It seems to me that one of the worst things that could happen to you as a Christian, other than losing your soul, would be to have throngs of people following you who identify themselves with your name (Calvin-ist, Luther-an, Barth-ian, etc. Okay, I made up N.T. Wright-ian, but I won’t be surprised if it happens soon after he dies).
The passage in the Bible from 1 Corinthians 1 is pretty relevant:
- For it has been reported to me about you, my brothers, by Chloe’s people, that there are rivalries among you. I mean that each of you is saying, “I belong to Paul,” or “I belong to Apollos,” or “I belong to Cephas,”…Is Christ divided? Was Paul crucified for you? Or were you baptized in the name of Paul?
Were you baptized into John Calvin? Was Martin Luther crucified for you?
Karl Barth
Now of course, I know that Lutherans and Calvinists don’t intend to say that they follow Calvin instead of Christ, but rather they follow Christ as he is understood in a primary way through the teachings of Luther or Calvin, in order to differentiate themselves from Anabaptists, Methodists, Catholics, and so on.
But isn’t Paul’s whole point that there shouldn’t be such divisions (schisms) where one group follows this man and another group follows that man? Christ is not divided, and He prayed that we would not be. So it seems we can deduce that schisms are wrong and that Christ desires that we be “perfectly one” just as He and the Father are perfectly one.
So what are we doing about it? Some friends of mine have attempted to counter my efforts to work toward unity by declaring that “they see no problems in what they believe and are fine letting me believe whatever it is that I believe,” so why make such a fuss? Quite simply, because Christ desires it, as He made clear in the sacred Scriptures. If Christ (and Christ through St. Paul) said “yeah go ahead and break into schisms and follow this one or that one–it’s all good,” then I wouldn’t care about Christian unity. But instead, Christ and St. Paul say the exact opposite: Christians are called to full communion with the Church that Christ established.
I would also answer my friends that, if they do not see a problem with the divisions within Christianity, they should pray and ask our Lord to show them whether it is a problem or not. It is easy for us to get used to “the way things are” and develop blind spots in our moral and spiritual life (think of pornography, objectionable movies/music, foul language, and so on as blatant examples), and we need to be “convicted” by God that these are problems, to borrow language from my Baptist days.
John Calvin requested to be buried in an unmarked grave so that he would not be venerated and have “Calvinists” make pilgrimages to his tomb. It is somewhat ironic given his iconoclasm and aversion to veneration of the saints that he would fear that his followers would do exactly those things toward him, but there it is. Unfortunately, he was unable to prevent millions of Christians from naming themselves Calvinist Christians in his honor.
How is this avoided? After all, Christ works through human beings, and it is natural to want to follow someone who seems to preach Christ powerfully. I would say, it can only be avoided when a person bases their teaching, not on their own authority or biblical interpretation, but on the authority given to the Church that Christ established. Because, instead of them declaring themselves to be a minister and proclaiming their interpretation of the Bible, they are ordained by the successors of the Apostles, whom Christ Himself ordained. And they base their teachings off of those of the Church which Christ has protected from error.
In a first for me, just the other day I had a Pentecostal friend defend disunity to me. I was told that a fractured Christianity was better than a united Christianity because unity begets secular power which begets abuse of power. What he was really saying (because I know him well enough) is that unity begets Catholicism, and that would be bad. The usual protestant response to the unity question, in my experience, is that we are united….we are united in Christ, and a couple two or three other things.
The hidden premise here is some definition of what counts as the relevant sort of unity. After all, you would not say that Roman Catholics are “perfectly” unified in every way (there are still plenty of disagreements), but you would say they have the relevant sort of unity. Okay, tell us what you think the relevant sort of unity is and why you think that.
Unity: Visible unity, three-fold: same faith, same government, same sacraments.
Bryan Cross recently made an excellent comment in this regard here: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/08/bank-accounts-and-justification/#comment-11094
Cross’ comments includes Scripture passages supporting a visible (and not just invisible) unity that is three-fold.
Note that, for instance, the Orthodox have almost the same faith, do not have the same government, and have the same sacraments. That is why were are closer to unity with them then, say, Anglicans.
Okay, now why are those the relevant criteria? (I’ll ignore Mr. Cross’s post because it’s really only a series of assertions, with no argument at all for most of them, and I couldn’t tell which sentences you thought were apt to this discussion).
