Figuring Out Religion

[Tortoise]

One way that I think of hell is not as something God does to us but rather the natural path that we follow throughout life.  It is almost automatic to give into temptations/laziness/anger/etc.  We somehow need to be snapped out of this downward spiral, and strangely a belief in a higher power seems to really help people.

I agree that one can certainly go through a type of earthly "hell" while still alive, but consider that the book of Revelation uses the phrase "second death" ( Revelation 2:11, 20:6, 20:14, and 21:8 ). That seems to be a clear indication that it's not something we can or ever do experience in this earthly life.

By the way, I just figured I'd share something with everyone that I learned the other day that blew my mind. I've never read the Old Testament very carefully in big chunks--only verses here and there--but recently it came to my attention that the story of God commanding Abraham to sacrifice his son Isaac actually foreshadowed Christ's sacrifice. Pay close attention to the parts I've placed in boldface:

Some time later God tested Abraham. He said to him, “Abraham!”?

“Here I am,”? he replied.

Then God said, “Take your son, your only son, whom you love—Isaac—and go to the region of Moriah. Sacrifice him there as a burnt offering on a mountain I will show you.”?

Early the next morning Abraham got up and loaded his donkey. He took with him two of his servants and his son Isaac. When he had cut enough wood for the burnt offering, he set out for the place God had told him about. On the third day Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance. He said to his servants, “Stay here with the donkey while I and the boy go over there. We will worship and then we will come back to you.”?

Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering and placed it on his son Isaac, and he himself carried the fire and the knife. As the two of them went on together, Isaac spoke up and said to his father Abraham, “Father?”?

“Yes, my son?”? Abraham replied.

“The fire and wood are here,”? Isaac said, “but where is the lamb for the burnt offering?”?

Abraham answered, “God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.”? And the two of them went on together.

The part about Abraham placing the wood on Isaac to carry up the hill just blew me away. The parallel with Jesus carrying his wooden cross up the hill to the place where he would be sacrificed struck me as utterly profound. And then Abraham made the parallel even clearer by saying, "God himself will provide the lamb." Maybe some of you already knew about this foreshadowing of Christ, but I had never heard about it even though I was raised Christian and attended a religious school. (Maybe I just wasn't paying attention...)

For someone under the mistaken impression that the OT and NT are virtually separate Bibles describing two completely different versions of God, just consider this story of Abraham and Isaac as just one example of how that's not necessarily true. Jesus quoted the OT all over the place, saying that all of it was written about him--he said he was the fulfillment of Scripture. So now that I recently finished reading the NT, I'm going to get a study Bible (perhaps the ESV Study Bible, unless anyone here recommends a different one) and carefully read the OT from beginning to end in the proper big-picture context of Christ. It's something I should have done a long time ago.

[Mountaineer]

So now that I recently finished reading the NT, I'm going to get a study Bible (perhaps the ESV Study Bible, unless anyone here recommends a different one) and carefully read the OT from beginning to end in the proper big-picture context of Christ. It's something I should have done a long time ago.

http://www.cph.org/p-11334-the-lutheran ... dback.aspx

This is the best study Bible I have used.  It contains lots of supplemental material, besides the notes and such, that I have found very interesting and useful.  Best wishes for whatever you choose.  The Bible that I linked to comes in several editions, some large print, some fancier bindings.  If you decide you want the Lutheran ESV study Bible, be sure you get the one from CPH.  I think there is another Lutheran study Bible by almost the same name that is not from CPH (Concordia Publishing House).  I did get mine from Amazon a few years ago, thus my caution to be sure you know which one you are getting as they probably still offer both.

Excellent post you made about the "foreshadowing" of Christ by Abraham and Isaac in the First Testament.

... Mountaineer

[Mountaineer]

I would have probably said exactly the same thing in response to myself some years ago.

Personally, I think God probably has better things to do in the Universe than sort through people's beliefs to determine whether they are heretics are not. Reminds me of a lot of the stuff I have to work with in corporate Bureaucracy.  Personally, I think he would be much more interested in how we lived our lives, not in the purity of our beliefs.

