Anti-Catholics: Here is How to Convince Me I'm Wrong

[Bible Highlighter]

[Perhaps Anti-Catholic is too strong a term, but it was a lot shorter than saying, People who seriously disagree with the Catholic Church on Biblical grounds. But I digress.]

Update: As many people have made fair arguments about my challenge, I have thought this through a little more, on how to make this more reasonable (though to be fair, I do have a user who took me up on this, and at least 1 friend who's doing this in real life). The principle reason for why I choose Catholicism isn't just because I think Dave Armstrong's arguments prove the Church as the most Biblical; I see a lot of very Biblical arguments for a lot of contrary views. I see the Church as an authoritative institution. The Bible is complicated; God knows that. He wouldn't leave us on our own, to figure out a notoriously difficult book by ourselves; it makes sense that He would institute some sort of living authority to teach us (with the infallible guidance of the Spirit) the essential moral & theological information about the faith. I intend to make a post about this in more detail in the near future; for now, I would direct anyone with the book (mentioned below) to Appendix 2: The Visible, Hierarchical, Apostolic Church. Thank you for your recommendations on how to refine my challenge, and may God lead us all to the true Church, wherever that may be!)

Update to the Update: Here it is! Please pray for good things to come as a result! Why I Choose Catholic Christianity

A very common argument against Catholicism is the idea that the Catholic Church is unbiblical. A valid concern; however, I truly believe that this idea is a misconception. I've spent quite a bit of time arguing theology here & in real life with my Protestant brothers & sisters, and my Protestant brothers and sisters have spent quite a bit of time arguing theology with me. To date, nobody has changed their mind either way.

This is often due to an understandable lack of thoroughness; the Bible is a very detailed, sometimes complicated, and remarkably long book. A proper understanding of all its implications would take extensive time & effort that many of us just don't have.

So I will direct you to a book written by someone who has put in all that time & effort...an evangelical Protestant, who did a year-long in-depth Bible study to disprove Catholicism.

Long story short...he converted.

The author is Dave Armstrong, and the book is titled A Biblical Defense of Catholicism. It's around 350 of very meticulous Biblical analysis, written to explain how the Catholic Church is the most Biblical Christian Church, and even the only truly Biblical Church.

It's detailed enough that it can be hard to read, especially when Armstrong discusses the original languages used in the Bible. But if you really want to convince me against my Catholic Christian faith, this is my challenge: Read the book (all of it), take careful notes if that's how you do things, find out how the concert got it all wrong, and let me know. Give me a thorough enough explanation for how the Catholic Church isn't Biblically & historically valid, and I promise I will convert. You have to read the book first; I can't defend my faith & explain Scripture as well as Armstrong can, so I direct my apologetics to him (sometimes it's good to let someone more educated do the explaining).

You can find it pretty cheap online (remember to use Amazon Smile if that's your avenue; that gives money to a charity of your choice, with no extra fee to you). And if you don't want to, I understand, it's a lot of reading. But if disproving Catholicism is really what you want to do in this life, then a Catholic Theology major just told you what you need to do to convince him.

May God continue to bless us all!

First, no offense, but I think it will be hard to get someone to read a book as a part of a discussion. Second, the problem is that if this author truly knew what I knew about the Catholic church, he would in no way believe in the Catholic church. It is a spiritual thing, and yet it is also a Scriptural thing. I believe people who are Catholic are that way because of the spiritual influence and it is not really a Scriptural influence in any way. Nowhere in the Bible do we see anyone praying to dead people, and venerating Mary, and bowing down to statues, and priest confessionals, and prayer beads, and popes that say they are vicars, and folks who go about in long flowing robes (that Jesus warned us about involving the Scribes). You would be hard pressed to find any of these things in the Bible. Hence, why Sola Scriptura is rejected, and church traditions needs to be the missing element. When I read Scripture, I see warnings against what the Catholic church does. Call no man your father, Jesus is the only mediator between God and man, and forbidding to marry, and eating meats, etc, etc. But people see what they want to see (of course).

For me: The Holy Bible is the only divine written work of God with the evidence to back it up. I written a Blogger article showing the many evidences backing up the Bible here:

Love Branch: Evidences for the Word of God

But you will not find the same level of evidence for the written church traditions of the Catholic church. Furthermore, 2 Timothy 3:16-17 essentially says that all Scripture is profitable for instruction in righteousness so that the man of God may be perfect unto ALL good works. Not just some. This means that Scripture alone is sufficient for leading us into righteous instruction unto ALL good works and not some added holy book or some written down added church traditions that appears to conflict with the Bible.

"All scripture is given by inspiration of God, and is profitable for doctrine,
for reproof, for correction, for instruction in righteousness:
That the man of God may be perfect,
throughly furnished unto all good works."
(2 Timothy 3:16-17).​

So if men of God can be PERFECT unto ALL good works by Scripture, then what do we need any added extra holy books, or added written church traditions for? We don't. Scripture is sufficient according to Scripture.

