Blogger Priest

The following is my response to Steve Thompson who posted comments against the Priesthood, the Church, and Mary.

STEVE:  Joe, you are NOT my father.

FATHER JOE:  I certainly hope not because I do not know your mother.

STEVE:  Jesus said to “…call no man father except Father who is in heaven.”

FATHER JOE:  Yes, and he also said to call no man your teacher, but we have many teachers.  We also have biological fathers.  Saint Paul even spoke about himself as a spiritual father.  Priests are also spiritual fathers.  Jesus uses Hebraic hyperbole so as to make an emphatic statement or emphasis.  It is the Jewish way of adding an exclamation point, by making an outrageous claim.  Our fatherhood should amplify and make clear the reality of God as our Father.  God cares about us.  Similarly, genuine teachers teach in conformity to the truths revealed by God.  Anything else is forbidden.

STEVE:  The Catholic church is full of pedophile priests.

FATHER JOE:  Actually, it is not.  There were as many sick men as in the general population and we have made a real effort to remove them from ministry and to enact policies to protect our children.  But let us be honest, you are not so concerned about the issues and answers as you are eager to pounce on the Catholic Church (large ‘C’).

STEVE:  Jesus Christ is our high priest, and the pastoral epistles (Timothy I & II, Titus) outline the church offices, whereby you will not find monks, nuns, cardinals and popes.

FATHER JOE:   Cardinals are the electors for Popes.  The Church at one time selected the Bishop of Rome in other ways.  Most Cardinals are bishops or at least priests.  Your mistake is a failure to discern that the titles or labels attached to ministries and sacraments have changed over time.  Everything that the Church is today is planted by Christ and grew up during the apostolic period.  Ministers are called pastors, a name originally associated with shepherds.  Our bishops to this very day carry the shepherd’s staff or crozier as a sign of their office.  Men are ordained, elders (presbyters) are appointed and the qualifications for bishops (episcopoi) are detailed.  Deacons are selected to care for the Greek widows and they preach the Good News.  St. John would become a part of an ascetic community.  The desert fathers would trace their piety to him.  Early Christian monastic communities would model themselves on the Jewish communities as at Qumran.  Like St. Paul, many would embrace a celibate way of love and life.  While the title was not always used, all the Popes are successors of St. Peter.  The charge given him by Christ is also given to them.  “You are Rock!  Feed my sheep!  I give to you the keys of the kingdom.”

STEVE:  Christians do not need human priests, popes, nor the “mother of God,” since God has no mother.

FATHER JOE:

The unique mediation of Christ as our great High Priest does not preclude the extension of Christ’s ministry through his priests.  Indeed, the Bible makes this point.  Our Lord told his apostles to perpetuate the Eucharist (Lord’s Supper) in remembrance of him.  He gave Peter universal jurisdiction over the Church.  He gave his priests the awesome power to forgive sins.  Read 2 Corinthians 5:14-21:  “Brothers and sisters: The love of Christ impels us, once we have come to the conviction that one died for all; therefore, all have died. He indeed died for all, so that those who live might no longer live for themselves but for him who for their sake died and was raised. Consequently, from now on we regard no one according to the flesh; even if we once knew Christ according to the flesh, yet now we know him so no longer.  So whoever is in Christ is A NEW CREATION: the old things have passed away; behold new things have come. And all this is from God, who has reconciled us to himself through Christ AND GIVEN US THE MINISTRY OF RECONCILIATION, namely, God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting their trespasses against them AND ENTRUSTING TO US THE MESSAGE OF RECONCILIATION.  SO WE ARE AMBASSADORS FOR CHRIST, AS IF GOD WERE APPEALING THROUGH US.  We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. For our sake he made him to be sin who did not know sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.”

As for the title MOTHER OF GOD given to Mary, it is the language or communication through idioms.  What are you, a heretical Nestorian?  Mary’s title defends the divine identity of her Son.  Mary is a blessed creature preserved from sin and chosen by God to be the vehicle through which the Messiah and Lord would enter our world.  Your rebuke against her is most foul and unbefitting a Christian.  But are you a Christian?  Do you believe in the Trinity?  Do you believe that Jesus is the Second Person of the Trinity made incarnate by the power of the Holy Spirit?  Do you believe that he is the eternal Word made man?  Those who argued that Mary was only the mother of the man were interpreted as denying that Jesus was a divine Person.

STEVE:  Catholic Jesuits endorsed the Inquisitions, and their banana republic nations in South America reflect what this religion is really all about.

FATHER JOE:  Jesuits, Franciscans and Dominicans were involved with numerous Church courts.  Many of these functioned as civil courts do today, seeking to preserve public order.  Various nations misused particular inquisitional authority, but in some kingdoms the efforts were very mild.  Protestant and Catholic nations both sometimes misused religion.  The numbers of people wronged are often exaggerated, some pushing from a few thousand to other critics ridiculously suggesting millions (which would have emptied Europe of any and all population).  People also suffered in the ancient prisons from poor health conditions.  You wrong the Jesuits who died to bring the faith back to England.  Priests have also suffered torture and execution in Mexico, Central, Latin and South America from the very tyrants with whom you associate them.

STEVE:  Catholics/Popery signed a Concordat with Adolf Hitler during World War II.

FATHER JOE: 

The Concordat was signed in 1933, a number of years before World War II.  Hitler’s Germany would break such agreements just as it would with France, Russia and other nations.  The Concordat was to protect the status and work of the Church in a totalitarian fascist state.  The Church was very much at odds with Hitler and was seeking breathing room.  The Church wanted to insure the spiritual care of 20 million German Catholics.  It was not approval for a Socialist state that was philosophically antithetical to Catholic faith and values.   Pope Pius XI issued the encyclical Mit brennender Sorge in 1937.  It was drafted by Pope Pius XII and read in all the Catholic churches.   It criticized Hitler, National Socialism, and the persecution underway.  Catholics were warned that Nazism was incompatible with Catholic Christianity.