But maybe that's just me. Maybe only the Quality Assurance team makes it to heaven. The rest of us are fucked.

ns3,

Interesting where you and I are in our beliefs - we have apparently changed places.  Many years ago, I would have said what you did about good works being what God cared about and got you saved (I was raised in a "works righteousness" type church).  I have now come to understand the brilliance of Martin Luther rediscovering via intensive Scripture study that "justification by faith" is the way and is what the Scriptures have always said (read through the lens of the entire Scriptures being about Jesus - OT pointing out the need for Jesus, NT about what Jesus did for us).  I do tend to think the end result of an Evangelical (e.g. Southern Baptist, Roman Catholic) works righteousness interpretation of Scripture is usually despair or pride; despair when one finally determines he can never do enough or questions how much is enough, and pride if you fall out on the side of thinking you know it all and why doesn't everyone else "get it".  That is unless the Evangelical "jumps ship" to justification by faith, the other option besides pride or despair.

... Mountaineer

I was raised in the Quaker Church, as was Richard Nixon. Actually, the pastor of the church I attended (Richard Ball) gave the invocation at Nixon's inauguration.

In 1969-70 I served the Christian cause in Vietnam, helping to kill communists for Christ but ending up in jail in protest when I came home and eventually receiving a dishonorable discharge from the Navy.  Today my "service" in Vietnam is a source of shame that I keep to myself, especially when people try to honor me for it, which is often. I struggle to be polite when they do.

Despite all this I was an unbeliever until I got "saved" (said a prayer) during the Jesus movement in the 70's.

I spent nearly every waking minute reading the Bible for a very long period in my life. And I have no regrets about it.

Long about 1978 I was sitting in a Bible study in a Lutheran church when the pastor walked up to me and spoke a word of prophesy that I had been called as an Apostle (mind you, I said this was a Lutheran Church - a very mainstream protestant denomination not given to such dramatic things as prophecy).

I took this as a call to "the ministry" but despite my best efforts it never happened, although I was officially ordained as a Southern Baptist minister during a period of having a Bible study in my home.

My first wife died of cancer and today I am married to a wonderful Catholic lady from the Philippines who is the best thing to ever happen to me and I never go to church. Church sucks.

That is my testimony.

Do with it what you will.

Life on this earth certainly is a struggle as Scripture so clearly indicates.  Your story is an indication of that you have really had some "interesting" stumbling blocks put in your path that would raise a lot of questions for most of us.  I really do hope you are able to find peace and comfort in the way you are pursuing.  From my perspective, God's gift is always there for you.

... Mountaineer

[ns3]

Anyway, I guess my point is that I hope you can set aside the "kill the commies for Christ" crowd that you encountered in the past, as well as the many sucky churches that exist today, and focus on Jesus's message as it's told in the NT and foretold in the OT.

I put away the kill the commies for Christ crowd long ago. This included protestant saint Billy Graham, BTW. There are tapes available of him urging Nixon to bomb the hell out of Vietnam and you can find them on the internet. Today you have "evangelists" like John Hagee who view modern day Israel as the Israel of the Bible and take a completely Old Testament view about it. I think he would cheer Israel on if they went into Palestine and destroyed every man, woman, and child (after all these are the Philistines that Samson destroyed, are they not?) Pretty sickening stuff, in my opinion but I can very well see how you come to believe these kinds of things if you are a Biblical literalist.

[ns3]

Life on this earth certainly is a struggle as Scripture so clearly indicates.  Your story is an indication of that you have really had some "interesting" stumbling blocks put in your path that would raise a lot of questions for most of us.  I really do hope you are able to find peace and comfort in the way you are pursuing.  From my perspective, God's gift is always there for you.

... Mountaineer

Looking back on it all I don't think I have lost any faith, taken altogether. Just chaff separating from the wheat.

I still think I know Jesus. Personally.

And despite some setbacks in our relationship I am well convinced this feeling is mutual.

