I read this: http://docs.google.com/View?
doci...d2cg4kp_2fw7q6c
from Michael Liccione. It is a discussion of private judgement and wanted to go looking for more, and, here on your front page, there it is. I'm a bit fuzzy to read it carefully though I buzzed through it and, as usual, you are clear and concise. Off this goes to my private reading list to dwell over.
Thanks Dave.
You're welcome! Authority is always a very important point of discussion for Catholics and Protestants.
Dave,
Thank you for your helpful article. It' interesting that "Purify your Bride" has an article on this same topic right now:
http://purifyyourbride.stblogs.c...ility-argument/
While it does not invalidate the rest of your argument, I note that you seem to stand up a straw-man at one point. You state: "I refer to the Protestant formal system of sola Scriptura, which places the individual in the position as the supreme and final arbiter of his own theology and destiny. "
I would expect a Protestant to say that you have misunderstood Sola Scriptura -- in that it is the Holy Spirit who is the arbiter, not the individual Christian. Unfortunately for the Protestant, empirical evidence shows this theory to be unworkable in practice and that the doctrine is a tragic mistake. -- The Holy Spirit does not err, but the individual Christian does not receive the grace outside of the Church sufficient to avoid misunderstanding the Spirit.
I think you address the full Sola Scriptura argument elsewhere in this post, but the above quote is, I think, an incomplete representation of the Protestant position.
When I say that, I mean strictly in an epistemological / authority sense of who makes the final decision in terms of any given theological dispute.
I do not mean Pelagianism: that the individual determines his own salvation (the big clue are the words "formal system"). I also mean that in terms of a logical reduction of the position. Protestants argue vigorously with me that their position does not reduce to this, but I haven't yet been persuaded!
The topic requires tons of discussion and explanation on both sides.
Ultimately I do not care what you think about me, Dave. However, as a simple matter of factual correction, I note ONCE AGAIN that I am not now and never have been an "anti-Catholic," not even when I was associated with such characters. You can tweak the category all you like, even come up with new strains of it ("quasi-anti-Catholic") or whatever you wish, and it still remains true that it does not apply to me and never has. Once upon a time you yourself admitted this. It's transparently obvious that you go on these little crusades against me because you're pissed that I don't think you're a serious force to be reckoned with, but instead think you're a populist showman whipping up the prejudices of the masses instead of giving them real substance and advancing their understanding of Catholic-Protestant disputes. Now I am sorry you can't take criticism without flipping your wig in anger and bitterness (exemplified in your exquisite record keeping of offenses against you, and ability to quickly find even the oldest examples of such to trot out), but that's your problem. You just need to get out more, read a novel or two every now and then, broaden your intellectual horizons, stop being afraid of the Big Bad World trying to squash your faith.
As I said, ultimately I do not care what you think of me. The only sense in which your continued portrayal of me in the "anti-Catholic" light matters is to expose yet another way in which you do not follow the standards which you yourself try to impose on others. You love to talk about people who "lie" about you merely because they differ with your own exalted self-impression. You love to highlight their breaches of "ethics," as if you are God's own arbiter of the Internet in that respect. Well, buddy, you yourself are massively guilty of both things. Every time you portray me as any kind of "anti-Catholic," however qualified, you are "lying" about me by the standards that you yourself apply to others. This makes you, by your own standards, "unethical."
I wish you'd just get a life, but I guess your life just IS being a hyperactive controversialist who can't evaluate differing perspectives properly because of always having to "win" and "refute" and "defend."
Hey, how about this: instead of writing lying slander about me having a "zealous desire to refute Catholicism," why not compile one of those massively researched lists your famous for--one that shows how many out of the last, say 100 posts on my own blog have been directed at "refuting" Catholic doctrines. As you research, do please keep in mind the elementary distinction that fighting with a populist convert apologist is NOT the same thing as trying to refute Catholicism. None of you convert guys are the voice of Catholicism. You are just guys with Internet connections and too much time on your hands and a questionable understanding of what serving God means. Dealing with your collective various forms of immod
Dealing with your collective various forms of immoderate argument and behavior does not constitute wanting to destroy Catholicism. In my own case, at least, I have far more sympathy for Catholicism than most Protestants I know, and the whole body of my work well attests to this.
