Sola scriptura

The thing I like about Sola Scriptura is that it's a Latin phrase. The idea is not so great.

 

I also used live in the poverty of Protestantism for 9 years, until I found my way back home. Now I am rich in all spiritual things.
I pray that you may also see likewise.
In Christ.
Andy.

 

Wow, I didn't expect that kind of response

 

This is an odd perspective. Jesus was the word made flesh. If scripture was truly all that was needed then why the incarnation? Why not more prophets, more words, more writing?

 

Part of the problem with Sola Scriptura is that it simply is not biblical. Prior to the writing of the New Testament and its acceptance by the Church as scripture — in lieu of other writings about Jesus — no belief in Jesus as the Messiah, the son of God, could have been accepted. People believed because of what they were taught by the apostles, both in person and through written letters, some of which were eventually recognized as sacred scripture by the Church, which evidently had the authority to declare what was scripture and what was not.

 

It's a wonder that people could ever get saved before the printing press. It's a wonder that a poor or illiterate person could ever be saved at all. Ironically, it's more likely the poor and illiterate throughout the centuries will be the first in the kingdom.

 

Luther is not the guy I trust in: He is a catholic priest, a monk, married with a nun, both vowed holy oathes that were broken by them. So they saw themself justified doing so, but studying their lifes - I cannot see the power of for example the therese of lisieux, Don Bosco and many others I "follow" .

Sola scriptura is too much, it is one of the tree provocative theses of Luther, sola fides, sola gratia, sola scriputra. We catholics are also obliged to read the bibel - that is not the point. But catholics accept an ecclesiastical function of reliable interpretation - Luther denied it. The point is, the Lutheraners, the Zwinglianers, the other reformist and protestants startet to interpret the bibel for their own - with differing results, everyone told and tells different interpretation - so something went wrong.

I am from Germany (no excuse for my bad english and live peacefully together with protestants and a lot of other christian churches. I am happy that there priest who give me useful interpretations of the holy scriptura with which I can understand more of it, I am interested in the statements of my biships and the pope in Rome, to get more understanding of the scripturas I read. And tradition should guarantee the original meaning of the time of the writing of the bibel, but be open for the time of now.

Same point for sola fides - I have to do more than only to believe, for example to get out of this junk of my porn addiction, I have to love God and all humans and much more. Sola gratia - Yes it is true, it is only the one God who can save. But we can help each other, for example here in nofap to get out of it! So let's do it, as christians believing in HIM and fighting for HIM. I try to be save from pmo from now on until end of the year - that would be a BIG STEP out of my sad addiction. Everyone may join me!

 

One can NOT live only by scripture. It is true. Or is it that you can give a newborn a Bible and all the food he needs, and when he grows up he'll fully understand it and be able to know everything to life. OF COURSE NOT. The baby needs his mother, school, in which he'll read OTHER books to learn to read, teachers to guide him, and etc. To say that one lives only from scripture would be kinda blasphemous in a way. It literally goes against life itself. You NEED the Bible, I won't lie, but you obviously need so much more than that. Martin Luther was a good for nothing spoiled law school dropout. Don't you dare tell me I'm wrong because he literally found a single verse on the Bible and said, "Yep, the new religion will be based on less than ten sentences I just found". HE BROKE HIS VOW OF CHASTITY AND MARRIED A FRICKIN NUN! I'm sorry, and I don't mean to be rude, but what truth do you find in this? THERE IS NONE!!

 

On multiple exorsisms the demons themselves have testified to have had a huge hand in the creation of Protestant churches. The demons do not lie when they are asked in the name of Jesus. What does that tell you?

 

Martin Luther's premise for Sola Scriptura was to establish a single, unitary faith through a common-sense precept of interpreting the Bible's message. He believed that if one were to clear themselves of all preconceptions in regards to religious teaching and read the bible in a clear-minded way, then the message of the bible, the divine revelation hidden within, would naturally come to the reader. He believed that all honest Christians in approaching the bible in this fashion would interpret the same divinely revealed message and this would therefore unify a new Christian body distinct from the Catholic church and its hierarchy that interpreted scripture for believers.
However, the thing that I find problematic with this approach and for what I believe is good reason (as it is something that the Catholic has a problem with this one feature of Protestantism), is that this doctrine easily leads to a wide variety of different interpretations and this is pretty much what happened right off the bat during the Reformation (Ex. Luther read the Bible and he interpreted the message of salvation as open to all who are willing to put their faith in Christ; Calvin read the bible and interpreted the message of salvation as select to only those God has directly chosen). And it has plagued Protestantism more or less ever since, for it is the one thing that has led to all the different denominations that Protestantism possesses.
I am not bashing Protestantism but it is this one doctrine and its repercussions that have deflected me away from it the more I have come to think about the Christian faith.

 

Scott Hahn made a good allegory in his book Rome Sweet Home. He made the example of the Founding Fathers when they established this country. What did they do? They had the spirit of establishing the independence from Great Britain's reign over the colonies, they had the Declaration of Independence, and then they established a new government for the new nation. But it would've been farcical for the Founding Fathers to say: "May the spirit of the Revolution and the Declaration of Independence guide us diligently to this new life" and yet forgo anything about establishing a new government. Point is, we need a governing body to establish diligently the ways of the Spirit and the Scripture that brings about such revelations; without it, if we were to rely on the document or scripture alone, things would just be chaotic.