(Is this a nut speaking> - someone who claims to personally know Jesus Christ - isn't this what Christianity is supposed to be all about?). Any of you claiming to be Christians who want to chime in with your own personal testimony of knowing Jesus personally, please do so - the world needs it.

[Mountaineer]

Session 5 of "Questioning Christianity" is another good one.  This time, Pastor Keller addresses, by logic, all the reasons Christianity makes better sense than the other religions, including the "non-religion" religion.

If you are interested in logic, as I suspect most of us on the board are, this is a good one to test your thinking.

http://new.livestream.com/redeemer-nyc/events/2682018

... Mountaineer

[Tortoise]

I've been reading one of the books that Mountaineer mentioned (may have been in a different thread), called Broken: 7 "Christian" Rules That Every Christian Ought to Break as Often as Possible by Jonathan Fisk. It's a really good read, and it's gotten me wondering which denomination of Christianity tends to center itself around the actual, unadulterated, non-cherry-picked Word of Christ most faithfully. The author is Lutheran, and two of the participants in this thread--Mountaineer and Xan--are also Lutheran (LCMS).

I was raised in the Seventh-Day Adventist church: a small, borderline cultish denomination that, although ostensibly Christ-centered, also reveres the writings of a 19th century woman named Ellen G. White, whom they consider to be a prophet. SDAs "keep the Sabbath" by worshiping on Saturday, like the Jews, and they point to one of the Ten Commandments (Exodus 20:8-11) as the reason for that. They claim that working on the Sabbath is a sin and that worshiping on Sunday is a sin, and in fact, E. G. White wrote that in the End Days, the forces of Satan will try to force SDAs by law to worship on Sunday. SDAs also believe that drinking any coffee or alcohol is a sin, and that eating certain kinds of "unclean" meat (such as pork) is a sin. I think E. G. White also wrote some other weird things back in her day like it was sinful or improper to ride on bicycles, one should not eat butter, one should stay away from condiments like mustard and "excessively spicy" foods, etc., etc. Bizarre, uber-puritanical, legalistic stuff.

Seventh-Day Adventism always struck me as extremely legalistic on matters based on cherry-picked Bible verses that are either taken out of context, or aren't even from the Bible at all. So when I went away to college, I pretty much stopped going to church and reading the Bible. And I didn't look back until now, at the age of 34. Some conversations with friends, some events in my life, and even this discussion thread have all been gently pulling me back toward Christianity. The thing is, I want to go back to Christ--not necessarily the Seventh-Day Adventist church and its strange, cultish beliefs that distract from Christ's actual words.

I hate to be a "church shopper," but I'm afraid that's what I might have to be temporarily until I find a Christian denomination that seems least distracted by false teachings, false prophets, cults of personality, excessive legalism, completely made-up doctrines, leadership/administration/pragmatism/self-help/Oprah/Dr. Phil nonsense, pop culture, "contemporary" trappings like praise bands and PowerPoint presentations, etc. I want to try to get away from all of that if possible. What I feel I'm looking for is a group of people who want to really sink their teeth into Scripture and understand fully what Christ actually said and did, and aren't constantly tinkering with things in an attempt to boost church attendance and "speak the language" of pop culture.

So far, I have to say I've been pretty impressed with the Reformation-spectrum ideas expressed in the White Horse Inn podcast, and I've also been impressed with the LCMS material I've started reading. It seems like they have a refreshingly focused, consistent approach to reading and interpreting Scripture in proper context. In addition to attending an LCMS service and maybe Presbyterian as well, I'd also like to study more in-depth the core similarities and differences between the various Christian denominations--doctrine, liturgy, etc.--and what issue(s) historically motivated each of them to finally break off and form their own denomination. Do any of you know of any especially good books, articles, or videos that effectively compare and contrast the major Christian denominations?

[Ad Orientem]

May I suggest you add 'The Orthodox Church" by Timothy Ware to your reading list?
http://www.amazon.com/The-Orthodox-Chur ... 0140146563

P.S. Most well stocked public libraries will have a copy.

