re: The "Church" of England

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There were The Twelve Apostles and then Paul of Tarsus. I'm not aware of any additional Apostles. The List includes The Twelve and Paul. That's it.

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Who’s list?

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There may be other folks who traveled with and preached with the Apostles. They may have been very well known, very gifted and maybe even venerated and highly esteemed among the Apostles, but, does that phraseology in Scripture mean that they are actual Apostles? Not to my knowledge, because, the Last Apostle was Paul of Tarsus.

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One good example is Barnabus. He was definitely an apostle, and not one of the Twelve, and isn’t another nickname for Paul.

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Why do you think that there were other Apostles?

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1 Cor 9 and Acts 14 specifically names Barnabus as an apostle who traveled with Paul working for a living spreading the gospel message of Jesus.

that picture of the women sitting on the golden throne needs to be put up with a picture of the manger at Jesus birth, picture of casting the net to feed the crowd, picture of throwing the money changers out of the temple, picture of the crusifixtion etc.

and ask if the Church of England represents a form of Christianity. I would say it does not.

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The dogma rules that you follow are "man-made", and many different men of the Protestant side have established their own man-made rules that differ wildly and are often in direct contradiction with one another.

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"Dogma" is that which must be believed--or things you cannot reject--in order to be saved. There are actually only a few of those things--fewer than Rome has--and they are centered on the primary truths about God and the gospel. Basically, the Apostles' Creed and what are described by the five solas of the Reformation, which speak to how one is justified (by grace, through faith, in Christ, for God's glory alone, according to His word alone).

You can't be a saved and reject the Trinity. You can't be saved and believe that Jesus isn't both fully God and fully man. You can't be saved and believe that the Father, Son, and Spirit are actually one person acting in different roles at different times. You can't be saved if you trust in anything but Jesus' work alone.

We're actually very similar here, as Rome accepts most of what I just said. The difference is that she adds other dogmas that must be believed, like believing the Pope can speak infallibly and that Mary was conceived without original sin.

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I will say that MY rule is God-inspired, and yours is not. You will say the same thing to me.

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My only rule (defined as an infallible standard that judges all controversies of the faith) is the Bible. You believe the Church as an infallible rule in addition to the Bible, and since you can't have two ultimate standards, the Church is what functionally takes over for you.

In your belief system, the Church determines what is Scripture, the Church alone can interpret Scripture, the Church determines what is oral tradition, and the Church alone can interpret that oral tradition. That means the Church is the rule of and over the Scriptures, because even if someone may read the Bible and think there is an obvious conclusion being taught that differs from what the Church teaches, that conclusion has to be wrong.

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The difference is MY side has one consensus of belief which is published in the Catechism.

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Apparently that consensus can change, which means the Catechism can be updated.

When the Catechism was published in 1992, it taught that there was room for the death penalty as an appropriate response. In the last decade, it was updated to reflect the death penalty as being "inadmissible" (not an option) due to it being "an attack on the inviolability and dignity of the person".

While the RCC teaches that she doesn't change its position, only clarifies it, and that doctrine isn't changed but "develops", this, to me, is an example of a doctrinal change, and goes against what the Scriptures have taught in both the Old Testament and New.

This doesn't even speak to the myriad of beliefs tolerated within Catholicism that have been reason for split within Protestant churches, such as the continuation of the sign gifts (i.e., speaking in tongues). Just because Catholics don't have the option to split and form a different Catholic church over something like that doesn't mean you have unity.

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The Protestant side has many opposing beliefs, often in direct contradiction with one another, and often on topics very fundamental to Christianity, such as the existence of the Trinity and the Nature of Jesus Christ Himself.

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As I said a moment ago, the existence of the Trinity and the nature of Christ are two fundamental things that even Protestants agree must be believed. We would reject Unitarians, for example, as Christians.

The different and even opposing beliefs that Protestants have are not on gospel issues by and large, but on secondary and tertiary issues not critical to salvation. We make that distinction, because even though we may be divided on those issues an separated institutionally (meaning we have different governments and designations as denominations), we still believe we are part of one visible church of Christ.