 

Well said. And what better system than the Catholic Church? Granted, Satan is working through many of the clergy, but the system is essentially flawless

 

I was born and raised Catholic, understand what has been said above, see truth sprinkled here and there in all the posts. Before I comment on the issue, I would like to mention to Jeff Boyder concerning the following quote: "Martin Luther was a good for nothing spoiled law school dropout. Don't you dare tell me I'm wrong because he literally found a single verse on the Bible and said, "Yep, the new religion will be based on less than ten sentences I just found". HE BROKE HIS VOW OF CHASTITY AND MARRIED A FRICKIN NUN! I'm sorry, and I don't mean to be rude, but what truth do you find in this? THERE IS NONE!!"
I understand that in frustrating situations it is difficult to keep our emotions under control. I have a temper and have been guilty of reacting the same way you did, but brother, you need to apologize to the people you were writing to and to everyone who read your post. It may not have been your intention to be rude, but you were. We don't help anything and harm much when we allow the enemy to rule our emotions and think we have a right to be rude and insulting in the cause of expounding what we believe to be true. I still struggle with it myself, so please pray for me that I will follow my own counsel.

Now getting to the issue of sola scriptura and/or scripture and tradition. One thing many Catholics don't consider is that there is no compiled list of Sacred Tradition. If you find one please let me know because I have searched unsuccessfully for it. Because of this, anything can be said to be Sacred Tradition with no way to confirm it. We naturally tend to follow people and writings that correspond to our understanding of what makes sense and take it as definitive truth. In the history of the Church there have been many propositions that this or that is Sacred Tradition. Leaving out the early Church Councils which pretty much all Christians adhere to, you will not find, for example, demonstrative evidence that in the split between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches that one or the other was following Sacred Tradition.

Because there is no list, we who believe Tradition plays a role in Divine Revelation can only surmise what Tradition may be. Those who study the writings of the early Church Fathers may find there some consistency and conclude that what they see as fitting together coherently is sufficient evidence to come to a conclusion that certain things were always taught (at least in seed form) and are part of Sacred Tradition. One problem with that is the subjectivity of the individuals coming to those conclusions. There is no objective proof they are correct.

There is also no objective way to discern what books and/or portions of books are actually the Sacred Scriptures. We have to take someones opinion for those things and someone's opinion is not considered infallible by anyone. So we do the best we can and follow what we believe makes sense to us. Thus the Catholic Church relies on the authority of the Magisterium (the Pope and bishops in union with him) to tell us what is or is not Sacred Tradition and Sacred Scripture. We have no objective proof, no list from the Apostles defining these things. But the magisterium has never drawn up a list of exactly what is and what is not Sacred Tradition (at least that I could find).

Consider the quandary we find ourselves in today with the Council of Trent clearly stating you must be formally a Roman Catholic to be saved and the Second Vatican Council effectively disagreeing with that and other items to the point that we have different splits (several various Traditional Catholic groups which differ in their conclusions) and those who adhere to Vatican 2 with various opinions of exactly what it taught and whether or not what was taught in the documents of Vatican 2 are simply pastoral statements or dogmatic. (Personally I don't know how we could consider documents with the beginning of their title containing "Dogmatic" to be only pastoral statements, but that's just my subjective opinion)

So what's the point in all of this. Frankly, I don't know. I haven't come to definitive conclusions about some of it, maybe none of it. What I suggest is that we seek the guidance of the Holy Spirit, be charitable to others who differ in their opinions and trust that God has a plan and will in His own time reveal to us what we need to know to follow His will. I hope that makes sense.

 

I would say while identifying Sacred Tradition requires homework sometimes, the best bet is to read Church council documents, also the Roman Catechism, which was intended to be the kind of summary of which you speak.

Regarding the apparent discrepancy between Trent and Vatican II on no salvation outside the Church, there has been plenty written reconciling the two explanations. As Catholic Answers notes, the understanding that a person can be incorporated into the Church through implicit desire existed well before Vatican II. While I don't want to get too deep into it here, I think the problem is that Trent and Vatican II were answering two slightly different questions. Trent was answering the question of whether there are other paths to salvation, and the answer is no, and whether the sacraments actually have an effect and are necessary or are just superfluous symbols, and the answer is yes, they have an effect and are necessary. Lumen Gentium, from Vatican II, reaffirms the necessity of the Church: "This Sacred Council wishes to turn its attention firstly to the Catholic faithful. Basing itself upon Sacred Scripture and Tradition, it teaches that the Church, now sojourning on earth as an exile, is necessary for salvation." However, Lumen Gentium also goes into questions like invincible ignorance, and not for the first time in the Church's history.

I tend to think this is one of those things like in the Gospels, where at one point, Jesus says, "Whoever is not against (us/you) is for (us/you)" (Mark 9:40 and Luke 9:50), yet also says, "Whoever is not with me is against me, and whoever does not gather with me scatters" (Matthew 12:30 and Luke 11:23). I especially like that these passages both appear in Luke, despite the what looks on the surface like a contradiction. But yes, it is the same Jesus speaking, just in two different contexts.