Why anybody who belongs to one of the Apostolic Churches -- and thinks that's important -- can be comfortable adding to or altering the faith according to some human logic that has no Scriptural basis actually does amaze me. It seems so contrary to what we read at other times, i.e. that it's those "Evangelicals" and Protestants in general who don't adhere to the original faith, tsk tsk.
yes tsk tsk.
Did you ever watch TV shows like "Connections"? dealing with the history ideas, inventions etc. That was what I was trying to do in the thread. Answering the question directly. And by the way if you are interested in things like history of theology and the Bible this is a very spot on approach. But maybe that is not you....
1) I would also say that to some degree this is also about things like "bearing false witness" etc. When I was a young Lutheran boy in my 1st year of Catechism. (My Catechism got stretched out 3 years because of commuting to Church issues the nearest conservative church near my desert city of Ridgecrest, was over 90 minute drive away in a city called Victorville. And later got delayed once we started a mission church, due to frequent illness of me and my fellow student Brenda, and issues with the pastor and the main church). But being 3 years long is something I point out if people accuse me of not having a foundation in Lutheranism etc.
Anyway one of the early lessons did have to do with praying to the saints and I heard the usual stuff you mentioned in my thread. Anyway, a few months later, I went away to spend most of the summer with my grand parents, and on one week my favorite cousins who were Roman Catholic liberated me for the weekend to spend time with them because things with the grand parents was a bit slow. But one of the things that came up on the ride to their house, I brought it up since I knew I was going to go to church with them was the praying to the saints thing. Anyway they very promptly mentioned the soliciting prayers answer etc. which was much different than what I was taught in Catechism. I took their word for it, because they were always truthful, and devout and knew their faith etc. And I realized all the stuff on that subject that I was taught was more a rehashing of all the stuff from the 95 Theses to the Council of Trent, and your typical Lutheran pastor had not really caught up with where Catholicism was now.
Anyway Christian Charity aka Love I believe is at least taking people at their word until somehow being proven otherwise. We do that in general in life, or at least we should do that. So I see it as the same thing with Catholics.
2) Besides that I will also mention other things like when covering Mary in the Creed, in the Bible references etc. the church basically had accepted the Helvidian position of Mary having a regular marriage with Joseph after the birth of Christ as far as sex etc. goes. Even though that was not what Luther believed etc. We however did believe we were really Lutheran etc. and taught what Luther taught etc. In truth, I'm not sure if the pastor really knew or understood things. In my early days, I was impressed with him. He had a lot of things going for him as far as being a pretty decent preacher, but also having social graces and bed side manner, things that earlier pastors in an independent formerly Missouri synod church lacked. But on the other hand, in some ways he kind was a guy to phone things in. Like I don't think he possessed any drive as far as intellectual curiosity, or had any kind of desire for continued education etc. Basically I spent some time seminary etc, couldn't complete it due to life issues with job, money etc. But I'm pretty sure, I could run circles around this guy at the same point in life, except for not having a mind that is well suited for learning foreign languages including Biblical ones, I barely made it through my year of Biblical Hebrew with a passing grade.
It's interesting years later after internet Blogs became big, and I was a member of the Coptic Church, I stumbled on this Lutheran Blog, that had a Latin caption that I don't remember the term and never heard it before, but the Caption describes essentially the most conservative orthodox position of Lutherans, basically Lutheranism as Luther taught it not watered down by other Evangelism, Americanism etc. Anyway this Blog post had "The 18 things You didn't know that you Believed if you are a such such Lutheran". It was very interesting comparing what my old Wisconsin synod church taught vs. that list. I think we got 70% of the items on the list.
3) I think it cannot be emphasized enough that their often is multiple potential interpretations of scripture. I know many Protestants assume a Tabla Rasa type viewpoint, but I don't we tend to interpret things through our beliefs, paradigms, past experiences etc. It's a little like the Biblical phrase "seeing through a glass darkly".
I still have some Lutheran sensibilities on things, I am willing to cut Catholics some slack though. Just because people feel something is improper, doesn't always make it so. In my life, I have often learned after the fact, the things that I assumed were not correct, were much different than I thought, imagined or understood, rationalized etc.
So yes, I do give Catholics the benefit of the doubt and you know that even is Biblical to do so, but our own psychology typically does the opposite of that Self Attribution theory being the best example of that.
PS - I also make a distinction on things that are a matter of taste so to speak. Like some Catholic things like giant Mary statues don't float my boat, but I also make allowances for Protestants who can do other things that I think are tacky.
4) And by the way what about this cartoon below... Like hasn't what you've talked about it kind of been the same thing that has been talked about for 500 years or so? Wouldn't you actually like to hear something different and maybe learn something new maybe?
And once again, I will go back to my Lutheran days. I spend a lot of time being bored to tears. The good pastor (who was still a slacker) left the church to woo back his wife that left him a few years before and instead we got this old formerly retired pastor. He only knew 2 basic sermons: Sermon 1) You can't earn your way to heaven! Christ did it for you, paid your sins etc. and 2) Things are really bad here on earth, but if we just hang on, things will be really awesome in heaven!
Anyway isn't there more to Christianity than just that?
It's interesting there is a Biblical statistic, that something like maybe 62% of the NT is a response to error (in doctrine or praxis or both). And if you go into theology like the Creeds that sort of thing would be much higher probably almost 100%. But the thing is when saint Paul when he confronted X, he didn't cover it ad nauseum, but actually used that error as an opportunity to give a great exposition on the nature of Faith, Christ's sacrifice and so on. So I guess I would like to try to do the same. I actually think its the big ideas, concepts that are the exciting thing, but also the ones that are useful and edifying.