Your insinuations or perjury to the contrary is a gross violation of the commandment against false witness.  This was one of the strongest condemnations ever offered by the Vatican!

STEVE:  Furthermore, your Maryolatry is based on the pagan “Queen of Heaven” cult going back to Nimrod/Semiramis, Venus, Diana, Isis and Aphrodite. Get yourself a copy of the Two Babylons by Alexsander Hislop and you will learn what I already know about your religion.

FATHER JOE:  I have a first edition hardback copy on my anti-Catholic bigotry shelf.  The book Two Babylons by Alexsander Hislop is a joke and represents the worst of twisted logic and poor scholarship.  Only anti-Catholic bigots take it seriously because it fuels their hatred against Catholicism.  He equates similarities with an absent historical progression.  It is up there with spurious works like Chariots of the Gods by Erich von Däniken, although his fancy are ancient alien astronauts.

STEVE:  The Catholic Church is all about the Babylonian religion, priestcraft and sacraments (Your so called 7 saving sacraments could not save anyone from anything).

FATHER JOE:  The Catholic Church is the most authentic and original form of Christianity.  The apostles were the first bishop-priests.  The sacraments or as they were once called, the divine mysteries, are sacred signs instituted by Christ to give grace.  They enter us into the Paschal Mystery of Christ.  It is because of this that they have saving value.  The priests of the Church participate in the one priesthood of Jesus Christ.  Jesus offers the Eucharist.  Jesus forgives sins.  There is no contradiction.

STEVE:  Anyone can have access to Jesus Christ directly without your pagan plumbing, including but not limited to Maryolatry, Popery and your priestcraft.

FATHER JOE: 

The Church encourages both a personal and a corporate faith in Jesus Christ.  You would shortchange others just as you do to yourself.  Separated from the Church, believers are liable to lose their way just as you have.  We do not come to God alone.  You are deceiving yourself if you think otherwise.  Without the Church, you would have neither a Bible nor someone to translate and pass it on.  The Holy Spirit watches over the Pope and bishops to insure the faithful transmission of the deposit of faith.  As for Mary, precious biblical prophecy is preserved in Catholicism that you out-rightly reject:

Prayers and Intercession of Mary

Luke 2: 33-35:  “The child’s father and mother were amazed at what was said about him; and Simeon blessed them and said to Mary his mother, ‘Behold, this child is destined for the fall and rise of many in Israel, and to be a sign that will be contradicted (and you yourself a sword will pierce) SO THAT THE THOUGHTS OF MANY HEARTS MAY BE REVEALED.’”

Honoring Mary

Luke 1: 46-49:  “And Mary said:  ‘My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord; my spirit rejoices in God my savior.  For he has looked upon his handmaid’s lowliness; BEHOLD, FROM NOW ON WILL ALL AGES CALL ME BLESSED.  The Mighty One has done great things for me, and holy is his name. ’”

STEVE:  Peter was married and there was no “pope” for 300 years.

FATHER JOE:  The Church began with many married ministers but later decided that celibate love was more desirable for our Christian shepherds.  So what?  But there were indeed Bishops of Rome or Popes, extending from Christ to the present day.  Clement of Rome wrote an epistle or papal letter to the Corinthians in 96 AD!  The Popes and the Church was proclaiming the Gospel even though the New Testament had not been completely written and the biblical canon had yet to be formed.

STEVE:  Your religion is mostly man made.

FATHER JOE:  Sorry, but such is the charge that convicts you.  You have made yourself into the great authority of the divine and arbiter of truth.  You oppose the Pope by making yourself a false Pope.  You strip Christianity of its richness and truths.  Yours is a religion of hate and bigotry.  You define your faith by what you oppose and offer little of lasting value.  You poison the mix.

STEVE:  You killed people during the Middle Ages for owning a Bible or part of one, and read the services in Latin so no one could understand them.

FATHER JOE: 

Me?  Actually I was not born until the last century.

Your charges do not stick against the Church, either.  Disagreements I can understand, but I am always challenged to keep my cool in the face of bigoted ignorance.  Before the printing press, bibles took years to make and churches preserved them so that all might benefit.  Many people could not even read which is why bible stories were told with images in stained-glass windows (something else I suspect you hate).  Latin was originally used as the language of the people.  Church language transitioned from Aramaic/Hebrew to Greek to Latin.  Modern English did not even exist as a language.  The languages of man changed over time and the Romance languages grew from Latin:  Italian, French and Spanish.  Latin was preserved as the language of the Church reflecting the changeless quality of faith.  Jesus is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow.  Today the liturgy is translated into the vernacular.

STEVE:  I was blessed by God to have never been born into this religious institution.

FATHER JOE: 

People are not born into the Church as through nature; rather, they are reborn into the Church through faith and baptism.  Some as children and others as adults are initiated.  Parents and sponsors witness for a child and we trust that the same baptismal promises will be personally professed in Confirmation.  We become temples of the Holy Spirit, members of a priestly people and a holy nation.  We are fashioned by grace into the likeness of Christ.  We become adopted sons and daughters of our heavenly Father.  Jesus who is our King becomes our elder brother and Mary is the Queen Mother.  The saints are our spiritual brothers and sisters.  We become members of Christ’s Mystical Body, the Church.  We become inheritors of the kingdom of heaven.

We are the ones truly blessed and we would pray that you might know such blessing!

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