“Same faith” makes sense to me, because the only source of true faith is the Holy Spirit (and thus faith is, by definition, always the same faith). In virtue of what are the other two criteria not examples of either special pleading or arbitrariness? The most obvious scripture here is Ephesians 4. There “unity” comes from the bond of peace in one Spirit. Overall, the chapter seems to communicate that unity is in faith, hope, knowledge, and love. The only sacrament mentioned is baptism.
There seems to be a lot of weight in your post on the word “visible.” But I don’t know what you mean by visible. Since “church” means the collection of those who are called (i.e. all Christians), it’s of course visible because we’re visible.
The Called to Communion guys wrote a long article arguing that Christ established a visible Church, and not just “visible” because human beings are visible. No Protestant made much of an effort to rebut their arguments. Perhaps you would like to try.
It’s important to try to understand what the [very visible, unified] Church meant when she said that she is one, holy, catholic, and apostolic. Sure, you can interpret those words to mean something of your own devising, but what did she mean by them? She is able to make claims about herself, and her understanding of herself has grown over the centuries by the Holy Spirit’s guidance.
So, you don’t think they’re really relevant. Well, that’s Kevin’s opinion, which if you add 50 cents buys you a coffee at McDonalds. You say that “the same faith” makes sense because the faith is from the Spirit, but every kind of Christian thinks that they follow the Spirit and know “the faith” yet they contradict each other on one teaching after another. So it is not so simple to say that the faith is from the Spirit. Sure, but what, exactly, comprises the faith? What are the essentials? And who has the authority to decide?
The Church for centuries convened binding councils, declared things orthodox or heterodox, excommunicated people, and so on. Under your invisible Church regime, none of that makes sense (nor do the Biblical passages that talk about the Church being able to do those things). “We’re all unified,” just so long as you ignore all the fundamental ways we are disunified. Don’t like your church? Go to one down the street!
Gotta run to get dinner. Getting tough on you. Thanks for the discussion.
The reply, though interesting in its own right, was almost entirely orthogonal to my questions. So let me start by repeating the previous question: in virtue of what are the criteria for unity which you picked not either arbitrary or special pleading?
As to what you did say, I don’t think people who use “church” the way you do understand what the word means. You begged the question about what the Church is (and then doubled the bet by personifying “her” – “she” can’t actually speak, make claims for herself, or understand herself of course, since “she” isn’t a person) in order to move on to a bit of chest-thumping about the claims of the Roman Catholic curia. Fine. I love that my RC friends are so proud of their tradition. There’s lots to be proud of (and also lots to be embarrassed by, of course). But you’ll have to do better than that to be persuasive and compelling. A good start would be directly addressing the rather reasonable questions I posed earlier and restated above.
Kevin,
Based on your understanding of “the Church”, why isn’t the Nicene Creed’s phrase that “we believe in one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church” not arbitrary?
I didn’t directly answer your question because it won’t get us anywhere. I can try to make arguments and support them with biblical passages for why three-fold unity is important, and you can call them assertions or prop up your own interpretation of those passages to say that they mean something else, but where will it get us.
Instead, I think it would be helpful to know what you think unity is comprised of? I’ve told you how the Catholic Church understands it. What is the principled reason for distinguishing between schisms from the Church and valid branchings within the Church? These questions get to the heart of our difference.
You don’t think the Church can make claims about herself or speak, etc. I disagree and could offer counter-arguments, but don’t want to ask too many questions in one comment.
It is always your prerogative to pull back from an argument, but let’s be clear about what’s happening. You made a claim about unity; I asked you to justify that claim; you’re refusing. That’s fine, but you can understand, can’t you, why apologetical appeals to Christian unity from Roman Catholics will fall flat with me (and many other thoughtful Prots) until someone explains and justifies what the relevant sort of unity is? This is a really important issue, both in itself and because it’s always a central feature of Prot-Cath discussions; my request here seems to me entirely reasonable.
Instead, you want to turn the tables and interrogate my understanding of unity. Assume for the moment, because it happens to be true, that I don’t have a settled view, that I’m inquiring after what others think to try to figure this question out. Now, if you still think it’s useless for you to justify your claim, then I guess we’ll have to move on.
Kevin,
I only have so much time. I used to have more, but now I have less, so in discussions I try to get to the heart of the matter quickly. I apologize that this has seemed to you to be dodging your questions.