[Mountaineer]

In addition to attending an LCMS service and maybe Presbyterian as well, I'd also like to study more in-depth the core similarities and differences between the various Christian denominations--doctrine, liturgy, etc.--and what issue(s) historically motivated each of them to finally break off and form their own denomination. Do any of you know of any especially good books, articles, or videos that effectively compare and contrast the major Christian denominations?

This book is a high level summary of different denominations that might be helpful.  I have the 11th edition; from my perspective, it is just "OK" as it does not go into much depth.  However, it is probably one of the better overall summary books that I've read.  If you find something that interests you, you will probably be better served by going to that denomination's website and exploring in more depth, or finding a pastor/minister/priest who belongs to that denomination and having a discussion with them. 

http://www.amazon.com/Handbook-Denomina ... 1426700482

Another book that gets mixed reviews and I have read is:

http://www.amazon.com/Complete-Guide-Ch ... 0736912894

For either book, you may wish to read the comments on the Amazon page before making a decision. 

I have also read the book by Timothy Ware that Ad Orientum recommended and found it interesting as I remember; it's been about 10 years since I read it so my memory for specifics is quite fuzzy.  I read the book when I was taking the class on Eastern Orthodoxy.

This is also a helpful website for looking up all sorts of things and it has a great bibliography for many subjects:

http://cyclopedia.lcms.org


... Mountaineer


Edited to add link to the cyclopedia webpage.

[Ad Orientem]

May I suggest you add 'The Orthodox Church" by Timothy Ware to your reading list?
http://www.amazon.com/The-Orthodox-Chur ... 0140146563

P.S. Most well stocked public libraries will have a copy.

Thanks for the link.  Would you mind sharing a bit about how you discovered the Orthodox Church, and some of the key differences between the Orthodox Church and Protestantism?

Oh my. In two sentences you ask for what could easily fill several books. The extremely brief version...

I was raised Roman Catholic and first came into contact with Orthodoxy when I was about 15 when I attended a Russian Orthodox liturgy.  I probably was a convert before the service was over but it took a couple decades before I made it official.

A comparison between Orthodoxy and Protestantism is rather difficult since I am unaware of any article of doctrine on which all Protestants agree. That said I will give it a shot and add a few online references.

The Orthodox Church self identifies as The Church founded by Jesus Christ at Pentecost and referenced in the various symbols of Faith, most notably the Nicene Constantinopolitan Creed (http://orthodoxwiki.org/Nicene-Constantinopolitan_Creed). It's doctrine is based on Scripture, Holy Tradition (which is to say the interpretation of Scripture and the Faith by the Fathers of the Church and the saints), the consensus fidelium, and the decrees of the Ecumenical Councils. The Orthodox Church recognizes nine Great Councils as having made binding doctrinal pronouncements. The first seven of these are also recognized by the Roman Catholic Church.

Orthodoxy means right belief and the core of the Faith is contained in the Nicene Creed. Later the Roman Catholic Church unilaterally added the Latin term "Filioque" (http://orthodoxwiki.org/Filioque) to the Creed which greatly contributed to the eventual breakdown in relations between the Christian East and West. See The Great Schism for an overview of the East - West break up. (http://silouanthompson.net/library/hist ... at-schism/).

Despite the schism, it would be fair to say that Orthodoxy has much more in common with the Roman Catholic Church than any of the innumerable Protestant denominations. This should not be surprising since the Roman Church was part of the Orthodox Church for roughly a thousand years. (They would of course say that the Orthodox was a part of the Catholic Church.)

Among the many points of difference...

