Protestantism: Critique and Debate Thread

[Cornelius V.E.]

Again, there is no reason to read a works-based salvation into Matthew 7. Doing the will of the Father = believing in the one whom He has sent. Not trusting in your works. Faith without works is dead, but there are no good works without faith.

Sorry, I should have better clarified before. In Matthew 7 Christ throws out those calling him "Lord" for being "evil doers" or, in your translation, "workers of lawlessness." So the problem was not that these Christians didn't have any good works, the problem was that these Christians had unrepented evil works while still feeling entitled to God giving them a free pass for their faith. It sounds to me like they were modern protestants--the same protestants who are declared to be certainly in Heaven during their funerals.

 

[Cornelius V.E.]

Have you stopped sinning or do you still sin?

I have not completely stopped sinning, unfortunately. That being said, I've made tremendous progress and have experienced tremendous spiritual healing over the last several years of living an Orthodox life. I used to commit much bigger sins more regularly, and now I commit small sins, like occasionally saying something negative about someone else, or occasionally feeling prideful. Even these things, however, are unacceptable and must be repented of, and I do not presume that God will give me a free pass for them. I continue to go to confession, to attend Liturgy, to receive communion, and I hope for God's forgiveness and eventual healing. The Bible does make a distinction between mortal and non-mortal sins, although we're not told which is which, but I hope that most of my sins no longer fall into the mortal category (1 John 5:16-17).

From our Orthodox perspective, it is great arrogance and dangerous presumption to say you know for sure you are going to Heaven. We cannot know this simply based on our membership to some church. Christ makes it very clear in the Gospels that salvation depends on much more than just our intellectual assent to a given proposition about history, and He furthermore teaches that we must be humble, and to approach any question of God's Kingdom with great humility. As St. Paul called it, "Fear and Trembling", the type of feelings that are not present in Protestantism's empty and dangerous guarantees.

 

[Cornelius V.E.]

Two threads on here that prove this is false. There was no Orthodox tradition to appeal to in the days of the Apostles. There was only what the Apostles taught orally (which we do not possess) and what they wrote (the Scriptures). The Orthodox tradition, starting from Palamas onwards, is an add-on and non-essential to the Biblical faith. Worse, the deeper you dive into Orthodoxy, the more you are going astray from what the Apostles taught.

If you're going to claim that Orthodox tradition began with Palamas, then I don't think I can consider you a good-faith interlocutor. I'm most likely going to just stop engaging with the discussion here.

 

[Genealogist]

Distinction without a difference. Being reconciled to God = being saved.


In other words, you don't need Baptism to be saved. So either your interpretation of John 3 is wrong or Jesus was.

Christ has the right to dictate the conditions of salvation and He distinctly commanded Baptism as a condition of salvation. As for St. Dismas ('the good thief'), that was still under the old covenant. We live under the New Testament covenant, and therefore all are bound to receive the sacrament of Baptism (or at least have baptism of desire). You can read more on this topic in Summa: https://t.co/3fw4X9oics

Again, there is no reason to read a works-based salvation into Matthew 7. Doing the will of the Father = believing in the one whom He has sent. Not trusting in your works. Faith without works is dead, but there are no good works without faith.

Luther reduced faith to a kind of blind trust or confidence in one’s salvation (faith as hope). What Protestants call 'faith' is in actuality 'trust to be saved'. This is why faith/works arguments with them don’t go very far. They misuse the term 'faith', and it causes a plethora of misunderstandings. Faith is a supernatural assent of our intellects to truths revealed by God, and proposed by the Catholic Church, and believing these truths based solely on the authority of God revealing them, who can neither deceived nor be deceived. It is a free gift of God, since the power to believe can only be obtained through the grace of God. Without faith there is no salvation - but 'faith alone' is not sufficient for salvation. It must be a living faith, that us, we must add to it good works pleasing to God and must be ready to confess it openly.

Your entire post is bashing on Protestants and talking up the Orthodox Church, you guys don't come across as very humble to me. You are free to say Orthodoxy is better in every way. But I am also free to point out that it is worse (less Biblical) in every way.

