm sure it is.

SPEAKER_06 55:45

Weak weakness.

SPEAKER_00 55:46

Yeah, diet Pepsi and Toblerone and all the things. What's toblerone? It's candy. Grapes, yeah, take a grape. So, but in a reformed view, I would argue that we actually have a higher view of the Lord's Supper than transubstantiation. Because we don't believe that the bread and the wine become the body and blood of Christ. But we do believe that by the power of the Holy Spirit, by way of the bread and wine, we have real communion with the risen and ascended Lord Jesus. Spiritual communion. A knitting together that is actually closer and more beneficial than if we were given the opportunity to chew on a little bit of Jesus' flesh and drink a little bit of his blood. What's that? Oh, yeah, you're not supposed to chew it. They told me if I chewed it, I'd go to hell. I'm not even kidding. That's what I was told. You don't chew the wafer, you let it dissolve on your tongue, because that's more respectful to Jesus. You let them dissolve on your tongue. Bill.

SPEAKER_04 56:49

Do you use the word presence?

SPEAKER_00 56:51

Uh-huh. In receiving, we use that. Yeah? Yeah. Jesus is present by way of his Holy Spirit. The tradition is articulated it in different ways to try and work it out because it's mysterious. Uh but one of our key differences with the Lutheran tradition is for Lutherans, they believe that Jesus is physically present in with and under the elements. Luther didn't really have that much problem with transubstantiation. He had more problem with Aristotle and the elevation of that to church dogma. The big argument between the Lutheran and Reformed is the Reformed are like, well, Jesus is fully human, right? Well, if he's fully human, that means he has a body. If he has a body, it belongs to the nature of a body to be located in space. It cannot be everywhere present all at once. So in the ascension, Jesus actually ascended to a place. We can't go there and find him right now. It's mysterious for us. But Jesus, bodily, actually is somewhere. So Jesus cannot be physically present at every instance of the supper that might happen on a Sunday morning without violating the nature of his humanity. And Lutherans are like, well, whatever. Jesus is God. He has omnipresence. He can do that. No, no, no, wait, wait, wait, wait. If you do that, you violate this core biblical teaching articulated in the Chalcedonian Creed, that Jesus is fully God, fully man, without any mixture or confusion. You can't cross the God-man barrier in order to make Jesus the man omnipresent without actually taking away his humanity. So we as Reformed Protestants believe that that humanity maintains, it remains intact. But the way we are present to Jesus is by way of the Holy Spirit. So instead of thinking that Jesus condescends to sit at the table with us, it's better to think of the Spirit whisking us up to heaven to sit at the table with him. And in that sense, we are truly present to him, and he's truly present to us. And again, enjoying that close, close communion with him. Because 1 Corinthians 10 tells us that as we partake of the bread and partake of the wine, we have a participation, a sharing, a koinonia, a communion with the risen Lord. So that's our view over against Roman Catholicism. So we've arrived at the end of our time. Tony, no, go ahead.

SPEAKER_03 59:28

So if that is the actual body and blood of Christ, in the human body, it's going to be metabolized. Part of it's going to be converted to waste. So are you saying so does he does it does he stop being the blood fighting?

SPEAKER_00 59:48

I don't know, to be honest with you.

SPEAKER_03 59:50

How would you answer that question?

SPEAKER_00 59:52

I don't know how a Roman Catholic would answer that question. It's probably an appeal to mystery. It dissolves into your soul. I don't know. They'd probably say I don't know. Bill.

SPEAKER_04 1:00:02

Could I say a word of appreciation for the Catholics?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:07

In terms of abortion, euthanasia, GLPT, male leadership.

unknown 1:00:20

Yeah. And it's probably done.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:24

They have stood tall and paid the price for it. Yeah. Yeah, there are a lot of issues in which we can ally with Roman Catholics. Co-belligerence, sometimes we might call them. There are a lot. Even in terms of like social teaching. Rothy Wade, the Southern Baptist Convention was for it before they were against it. And as Protestants, we just we didn't really have social ethics. We didn't really have anthropology. We didn't really have we just didn't have the resources to deal with a lot of the stuff the world is throwing at us right now. Catholics have had it in spades. Right? So, in a lot of ways, we're looking to, we're playing catch up with the Roman Catholic Church, and we're looking for Roman Catholic sources to help us understand what it means to be human. And that's, you know, and we need those resources to help us because that's that's the fundamental question. What does it mean to be human? She's okay, I'm sure.

SPEAKER_09 1:01:25

Maggie.

SPEAKER_00 1:01:25

Maggie. Alright, so before we close up, are there, you know, we we can't go too long on this, but I've come with a lot of stuff and I've talked a lot about a lot of stuff that I thought was important. But do you have questions about the Roman Catholic Church or maybe Roman Catholic believers that you're engaging with right now and you're kind of you don't know where to go with something? I'm just I'm leaving the floor open for a couple minutes for y'all to bring up anything that you want to talk about on this topic before we close out.

SPEAKER_06 1:02:00

Wendy does some of the Roman Catholic um traditions and and um doctrine lead over into some of the Protestant churches. Like I know my father being one who was raised in a United um United Methodist Church. This was years ago, when he was asked about you know his salvation, is it is he does he know if he's gonna go to heaven or not? He was really unsure. And it was based upon the works, and then Roy and I, you know, have traveled and we've come across another person in in the United Methodist Church that when I said that you know Christ paid it all, period, end of statement, um she corrected me. She said, No, and good works. I was like, yeah, where you know, is it has it bled over into that, or is that just people not understanding scripture or yeah, it's I mean, uh works righteousness is kind of the default mode of the sinful human heart.

