The Whore of Babylon

[Rhyfelwyr]

Wow, I can't believe I started a serious discussion on the Culdees. That was a joke people, as was the 25AD thing. The Culdees were an obscure monastic reform movement from around the 8th century IIRC. But they've gained some sort of mythical status in the Protestant mindset in Northern Ireland with the whole ethnic/religous debate over Celts and Cruithin and Catholicism and Celtic Christianity, with the Culdees supposedly defending the purer Celtic Church from the influence of Rome. Another related favourite is the debate over whether St. Patrick was a Protestant. As for the Celtic Church, well it was distinct from Rome, but it sure wasn't Protestant. It got very superstitious with parading saints bones and things like that.

Ah, but the Church can reasonably be said to be the felowship of God's servants. If the Catholic Church was ever just then it would follow that it was the earthly manifestation of this fellowship. It's proposed decline into depravity therefore constitutes an abandonment by God of the greater part of what should be the body of Christ. Since in Calvinistic theology the precise membership of said body is defined by God, that means he has allowed the Earthly manifestation of the body to rot.

The thing is it was never the 'Catholic Church' back then, it was just part of the wider catholic church. The earthly manifestion of a church was your local congregation. As the scripture says, some were given the gift of prophecy, others teaching, others preaching etc... but all were equal members with Christ alone as the head.

And it's hardly surprising that God would allow the earthly state of the church to decline. The prophets themselves give enough indication that this was always going to be the case

Further, the Roman Catholic Church must have once been the body of Christ, and the Pope it's Earthly head because he authorised the Biblical Canon, which ensured it was those books which Calvin asserted were infallable.

This is why Biblical infallability can ONLY be asserted by Roman Catholicism.

The Protestant position on the scripute is justified by the scripture itself (circular I know, but they did argue it was a sort of self-evident truth). Also, the Synod of Hippo which finalised the canon far preceded any concept of the Roman Catholic Church, since the very term 'Roman Catholic' would have appeared to be an oxymoron to the early patriarchs of Rome. And even then, all the fantastical stories about temporal influences suddenly declaring the canon for their own ends are myths, there had increasingly been a general consensus within Christianity in what ought to be regarded as scriptural for hundreds of years prior to that date.

Furthemore, the Reformers never took the Papacy's position on the grounds of Papal authority. Luther of course changed his views a number of times, and Calvin addresses Luther's concerns in the Institutues, and provides his own reasoning for why certain books ought to be considered canonical. They never simply followed the RCC's decision.

There is a reason Reformed Churches are smaller than other denominations; they contain only the Elect, and the Elect are God's special servents, his prophets and his servents on Earth. This is the horror of Calvinism, admitted by Calvin but denied today, Calvinism proposes a far less merciful and loving God.

The way in which God's mercy is displayed is different in Calvinism. Without God's sovereingty in our salvation, people must save themselves, and so really his mercy is revealed to no one. With Calvinism, God saves those that were sin itself, and makes them blameless before him. The fact that God saves some may seem harsh when we are still looking through a glass darkly, but it should be remembered what the chief end of all things are - to glorify the Lord.

Actually, the words are praedestini (fore-chosen) and praesciti (fore-known) in Latin. Elect and Reprobate are Early Modern inventions and have no basis in the Latin theological language of the West.

Good point, unfortunately I have no knowledge of these linguistic things, other than what they sometimes point out during a work. But since neither of us use the "you choose but he knows first" cop out, these terms have a similar effect to 'elect'?

"Liberty of Conciense" is only exercised after the application of Calvinistic Grace. It isn't relevent to the discussion we are having, therefore.

I thought when you called Calvinism totalitarian you were referring to the fact that we are not able to alter our fate, there is no choice as such. Surely if God refused to administer grace to a fallen mankind, that would make him more of an absentee landlord than a totalitarian ruler?