Grow up, get a life, and start following your own standards. That's my challenge to you.
Ultimately I do not care what you think about me, Dave. However, as a simple matter of factual correction, I note ONCE AGAIN that I am not now and never have been an "anti-Catholic," not even when I was associated with such characters.
And once again, as I recently explained to you here (and whatever you are, you're not STUPID), I have not classified you as that, as can be proven by checks of my "Anti-Catholicism" page on Internet Archive. The term "anti-Catholic" doesn't even appear in this article, for heaven's sake.
You could, of course, object to being called a "Protestant" (which I did classify you as in the post). But that would be almost equally silly.
Once upon a time you yourself admitted this.
I still do! If you would take some Ex-Lax or something and think remotely rationally and fairly when ranting against me, take a deep breath, and just a moment to comprehend the plain meaning of English words, you would know this. But I suppose irrational anger does that to one's thinking capabilities.
It's transparently obvious that you go on these little crusades against me because you're pissed that I don't think you're a serious force to be reckoned with . . .
Right. Are you that convinced of your own super-importance? The truth of the matter is that I was responding (rather out of the blue and on an impulse) to a comment from "Interlocutor". I can't help it if you were one of the people I have had this discussion with before. It was relevant to my reply and so your stuff was used. Period. It ain't got nothin' to do with YOU per se; it is about the false charge against Catholics.
Now I am sorry you can't take criticism without flipping your wig in anger and bitterness . . .
Yes; it's patently obvious in this post and my current comments that I am the one frothing in a furious rage, not you . . .
instead of writing lying slander about me having a "zealous desire to refute Catholicism,"
Right. You have never had any desire at any time to refute that thing known as Catholicism, headed by the pope in Rome. I stand corrected. Thanks for clarifying!
why not compile one of those massively researched lists your famous for--one that shows how many out of the last, say 100 posts on my own blog have been directed at "refuting" Catholic doctrines.
Papal infallibility has certainly received its share of criticism on your blog. For example, your post of 10-11-07, " Some Changes In And Influences Of 15th Century Conciliarist Thought" keeps up your drumbeat for conciliarism, which is, of course, opposed to the orthodox doctrine of papal infallibility and the necessity of ecumenical councils being ratified by popes in order to be infallible themselves. In so arguing, you enlist your usual laundry list of famous liberal "Catholic" dissenters against infallibility, such as Hans Kung and Brian Tierney:
http://www.timenloe.net/?p=443
For example, citing A.J. Black:
"A third Modern approach has been taken by Catholics such as Paul de Vooght and Hans Kung, who 'see the Council of Constance and its apologists as upholding in a dark time certain central principles of Catholic ecclesiology, which are only now gaining hard-won acceptance among Catholic theologians.'"
Certainly you are not so ignorant as not to know that Hans Kung no longer has the right to call himself a Catholic theologian. I think it is important that your readers ought to know that, if you want to refer to Kung as a "Catholic" and any sort of competent authority in matters Catholic.
Your intent to war against papal infallibility and the orthodox Catholic view of true conciliar authority (in line with the pope) is also evident in your remark:
"The older Catholic polemical notion that conciliar ideas were largely due to the radical and heretical innovations of Marsilius of Padua and William of Ockham was destroyed by Tierney’s demonstration of conciliar reliance upon a much older tradition of canon law which was quite in tune with accepted, orthodox Catholic doctrine."
Grow up, get a life, and start following your own standards. That's my challenge to you.
Thanks for the friendly advice. I'll be sure to point this out to Fr. John A. Hardon, S.J., if by God's grace I make it to heaven, since he wrote about my first book, in the Foreword:
"Please allow me to introduce to you Dave Armstrong. I know Dave and his wife Judy personally. I received him into the Church on February 8, 1991, and baptized both their children, Paul and Michael. Dave has attended my classes on spirituality and catechetics. . . .
"In particular, I highly recommend his work, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, which I find to be thoroughly orthodox, well-written, and effective for the purpose of making Catholic truth more understandable and accessible to the public at large. Dave has edited and compiled much material from great Catholic writers past and present, interspersed with his own commentary and analysis. It is, I firmly believe, a fine book of popular Catholic apologetics."