Here is where I am coming from. For us to understand what Christ’s call for unity means, we must first resolve our differences and come to agreement on what, exactly, is the Church. Is it a purely invisible, spiritual entity that is only visible in the sense that human beings are visible? That’s what Protestants believe.
“By contrast, the Catholic Church for 2,000 years has believed and taught that the incarnate Christ founded a visible, hierarchically organized Body. In the Catholic paradigm, faith in Christ is not sufficient by itself to make a person a member of this Body; a believer is incorporated into this Body by valid baptism, but is removed from this Body either by heresy, apostasy, schism, or excommunication.”
So we have a fundamental difference over what the Church is, and any discussion about the unity of Christ’s Church will not get us anywhere until we understand correctly what the Church is. That is why it will do us no good to try to resolve our differences at the level of ecclesial unity before we resolve a more fundamental difference of ecclesiology.
This isn’t a dodge. It’s instead tackling first things first and second things second. If you want to engage in a discussion, I’m all for it. Let’s start at the Called to Communion article that argues Christ established a visible Church. You can read the article and try to refute its arguments. I will happily meet you over there and respond to your arguments. Some of the Called to Communion guys who wrote the article will also respond, too, most likely. Great! We can have a discussion. And once we have resolved that basic issue, we can move to understand our differences over what unity means and by God’s grace resolve it.
Here is the article: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/06/christ-founded-a-visible-church/
Are you willing to engage in this more fundamental issue? If so, great! If not, then that’s okay, but we won’t get anywhere on the higher issue of unity.
I don’t think your description of our problematic is accurate. I still think your replies (including the last) are tantamount dodging the question. After all, even after I’ve asked for it, you haven’t said why we couldn’t say, “whatever the precise and accurate definition of the Church turns out to be, the reasons I say what I do about what unity with it would be are…”. I do not understand what prevents your saying that. You could at least connect the dots here.
Second, your description of the RC position, as I understand it, is question-begging and inaccurate. Question-begging because it is, after all, precisely my claim that you are not using the word “ecclesia” as it was understood in the first century. When you say “church” you mean something other than the collection of those who are called – but that’s just what the word meant when it was used in the NT. Inaccurate because you do not acknowledge salvation through implicit faith, baptism by lay people in extraordinary circumstances, and baptism of the heart in even more extraordinary circumstances (all of which, I’m told, are teachings of the Roman curia).
Thus, what I am willing to do is proceed step-wise, beginning with this argument here and now. This argument is, however, already getting close to where it seems ALL apologetical arguments eventually end up, the authority question. If that’s the case, i.e. if you’re just going to end up recurring to the infallible magisterial authority in every argument including this one, I don’t know why we bother with anything else. And since I understand but do not believe the authority argument, it would mean we shouldn’t bother with any arguments at all.
Kevin,
I have told you I am not dodging your question but getting to a more fundamental one. It makes no sense to talk about (visible and/or invisible) unity, which includes a correct understanding of the Church’s “visibility”, before we talk about whether the Church is visible or invisible. That said, I don’t mind responding to whatever area you want to play on.
I have a Presbyterian friend. I asked him why he accepted the 66 book canon. He didn’t know. I said go figure it out. He came back after a long time with a book he found by an old Reformed theologian and read me that man’s argument. I rebutted it immediately (it was actually the existence of the Orthodox Churches and their canon which rebutted his argument). He ignored my rebuttal, said he was “at peace” with the answer he read, and refused to talk more about the canon. Instead, he would only read and discuss Scripture, and specifically the book of Romans, with me. He had not established how he had conscience-binding certainty that Romans even belonged in the Bible. But he refused to talk about the more fundamental issue because he had no answer. I said fine and have met him on his own ground, and we are reading Romans. It’s the same kind of thing here.
Inaccurate because you do not acknowledge salvation through implicit faith, baptism by lay people in extraordinary circumstances, and baptism of the heart in even more extraordinary circumstances (all of which, I’m told, are teachings of the Roman curia).
Where has this even come up in our discussion? Certainly the Church teaches that lay people can baptize; as a matter of fact, the Church teaches that even unbaptized persons can baptize. These are not teachings of “the Roman curia” but “the Catholic Church.” So what?
“Salvation through implicit faith?” Do you mean that the African bushman who has never heard of Jesus can still be saved? Sure I believe that and the Church teaches it. (He is of course, still saved by Jesus and through the Church, but he doesn’t explicitly have to know that.) So what?