* Sola Scriptura is not accepted and is generally regarded as theological heresy. http://silouanthompson.net/2008/07/sola-scriptura/

* Sacraments: Our position is very close to that of the Roman Catholic Church excepting they have limited the number to seven and we have never defined how many sacraments there are. But we agree substantively on the seven major sacraments which we call Holy Mysteries. There are some minor differences but not enough to warrant discussion here. http://orthodoxwiki.org/Holy_Mysteries#Seven

* Calvinism is a condemned heresy. http://classicalchristianity.com/2011/0 ... calvinism/

* Saints: We venerate saints and the holy icons. Though worship (an important distinction) is restricted to God. http://orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/inq_veneration.aspx

* Worship: We are a liturgical church and would be considered decidedly High Church by probably everyone. The Orthodox Church's style of worship is of the Byzantine tradition which developed in the Eastern Roman Empire. Many of our services have not seen any major changes in 1500 years. Orthodox services tend to be longer than those in the Western Christian tradition. It's something of a joke that if there is a shorter way to do something, it's not Orthodox. http://youtu.be/IGm5Llw3wPc

* Scripture: The canon of scripture in the Old Testament is different from most Protestants as the Orthodox Church accepts the Greek Septuagint. http://orthodoxwiki.org/Holy_Scripture# ... _Scripture

* Fasting: We still fast in the Orthodox Church. Most Wednesdays and Fridays are fast days. Additionally there are four major fasts during the church year, with Lent being the longest and most strict. http://www.abbamoses.com/fasting.html

* Salvation: Just watch the video. The lecture starts at around 6 minutes. http://youtu.be/3F7h-TStNd8

* Ecclesiology: The Church is visible and it is one. http://www.orthodoxinfo.com/inquirers/church.pdf (A word of caution. The linked article is a bit polemical. Apologies if anyone is offended.)

The above list is probably just scratching the theological surface. But it was what came to mind as I was typing.

[Ad Orientem]

Ok, I've made it through all this material.  Thanks again for the information.  The article regarding sola scriptura was very interesting.  I have a lot more thinking to do on that topic.  I have a few hopefully simple questions, and then I'll go away and study some more:
1. Are services generally held in the local language?  In other words, if I wander into a Orthodox church in the mid South, should I expect to hear English? 
Your mileage will vary here. In general it is the tradition of the Church to hold services in the local language. However there are some parishes that are heavily ethnic and the language of the old country/mother church (Russian Slavonic Greek Serbian etc) will still be heard in parts of the service. But today English is by far the most common language in Orthodox parishes. If you are looking to visit check around or just phone the parish and ask. Many cities have more than one parish.

2. Do young children typically participate in the services along with the parents?
Children are always welcome and many people are surprised at how much latitude they are given at Orthodox services. Also we give Holy Communion to children from the time they are baptized. Young people are encouraged to join the choir or serve on the altar (though the latter is restricted to boys).

3. Do you find the sacrament-rich, "High Church" environment is incompatible with ... (having a hard time choosing the words) a passionate zeal for Christianity?  In other words, is it like some Catholic churches in which the congregation is religious on Sunday, but they're pretty much like the rest of the world the rest of the week? 
Again your mileage will vary a bit. There are certainly some people who go to church on Sunday because that is what they were raised to do. But in my experience (anecdotal) that is not too common. And in fairness I have never set foot in a church where there weren't  at least a few people like that. The heavy emphasis on a sacramental life in my experience is actually a huge source of spiritual strength.

4. If you walk into multiple Orthodox services in various locations in the U.S., do you find a fairly consistent experience and doctrine? 
Yes. There will be minor variations in the way things are done (emphasis on minor) but doctrine is doctrine. Also the liturgy is pretty much the same. Again if your an experienced liturgist, you may note when some priests omit the prayers for catachumens and there are a few, mostly Greek parishes, where one may find an organ (yuck!). But these things are pretty trivial. The concept of liberal and conservative are definitely subjective terms in Orthodoxy. There is a joke that in the Episcopal Church a very conservative pastor might have qualms about marrying two men. In the Orthodox Church a radically liberal priest might shave.

I must say that, after a very brief read through the material above, I find a lot to appreciate about the Orthodox church.  The biggest hurdle for me would likely be my bias (which I don't defend, only admit to holding) against formality and what I sometimes view as "stuffy tradition."  Don't take that the wrong way, it's just a bias I've somehow ended up with.  That doesn't mean I wouldn't pursue Orthodoxy if I felt it was the closest to the "true church," however.  I'm more interested in the truth than I am in my own intellectual comfort (or at least I try to be).