Fr. Hardon being a close advisor to Pope Paul VI, catechetical consultant to Mother Teresa and the Missionaries of Charity, and one of the most respected catechists in America (even up for possible sainthood) means, I think, that I perhaps already had a "life" even as far back as 1993 (three years before I was on the Internet), when he wrote this Foreword.
You have often pretended that I was "self-appointed" and "self-anointed" as an apologist. Fr. Hardon, of blessed memory, would seem to have believed otherwise.
I think I will take his opinion of my work over that of an ever-dogmatic polemicist with a BA degree finally obtained at age 35, with (quite ironically and absurdly) a history of changing his opinions every eight months, one who couldn't even figure out the extreme harmfulness and credibility-destroying consequences of hobnobbing with (and often defending) most of the major Internet anti-Catholics a short five years ago, and one who has never defended his own assertions in a sustained manner, who runs from intellectual debate and pro and con discourse like a cat from a bath or Dracula from a cross and holy water.
Here is Tim railing against papal infallibility (Greg Krehbiel's old discussion board: 2-15-06), sounding for all the world like Dollinger and Kung:
* * *
But just as some Protestants will never "get" the problems with absolutist rhetoric centered on the 16th century, some Catholics will probably never "get" the problems of absolutist rhetoric centered on the papacy. The thing I'm grabbing onto here is the fact that Catholic examples themselves show that there are other, more moderate ways of construing the papal "primacy." May the tribe of the moderates increase, and the tribe of the fanatics decrease, is all I'm saying.
* * *
And in another post on the same day:
I do wonder, as an ignorant outsider, whether Vatican I was itself infallible, and how Catholics can know it was, if it was . . .
* * *
And on 2-14-06:
I am an outsider, but I wonder if Vatican I's definition of "primacy" is infallible. Maybe in the future God will lead popes less strident than late 19th century ones to realize that Vatican I's definition was kind of like Florence's about the Jews. Some popes made an "oops" and got some egg all over the papacy's face for a while. No big whoop.
* * *
^^LOL^^
Note also Tim's constant use of the term "papalist" on his blog (countless instances if one searches for the word). This seems to function in his mind as a code word for "orthodox Catholic." In his more cogent moments he will even readily admit this:
"Second, [historian Warren] Carroll is, as all Catholics are and must be, a papalist."
"This [so-called "papalism"] is certainly a position with a long history in catholic discourse, and it is therefore not ipso facto wrong for Carroll to hold it or to strongly defend it."
"A History of Christendom, by Warren H. Carroll"
(3-16-06)
http://www.timenloe.net/?p=113
Having conceded that all Catholics are required dogmatically to be "papalists" (i.e., to believe in papal infallibility, which is patently obvious to anyone who has the slightest understanding of how the Catholic system of dogma works), he proceeds to immediately cast Dr. Carroll in a negative light by describing him in negative terms:
"he holds to a rigid absolutist spin on papalism."
"Very strong rhetoric, indeed, and the fact that this example is what Carroll has selected, and that he has not selected contrasting examples of Catholics loyal to the papacy yet not construing obedience to it in such stark terms, serves to show that Carroll is an not merely a dedicated papalist (as again, all Catholics must be), but more than that, he is an ardent papalist absolutist." [italics his]
"Carroll’s rather unbalanced presentation of the issues of the Schism period."
"It is difficult to resist the suspicion that he is taking a veiled swipe at “dissident” Catholic scholars (i.e., Catholics who disagree with his absolutist vision of papalism), . . ."
"On a related point, I have yet to find evidence in Carroll’s work (though such may exist, and I stand ready to be corrected) of any recognition that there are other legitimate ways for a Catholic to conceive of papalism than the starkly absolutist way which he himself holds."
". . . there are other strong Catholic voices advocating less strident, more flexible understandings of papalism than does Carroll."
". . . these factors seem to add up to a great imbalance in his work. Granted, I have chronicled this imbalance entirely through his treatment of the Western Schism and the early phases of the Conciliar Movement . . ."
". . . Carroll’s really ardent attachment to a particularly rigid form of papalist absolutism . . ."