Alright, I’ll pick up where I think you want to start, that is, with my answer to what unity means. Well, I’ll ignore the fact that I said it was first a visible unity, since you’ve refused to tackle that more basic issue of visibility, and move on to the next one:
I wrote “Unity: Visible unity, three-fold: same faith, same government, same sacraments.”
You think that the same faith makes sense. Alright that’s great, I’ll skip that one then for now but only point out in passing that you and I don’t have the same faith. We differ on many doctrines of the faith. (For more on this, which should be up your alley, read about St. Thomas Aquinas’ definition of unity, with some commentary, and ask yourself whether you and I share the unity he talks about: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/01/st-thomas-aquinas-on-the-unity-of-the-church/).
So I’ll start with unity requiring the same government. I mean, Aquinas spells this out more clearly and powerfully than I could, and I believe that you just finished reading the entire Summa, so I wonder that you don’t understand why this is “relevant”?
I’ll just go with some common sense reasoning: Your church is the Anglican Church. The titular head is the Archbishop of Canterbury, though of course his authority is not the same kind that the Pope exercises in the Catholic Church. In any event, the Anglican Communion has its bishops, the first of whom were Catholic bishops who went into schism from the Catholic Church, and these bishops lead the Anglican Communion. They form your Church’s government, and that government is completely separate from my Church’s government. They each make decisions independently of each other and generally don’t give a hoot what the other thinks about such and such doctrine or moral issue. Surprise surprise: our Churches teach many things that contradict the other.
So to declare that we are “in unity” in spite of these completely separate governments is at best wishy-washy and at worse just plain false (sophism).
I could say much more but don’t have more time than that. Rebut my arguments if you are able.
P.S. This Anglican priest just announced to his parish he is entering full communion with the Catholic Church: http://onetimothyfour.blogspot.com/2010/09/becoming-catholic-statement-made-to.html
A bit of ground-clearing:
“It’s the same kind of thing here.”
It’s not really like that at all. It’s more like this: Person A makes a claim about raising taxes. Person B asks questions about what grounds Person A’s claim, and then Person A says, “I can’t answer that because we haven’t discussed whether the executive should be unitary or dual, and that’s a more fundamental question.” It is more fundamental, that’s true, but it is not necessary to settle it in order to discuss the other issue – in no small part because I wasn’t (yet) asking why I should believe what you do, but what the ground is for what you already believe. Thus we don’t need to settle the more fundamental question in order for you to address this one.
“These are not teachings of ‘the Roman curia’ but ‘the Catholic Church.’”
We can pass over this pro tempore, but I was trying to find a term we could agree on (i.e. one which wouldn’t beg the question). Since it’s just a fact that it’s the teaching of the Roman curia (contrary to what you say there), I thought you might find that term congenial. Why you object to it, I do not understand.
The answer to the “So what?” questions is that in either case it is not clear to me that those baptized in extraordinary circumstances are in unity (as you see it) with Rome. If they are part of the Church (specifically the Church Expectant or Church Triumphant), as you agree is possible, then what form of unity with Rome does the Bushman have?
“since you’ve refused to tackle that more basic issue of visibility”
I’m not refusing to tackle it forever, but I would rather settle the first argument first, since it’s where you started and what I asked about. As evidence for that, I did offer that I think you do not understand the meaning and etymology of the word “church” which is why you use it in the way you do. So we can definitely come back to that.
On to the most interesting bits:
1. I find it disturbing that you don’t think we have the same faith. Prots are often a bit skeptical because our RC friends seem to say different things at different times: suggesting at some times that we are brothers in Christ and at others that we’re not. Surely you do understand that to say we do not share a faith, and assuming you would claim your faith is in Christ, the deductive entailment of your statement is that you do not think Prots are Christians. What have I misunderstood here?
2. On the government bit, not so fast. I’m a citizen of Texas. I don’t share the same immediate government with those who are citizens of Arkansas. But we share a more fundamental governmental system under the U.S. and, because of that, I am unified with them in a very important way. Mutatis mutandis, the Anglican Communion and Roman Catholics are, I believe, both under the headship of Christ and thus unified in the most important way. But you don’t think so; what a shame.
Kevin,
I am going to avoid discussing any tangential topics (like “Roman Curia” vs. “Catholic Church”) so you won’t be tempted to try to comment further on them.
