Archive for category: Roman Catholicism

I sometimes feel sorry for ancient artists. Their work gets plastered all across the covers of modern books, but they never get a dime for their efforts. It’s a shame. That odd observation aside, I picked up a copy of Dave Armstrong’s The Catholic Verses: 95 Bible Passages That Confound Protestants (Sophia Institute Press, 2004, 235 pp.), which sports said

And Dave Armstrong pops up again and throws me into the mix of people who turn off the comments sections of their blogs to hide from refutation. Uh, earth to DA…news flash, buddy…I haven’t graduated to RSS capable blogging. This is a plain ol’ html file, nothing more. Someday I may get a real blog, but for the moment, this

In God’s providence I was on the same shuttle bus that picked up Doug Wilson at the airport today, and as we were riding to the hotel he said, “I’ve only been in this blue state for ten minutes, and I already feel icky.” Yes indeed, I know the feeling. But you can look at it in a positive way:

It seems the Roman Catholics gang-called the Bible Answer Man show when Paul Maier was on regarding Luther. Around the 42 minute mark a fellow who sounds vaguely familiar to me who identified himself as a Roman Catholic, Mike from Covina, calls in with a clearly pre-written question presenting an argument against eternal security. He places it in the context

Dave:  Regarding your suggestion that you and I spend an hour on the DL “chatting” and getting to know each other: I don’t believe that would be a proper investment of an hour of our webcast. While at times we do less than serious things for portions of the show, I don’t think “getting to know your local Roman Catholic

I recently read a blog commentary by a Presbyterian, and the resultant comments, regarding my response to Doug Wilson’s “What is a Christian” blog entry. I’m very glad the thesis is “Are Roman Catholics our brothers and sisters in Christ?” so that we do not simply dicker over using the term “Christian” in a way that is biblically meaningful or

I wondered when those not involved in the issue would chime in, and I didn’t have long to wait. But in what is probably one of the saddest comments I’ve read in a while we read from Kevin Johnson: Imputation, the merit of Christ’s active obedience, and forensic justification–one wonders why they are so important for Reformed people to adhere

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Presbyterian scholar and professor at Montreat College Paul Owen continues bearing false witness in his public writings. After writing to Roman Catholic apologist Dave Armstrong that he would indeed be able to worship alongside a Roman Catholic “much more easily than with James White or David King” (Owen has said before he would rather see someone in a Catholic Church

Try to read past the acidic tone (a commonality of rC’s these days); step back, listen, consider, and come to understand the capacity of the modern scholar to turn the most obvious statements on their head. But remember, through it all, I’m just a dumb Baptist, and it is probably my fault, too. 🙂 Prepare to enter the theological spin

The question which is raised in sacerdotalism, in a word, is just whether it is God the Lord who saves us, or it is men, acting in the name and clothed with the powers of God, to whom we are to look for salvation. This is the issue which divides sacerdotalism and evangelical religion. (B.B. Warfield, The Plan of Salvation,

Presbyterian Scholar of Today:  In other words, I believe Roman Catholics and Protestants both agree that the sole OBJECT of faith is Christ. Anyone who believes in someone or something OTHER than Christ for justification does not have genuine faith. Faith is a whole-hearted commitment of oneself to, and trust in the person of Christ. The Roman Catholic who trusts

Someone came in channel last night and gave me the URL to a brief article by Jimmy Akin where, finally, after many years, he addresses the error he made in attempting to explain away John 6:37-44 in our debate. I had noted this, yet again, in my blog entries for 5/1 and 5/2/04. Here it is. I quote the most

In the comments section on l0g0s’ blog a number of folks (including Roman Catholic apologist Dave Armstrong) have taken him to task for asserting the citations offered above are “out of context.” l0g0s has been utterly unable to back up his claims outside of saying Bahnsen and I would not have agreed on other subjects, a glowing canard to anyone

Within a few hours after posting these words from Greg Bahnsen, l0g0s came unglued on his blog. How dare I quote Bahnsen’s own words directly on the subject of the Roman Catholic Church, and those who would prefer “a spirit of detente rather than antithesis”! How dare I post his own voice taking the opposite position of the rC’s, or

I was rummaging through some old—and I do mean OLD—files yesterday looking for a letter, when I ran across some old Penpoints. Penpoint was the monthly update from Dr. Greg Bahnsen of the SCCCS (Southern California Center for Christian Studies). My eyes happened to fall upon the issue from just over a decade ago, June, 1994, which carried the title,

Lessons learned this AM:  Respond to one rC, and another will say you are misrepresenting him. Lesson: rC’s are allowed to differ, but you aren’t allowed to criticize. rC’s can go ballistic and lose all balance on rC blogs, without rebuke (at least, public rebuke).  If you say, “This position trumps soteriology with sacramentalism” rC’s will say, “No, you are

Don’t blame me. I didn’t write it.