You're not kidding!

 

[GodfatherPartTwo]

From our Orthodox perspective, it is great arrogance and dangerous presumption to say you know for sure you are going to Heaven. We cannot know this simply based on our membership to some church. Christ makes it very clear in the Gospels that salvation depends on much more than just our intellectual assent to a given proposition about history, and He furthermore teaches that we must be humble, and to approach any question of God's Kingdom with great humility. As St. Paul called it, "Fear and Trembling", the type of feelings that are not present in Protestantism's empty and dangerous guarantees.

So in Orthodoxy, you don't know if you're saved. And everything that bespeaks God's promise of salvation, that is His grace, His predestination, His justification, His taking our sins onto Himself, His dying for us, anything that guarantees our salvation is to be denied because salvation is not guaranteed. And people should believe in this, why? The telltale sign of a man-centered, works-based soteriology: there is no doctrine of perseverance, no assurance of salvation.

I will leave you with this.

1 John 5:13 These things I have written to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life. 14And this is the confidence which we have before Him, that, if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. 15And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him.

Fellas, this is for CATHOLIC debate. Protestants should get their own thread, this thread is ultra confusing as it is.

Unfortunately, it is hard to avoid the Mexican standoff in this thread. Catholicism lies somewhere in between Reformed theology and Eastern Orthodoxy. So when you shoot at Catholicism, some of the shots go through and the other side takes collateral damage.

 

[GodfatherPartTwo]

Christ has the right to dictate the conditions of salvation and He distinctly commanded Baptism as a condition of salvation. As for St. Dismas ('the good thief'), that was still under the old covenant. We live under the New Testament covenant, and therefore all are bound to receive the sacrament of Baptism (or at least have baptism of desire). You can read more on this topic in Summa: https://t.co/3fw4X9oics

Dismas was not justified by the Old (Mosaic) Covenant. In order to be saved in the Mosaic Covenant, you had to keep the Law perfectly. Something Dismas clearly didn't do as he was being crucified for theft. That's why no one is saved by the Law because only Jesus ever kept the Law perfectly. Dismas was saved just like everyone else who ever was saved: on the basis of God's grace given through Christ in the New Covenant. Water baptism is not necessary (for salvation), as is clearly seen in the case of Dismas.

Luther reduced faith to a kind of blind trust or confidence in one’s salvation (faith as hope). What Protestants call 'faith' is in actuality 'trust to be saved'. This is why faith/works arguments with them don’t go very far. They misuse the term 'faith', and it causes a plethora of misunderstandings. Faith is a supernatural assent of our intellects to truths revealed by God, and proposed by the Catholic Church, and believing these truths based solely on the authority of God revealing them, who can neither deceived nor be deceived. It is a free gift of God, since the power to believe can only be obtained through the grace of God. Without faith there is no salvation - but 'faith alone' is not sufficient for salvation. It must be a living faith, that us, we must add to it good works pleasing to God and must be ready to confess it openly.

Faith is a gift given according to God's grace. If that's what you're saying, then we have no disagreement. So it is not merely intellectual assent, it is the gift of God so that no one may boast. Good works will necessarily result from faith, but they are not the grounds for our justification.

 

[Cornelius V.E.]

So in Orthodoxy, you don't know if you're saved. And everything that bespeaks God's promise of salvation, that is His grace, His predestination, His justification, His taking our sins onto Himself, His dying for us, anything that guarantees our salvation is to be denied because salvation is not guaranteed. And people should believe in this, why? The telltale sign of a man-centered, works-based soteriology: there is no doctrine of perseverance, no assurance of salvation.

Christ condemns protestant soteriology, assurance of salvation, and salvation by "faith alone" throughout the Gospels. Perhaps most clearly in the Parable of the Sheep and the Goats (Matthew 25:31-46):
--------------------------
31 “When the Son of Man comes in his glory, and all the angels with him, he will sit on his glorious throne. 32 All the nations will be gathered before him, and he will separate the people one from another as a shepherd separates the sheep from the goats. 33 He will put the sheep on his right and the goats on his left.

