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Friday, June 27, 2008

Apologetics and Evangelism: Roman Catholicism part 1 (I've been neglecting this for too long)

Imagine that you (as I was) were driving through Green Bay, WI and decided to take an alternate route in order to become more familiar with the layout of the city when you stumbled upon this sight:








------------------------------------>If you’re anything like me, you would be very disappointed/enraged/distraught/saddened by this spectacle. You would probably share the same sense of provokedness in your spirit as Paul did when he was walking through Athens amidst all of the idols that were being worshiped.

This picture, by the way, was taken of the side of someone's house.

I have been involved in quite a bit of study and interaction with Roman Catholics (RC’s) in the last 5 years or so and I have had quite a burden for them mainly due to the fact that my in-laws are RC’s. I have learned much about the way in which RC’s understand the Gospel (or misunderstand), and I have spent a lot of time on discussion forums discussing this and other issues with them.

Lately, I haven’t given much time or thought to the subject, but when I see disappointing examples like the one in this picture I have to ask myself why I’ve not been taking the time to evangelize these lost and deceived people. I have spent much time in a priest by the name of Sean’s house attempting to reason with him, but when he realized that the reason I was attempting to convince him of the truth of substitutionary atonement was because I didn’t believe him to be a Christian he told me not to come back. This greatly disturbed me, but it’s in the Lord’s hands, not mine. In the future, I hope to have some more interaction with him, and I pray that the Lord will reveal to him that I deeply care for him and am concerned for his soul. Nevertheless, I would like to spend some time on some future posts to explore the topic of Roman Catholicism and how to approach those infected by the false teaching contained therein.

Without getting into any specific issues in this post, I would just like to lay out some guidelines that I think to be helpful when approaching RC’s with the Gospel:






  1. Do NOT attempt to argue with them about Mary, purgatory, the papacy, or any other absurdity that will appear absurd to them upon a realization of the true Gospel and the finished work of Christ.


  2. If they attempt to cite any particular Bible verses as a proof text for their position and you have the luxury of looking at that text with them, do it. Without fail, an examination of the context will reveal the fallacy of their understanding of that verse. If you have a prior knowledge of the context of the verse in question and no time to look at it, remind them of it and invite them (humbly) to take a look at it.


  3. Ask them if they think that they are a good person, and follow the steps in The Way of the Master evangelistic approach (see the link in the left column that asks if you are a good person). This approach is a good technique for showing someone the weight of their sin in God’s eyes and why they need the true Gospel of Jesus Christ.



Well, I hope to add to this soon, and I hope to cover as many areas as possible by the time I’m finished. Until then, find a Roman Catholic and tell ‘em about the Jesus Who saves AND keeps to the very end (John 6:39).

5 comments:

Timothy said...

Greetings!

Saw your post in Google Blogsearch and came to read.

>"If they attempt to cite any particular Bible verses as a proof text for their position and you have the luxury of looking at that text with them, do it."

As one of the Catholic apologists, I'm very glad to hear that advice. Since all Catholic doctrine is found either explicitly or implicitly in the Bible, I for one love to chat with sola scriptura Christians. Under sola scriptura, the non-Catholic can never "win" a discussion and I can never "lose." Its always a "tie".

>"Ask them if they think that they are a good person, and follow the steps in The Way of the Master evangelistic approach"

Ah, yes! The Good Person Test, one of my favorites. I always answer "NO" and it confounds the non-Catholic. Then, I'm asked to play along. I think next time I'll turn the question around on them.

By the way, where do I find "The Way of the Master evangelistic approach" cited in my Bible? This seems an invention, or tradition, of man as I never see this approach used by Jesus, the Apostles, or Paul.

(I suspect its in Acts, just after the word "Trinity", but before one comes to the "sinner's prayer".)

>"Do NOT attempt to argue with them about Mary, purgatory, the papacy, or any other absurdity that will appear absurd to them upon a realization of the true Gospel and the finished work of Christ."

I was actually glad to read this as usually the non-Catholic lacks a clear understanding of what the Church teaches and its Biblical basis for the doctrine. Without know what the CHurch truely teaches allows the Catholic to disarm the non-Catholic with "That's not what we teach/believe."

The Catechism of the Catrholic Church is available in its entirity online and is crossed referenced to both the Bible and other scripture. I recommend becoming familiar with paragragh 1996 which states that salvation is by God's grace.