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My side doesn't have that problem, because we have our published Catechism

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Again, not true. You still have a lot of diversity of belief and practice in spite of the Catechism. You just look at the external organizational alignment as being an evidence for unity.

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Your side has man-made dogma. You simply refuse to admit it.

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My denomination, for example (but it's similar in all Presbyterian denominations), has a Confession of Faith (Westminster) as well as a set of catechisms that define what we believe about all sorts of topics that God teaches in His word. It's very much like the Catholic Catechism in that sense, actually. The difference is that we don't hold those subordinate standards as being infallible like Rome does, and we believe those things could possibly be changed if we thought the Scriptures taught something different.

We teach a difference between submission to these things compared to subscription to them. Our officers must subscribe (confirm belief in these things in order to become officers) while members merely have to submit to them being taught (not create division if they disagree). Because of this, we do not teach these things as "dogmas" that must be believed to be saved, as we don't even require our own members to believe them.

We have different teachings, for sure, but not different dogmas.

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I'm not bashing you. I'm just encouraging people to look at the two sides and make their own decision between my side with a teaching authority and a unified Catechism and your side, which is fractured into many different beliefs, many of which are in direct contradiction to one another.

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Yes, people are free to see that when the church of Rome wants to contradict itself, she just changes her teachings and forces everyone to submit to it or go to Hell.

We Protestants allow for liberty of conscience when it comes to non-gospel issues, and we don't teach that our leaders are infallible. Only God's word is infallible, and it is our duty to study it diligently to understand it and to be conformed to it and reformed by it.

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My only rule (defined as an infallible standard that judges all controversies of the faith) is the Bible.

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Bible Alone is the man-made dogma shared by your Protestant sect and most of the others. The problem here is that when Protestantism started out just over 500 years ago, the men who invented Protestantism thought it would be easy for everybody to read the Bible and interpret it the same way.

As it turned out, the first Protestant denominations from the very beginning were in violent disagreement with regard to how to interpret the Bible. Henry 8th put some fellow Protestants to Death over this issue of how to correctly interpret the Bible. Now, after over 500 years of Protestantism, we have many, many individual man-made interpretations and opinions of what the Bible actually says to us. Under Protestantism, each individual person is his or her own teaching authority, and we can see today how this approach has fractured Christianity and caused great disunity.

Yes, the Bible is the Truth and the Word of God. Your problem is that every person with their own Bible can preach and teach their own individual interpretation of what the Bible says, and, so, we have scores of different Protestant truths, with many of them in direct contradiction of one another.

Jesus Christ Himself prayed to the Father for Unity within His Church. Perhaps we never had complete unity, but, it is clear that since Protestantism came along, we have GREAT disunity, even to the extent that one side will argue that the other side is not even part of the Body of Christ.

The Roman Catholic approach was and is to have a Teaching Authority to serve as a method to discern what the Holy Spirit is trying to tell us about God's Will. There seems to be good logic in this approach, IMHO. Instead of every single individual being a teaching authority, we have a group of learned clerics with decades of experience to be on the teaching authority "committee".

It's up to everyone to make up their own minds.

Sure, back when it was first suggested, the approach of "Why don't we just let everybody read the Bible and make up their own minds with regard to what it means? We don't need a church or preacher for that", does seem attractive at first. But, did this approach work out well?

It doesn't seem so to me. Luther and Zwingli wanted to hurt each other, their disagreement over what the Bible says was so violent. Calvin was forcibly ejected and exiled from Switzerland, once he got his own version of Christianity instituted as the law of the land.

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Bible Alone is the man-made dogma shared by your Protestant sect and most of the others.

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Believe it or not, but while “Bible alone” is an important part of the Christian faith (otherwise other important biblical doctrines may be cast aside, as Rome does), we don’t teach that it is a gospel issue that puts someone outside the Christian faith if not accepted.

That said, Sola Scriptura is derived from the Scriptures, themselves. We even have a direct parallel to what Rome claims from the Bible. The Pharisees taught the traditions passed down from Moses, God’s prophet, were equally authoritative with God’s word in the Bible, and Jesus condemned them for elevating the traditions of men to the same level or higher than the word of God. (Matthew 15; Mark 7). Jesus tested all things by the Scriptures, not the oral traditions that were passed down from Moses.