SPEAKER_00 1:03:22

That's true. So, you know, we find ways to revert to that. Whether it's like overtly, you know, maybe that person was got some latent Catholicism in them, and they're kind of importing that, maybe. Uh, there are habits of heart and mind that are really hard to shake. Yeah, I sometimes I feel the weight of Catholic shame and guilt. Sometimes I wield Catholic shame and guilt. Um yeah, I mean it could be that, or it could be kind of uh some of the effects of an Arminian view of salvation, which in a lot of ways has a similar kind of outlook in terms of God's initial grace and cooperating with God's grace. Because we believe, as Reformed Protestants, that God's grace is irresistible. Whereas Arminians believe that God's grace is resistible. Alright, so God gives you just enough grace to overcome total depravity, but then it's on you to make good use of that grace by putting your faith in Jesus and keeping your faith in Jesus. And so while you would say that you're saved by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, which sets you apart from being a Roman Catholic, there's always that sense in which you've turned faith into the one work you have to do in order to be saved. Faith is not a work. In Scripture is a categorical distinction between faith and works. Faith is the instrument by which we receive the finished work of Christ and all its benefits. So yeah, there's you know, there's Protestantism that leads to that kind of view, not necessarily Catholicism.

SPEAKER_05 1:04:56

Another question do you have a book like that made for dummies that don't understand a lot of the big words that you're throwing out there?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:05

This one.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:06

Yeah, because that's okay. Well, this one's gonna ask you, what would you recommend?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:09

Yeah. This one is super, uh I don't want to say basic because that that sounds demeaning, but it's just it's entry-level, it's clear, it's accessible, it gives you the Protestant position versus the Roman Catholic position. It gives you plenty of references to the it quotes the Catholic catechism and the sources and stuff.

SPEAKER_05 1:05:36

They'll say, and then this transfer, and then this, and they're like, what are they talking about?

SPEAKER_00 1:05:42

The ones you need to know, yeah. The ones you need to know to track the discussion that they define for you. Okay, Tony.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:50

Can Catholicism let me rephrase that a little bit? Can we say that Catholicism is a cult since they deviate so much from Protestant?

SPEAKER_00 1:06:06

I don't know. I I wouldn't call the Roman Catholic Church a cult. Uh I don't know what the technical definition of cult is, but it's it's so big and ubiquitous that I don't know. Brennan, do you know?

SPEAKER_04 1:06:19

To technically, like Mormonism is a cult. Yes. Right? And and there's a distinction between Mormonism and Roman Catholicism, in that Mormonism openly. Teaches that their beliefs are based on one man. And uh, you know, well, him and uh Joseph Smith and Bernie Beyond the GitHub, but you know, as Roman Catholic Church still does profess that they are descendants from from Christ and from a from a I guess a deity. So by definition, technically no, but they're not far.

unknown 1:07:03

Are all are all Roman Catholic churches?

SPEAKER_05 1:07:08

I mean, are do they have branches? You still have Protestant as you can judge. You got, you know, are all Catholics.

SPEAKER_07 1:07:18

I don't think I don't think they I think there's some differences, but as we travel, there's just the main Roman Catholic Church that you come across, and you hear about others that may be in the Philippines, yeah, and have some weird things and stuff like that. But the ones that we come across here in America is just all the one Roman Catholic Church.

SPEAKER_00 1:07:39

In a way, the question you asked was, you know, all are white are all white men white? Because, yes, all Roman Catholic churches are one thing, because to be a Roman Catholic Church is to be in communion with Rome. I believe there are other minority Catholic churches that are not in communion with Rome, but it's they're kind of dispersed. I I've met someone from one before, but I can't remember all the details.

SPEAKER_06 1:08:08

Do other Orthodox, like the Greek Orthodox or the Eastern Orthodox churches, espouse the same doctrine as the Roman Catholic Church?

SPEAKER_00 1:08:21

No. No. In 1054, the church split into Roman Catholic and Eastern Orthodox. No. So the Eastern Orthodox Church, I mean, there is a major parting of the ways over a number of things. Uh the understanding of how the Son proceeds from the Father, or sorry, the Spirit proceeds from the Father, the understanding of the Pope's authority, sacraments, icons, scripture, and tradition. So there's a pretty big split between Orthodox and Roman Catholicism. And if you go to an Eastern Orthodox Church, you'll see the differences. We have a guy in our church who was Roman, who grew up Roman Catholic, then was Eastern Orthodox for a number of years, and is now Reformed Protestant.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:19

One of the biggest complaints I have about the Catholic Church, maybe a more modern uh theology, is that the statement pretty much all roads lead to salvation if you're sincere in your faith.

unknown 1:09:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 1:09:42

That seems to be almost a more secular view of facts.

SPEAKER_00 1:09:48

So a lot of times when you argue with Roman Catholics, they'll act as though, you know, they'll try to play Protestant diversity against you. Like you Protestants, there's so many denominations, there's like, you know, 30 something thousand denominations, you don't agree about anything, yada yada, yada. There's no unity there. And it's kind of like we have perfect unity under the Pope. But you can turn it around and say, there's actually a lot more diversity and variety in Roman Catholicism that I think you're assuming or that you're admitting. Because there's something of a war between, you know, just like in Protestant denominations, the progressives versus the conservatives. So, you know, Pope Francis was very much on your train there, where it's like everyone is saved through Jesus in some sort of way. And you know, different Catholics articulate that in different ways that are more over and more covert. And then you have the traditional traditionalists who are more like, no, no, that's not the case at all. We need to get out there and convert people. Right? And you know, we would probably have. I'm not gonna go down that road. I would probably have more in common with those traditionalists. Alright, it's 6 30. This is great. We could probably continue talking, and we can talk some more afterward. But I think it's time for us to sing.