The only thing that I would add that you omitted would be to learn about the Catholic Church. Not all Catholics are Roman Catholics. There are 22 different Catholic CHurches of which the largest is the Latin Rite or Church at Rome. Non-Catholics are often surprised and dumbfounded to run across a Melkite Catholic or a Malabar Catholic. They too are Catholics, but will quickly inform you that they are not Roman Catholics.

Michael.Gabriel said...

I was pretty sure that I'd get some responses by Roman Catholics. I'm aware of the myriads of keyboard apologists on the net, but I really didn't expect a response this quickly.

Mr. Timothy, you say that you're one of the Roman Catholic apologists? Do you work for Catholic Answers? EWTN? What have you written? Where may I have heard of you before? I'm just curios. Obviously, I'm not an apologist you have ever heard of. No one has.

If you asked me if I was a good person, I'd answer in the negative as well. When I answered, how would you point me to hope? What kind of peace with God can you offer me? What would you tell me that I would have to DO to know Christ? Better yet, what must I do to be saved (Acts 16:30)? Even better still, what hope do you have in you that drives you and can you give me a reason for it? Can you tell me why I would want to adopt your hope?

The Way of the Master evangelistic approach is a Biblical one, but this blog is not the place that I intended to defend it. To assist someone in seeing the fact that they are a sinner in danger of judgment is necessary. You can hear the presentation of The Way of the Master's explanation of this here:

http://www.wayofthemaster.com/audiolessons.shtml

It's called "Hell's Best Kept Secret," and it's a free download.

*quote*(I suspect its in Acts, just after the word "Trinity", but before one comes to the "sinner's prayer".)*endquote*

I assume you believe in the doctrine of the Trinity as I do, but you may believe that you cannot defend it from the Bible without the Roman Catholic church, right? Well, it is a Biblical doctrine just like any other doctrine that I believe and can support it from the Bible. Just the Bible. I can demonstrate the fact that certain others in the history of the Church believed everything that I believe, but that is not important really. They were not inspired.

Michael.Gabriel said...

An by the way, Mr. Timothy, I'm looking forward to hearing back from you.

Timothy said...

Greetings and thank you for the invitation to return. That's very charitable.

>"You say that you're one of the Roman Catholic apologists? Do you work for Catholic Answers? EWTN? What have you written? Where may I have heard of you before?"

Yep, I'm a lay Catholic apologist. I also happen to be a Latin Rite or Roman Catholic versus an Eastern Rite Catholic. I don't work for Catholic Answers or EWTN. Wouldn't that be a great job! What I've written is largely confined to the blogosphere, my own blog and the hundreds of other blogs where apologetics rubber hits the road, so to speak. I don't know where you would have heard of me shy of you attending one of my many classes and workshps in my area. I'm a technical trainer on many things Internet.

>"If you asked me if I was a good person, I'd answer in the negative as well. When I answered, how would you point me to hope? What kind of peace with God can you offer me? What would you tell me that I would have to DO to know Christ?"

Your first question is key. I don't ask people if they are or consider themselves to be a good person, so I would likely never ask you that question and none of your following questions would likely ever come up.

Generally, I remind people that they are a child of God with an immortal soul made in God's image and that God loves them, but not some of their behaviors. I encourage them to return to their church and pour their heart out to God. [My area of the world is largely Baptist, so I usually am talking with Baptists.]

>"Better yet, what must I do to be saved (Acts 16:30)?"

Interesting that you chose the verb "do". If we delve into scripture, we find many answers given to the various people asking that very question.

To the jailer, Paul said: "Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved, and thy house." (Acts 16:30)

To Nicodemus, Jesus answered: “Verily, verily, I say unto thee, except a man be born of water and of the Spirit, he cannot enter into the kingdom of God” (John 3:5)

To the lawyer, Jesus replied: "Do this ['Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind' and, 'Love your neighbor as yourself] and you will live." (Luke 10:25-28)

Jesus answers the young rich man: "but if thou wilt enter into life, keep the commandments" (Matthew 19:17).

"Belief, baptism, repentance, keeping the commandments, and love of both God and neighbor, are all necessary to achieve salvation." (1)

But, at a meta-physical level, there is nothing you can "do". Salvation is by God's grace. Sanctifying grace is a freely given gift which you or I are free to accept or reject. Personally, I'd accept and say "Thank you!", really loud and long.