Paul affirmed that the Scriptures (a category of divine revelation) are sufficient to make the man of God “complete”, and equipped for “every good work”. (1 Timothy 3)

There is also the problem of historicity with the oral traditions that isn’t a problem for the Scriptures. We have the complete Bible from early on in Christianity and we have documented evidence of it and its teachings going back to the first two centuries. There are supposed oral traditions that are claimed to go back to the Apostles but that do not have historical witness for many centuries after the Apostles, so Christians are being told to believe that those traditions are authentic and apostolic even without evidence that they were.

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The problem here is that when Protestantism started out just over 500 years ago, the men who invented Protestantism thought it would be easy for everybody to read the Bible and interpret it the same way.

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First, Protestantism wasn’t “invented” by Protestants. It was the result of seeking to reform the church and being kicked out by Rome. Even the name Protestant is derived from the protesting of Rome’s unbiblical teachings that led to the persecution and separation of those Protestants.

Second, the Reformers didn’t teach that everything in the Bible was equally clear, but that all that is sufficient for salvation is clear and easy to understand. That is why Protestants are more or less united on justification by grace alone through faith alone in Christ alone, even with all the other differences that may exist.

The Reformers had different beliefs about other doctrines, but what was necessary for the Christian was agreed upon. So your assessment is incorrect.

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As it turned out, the first Protestant denominations from the very beginning were in violent disagreement with regard to how to interpret the Bible. Henry 8th put some fellow Protestants to Death over this issue of how to correctly interpret the Bible.

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It is ironic that you use Henry VIII as the use case for violent differences, since Henry was still largely Catholic in his beliefs and persecuted Protestants for denying Catholic doctrines like transubstantiation. His beef was with the authority of the Pope, and he wasn’t a consistent supporter of sola scriptura. So, in a lot of ways the break of England from Rome was more like the separation of the Eastern Orthodox Church and Rome.

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Now, after over 500 years of Protestantism, we have many, many individual man-made interpretations and opinions of what the Bible actually says to us.

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In a lot of ways, that is still true for Catholicism. The difference is about scope, authority, and visible unity within one ecclesiastical organization. Individual Catholics disagree on many things based on their interpretations of both the Bible and the Magisterium, so that isn’t unique to Protestantism. The bigger issue is the lack of formal organizational unity, but I don’t believe that type of unity is necessary for Christ to still have one Church.

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Under Protestantism, each individual person is his or her own teaching authority, and we can see today how this approach has fractured Christianity and caused great disunity.

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You need to be clear about this: we don’t believe that each individual is authoritative over what the Bible teaches. We believe each individual is allowed to search the scriptures to understand what God authoritatively teaches in His word. That’s a critical distinction because we believe that the Bible is the ultimate authority, not fallible humans.

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Jesus Christ Himself prayed to the Father for Unity within His Church. Perhaps we never had complete unity, but, it is clear that since Protestantism came along, we have GREAT disunity, even to the extent that one side will argue that the other side is not even part of the Body of Christ.

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That formal disunity started long before Luther. The East and West split happened 500 years earlier, and other divisions happened both before and after.

I should also mention that only one side of the Catholic/Protestant divide has formal anathemas against the other still in effect, and it isn’t the Protestants.

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The Roman Catholic approach was and is to have a Teaching Authority to serve as a method to discern what the Holy Spirit is trying to tell us about God's Will. There seems to be good logic in this approach, IMHO. Instead of every single individual being a teaching authority, we have a group of learned clerics with decades of experience to be on the teaching authority "committee".

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If all Rome did was seek to interpret the Bible, you might have a stronger case here. However Rome also defines and demands adherence to non-biblical traditions that can’t be validated by the Scriptures to test whether those things are true. And the authority claimed by Rome is such that there can’t be meaningful reform, because she claims not just higher-quality interpretation, but infallible interpretation and teaching.

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Sure, back when it was first suggested, the approach of "Why don't we just let everybody read the Bible and make up their own minds with regard to what it means? We don't need a church or preacher for that", does seem attractive at first. But, did this approach work out well?

