Reply to a Phatmass Question

[quote name='CatholicAndFanatical' date='Jan 3 2008, 12:12 PM' post='1441573']
BG, not to hijack the thread but you seem pretty knowledgeable about the Church, may I ask why you are not Catholic?
[/quote]

Well after thinking about this, I've come up with a simple reply:
Fear. Fear of being wrong for 21 years, and fear of being wrong if I made the choice to cross the Tiber. Fear of Confession. Fear of, all people, Mary. Fear of being disowned by my family and cut off in my Senior year of university.

So, if I'm going to come out and say that, perhaps a laundry list is in order, of doubts, of what I've read, etc? Mention the notebooks worth of notes in the past five years? No, I'm not trying to come across bitter, far from it, but you asked a question which I might as well try to answer fully.

So let's see, last year I read (Catholic Literature wise):
Catholicism for Dummies
The Complete Idiot's Guide to Popes and the Papacy
Rome Sweet Home
Born Fundamentalist, Born Again Catholic
Humanae Vitae
Dives in misericordia
An Introduction to Christianity
The Chalice (Okay, I wrote this one for NaNoWriMo)

The Quick List of Issues I've had with Catholicism:
1) Sola Scriptura
2) Sola Fide
3) Apostolic Authority
4) The Eucharist
5) Purgatory
6) Mary

Addressing Issue One: Sola Scriptura

As I told my lovely girlfriend, "Darn you Scott Hahn". Dr. Hahn thoroughly convinced me of how un-scriptural Scripture Alone is.

Anyhow, some verses:
Matthew 28:20, Jesus commands to listen to all He has taught, which implies far more than the Bible shows. Thus, Sola Scriptura is not enough, Sacred Tradition is required.

Luke 1, he writes in addition to what has already been taught to the readers of the original letter. Again, this is showing Sacred Scripture as only a portion of what is needed.

1 Corinthians 11, at the beginning Paul gives them props for sticking to tradition that he handed down to them.

2 Thessalonians 3, Paul again talks about Tradition.

Addressing Issue Two: Sola Fide

Again...Dr. Scott Hahn pwned me.

Some Scripture:
James 2: 19-26, really is all I can think of that should ever be needed for this. Particularly in verse 24, where James makes a point of saying we are not justified by faith alone.

Addressing Issue Three: Apostolic Authority/Succession

Again, I was really ticked off at Dr. Scott Hahn. And no, I've never heard the infamous "tape". ;)

So some Scripture and other stuff:
Saint Ignatius of Antioch once wrote, "You must follow the bishop as Jesus Christ follows the Father, and the presbytery [that is, the council of priests] as you would the Apostles. Reverence the deacons as you would the command of God. Let no one do anything of concern to the Church without the bishop."

Part One, Section One, Chapter Two, Number Seventy-Seven of the Catechism of the Catholic Church states, "In order that the full and living Gospel might always be preserved in the Church the apostles left bishops as their successors. They gave them their own position of teaching authority. Indeed, "the apostolic preaching, which is expressed in a special way in the inspired books, was to be preserved in a continuous line of succession until the end of time."

John 20:20-23 says, "When he had said this, he showed them his hands and his side. The disciples rejoiced when they saw the Lord. (Jesus) said to them again, "Peace be with you. As the Father has sent me, so I send you." And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the holy Spirit. Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained."

Matthew 16: 17-29 states, quite famously, "Jesus said to him in reply, "Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."

The verse in Matthew hearkens back of course to Isaiah 22, the symbol of the keys being for a Prime Minister of Israel. One whom has authority to rule in the stead of the King.

Addressing Issue Four: The Eucharist

Scott Hahn got me again there...pointing out how Jesus would not have repeated himself if speaking figuratively. Amongst other things.

So Scripture and Such:
John 6, just...almost all of it.

1 Corinthians 11:27 states, "Whoever, therefore, eats the bread or drinks the cup of the Lord in an unworthy manner will be guilty of profaning the body and blood of the Lord."
If it's a symbol, then how is it able to be profaned?

