"(Well, actually, my own response would be to think 'Gee, that list sounds like the confusing multitude of opposing factions within pre-Reformation Christendom that Umberto Eco outlined in The Name of the Rose ')."
Um, Eco is a writer of fiction, not a historian -- and it's somewhat misleading to refer to "opposing factions within pre-Reformation Christendom," since most of those "factions" were non-Catholic sects, not theological schools or movements within the Catholic Church.
Mormons are not Protestants in the sense they are still within the minimum bounds of Christian orthodoxy which is belief in the Trinity...they are Protestants in the sense they were the next phase of Protestantism and were an offshoot of protestantism. It is not normally proper to call them Protestants though because Protestantism in general is much much closer to Catholic orthodoxy and thus much much closer to the fullness of Truth.
Continued discussion on the other blog:
ME: "Therefore, Catholics are specifically categorized as one such pseudo-Christian cult."
Tom R.:
No. Re-check what "specifically" means. Syntactically, the sample sentence above is the same logical form as "Today I went to the laundromat at noon. I ate carrots and peas for my lunch." A visiting Vulcan might see no grammatical disconnect between the two sentences. An inhabitant of planet Earth, though (or planet Blogosphere - same quadrant!) would see these two sentences as a jarring disconnect because normally, when sentences follow so closely, they are linked in their intention. And because you don't normally eat at a laundromat, there is a disruption to the normal flow of ideas.
You know the media do this sort of thing. "Pope JP2 recently spoke out against abortion and defended the 'rights of the unborn'. The Pope made no comment about allegations that nuns and priests in Rwanda incited the massacres." Hint, hint, nudge, nudge. (I use hints too, but if challenged I don't disavow the implication in express words).
I don't know if the Stenhouse work is online, but you will have to take my word for it that about 80% of the printed version consists of (a) indignities inflicted on English Catholics during and after the reign of Henry VIII, and/or (b) the number of different Protestant sects who all claim allegiance to Scripture as "Bible Christians" (hence the title of the two volumes).
If you are blogging this at Res Ipsa Loquitur, I want my words to be in a sort of fluorescent bright green, thanks.
---------------------------------
ME:
I considered kelly green (symbolic of blarney) but at length settled upon my usual dignified blue for my opponents. Thanks for the aesthetic input, tho!
You're doing a great job at demolishing your own assertions; saves me a lot of trouble.
In trying to bolster up your failed examples of supposed equation of Mormons with Protestants you introduced the analogy:
If I were to write, eg, "Many Evangelicals fall away into pseudo-Christian cults. A large number have recently become Mormons, JWs, Christian Scientists, Roman Catholics, Scientologists, or Unitarians", it would be jesui- ... er, it would be talmu-... umm, it would be really, really quibbling if I then turned around and said "No, I never actually said 'Roman Catholicism is a pseudo-Christian cult'!"
In other words, you are arguing (unless I am somehow totally missing your point or you are being illogical) that to deny that Catholicism was regarded as a "pseudo-Christian cult" in this sentence is as foolish as denying that the priest was saying Mormonism was Protestantism.
I went on to make a logical / grammatical distinction between the two instances under consideration, and to contend that they are NOT analogous.
But lo and behold, now you want to (for reasons unfathomable to me) annihilate your own argument, by saying that there is no logical
(cont.)
. . . connection between the first and the second part.
Ergo, by analogy, if your illustration did NOT prove that the intention of the hypothetical person making the statement thinks this of Catholicism, then by the same token (since it was YOUR analogy in the first place), the priest does not necessarily think Mormonism is Protestant. You have set about consecutively arguing two mutually contradictory positions, but don't seem to be aware of it.
I already destroyed the quote by Fr. Roberts anyway, since he included Jews, Catholics and Orthodox in his list of denominations.
Give it up. It's been fun (I like logical exercises too), but you've done all you can do with these two citations. They don't prove what you are asserting. We all make mistakes.
For the third or fourth time, are these the only "compelling proofs" you have for the original bogus contention by Josh, shored up by you?
Posted on Josh's blog:
Your passion on this topic ought to be directed towards an entity that actually believes in what you are questioning.
How about the National Opinion Research Center at the University of Chicago? In 2004 it did a General Social Survey on the religious beliefs of Americans:
"How quickly the scales tip depends on how statisticians count the rapidly growing Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (Mormons), Smith says. The survey makes a theologically controversial decision to include them as Protestants. Nearly 2% of Americans said they were Mormons in 2002."
(USA Today, 7-20-04)
http://www.usatoday.com/news/rel...-
majority_x.htm
Josh S.:
Aren't Protestants a pseudo-Christian cult in Catholic eyes?
Pseudo-Christian? Absolutely not. We regard you as brothers in Christ by virtue particularly of baptism, but many other things as well.
How is that you don't understand this, yet feel yourself altogether capable of writing lengthy critiques of Catholicism? If you can't grasp the simple things, why would anyone think that you can comprehend more complex Catholic matters?
The more I read your stuff and some of the comments, the more I realize that the ignorance of Catholicism in Lutheran ranks is far greater than I had imagined (and I am always one to freely grant widespread ignorance in the theological realm, including -- very much -- Catholic circles too).
Here we are, then, seriously discussing whether Catholics:
1) equate Protestants with Mormons
and
2) think Protestants are mere "pseudo-Christians."
Wow. At some point, it seems to me, either embarrassment or simple intellectual curiosity should compel those who argue about stuff like this with a straight face to take a Catholicism 0101 course and disabuse themselves of the avalanche of disinformation on "Catholicism" that they are buried in.
Hi Dave and co. Someone just alerted me to this URL. As an Ockamite (All Haiol Ockham! Degraded mediaval nominalism rules!), I'm not really sure of the point of multiplying entities by mirroring the whole debate here, although I s'pose it does mean J#$H Scrodback can't go on a deleting-bender as he hath oftimes done in diverse ages past (and yes, I am still annoyed that my erudite, almost Tighean commentboxing disappeared into the aether).
Jordan, although TNotR is fiction, Eco is a very careful historian and he didn't invent the Paulicians et al. And since these all cropped up centuries before Luther/ Calvin, it's misleading to talk as if pre-Reformation Christendom was a big happy family until those two fracked it all up.
Note also that Baptists and Pentecostals are not "theological movements within" Lutheranism. We have less connection with them than Catholicism does with Abp LeFebvre, Anne Catherine Emmerich or the Magnificat Meal Movement.
Someone just alerted me to this URL.
That would have been me, since I announced it over there.
Yes, DA, you did announce it, but didn't give a URL. I try to minimise my web-surfing these days, firstly because I have a day job, secondly because my home modem is SLO-O-OW... and this week my family is moving house, so I put off doing a Google search. However one of my fellow Lutherischers emailed me to say "Dave Armstrong seems to be conducting an energetic debate with you in
the comments section on his own blog (http://www.haloscan.com/comments/davearmstrong/
8662458528259871051/). The least you could do would be to show up. On the other hand, Dave seems to be doing just fine without you, so it'd be a shame to spoil his fun. :o)"
- which put it within one mouse-click, rather than two.
Anyway, I will write a more detailed reply (apportioning truth 75% to TR/ JS and 25% to DA) once unpacked. Shalom til then.
A Protestant granting me 1/4 of the truth? I'll take those odds any day! LOL
I'll go as high as 26.3% if you grant me that green fluoro.
You kidding? Ugly colors for a lousy 1.3%? I have a reputation for aesthetic excellence to uphold, after all!
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