Finally, God is free to save anyone with sanctifying grace without regard to belief, baptism, repentance.

>"Even better still, what hope do you have in you that drives you and can you give me a reason for it? Can you tell me why I would want to adopt your hope?"

As the Bible says, I am already saved (Rom. 8:24, Eph. 2:5–8), but I’m also being saved (1 Cor. 1:8, 2 Cor. 2:15, Phil. 2:12), and I have the hope that I will be saved (Rom. 5:9–10, 1 Cor. 3:12–15). Like the apostle Paul I am working out my salvation in fear and trembling (Phil. 2:12), with hopeful confidence in the promises of Christ (Rom. 5:2, 2 Tim. 2:11–13)

>"...you may believe that you cannot defend it from the Bible without the Roman Catholic church, right?"

Wrong. The doctrine of the Trinity is found implicitly in the Bible even though the word "Trinity" does not appear in the Bible.

As I usually only offer apologetic defenses of the Trinity with Islamists, the Bible is not a very effective defense. I generally use Jerome's defense of demonstrating how a liquid (wine in Jerome's case) can be poured into three glasses and then back into one bottle. As this property is universally found among all liquids, powders, and gases, why would God, a non-physical entity, lack this universal property that is so common? Why limit God? (So far, Jerome's defense of the Trinity has been 100% effective.)

>"I can demonstrate the fact that certain others in the history of the Church believed everything that I believe,"

Ditto for Catholics. All of Catholic doctrine is found either implicitly or explicitly in the Bible.

>"They were not inspired."

That's an interesting statement. I'd be curious as to your proof and how one goes about proving that someone centuries ago was "not inspired".

Again, thank you for commenting on my own blog and for the invitation to return and comment on yours. Good luck with your studies and I hope you keep an open mind regarding Catholic doctrine. Take time to read the Ante-Nicene fathers. There's a good collection on the Calvin College web site at:

http://www.ccel.org/fathers.html

God bless...

+Timothy

Michael.Gabriel said...

Timothy, when you quoted me here:

>"If you asked me if I was a good person, I'd answer in the negative as well. When I answered, how would you point me to hope? What kind of peace with God can you offer me? What would you tell me that I would have to DO to know Christ?"

And then answered here:

>Your first question is key. I don't ask people if they are or consider themselves to be a good person, so I would likely never ask you that question and none of your following questions would likely ever come up.

You must not have realized that my comment that you quoted was meant to be a question for you. So, please ponder these questions:
"...how would you point me to hope? What kind of peace with God can you offer me? What would you tell me that I would have to DO to know Christ?"

I do, however, have a comment for this comment that you offerered:

>Generally, I remind people that they are a child of God with an immortal soul made in God's image and that God loves them, but not some of their behaviors. I encourage them to return to their church and pour their heart out to God. [My area of the world is largely Baptist, so I usually am talking with Baptists.]

I'd be interested to know where you have come up with the idea that everyone is a child of God. Are you speaking of people who are Christians? The reason I ask is because Jesus, when speaking to the Jews who would have claimed to have this type of an intimate relationship with God, called them the children of the devil (Jn. 8:44).

Certainly God created mankind in His image (Gen. 1:26-27), and even after the fall man retained that image (Gen. 9:6), although hopelessly tarnished by sin. On the other hand, man (in Adam--see Rom. 5:12 on original sin) has rejected God's authority as creator and stands in danger of judgment based on the fact that he is a sinner from birth and willfully throughout life. By the way, this includes you and me.

Lastly, I'd like to know how you justify the encouragement of unbelievers to "return to their church" based on the fact that one isn't even initiated into the Roman Catholic church without being baptized. As far as I know, the Bible only speaks of believers as being the stones which are building the great temple of Christ's body known as the Church, but please inform me as to any Scriptural evidence you rely on for this assertion.

I plan to get to the rest of your response, but I think that I'll post it in a round about way as a new post on the main blog. But please take some time to respond and interact with me some more on these comments before we move on. Also, keep in mind that I'm praying that the Lord will open your eyes to the truth that Jesus Christ must be all sufficient for you without your trust being in anything else or He will reject you completely. This is about much more than winning an argument Timothy. Both of us cannot be right. Whoever is wrong will stand in danger of God's judgment at the last day. I hope to hear from you soon.

--Mike

Dramatized Exegesis