If you are thinking about visiting an Orthodox parish (I  encourage it) here are a couple of sites that may be helpful.

1. An Orthodox Parish Directory for the US and Canada... http://orthodoxyinamerica.org/
2. Tips for first time visitors to an Orthodox parish... http://frederica.com/12-things/

Finally a quick FYI. As I type we are only hours from the beginning of Lent sometimes known as the Great Fast (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great_Lent). So please don't be offended if the coffee hour after church is actually limited to coffee (with no cream!) and maybe a little vegetarian side dish. During Lent there are a lot of special services held that are unique to this time of year. One of my favorites is the Great Canon of St. Andrew of Crete (guaranteed to make you feel like dirt). The service is so long though that outside of monasteries it's usually broken up and served over several days.

I hope this helps.

[Xan]

Ad, let me echo Desert's thanks for the great information.

I'm curious about the practice of communing young children.  For us, parents bring their children up to the rail, and they receive a nice blessing, but don't receive the Sacrament until they have been instructed in the faith and confirmed.  I believe this is primarily based on 1 Corinthians 11:29, that if you eat and drink the Lord's Body and Blood without discerning it, you're inviting judgment.  Is it the Orthodox position that baptized infants by default accept the doctrine of the Real Presence until and unless they specifically repudiate it?  Just curious here.  I think it would be great to commune children.

I'd also like to make a defense of sola scriptura.  As the article you linked to points out, what Luther meant by sola scriptura is not what the radical reformers ended up doing.  Many churches use what we would call "nuda scriptura", that is, naked Scripture, Scripture and absolutely nothing else.  We would condemn this as well.

Sola scriptura means that anything that we preach, teach, or confess must be in agreement with Scripture, or more precisely, not be in disagreement with Scripture.  That is, Scripture is the sole measure, or test, of doctrine.  Sola scriptura DOES embrace the tradition of the Church.  Somebody like the Baptists would say that you don't need context or tradition or creeds or councils or church fathers or anything other than the words written in the Bible.  We wouldn't agree with that at all; we would call that "nuda scriptura" and reject it.  Our understanding of things is very much based on the tradition of the Church.

The trick is that the Lutheran rejection of "Tradition" is a rejection of the Roman Catholic version of "Tradition".  (Your article touches on this as well.)  When they say Tradition, they mean "whatever we make up".  That is in fact the exact OPPOSITE of Tradition.  I think the Orthodox are much better about Tradition actually meaning what it says, so we're really not much in disagreement on this one.

Desert, I don't think that being "high church" is at all incompatible with passionate zeal.  Here is a fascinating article (from a Lutheran perspective, but still generally applicable, I think) about where our liturgy comes from.  It's rather long and probably assumes a fair amount of familiarity with the service, but the long and short of it is, the Church's traditional Sunday liturgy is a Christian version of what a Jewish synagogue worship had been for centuries before Christ, plus a Passover seder modified (by Christ) to be Holy Communion.  "High Church" is in fact participating in a very ancient tradition, and when appreciated, truly helps give one a sense of being part of a communion of saints through space and time.
http://pastelder.blogspot.com/2013/03/w ... -2013.html

One other thing on High Church: it does not REQUIRE passionate zeal.  (That may be the source of the idea that it's incompatible, which is not the case.)  And I think that is really important.  At least for Lutherans, religion is not a matter of how you feel about God, it's a matter of how God feels about you.  So it's not about your feelings.  If you are going through a time when you're really excited about your faith, great!  If you're going through a time when you're not, "high church" allows you to trust in the Word and Sacraments rather than your own inner feelings; it allows you to participate in the service that has been saving people since time immemorial; it allows you to focus outside of you (on God, on your neighbor) rather than work on ginning up excitement in your tainted heart.  And that is certainly better than feeling like you're kicked out of the Church when you go through tough times.  That's when you need it the most!