Regarding the unity of baptized persons outside full communion with the Catholic Church:
“What does the Catholic Church believe and teach about the state of persons who are baptized but not in full communion with the Catholic Church? There are two not entirely uncommon misunderstandings of the Catholic Church’s teaching on this question. One is that such persons are entirely separated from the Body of Christ and from Christ. The other is that such persons are perfectly joined to the Body of Christ and to Christ.”
Read this article for clearing up the misconceptions (an either-or false dichotomy): http://principiumunitatis.blogspot.com/2008/10/baptism-schism-full-communion-salvation.html
I find it disturbing that you don’t think we have the same faith. Prots are often a bit skeptical because our RC friends seem to say different things at different times: suggesting at some times that we are brothers in Christ and at others that we’re not.
Don’t be disturbed. Again it’s not an either-or. In one sense of the word “faith”, yes we do share the same Christian, Trinitarian faith, including the important sacrament of Baptism. In another sense of the word “faith”, since we do not fully share the same faith but have many differences even on important doctrines, we do not share the same faith.
The Catholic Church teaches that you are a brother in Christ, a separated brother who has a certain real, yet imperfect, communion with the Church. So I happily call you my brother in Christ yet desire, as I believe Christ does, that you enter into full communion with the Church He established, which subsists in the Catholic Church.
Mutatis mutandis, the Anglican Communion and Roman Catholics are, I believe, both under the headship of Christ and thus unified in the most important way. But you don’t think so; what a shame.
I saw this coming. It is the result of your purely invisible ecclesiology (that bit that we haven’t yet delved into).
Are we both under, in some sense, the headship of Christ? Yes we are. The Church is Christ’s Mystical Body, and He is the head. I am in full communion with the Church. You are not. You are in an imperfect communion with her. I don’t say this to be a jerk but to tell you clearly what the Catholic Church teaches.
So it is not a shame, at least the way you are dramatizing it. It is a shame that we aren’t in full communion, but we are in some kind of communion, albeit an imperfect one, and that is much better than being in no communion at all.
Here’s another way to frame both of the issues you responded to: the Mormons claim that Christ is their Lord, too. So do Jehovah’s Witnesses and a hundred other groups you may or may not consider “Christians”. So does the Southern Baptist Convention, the ELCA, the ACNA, all the Presbyterian denominations, the restorationist denominations, the Pentecostals, and on and on, groups you probably consider Christians.
Are the Mormons under Christ’s headship and therefore, under your definition of unity, “unified in the most important way.” Why not?
What about Jehovah’s Witnesses? Oneness Pentecostals?
They might very well think that it’s “a shame” if you were to say that they don’t have the same faith, when they claim to profess Christ as Lord just like you.
The Catholic Church’s teachings on the kind of communion that baptized persons outside of full communion have with her is both coherent and reasonable. It isn’t an either-or as you seem to have feared but a correct and precise formulation that doesn’t white-wash our differences yet also admits the grace of God working outside of the visible confines of the Church (for instance, in the Anglican Ecclesial Community).
God bless,
Devin
It seems all RC apologists think the reason why those of us who are not RC don’t immediately run to the confessional and altar is that we have misconceptions or misunderstandings about what Roman Catholicism teaches. I’m sure I have some, but I assure you I have read the Catechism and understand what the teaching is on implicit faith (remember, I drew your attention to that) and other pretty basic issues (though I might have misconceptions on some of the small stuff). But your quoted statement didn’t address, at all, my question about what the communion is between those folks and Rome. I don’t see Rome governing them (since they don’t know about Rome). So how, on your criteria, which require that they have the same government AND that the government be Roman, can they be counted as in The Church?
Speaking of faith, tell me what you think faith is. As I understand it, the form is the light of the Holy Spirit and the matter is propositional content proposed for belief. I.e. faith is the evidentness to the mind of things not seen; it is not opinion because it is certain, and certain because its form is from the Holy Spirit, but it is not yet knowledge. If you agree with that, then I want to know how it wouldn’t be an either/or sort of thing – either the formal light of the Holy Spirit shines on the propositional content, or it doesn’t. A fortiori, someone can have the light shined on more propositions than someone else, but there cannot be, in the strictest sense, multiple faiths. There is faith, and there are mistakes. It looks like to me that what you want to say is that we do share the same faith, but that I am mistaken about some things that you would argue you know by faith. But I don’t think you want to say that ours is not the same faith (since the formal action is from the exact same source and is the exact same thing).