If you are one of those who thought that the self-glorifying work of the Trinity, the Father, Son, and Spirit, in redeeming a people to the praise of His glorious grace through the gospel, was part of the truth of God that He has promised to safe-guard to His people throughout the pilgrimage of the church on earth, you have

I was forwarded a commentary from T.A. McMahon (Dave Hunt’s co-laborer) in which he wrote,  Mary has played a key role in the conversion to Catholicism of some of that Church’s leading apologists such as former Reformed theologian Tim Staples and Scott Hahn, a graduate of the evangelical Gordon-Conwell Seminary and former Presbyterian minister.  Just a correction for brother McMahon:

Upon reading l0g0s’ denial that the gospel itself is included in the truth vouchsafed to the Church and protected by the Spirit on his blog, my comments on today’s DL, and the blog entry below, I knew an in-depth response would be forthcoming. Well, here it is:  Listen to the latest Dividing Line by James White of Alpha and Omega

For some reason l0g0s hopped back on the “rip and shred on Reformed folks” bandwagon today (I haven’t the foggiest what prompted it this time—perhaps the fractal below looks too…Calvinistic or something? Maybe it is “promote your local Anglican Day”?). In any case, he launched off:  The reason I ask is because C.S. Lewis–that master writer and theologian among the

Here is a glowing example of “common sense reading of the language” trumps “I’m a scholar and I decree it to be so” on the topic of sola gratia. If you can read Warfield’s full presentation and say, “Oh, yeah, he was surely affirming that Rome believes in sola gratia” then once again we prove that for some

I have suggested often over the past nearly decade and a half that whenever you hear a starry-eyed Protestant talking about Rome’s high view of grace, that the single best means of bringing them back down to earth and reality (if they are open to truth, anyway) is to get them to read Indulgentiarum Doctrina, the Apostolic Constitution on the

Pro-Abortion Catholics Seek Mary’s Intercession

David King provided the following citation this evening:  If those who profess to return to the right way feel hurt by these requirements, they are greatly mistaken. For it is impossible to accept them as Christian pastors if they have not renounced the papal priesthood in which they were ordained to sacrifice Jesus Christ, which is a blasphemy worthy of

This interaction is simply one of the clearest the “blog wars” has produced on the vast difference between rCism and a vision based upon biblical teaching concerning the centrality of the gospel. A must read. Update: In responding to a Roman Catholic correspondent, Mr. Johnson wrote, “The only thing I would say in response to your comment is that hopefully

For those who have never been in the midst of a debate on what Augustine meant in Sermon 131, those words may not be familiar. But they were suggested by the PlaidMan, and I thought they fit very well. As Alexander continues his crazed rampage, the picture he paints of me becomes ever more distorted, so that all who actually

For years I’ve heard about him. Tan Book Publishers (super conservative Roman Catholic publisher) still prints his book, The Catholic Controversy (Bethany House named my book, hence, no, there is no connection), a series of tracts he wrote that are specifically aimed at converting Calvinists to Roman Catholicism. Many a modern Roman Catholic has referred me to de Sales’ work

In the realm of the theological blogosphere today the conjunction of the great luminaries of reformed Catholicism collided in what observers called a “near black hole incident” wherein TGE and Alexander the Coppersmith piled laud and congratulations upon l0g0s for his stunning ability to take a comment about my consistency in holding to one particular view, ignore that context, and

This audio from a Q&A session was sent to me recently, and it is quite interesting to hear Bahnsen defend the Southern Presbyterian view, and specifically to defend the concept of offering baptism to a person who has come to Christ out of Roman Catholicism, for Rome, Bahnsen well knew, is not a true church. I wonder if the “reformed