34 “Then the King will say to those on his right, ‘Come, you who are blessed by my Father; take your inheritance, the kingdom prepared for you since the creation of the world. 35 For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in, 36 I needed clothes and you clothed me, I was sick and you looked after me, I was in prison and you came to visit me.’

37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’

40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’

41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’

44 “They also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry or thirsty or a stranger or needing clothes or sick or in prison, and did not help you?’

45 “He will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did not do for one of the least of these, you did not do for me.’

46 “Then they will go away to eternal punishment, but the righteous to eternal life.”
--------------------------

Read that again and tell me that works don't matter, and that works play no role in our salvation.

The only reason I reply here is to dispel any confusion for those who might be new to these debates. Any 3rd party to this discussion should be able to see very clearly which position shines with the truth of Christ. Faith, Hope, and Love remain. And the greatest of these is Love (not Faith).

Protestantism is heresy and doesn't correspond at all to Christ's clear teachings in the Sacred Scriptures. Protestantism merely cherry picks Bible verses and then interprets them in a very narrow, modern fashion without taking into account the greater whole Biblical teaching.

 

[magoo]

In order to remain Catholic, it is absolutely necessary to stay away from the Novus Ordo. The problem with the SSPX is that while rejecting certain aspects of the new religion, they still recognize value and authority in the hierarchy that gave us Vatican II. The integral profession of the Catholic faith demands that we stay away from the Novus Ordo and from the SSPX. Catholics should seek valid and LICIT Sacraments, if they wish to preserve their faith intact.

I believe in the Holy Catholic Church. This is the article of faith which the SSPX - all the false "trads" who recognize Francis and his Vatican II predecessors as legitimate popes - have turned into an empty name.

DIVIDE ET IMPERA

There´s no grey protestant shit in the Catholic Church. If you reject the Pope. You are not roman catholic. Either it´s black or white. There are no greys. As simple as that. You are a protestant. I don´t know what protestants are. Because there´s so many. But probably you are a protestant. Some conservative faction. They seem to don´t like the Pope. Transgender priests are ok though. Pope nope.

Jews don´t have a pope. Jews don´t have a central authority. Imagine this. I would have never guessed. They would have the same type of structure than protestants.

 

[Samseau]

This thread is so there is a place where off-topic Prot debates can be moved. Also, for those in general who want to square the circle of relativistic universalism of Protestantism.

 

[scorpion]

Without faith there is no salvation - but 'faith alone' is not sufficient for salvation. It must be a living faith, that us, we must add to it good works pleasing to God and must be ready to confess it openly.

Read that again and tell me that works don't matter, and that works play no role in our salvation.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and that not of yourselves; it is the gift of God, not of works, lest anyone should boast. - Ephesians 2: 8-9

It's hard to imagine a passage of scripture being more crystal clear than this. There is no "failure to interpret" this correctly. It plainly says exactly what it says. Paul continues in verse 10: "For we are His workmanship, created in Christ Jesus for good works, which God prepared beforehand that we should walk in them." (emphasis mine)

The good works we do are not of ourselves or to our credit in any way, they are simply the manifestation of the Holy Spirit dwelling within us, which is given to us as an undeserved gift by grace through our faith in Christ. We are no in way earning salvation or credit with God by performing good works, we are merely giving evidence (both to others and ourselves) of the regenerating salvific work He has already accomplished in us. Good works are therefore not a component of salvation, they are the product of it.

 

[magoo]

Some cath people I know went to a protestant service (this is how they call mass) in London. They were disgusted. They said it looked like a concert. Without any relation to christ. The mother was specially offended. She said something like. It was meaningless. There´s no meaning. Will tell her daughter to attend a transgender. Woman will have a heart attack.

 

[GodfatherPartTwo]

Paul says that the Law shuts the mouth up and makes the whole world guilty in Romans 3. How does it do this? Whenever you try to reconcile yourself to God on the basis of your own works, instead of trusting in His grace, you are trying to justify yourself. It is self-righteousness. Not Christ's imputed-righteousness. You say you've repented, you say you're ontologically perfect, but you cannot even keep the Law that God has already set. Indeed, you cannot even keep it for one day. So what hope is there for you who seek to turn the Gospel of Grace into a New Law?

