My "notion" comes from the Scriptures not from the Reformation.
No, it most certainly does not!
As for what the "church" supposedly believed or the Ante-Nicene Fathers you have read into their writings your views just as you do the Scriptures.
This is nothing but a hateful, malicious lie without even an attempt to document it!
The RCC was never the "church" up until the Reformation. Though the church did exist it was never the majority nor was it part of the RCC.
Even a dog knows another dog when he sees one.
You have made it clear more than once that you are closer to being RCC than you are to being Baptist.
If you were even vaguely familiar with Roman Catholic theology you would know for an incontrovertible fact that your statement is utterly false.
I know you claim to be Baptist but you reveal your true theology by your posts.
Men and women who are familiar with Baptist theology know that my theology is Baptist.
What you claim and what you argue are two different things. You claim to not believe in a works salvation but your whole argument and theology makes it very clear that you do believe in a works salvation.
Revelation 21:8 “But as for the cowardly, the faithless, {Or [the unbelieving]} the polluted, the murderers, the fornicators, the sorcerers, the idolaters, and all liars, their place will be in the lake that burns with fire and sulfur, which is the second death.” (NRSV)
Notice how you worded your response. It is just like the RCC who claim the same thing. Also notice that you left out the word alone in your description of how we are saved. That is a convenient deception that many may miss.
Did Paul and the other contributors to the New Testament, with the single exception of James, deceive us by leaving out the word ‘alone’ in their description of how we are saved?
James 2:24. You see that a person is justified by works and not by faith alone. (NRSV)
But just like the RCC you do not hold to salvation by grace alone through faith alone but salvation by grace through faith coupled with works which makes your theology a works salvation.
As I posted above,
The distinguished Jesuit theologian Robert Francis Romulus Bellarmine (1542-1621) listed eight earlier authors who used the adverb. Joseph A. Fitzmyer, a contemporary Roman Catholic scholar, in his monumental commentary on the Greek text of Paul’s Epistle to the Romans, listed two more, Theodoret and Thomas Aquinas. The doctrine of justification by faith alone was not a spurious doctrine introduced into the Church by Martin Luther—it has been taught throughout the history of the Church.
The Saint Joseph Edition of the New American Bible (1971) has the following note on Rom. 3:21-31,
The justice of God is his mercy whereby he declares guilty man innocent and makes him so. He does this, not as a result of the law, but apart from it (v 21), not because of any merit of man, but through forgiveness of his sins (v 24) in virtue of the redemption wrought in Christ Jesus for all who believe (22-24f), No man can boast of his own holiness, since it is God’s free gift (27), both to the Jew who practices circumcision out of faith, and to the Gentile who accepts faith without the Old Testament religious culture symbolized by circumcision (29f).
The Saint Joseph Edition of the New American Bible with the second edition of the New Testament (1986) has the following note on Rom. 3:21-31,
These verses provide a clear statement of Paul’s “gospel,” i.e., the principle of justification by faith in Christ. God has found a means of rescuing humanity from its desperate plight: Paul’s general term for this divine initiative is the righteousness of God (21). Divine mercy declares the guilty innocent and makes them so. God does this not as a result of the law but apart from it (21), and not because of any merit in human beings but through forgiveness of their sins (24), in virtue of the redemption wrought in Christ Jesus for all who believe (22, 24-25). God has manifested his righteousness in the coming of Jesus Christ, whose saving activity inaugurates a new era in human history.
The Saint Joseph Edition of the New American Bible with the second edition of the New Testament (1986) has the following note on Rom. 4:3,
Jas 2, 24 appears to conflict with Paul’s statement. However, James combats the error of extremists who used the doctrine of justification through faith as a screen for moral self-determination. Paul discusses the subject of holiness in greater detail than does James and beginning with ch 6 shows how justification through faith introduces one to the gift of a new life in Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Yes, this is a Roman Catholic Bible with Roman Catholic notes published by the Catholic Book Publishing Company in New York with both the
Imprimatur and the
Nihil Obstat.
As for the men and women who "unselfishly devoted their lives to the study of the Bible", I must wonder how many of them do or did it for a vocation rather than as a calling. They devoted their lives to their jobs not to a calling. Many men and women unselfishly devote their lives to their jobs. Their devotion means nothing. Moreover most of those you claim are scholars are nothing but academics who devote themselves to theory and, in my experience, have little use other than to come up with something new to advance themselves to a higher plane of academics. I am not impressed by them.
These are nothing but hatefully malicious remarks about men and women you have never even met! How does any man become so full of hatred toward other human being?
Hence the username right? You want folks to know where you went to school and that you are an academic right?
No.
Your posts are filled with pointing to "scholars" who agree with you many of whom are RCC.
Not true!
You see to it that everyone knows of your "credentials" as though we ought to be intimidated by them.
I have never posted my credentials on Christian Forums.
The difference between us seems to me to be that one of us has been led by the Spirit and the other not.
The Holy Spirit gives to those who yield to Him a love for others—rather than hatred and contempt! He also makes known to us those who love Him—including our brothers and sisters in the Roman Catholic Church. My best friend for more than 30 years is a staunch five-point Calvinist, and we are very close friends because we share the same Holy Sprit and the same love for God and His word. We also share an aversion for the Roman Catholic dogma that separates it from Protestantism.