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That isn’t what Protestants teach, at least that isn’t what the Reformers taught.

The freedom to interpret the Bible individually was never taught to be a freedom to make up your own interpretation. It was the freedom to come to the right conclusion without a fallible authority binding man’s consciences to biblical teachings.

And the church and preaching were actually taught to be very important to the understanding of the Bible. They just weren’t seen as infallible.

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It doesn't seem so to me. Luther and Zwingli wanted to hurt each other, their disagreement over what the Bible says was so violent. Calvin was forcibly ejected and exiled from Switzerland, once he got his own version of Christianity instituted as the law of the land.

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You should be careful here. Luther and Zwingli did not have a “violent” disagreement. They both agreed on all but one major point: the real presence of Christ in the Eucharist. Their disagreement was sharp, but not violent.

Regarding Calvin: he was temporarily exiled from Geneva (not all of Switzerland) for a disagreement of the role of the State in the affairs of the Church, particularly in how Calvin’s reforms should be implemented by the city council.

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We believe each individual is allowed to search the scriptures to understand what God authoritatively teaches in His word.

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That's what I said - each individual person is his or her own teaching authority, in your theology. That's how we arrived at the disunity in theology that Jesus prayed would never happen.

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Just today some guy called me out as lying about Eusebius and he quoted from his work and I quoted from the same work proving the guy wrong. Will anyone like that ever admit they are/were wrong? Absolutely not. Every one of these church or religion threads is all pretty much futile. All you religious guys are just pots calling the kettle black.

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Just when I thought I was out… they pull me back in.

First, that quote isn’t from Eusebius of Caesarea, it’s paraphrase from the Muratorian Fragment. So calling me wrong about Eusebius while citing a completely different source doesn’t really hold up.

Second, the passage you quoted doesn’t say what you’re implying. It mentions that some people rejected the Pastoral Epistles as not written by Paul, but it doesn’t name them, and it doesn’t treat that view as authoritative. In fact, the fragment still includes those letters among accepted writings.

And that’s the bigger point: no credible, recognized early Church Father, not Irenaeus, not Tertullian, not Clement of Alexandria, and not even Eusebius of Caesarea, argues that the Pastorals were written by someone other than Paul. The people who did question them aren’t identified and clearly weren’t part of the mainstream tradition that preserved the canon.

So no, I didn’t “refuse to admit I was wrong.” Your quote was misattributed, and even in its proper context, it reflects an unnamed minority opinion, not the position of any respected early Church authority.

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Will anyone like that ever admit they are/were wrong?

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I admit when I'm wrong. This "Apostles Issue" is a good example. My understanding is that Jesus selected The Twelve and then later Paul. If Paul and Luke call Barnabas an "apostle" then I must have missed something - maybe what I missed is an important distinction between The Apostles who directly interacted with and were chosen by Jesus and other "apostles" who were sent to help spread the Gospel, but never directly interacted with or were chosen by Jesus. Does that distinction make sense?

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I think so. I am glad we both accept when we are wrong. CSsamerican pointed out an error in my sources and I am embarrassed I used a bad source but I’ll admit when I’m wrong too.

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That's what I said - each individual person is his or her own teaching authority, in your theology. That's how we arrived at the disunity in theology that Jesus prayed would never happen.

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What you said and what I said are two different things.

You are saying that the individual's interpretation is authoritative, while I'm saying it isn't. The Bible and it's meaning is authoritative, and we are to be conformed to it, not it to be conformed to us. That's a big difference, and you seem to think we believe something that we don't.

The freedom to interpret the Bible ourselves does not mean we have the freedom to interpret the Bible wrongly. We have an obligation to search the Scriptures and seek to understand it according to what it says about itself. It's why the typical hermeneutic for interpreting the Bible is to interpret the Bible by itself, interpreting the harder passages by the easier, and the less clear passages by the more clear.

So again, we do not believe the individual is the authority, but the Bible is the authority. We are supposed to conform our thinking to God's, and reform our theology according to the Bible, not interpret the Bible according to what man says. That's what Rome does.