 

[GoodShepherd]

A major difference Iv noticed in my experience between protestant church and orthodox church is that the protestants are very confident of their salvation and everyone elsea salvation, as mention here in the comments even at funerals they tell the family members that they are sure the dead loved one is saved.

In the Orthodox church we dont really hear anyone claiming they are saved and neither are we 100% sure that we ouselves are saved but we hope so. When we have memorials we pray for the souls of the departed that God might have mercy on them, we dont make a statement of where they are because its a mystery to us, saint Paisios I heard once that he wasnt too happy that people thought he was a living saint because he said that when he died then those people might not pray for his soul.

In our prayer books I cant remember reading thay we are gauranteed heaven, the prayers are more inline with forgivness, have mercy on me etc, we have to wait for the great judgement day to see what God decides to do with us and I hope He will be mercyful with me.

 

[GodfatherPartTwo]

A major difference Iv noticed in my experience between protestant church and orthodox church is that the protestants are very confident of their salvation and everyone elsea salvation, as mention here in the comments even at funerals they tell the family members that they are sure the dead loved one is saved.

In the Orthodox church we dont really hear anyone claiming they are saved and neither are we 100% sure that we ouselves are saved but we hope so. When we have memorials we pray for the souls of the departed that God might have mercy on them, we dont make a statement of where they are because its a mystery to us, saint Paisios I heard once that he wasnt too happy that people thought he was a living saint because he said that when he died then those people might not pray for his soul.

In our prayer books I cant remember reading thay we are gauranteed heaven, the prayers are more inline with forgivness, have mercy on me etc, we have to wait for the great judgement day to see what God decides to do with us and I hope He will be mercyful with me.

The reason Orthodox do not know if they are saved is because they view salvation as a legalistic set of requirements that the individual must accomplish in order to be saved. They do not view it as the free gift of God freely bestowed on the believer. That is what determines your assurance of salvation. If you believe that you earn salvation, then rightfully, you will never know you are saved.

1 John says that he wrote what he wrote so that those who believe in Jesus may know and have confidence that they have eternal life and that God will grant them their desires if their desires are according to His will. Notice how the emphasis in 1 John is on God, not on man.

 

[magoo]

A major difference Iv noticed in my experience between protestant church and orthodox church is that the protestants are very confident of their salvation and everyone elsea salvation, as mention here in the comments even at funerals they tell the family members that they are sure the dead loved one is saved.

In the Orthodox church we dont really hear anyone claiming they are saved and neither are we 100% sure that we ouselves are saved but we hope so. When we have memorials we pray for the souls of the departed that God might have mercy on them, we dont make a statement of where they are because its a mystery to us, saint Paisios I heard once that he wasnt too happy that people thought he was a living saint because he said that when he died then those people might not pray for his soul.

In our prayer books I cant remember reading thay we are gauranteed heaven, the prayers are more inline with forgivness, have mercy on me etc, we have to wait for the great judgement day to see what God decides to do with us and I hope He will be mercyful with me.

It´s because they have no guilt. Plain and simple. If you take away the stop sign.

 

[Genealogist]

(emphasis mine)

is doing a lot of heavy lifting.

 

[Rax Moscow]

Really? I'm coming from a Lutheran background and I'd say it's less legalistic than Reformed/Calvinistic but Lutheranism is still legalistic in it's framing (no one was able to break that frame from Rome). The whole justification/imputation/approbation is all legalistic wording and assumes a legalistic mindset. Orthodoxy (as far as I can tell) is based on communion and theosis which is much more organic.

North I have zero experience with Lutheranism, though I am halfway through the excellent Stone Choir podcast made by 2 based Lutherans. They had a particularly bizarre episode where they critiqued Orthodoxy and it was mostly about meditation and prayer and how yoga is summoning demons or something. They also had a very bizarre episode where they insisted the moon landing was real (why did we need an episode about this?) So they can get a little nutty but overall I find them excellent.