Side Note:

As for the whole bishops thing from your meme:

Does the Bible describe a bishop as like the one we see in the Catholic church? No. Not at all. Catholic bishops forbid to be married, and yet our Bibles say in 1 Timothy 3:2 the following,

"It behoveth therefore a bishop to be blameless, the husband of one wife, sober, prudent, of good behavior, chaste, given to hospitality, a teacher..."

 

[BobRyan]

[Perhaps Anti-Catholic is too strong a term, but it was a lot shorter than saying, People who seriously disagree with the Catholic Church on Biblical grounds. But I digress.]

Ok that was pretty good.

That alone was worth the price of the ticket.

(BTW -- I assume you do not view Christ or Paul as being anti-Jew)

The author is Dave Armstrong, and the book is titled A Biblical Defense of Catholicism. It's around 350 of very meticulous Biblical analysis, written to explain how the Catholic Church is the most Biblical Christian Church, and even the only truly Biblical Church.
... But if you really want to convince me against my Catholic Christian faith, this is my challenge: Read the book (all of it), take careful notes if that's how you do things, find out how the concert got it all wrong, and let me know. Give me a thorough enough explanation for how the Catholic Church isn't Biblically & historically valid, and I promise I will convert.

Ok ... so then we all come here with a stack of book titles and say "read this book then give me a thorough explanation and ... I promise I will convert"??

That is "a thing"???

This last point was more entertaining than the opening comment.

I like your style.

 

[Amittai]

... long and telling as is the Jesuit oath. Here is a link to the Jesuit oath and tell me again how this is part of the one true church.

Jesuit Extreme Oath of Induction

Very interesting! Oaths in EVERY context distort the personality (that's the real reason freemasonry is harmful, not the looking after each other) (it's the reason almost all the new movements of the 20th century are harmful).

The RCC hasn't got round to sorting out its rubbish from its better stuff. Many of the other denominations haven't either.

As others have pointed out, some non-catholic churches accept what we think of as Tradition, too.

All the borders are so frayed it is mostly difficult to tell what is sea and what is ship, at the practical level.

My family didn't hold to most RCC baggage, at a time when the Church was neglecting even to teach anyone even that. I'm scarcely less of one now than then and I certainly repudiate all the organisational affiliations these days (despite certain local prelates being relatively good hearted - they are being let down by the bigger thing). Both sides were wrong before, during and after the Reformation.

Most of what I thought as catholic acquaintances have evolved of late into more than semidetached catholics or non-denominational with a slightly catholic flavour.

All congregations and denominations can become "demonic" in some senses and to differing degrees for shorter or longer periods.

 

[bbbbbbb]

Very interesting! Oaths in EVERY context distort the personality (that's the real reason freemasonry is harmful, not the looking after each other) (it's the reason almost all the new movements of the 20th century are harmful).

The RCC hasn't got round to sorting out its rubbish from its better stuff. Many of the other denominations haven't either.

As others have pointed out, some non-catholic churches accept what we think of as Tradition, too.

All the borders are so frayed it is mostly difficult to tell what is sea and what is ship, at the practical level.

My family didn't hold to most RCC baggage, at a time when the Church was neglecting even to teach anyone even that. I'm scarcely less of one now than then and I certainly repudiate all the organisational affiliations these days (despite certain local prelates being relatively good hearted - they are being let down by the bigger thing). Both sides were wrong before, during and after the Reformation.

Most of what I thought as catholic acquaintances have evolved of late into more than semidetached catholics or non-denominational with a slightly catholic flavour.

All congregations and denominations can become "demonic" in some senses and to differing degrees for shorter or longer periods.

Thank you for your excellent post. I think it is quite fair and balanced.

 

[JSRG]

Very interesting! Oaths in EVERY context distort the personality (that's the real reason freemasonry is harmful, not the looking after each other) (it's the reason almost all the new movements of the 20th century are harmful).

The problem here is that the oath in question, as another poster pointed out earlier, is almost certainly a fake oath. Let's look at the supposed sources that are offered in the link offered that claimed the quote was real:

"This oath is taken from the book Subterranean Rome by Carlos Didier, translated from the French, and published in New York in 1843."

Well, despite the fact it claims it was translated and published in New York, I can't find any evidence that this translation exists outside of people claiming the oath is found in it. Also, they goofed up the name, it's actually Charles Didier. And I am not sure the quote is in the book at all--a search through it on archive.org turns up some results for "Jesuite" (French word for Jesuit) but nothing that resembles the oath--but I admit my French isn't good enough to be sure.

But more important than that is the fact that Rome souterraine (the French title) is a fiction book. Even if the quote is in there somewhere, one can hardly use it as proof of the oath being real.

It then claims "Dr. Alberto Rivera escaped from the Jesuit Order in 1967, and he describes his Jesuit oath in exactly the same way as it appears in this book. Semper idem: always the same." Setting aside the major questions of credibility involving Alberto Rivera (multiple Protestant groups pointed out various problems in his claims of being a former Jesuit and the stuff he said he did while he was one), the fact it was the same oath proves nothing--anyone can seize onto an already-existing popular urban legend and claim it's fact as proof of their validity.