Of course Tim bristles at Carroll's non-use of his favorite historians, Brian Tierney and Francis Oakley:
"I will pass over the fact that despite his acknowledged heavy reliance upon secondary sources, there can be found in the pages of his work not a single reference to the foundational (and to this day unrefuted) secondary work of the Catholic scholar Brian Tierney on the origins and development of the conciliarist strain of Catholic thought throughout the Middle Ages. Nor does Carroll cite any of the work of the other Catholic conciliarist titan of our age, Francis Oakley . . .Tierney and Oakley, whom many self-described “conservative” Catholics dismissively think of as mere “dissidents,”"
Tim similarly rails with his droning rhetoric in an earlier post, " The Pontificator Explains the Fundamental Flaw of Divine-Right Absolute Papalism"
(2-11-06)
http://www.timenloe.net/?p=212
Tim has no love for thew Council of Trent, either:
"It is not just Luther who reaches a breaking point, however. Indeed, Christendom itself can no longer bear the strain, for the next event to occur, billed as the fulfillment of nearly a century of heartbreaking cries for reform, will be the assembling of a so-called General Council in a town called Trent. Controlled by papalist fanatics such as Pope Paul IV, the Council of Trent will create an even more horrific schism than the one which began the Conciliarist Movement in the first place. It will totally betray the conciliarist cause and, instead of healing the breach as its predecessor at Constance did, will only institutionalize it."
(" Thesis Defense (Text)")
(1-13-06)
http://www.timenloe.net/?p=47
Tim defines the heresy that he loves in the same article:
"The term 'conciliarism' means that the final ministerial authority of the Church resides in the council."
For an orthodox Catholic analysis of the heresy of conciliarism, see my papers:
Was Conciliarism an "Orthodox" Option in Medieval Catholicism?
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...-option-
in.html
Do Church Councils Possess a Higher Authority Than the Pope?
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...-
higher_17.html
Tim Enloe's Missing Definition of "Orthodoxy" & the Logical Circularity of His Thesis on Conciliar Ecclesiology
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...inition-
of.html
Council of Constance (1414-1418 ): Triumph of Conciliarism or its Kiss of Death? (vs. Tim Enloe)
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/2...18-
triumph.html
Reflections on Medieval Ecclesiology ("Fallibilist Conciliarism"?)
http://socrates58.blogspot.com/
2...clesiology.html
In honor of Tim's renewed groundless personal attacks against me, I have resurrected an old post that has been removed from my site (i.e., only for those reading this):
"The Sham Ecumenism and 'Reformed Catholicism' of Tim Enloe"
(12-22-05)
http://web.archive.org/web/20060...d-
reformed.html
Note that this response was provoked not even by Tim's personal attacks against myself or against Catholics, but against the Orthodox Perry Robinson, whom Tim described as his "enemy."
That was the last straw for me and this "Reformed Catholicism" business (that I initially was quite favorable to), and I announced it on their blog. Shortly thereafter I was banned.
See my announcement on the RefCath blog:
http://www.reformedcatholicism.c...cism.com/?
p=407
None of you convert guys are the voice of Catholicism. You are just guys with Internet connections and too much time on your hands and a questionable understanding of what serving God means
Tim Enloe must come up with a more effective strategy. When I read that, I was amazed.
"Please allow me to introduce to you Dave Armstrong. I know Dave and his wife Judy personally. I received him into the Church on February 8, 1991, and baptized both their children, Paul and Michael. Dave has attended my classes on spirituality and catechetics. . . .
"In particular, I highly recommend his work, A Biblical Defense of Catholicism, which I find to be thoroughly orthodox, well-written, and effective for the purpose of making Catholic truth more understandable and accessible to the public at large. Dave has edited and compiled much material from great Catholic writers past and present, interspersed with his own commentary and analysis. It is, I firmly believe, a fine book of popular Catholic apologetics."
I think the Fr. John A. Hardon quotes are a prudent aspect of your comment, Dave. Fr. Hardon’s quotes are powerful and clear.
None of you convert guys are the voice of Catholicism. You are just guys with Internet connections and too much time on your hands and a questionable understanding of what serving God means
The above quote is saturated with enormous ignorance.
. . . not to mention arrogance, too.
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