St. Ignatius to the Smyrnaeans, section seven, stated, "From Eucharist and prayer they hold aloof, because they do not confess that the Eucharist is the Flesh of our Savior Jesus Christ, which suffered for our sins, and which the Father in His loving-kindness raised from the dead. And so, those who question the gift of God perish in their contentiousness. It would be better for them to have love, so as to share in the resurrection. It is proper, therefore, to avoid associating with such people and not to speak about them either in private or in public, but to study the Prophets attentively and, especially, the Gospel, in which the Passion is revealed to us and the Resurrection shown in its fulfillment. Shun division as the beginning of evil."

Addressing Issue Five, Purgatory

I'm just going to out and out quote Doctor Hahn here, because he peppered an intense amount of Scripture in what I'm quoting. It's long enough I'll even use the quote tag...from [u]Rome Sweet Home[/u], pages 126-127,
[quote]In no time at all, the conversation was deteriorating into another debate over the doctrine of Purgatory. I decided to transpose the doctrine into major key, so to speak, by framing it in God's covenant love.

"Kimberly, the Bible shows how many times God revealed himself in fire to his people in order to renew his covenant with them: as a 'fire pot and a flaming torch' with Abraham in Genesis 15; in the burning Bush with Moses in Exodus 3,; in the pillar of fire with Israel in Numbers 9; in the heavenly fire that consumed the altar sacrifices with Solomon and Elijah in 1 Kings 8 and 18,; in the 'tongues of fire' with the apostles at Pentecost in Acts 2...."

Kimberly interrupted, "All right Scott, what's your point?"

I had one chance to get it right. "Simply this. When Hebrews 12:29 describes God as a 'consuming fire', it isn't necessarily referring to his anger. There's the fire of God himself. So fire refers to God's infinite love even more than his eternal wrath. God's nature is like a raging inferno of fiery love. In other words, heaven must be hotter than hell.

"No wonder Scripture refers to the angels who are closest to God as the Seraphim, which literally means 'the burning ones' in Hebrew. That's also why Saint Paul can describe in 1 Corinthians 3:13 how all saints must pass through a fiery judgment in which 'each man's work will become manifest, for the Day will disclose it, because it will be revealed with fire...'

"Clearly, he's not talking about the fire of hell, since they're saints who are being judged. He's talking about a fire that prepares them for eternal life with God in heaven; so the purpose of the fire is manifest: to reveal whether their works are pure ('gold and silver') or impure (wood, hay and straw').

"Verse 15 makes it clear that some saints who are destined for heaven will pass through the fire and suffer: 'If any man's work is burned up, he will suffer loss, though he himself will be saved, but only as through fire.' The fire is there for the purpose of purging saints. That means it is a purgatorial fire; one that purifies and prepares the saints to be enveloped in the consuming fire of God's presence forever." [/quote]

On Issue Six, Mary

Ah Mary, my hardest to reconcile issue...or person, or Blessed Virgin if one prefers. Funny enough, I think my biggest issue is with the only two ex cathedra statements in church history, both regarding her. If I accept the Apostolic Succession, then ex cathedra statements shouldn't matter, but they do to me. Even if Marian devotion can be traced back to the very beginning of Christianity.

Luke 1:46-55 makes a good case for Marian devotion scripturally, known in Catholic circles as the Magnificat.

Exodus 34, makes a decent point on how first-born does not imply there being a second born, when it comes to biblical conventions on birthing.

John 19:26, why bother leaving Mary to the disciple if Jesus had brothers to care for her?

Revelation 12:1, the 'woman' is clothed with the stars? It never seems to speak of the clothing of souls elsewhere in Revelation, which could support the Assumption I suppose. Also, Assumption bodily into Heaven is hardly something new, Enoch in Genesis, Elijah in Second Kings, Chapter Eight, is taken up by a whirlwind.

Revelation 12:16 also tends to imply, if this woman is indeed Mary, would be a spiritual mother as the Catholic Church claims. As her offspring are the followers of the Christ.

Okay...blogspotting this to not hijack the thread...