As they are my only experience with Lutheranism (other than reading a bit of Martin Luther, who was based and Christpilled), what is your experience with the modern Lutheran church? I was raised Methodist and they just had a schism this year and most of the church left due to gay marriage issues. How is the mainstream Lutheran church today? Are women pastors allowed? Gay flags? Progressivism?

 

[GoodShepherd]

The reason Orthodox do not know if they are saved is because they view salvation as a legalistic set of requirements that the individual must accomplish in order to be saved. They do not view it as the free gift of God freely bestowed on the believer. That is what determines your assurance of salvation. If you believe that you earn salvation, then rightfully, you will never know you are saved.

1 John says that he wrote what he wrote so that those who believe in Jesus may know and have confidence that they have eternal life and that God will grant them their desires if their desires are according to His will. Notice how the emphasis in 1 John is on God, not on man.

Its in the scriptures that the grace God is a free gift I understand that, I think the difference between our theology would be the definition of what salvation is, where in the protestant world salvation basically means saved from hell and depending on what group you belong to they would usually believe in once saved always saved. I think the Christianity that believes in works salvation alone without Gods grace they can also tend to boast and be "sure" of their salvation because they doing everything right it can go both ways.

If we also look at the demons, satan and the jews we get an example that you can be a part of God and then lose it and be seperated, the same with Adam and Eve, if I think about these stories they didnt lose communion with God because of works or lack of works but it does show that we can cut ourselves off or be cut off from Gods grace but there is also always room for a reuniting back to God and yes its by the grace and mercy of God.

Regarding works, someone who has faith will demonstrate their faith by their works, sometimes the person might not even be aware that they are demonstrating works and at the same time other mighy be very aware of their good works but they are not genuine, I think in the scriptures its called dead works.

There also seems to be degrees of Gods grace that each individual receives as they go. The sacrements help us here on earth in mortal bodies to partake of God like the holy communion for example, we read apostle Paul talk about it in book of Corinthians if taken in an unworthy manner it can make Christians sick and cause premature death.

As someone mentioned on the comments already sometimes people receive Gods grace without sacrements like the thief on the cross, he repented for his sins and recognised the Lord but the other guy his friend didnt repent and recognise the Lord, we can say it was a sacrement of confession maybe? If God wants to save people thats His business too I have no issue with that Im sure we will be very suprised

 

[GoodShepherd]

It is easier to sin and get away with it in the protestant world that I can admit and agree on, in the Orthodox church we have to go to confessio when we sin and discuss our sins with our priest and to partake of holy communion we would like to do it with a clean concience so we supposed to go to confession first before holy communion if we have fallen into sin, you will notice that not everyone partakes of holy communion at church as some havent maybe fasted or they not ready yet due to confession or whatever, I once went to a service and only 1 guy went to the front to take the Eucharist everyone else stayed back, other times the majority go,some people arent allowed to go for a few years maybe for whatever reason. So it does make you think twice before sinning because there is more accountabiluty.

The little I know about Martin Luther is that I think he would fit in more with the Orthodox church than modern Protestant churches as he still believed in confession, the Eucharist, icons, priests and sacrements he also didnt believe in an invisible church etc, the protestant church has evolved a lot and rejected a lot of Church customes and traditions of God and this is very dangerous.

 

[JCSteel]

I believe True Biblical Christianity exults Christ above our own efforts, while proclaiming that salvation is primarily new spiritual life within us, since spiritually dead men can't have communion with God.

Protestants focus heavily on the forensic side of being reconciled to God through Christ's death, insisting that there is nothing we can bring to the table to merit our salvation. I don't know any Christian who would argue against that.

Trusting in ourselves, as if we are acceptable before God without Jesus, is something to be guarded against, but not at the expense of other aspects of salvation. I get the sense from some Protestants that they feel it's a zero sum game between Christ and man's repentance/new birth. I acknowledge there is a range of views on this issue within Protestantism and Evangelicals.
Some Orthodox Clergy I've spoken with have a high regard for John Wesley and his soteriology.