But now, returning to the original question, the discussion is undermining your claims about the criteria for unity because, in addition to our shared faith, you also agreed that people who have no conscious connection with Rome whatsoever are considered fully members of the Church universal through implicit faith. Other than that, you do not so much justify your claims as continue to re-assert them in different words, e.g. when you just assert that I am not in full communion with Christ’s church. Yet another instance of begging the question. I am quite happy to discuss these issues, and even to go back and forth in a spirited and vigorous debate, but it is frustrating to have the position just re-asserted over and over without argument. Perhaps most of your interlocutors are unaware of the RC position and so you ordinarily find that helpful. I am not unaware. I understand the positions but do not find them compelling… what I continue to ask for is a decisive argument for why I should believe what you keep asserting.
To reiterate, once more for clarity, can you offer compelling arguments for the criteria you proposed for what constitutes unity in the relevant sense?
Kevin,
We seem, as has happened before in our discussions, to be talking past each other or misunderstanding each other. I just don’t have the energy for it right now.
You wrote But your quoted statement didn’t address, at all, my question about what the communion is between those folks and Rome.
I linked to an entire article that meticulously explained how the Catholic Church understands “what the communion is between those folks” and the Church. Did you read the article (at all? all of it? some of it? college-skimmed it?)? Your statement indicates that you either ignored the article link entirely or didn’t read it.
About faith, I wrote a blog post a month or so ago about it and linked to an article. But even if I had not, you can go read the Catechism of the Roman Curia (oops, I mean the Catechism of the Catholic Church) and find out what I believe. You indicated that you knew a ton about the Catholic Faith–great!–well then you know where to find what we believe.
You ignored the last half of my response. It seems like in our discussions you never want to answer any questions but just table-pound that I am (or the Catholic Church is) “asserting” things, which you don’t find “compelling.” Keep praying. Keep studying. The propositions of the Faith cannot be proven through reason, but reason can support the assent of faith.
I wrote an article a few months back that was published on Called to Communion. You should read it and read the comments especially from Dr. Michael Liccione. Here is an excerpt:
Second, “the Catholic apologist” is not obliged to “demonstrate” some sort of “necessity” for the Magisterium’s claims for itself. To demonstrate the necessity of a given proposition is to prove it, i.e. to show that it follows deductively from uncontroversial premises. But that is not possible to do for any article of faith; for if it were possible, then the articles of faith would be theorems of reason, not of faith. Therefore, it’s not possible to prove either the inspiration of Scripture or the teaching authority of the Church. So “the Catholic apologist” is obliged only to show that the Magisterium’s claims for itself are reasonable, not proven. And that’s what I, along with the owners of this blog, have sought to do.
and
If one leaves the issue at the scholarly level, one can only arrive at opinions. In light of the historical evidence available at any given time, some opinions are more defensible than others. But I’m not in the least interested in the question which opinions are more defensible in such a way. For in the very nature of the case, no such opinion can command the assent of faith; and when we’re seeking to identify divine revelation, as distinct from opinions, only propositions commanding the assent of faith will do. Yet opinions remain opinions, subject to revision or even reversal in light of further evidence and better arguments.
The Protestant principle ultimately reduces divine revelation to a matter of opinion. I don’t expect you to accept that, but read the article and comments and try to understand why this is the case. http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2010/07/faith-reason-context-conversion/
I am done corresponding with you on this post. Have the last word if you desire. I am willing to try again on another post, but only if you actually are willing to begin answering questions and meeting on ground that will actually get us somewhere.
Finally, since I don’t think you read it, please go and read the article that argues that Christ established a visible Church. If you are disappointed that I won’t discuss things further with you on this thread, go read that article and try to rebut the arguments: I can almost guarantee that you will get a discussion over there. http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2009/06/christ-founded-a-visible-church/
God bless you and may Christ unite us in the fullness of the truth.
I suppose you’re probably right: if you’re too busy to get to the meat of an issue, or else can only tell me to read the Catechism or Called To Communion, then these exercises are not worth your time. Or mine.
To correct misapprehensions on your part, I did not ignore the latter half of your reply, and I don’t think it’s a fair characterization of anything I said to call it “table-pound[ing].” That tone, pedantic if we must hang a word on it, is most unhelpful and a bit graceless.
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