Finally, it writes: "The Jesuit Oath of Induction is also recorded in the Congressional Record of the U.S. (House Bill 1523, Contested election case of Eugene C. Bonniwell, against Thos. S. Butler, Feb. 15, 1913, pp. 3215-3216)."

Much like "Subterranean Rome", it seems quite obvious this was never verified by the person asserting it. If you go through the trouble of looking it up (and it is obvious that the author of the linked page never did), you will quickly discover that this is claimed to be the oath of the Knights of Columbus, not the Jesuits (guess people can't keep their fake oaths straight). Further, if you look at the broader context, the reason it's in the Congressional Record at all is because there was a dispute after the election, where the loser (Bonniwell) accused the winner of committing various fraudulent tactics. Various examples were alleged, but the pertinent one to the current discussion is that he accused his opponent of being involved with a local newspaper that ran an article that published the supposed Knights of Columbus Oath (Bonniwell was a member of that organization). It was therefore included in the Congressional Record for record keeping. But no one involved in the dispute claimed the oath was real; his opponent, in fact, flat-out says he believes it's spurious (see page 3219, at the end of the paragraph that has the underlining on it) and that he had nothing to do with its publication.

So, in summation, the sources offered for this oath are:
1) A fictional book.
2) A man whose testimony in general is viewed as highly questionable.
3) A random local newspaper (though attributing it to a different Catholic organization entirely).

None of these are exactly persuasive in proving the validity of this quote.

 

[Concord1968]

The problem here is that the oath in question, as another poster pointed out earlier, is almost certainly a fake oath. Let's look at the supposed sources that are offered in the link offered that claimed the quote was real:

"This oath is taken from the book Subterranean Rome by Carlos Didier, translated from the French, and published in New York in 1843."

Well, despite the fact it claims it was translated and published in New York, I can't find any evidence that this translation exists outside of people claiming the oath is found in it. Also, they goofed up the name, it's actually Charles Didier. And I am not sure the quote is in the book at all--a search through it on archive.org turns up some results for "Jesuite" (French word for Jesuit) but nothing that resembles the oath--but I admit my French isn't good enough to be sure.

But more important than that is the fact that Rome souterraine (the French title) is a fiction book. Even if the quote is in there somewhere, one can hardly use it as proof of the oath being real.

It then claims "Dr. Alberto Rivera escaped from the Jesuit Order in 1967, and he describes his Jesuit oath in exactly the same way as it appears in this book. Semper idem: always the same." Setting aside the major questions of credibility involving Alberto Rivera (multiple Protestant groups pointed out various problems in his claims of being a former Jesuit and the stuff he said he did while he was one), the fact it was the same oath proves nothing--anyone can seize onto an already-existing popular urban legend and claim it's fact as proof of their validity.

Finally, it writes: "The Jesuit Oath of Induction is also recorded in the Congressional Record of the U.S. (House Bill 1523, Contested election case of Eugene C. Bonniwell, against Thos. S. Butler, Feb. 15, 1913, pp. 3215-3216)."

Much like "Subterranean Rome", it seems quite obvious this was never verified by the person asserting it. If you go through the trouble of looking it up (and it is obvious that the author of the linked page never did), you will quickly discover that this is claimed to be the oath of the Knights of Columbus, not the Jesuits (guess people can't keep their fake oaths straight). Further, if you look at the broader context, the reason it's in the Congressional Record at all is because there was a dispute after the election, where the loser (Bonniwell) accused the winner of committing various fraudulent tactics. Various examples were alleged, but the pertinent one to the current discussion is that he accused his opponent of being involved with a local newspaper that ran an article that published the supposed Knights of Columbus Oath (Bonniwell was a member of that organization). It was therefore included in the Congressional Record for record keeping. But no one involved in the dispute claimed the oath was real; his opponent, in fact, flat-out says he believes it's spurious (see page 3219, at the end of the paragraph that has the underlining on it) and that he had nothing to do with its publication.

So, in summation, the sources offered for this oath are:
1) A fictional book.
2) A man whose testimony in general is viewed as highly questionable.
3) A random local newspaper (though attributing it to a different Catholic organization entirely).

None of these are exactly persuasive in proving the validity of this quote.

IIRCC, Alberto Rivera was associated with Jack Chick.

 

[Amittai]

I agree in fact with JSREG and Concord 1968 in this specific matter.

My experience of oaths I have taken, albeit rather vaguely worded or explained, plus documentation (which I gave away) about a wide variety of actual oaths, plus the well known true record of some orders, told me the insights which I have commented generally.

Jesus was very disapproving of them and St Paul not keen at all (he would only have seen though one that was of a least harmful kind and then only for the shortest possible period). Jesus & Paul were concerned about the effect of things on our personalities for good living.

Some people I was involved with had an ambiguous basis so I broke it unilaterally. HTH