One Hundred Fifty Reasons Im Catholic And You Should Be Too! by Dave Armstrong 1.Best One-Sentence Summary: I am convinced that the Catholic Church conforms much more closely to all of thebiblical data, offers the only coherent view of thehistory of Christianity(i.e., Christian, apostolic Tradition), and possesses the most profound and sublime Christian morality, spirituality, social ethic, and philosophy. 2.Alternate: I am a Catholic because I sincerely believe, by virtue of much cumulative evidence, that Catholicism istrue, and that the Catholic Church is the visible Church divinely-established by our Lord Jesus, against which the gates of hell cannot and will not prevail ( Mt 16:18), thereby possessing anauthorityto which I feel bound in Christian duty to submit. 3.2nd Alternate: I left Protestantism because it was seriously deficient in its interpretation of the Bible (e.g., faith alone and many other Catholic doctrines - see evidences below), inconsistently selective in its espousal of various Catholic Traditions (e.g., the Canon of the Bible), inadequate in its ecclesiology, lacking a sensible view of Christian history (e.g., Scripture alone), compromised morally (e.g., contraception, divorce), and unbiblically schismatic, anarchical, and relativistic. I dont therefore believe that Protestantism is all bad (not by a long shot), but these are some of the major deficiencies I eventually saw as fatal to the theory of Protestantism, over against Catholicism. All Catholics must regard baptized, Nicene, Chalcedonian Protestants as Christians. 4. Catholicism isnt formallydivided and sectarian( Jn 17:20-23; Rom 16:17; 1 Cor 1:10-13). 5. Catholicunitymakes Christianity and Jesus more believable to the world ( Jn 17:23). 6. Catholicism, because of its unified, complete, fully supernatural Christian vision, mitigates againstsecularization and humanism. 7. Catholicism avoids an unbiblicalindividualismwhich undermines Christian community (e.g., 1 Cor 12:25-26). 8. Catholicism avoidstheologicalrelativism, by means of dogmatic certainty and the centrality of the papacy. 9. Catholicism avoidsecclesiological anarchism- one cannot merely jump to another denomination when some disciplinary measure or censure is called for. 10. Catholicism formally (although, sadly, not always in practice) prevents the theologicalrelativismwhich leads to the uncertainties within the Protestant system among laypeople. 11. Catholicism rejects theState Church,which has led to governments dominating Christianity rather than vice-versa. 12. Protestant State Churches greatly influenced the rise ofnationalism, which mitigated against universal equality and Christian universalism (i.e., Catholicism). 13. Unified Catholic Christendom (before the 16th century) had not been plagued by the tragicreligious warswhich in turn led to the Enlightenment, in which men rejected the hypocrisy of inter-Christian warfare and decided to become indifferent to religion rather than letting it guide their lives. 14. Catholicism retains the elements ofmystery, supernatural, and thesacredin Christianity, thus opposing itself tosecularization, where the sphere of the religious in life becomes greatly limited. 15. Protestant individualism led to theprivatizationof Christianity, whereby it is little respected in societal and political life, leaving the public square barren of Christian influence. 16. The secular false dichotomy ofchurch vs. worldhas led committed orthodox Christians, by and large, to withdraw from politics, leaving a void filled by pagans, cynics, unscrupulous, and power-hungry. Catholicism offers a framework in which to approach the state and civic responsibility. 17. Protestantism leans too much on meretraditions of men(every denomination stems from one Founders vision. As soon as two or more of these contradict each other, error is necessarily present). 18. Protestant churches (esp. evangelicals), are far too often guilty of putting their pastors on too high of a pedestal. In effect,every pastor becomes a pope,to varying degrees (some are super-popes). Because of this, evangelical congregations often experience a severe crisis and/or split up when a pastor leaves, thus proving that their philosophy is overly man-centered, rather than God-centered. 19. Protestantism, due to lack of real authority and dogmatic structure, is tragically prone to accommodation to thespirit of the age, andmoral faddism. 20. Catholicism retainsapostolic succession, necessary to know what is true Christian apostolic Tradition. It was the criterion of Christian truth used by the early Christians. 21. Many Protestants take a dim view towardsChristian historyin general, esp. the years from 313 (Constantines conversion) to 1517 (Luthers arrival). This ignorance and hostility to Catholic Tradition leads to theological relativism, anti-Catholicism, and a constant, unnecessary process of reinventing the wheel. 22. Protestantism from its inception wasanti-Catholic, and remains so to this day (esp. evangelicalism). This is obviously wrong and unbiblical if Catholicism is indeed Christian (if it isnt, then - logically - neither is Protestantism, which inherited the bulk of its theology from Catholicism). The Catholic Church, on the other hand, is not anti-Protestant. 23. The Catholic Church accepts the authority of the greatEcumenical Councils(see, e.g., Acts 15) which defined and developed Christian doctrine (much of which Protestantism also accepts). 24. Most Protestants do not havebishops, a Christian office which is biblical ( 1 Tim 3:1-2) and which has existed from the earliest Christian history and Tradition. 25. Protestantism has no way ofsettling doctrinal issuesdefinitively. At best, the individual Protestant can only take a head count of how many Protestant scholars, commentators, etc. take such-and-such a view on Doctrine X, Y, or Z. There is no unified
Posted on: Fri, 18 Jul 2014 18:27:30 +0000
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