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The "doctrine of discovery" was for all intents and purposes adopted into law by a USA Supreme Court decision in 1818 (?)
Actually, "Protestant" is a legal term and comes fromt the Diet of Speyer in 1529. The Diet reversed the earlier religious toleration of the reformation in the Holy Roman Empire. The Electors and other "barons" entered a formal protestation of the Diet proceedings. The protestation was an appeal of sorts and the signers were known as "protestants".
No, sorry, no. Sola Scriptura does not include or imply that idea.The idea that you can pick up a Bible - read it... and tell if a given church doctrine or tradition measures up to scripture - was a key part of the Protestant Reformation... "Sola Scriptura"
Religious toleration prior to 1529... so then Wycliffe? Huss? Jerome?
In the 1300's
One Pope issued five bulls against John Wycliffe for heresy, the Catholic Church in England tried him three times, and two Popes summoned him to Rome, but Wycliffe was never imprisoned nor ever went to Rome.
I don't know of any U.S. Law that says if an indian fails to convert to Catholicism they can be murdered.
I guess we are talking cross-purposes, then. The definition given by @BobRyan is a widely accepted one.No, sorry, no. Sola Scriptura does not include or imply that idea.
"Widely accepted?" No. And not by people who understand what Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide, and Sola Gratia actually do mean--and it is important that they do, since these are the foundation principles of the Protestant Reformation.I guess we are talking cross-purposes, then. The definition given by @BobRyan is a widely accepted one.
Meaning, I think, not private interpretations, but it's the individual conscience that is responsible to search the Scriptures as led by the Holy Spirit.Not by people who understand what Sola Scriptura, Sola Fide, and Sola Gratia actually do mean--and it is important that they do, since these are the foundation principles of the Protestant Reformation.
That said, yes, we do read posts saying something along the lines of "Sola Scriptura means that everyone can decide for himself what the Bible means," but that most often comes from Roman Catholics here and they have simply heard it from someone else in their own religious circles.
To be clear, you COULD associate some version of that idea with the Reformation. But not with Sola Scriptura.Meaning, I think, not private interpretations, but it's the individual conscience that is responsible to search the Scriptures as led by the Holy Spirit.
Could you then explain your point further, please?To be clear, you COULD associate some version of that idea with the Reformation. But not with Sola Scriptura.
The Reformers did, we know, assert that the Bible should be available to every church member and not forbidden to them by church authorities (as was the case during the Middle Ages).
It's mostly with Lutherans.The USA certainly has a lot of Protestants - but this month in Germany there are a lot of meetings and focus with church leaders from many different denominations coming together to work out a document of common understanding and to declare that the protesting in the protestant reformation - is less of a doctrinal issue now - between Protestants and Catholics.
So it is raises the question about defining just exactly what are the items in that "gap" that would need to be addressed before declaring that the gap had narrowed over the 500 year span of time.
Don't Seventh Day Adventists count Ellen G White as an authoritative interpreter of scripture and aren't at least some of her written words regarded as revelations from God in effect making some of her writings a secondary source as important in Seventh Day Adventist teaching and practise as anything that a church council, says in Orthodoxy and anything that a Pope approves in Catholicism?Sola Scriptura (testing all doctrine and practice against the standard of the Bible and not Bible+traditions-of-men).
The reason for Luther's call to reform was the tyranny of Rome. It comes down to the sacraments, Rome effectively teaches you cannot be properly baptized unless by them, so they are defacto agents of salvation rather then ministers of the gospel.Since there is at least some focus this month on the reformation, the protestant reformation and how wide the GAP is between protestant doctrine and Catholicism - lets work out some of the details.
While Luther may have "started" with 95 objections to selling indulgences.. that is not the sum total of the "gap" between protestantism and catholicism.
Foundational in Protestanism is this - (at the very least).
1. Sola Scriptura (testing all doctrine and practice against the standard of the Bible and not Bible+traditions-of-men).
2. Grace alone (mankind is saved by grace through faith - Ephesians 2) not saved by powers of sacrament or powers in a "rite" or ritual plus ...
3. Faith alone - justified by faith alone - meaning that when the lost person comes to Christ - they are saved not on the basis of good works done as a lost person - but saved by faith alone.
4. Christ alone - "there is no OTHER name under heaven given among men whereby we must be saved" -- so then no earthly priest or pope stands between us and Christ who is the "one mediator between God and man" 1 Tim 2:5-6
We come boldly to the throne of grace - directly to God in prayer. No earthly mediator or Pope between.
(And of course both sides agree that all the glory goes to God alone for the plan of salvation)
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I am not sure that whatever meetings are going on this month and next .. in Germany are going to find agreement on the points listed above.
In addition there is in the "gap" between the Bible and catholicism
1. Prayers to the dead -- called "the Dead in Christ" in 1Thess 4.
2. Claims to confect the "body, blood,soul and divinity of Christ in the mass" - by contrast Christ was offered up "once for all" Hebrews 10 and no earthly priest has been given the powers to confect the "body, blood,soul and divinity of Christ in the mass"
3. The "doctrine of discovery" regarding what Catholics are allowed to do to the natives of newly discovered lands in cases where those natives refuse to convert to Catholicism
4. Infallibility of Catholic church councils and popes.
5. Authorizing violence against Christians for "thought crimes" for doctrinal differences with the Pope.
6. Editing the Sabbath Commandment to point it to week-day-1
7. Apocryphal books injected into the Bible canon -- (books that even Jerome declared were not legitmately part of the Canon of scripture)
8. The Pope's claim to in any way be the head or leader of any denomination on earth - other than his own denomination - the Roman Catholic Church.
9. Purgatory -- does not exist according to the Bible but the RCC promotes it anyway.
I am probably missing a few of the topics in "the gap" between Catholicism and Protestantism
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So then what are the odds that the folks in Germany are ever going to be able to close the gap on such key doctrinal points of difference?
Each person should remain in the situation they were in when God called them.1 Cor 7:19 "what matters is keeping the Commandments of God"
through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.Romans 8:4-9 points to the fact that the lost "do not submit to the law of God - neither indeed CAN they" by contrast to the saved in Romans 8:4-9
Yes, slaves to righteousness.Romans 6 - you have an entire chapter on that subject.
Still missing quite an important detail
People can keep busy all day trying to practice Moses's Law and never quite get there
Every religion does that
Not really in context my friend:
Nevertheless, each person should live as a believer in whatever situation the Lord has assigned to them, just as God has called them. This is the rule I lay down in all the churches. Was a man already circumcised when he was called? He should not become uncircumcised. Was a man uncircumcised when he was called? He should not be circumcised. Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing....[
Each person should remain in the situation they were in when God called them.
through Christ Jesus the law of the Spirit who gives life has set you free from the law of sin and death.