[Mountaineer]

Xan and all,

I just finished reading "Heaven on Earth" by Arthur Just.  Excellent read on how the liturgy developed over the centuries going back before Christ if you want to explore in more detail.  And, Xan, that was a really good post about the LCMS liturgy and how our feelings are not important - it is all about what Jesus did for us.  Thanks for the post.

http://www.cph.org/p-454-heaven-on-eart ... rvice.aspx

... Mountaineer

[Ad Orientem]

I'm curious about the practice of communing young children.  For us, parents bring their children up to the rail, and they receive a nice blessing, but don't receive the Sacrament until they have been instructed in the faith and confirmed.  I believe this is primarily based on , that if you eat and drink the Lord's Body and Blood without discerning it, you're inviting judgment.  Is it the Orthodox position that baptized infants by default accept the doctrine of the Real Presence until and unless they specifically repudiate it?  Just curious here.  I think it would be great to commune children.

Xan
Our reading of 1 Corinthians 11:29 uses a word closer to "unworthily" than without discernment. Thus our take is that one should not commune if your relationship with God is impaired, especially by some serious sin or major distraction in life. Since small children are not capable of conscious sin they are normally admitted to the chalice until they reach the age of reason, usually around 7 or 8, and then they stop taking communion until they begin making regular confession. The practice of the early church was to combine all of the sacraments of initiation (Baptism, Chrismation and Holy Communion) even for children. This was true in the West as well as the East. I am not sure exactly when the Latin Church began to separate Chrismation and Communion from Baptism. I think it was in the early part of the Middle Ages. But it is one of those developments, like reversing the sign of the cross and using five fingers instead of three, that probably crept in gradually. It's also worth noting that Greek Rite Catholics still follow the Orthodox custom.

[Mountaineer]

Here is part five in the series of "What the Atheist Can Know about God".  This one deals with the problem of evil, a topic that has come up a few times earlier in this thread.  Perhaps it is still of interest to some?

http://steadfastlutherans.org/?p=35689

... Mountaineer

[Lowe]

Here's a problem.  If god is so powerful, then you shouldn't tell your kids about him.  He will reveal himself to them, by his own means.

[Mountaineer]

Here's a problem.  If god is so powerful, then you shouldn't tell your kids about him.  He will reveal himself to them, by his own means.

Perhaps His means is using the parent to tell the chilld the good news. 

... Mountaineer

[Mountaineer]

Have we thrown Christianity aside because we have it too easy?  This devotion from my Pastor discusses that question.

... Mountaineer

When the woes of life o’er take me,
Hopes deceive, and fears annoy,
Never shall the cross forsake me;
Lo, it glows with peace and joy. 

Woes, hopes, and fears – now there’s a threesome!  Each of us has woes that overtake us.  I like to think of this idea interns of life not working the way God intended to work in the perfect creation.  The notion of lost innocence is related to hope deceiving, because as we grow older more often than not the dreams of youth fade into distant memories.  That fears annoy may seem a bit of an understatement, but life before the 20th and 21st centuries in Western Europe and its descendants was mostly filled with fear.  There was fear from poverty, disease, political instability, food uncertainty, et cetera.  People of history likely developed a certain callousness to these harsh realities, and their appearance probably was understood more as annoyance than anything else. 

The comforts of living in our niche of America has made us less tough in dealing with the harsh realities of life.  When we ask ourselves, “Why do bad things happen to good people?,”? most people of history would likely say, “Why not?”?  Thus, the cross has lost its role of anchoring life amidst  its storm.  We have regular electricity, water, food, clothing, transportation, and the like.  Who needs the cross?  We all do, of course!  We usually recognize this, when the sudden tragedy hits.  May we recognize the need for the Crucified Jesus on the regular, sin-filled days, too!

[Ad Orientem]

When I ordered the book, I also purchased another book called "Becoming Orthodox" by Peter Gillquist.  I'll be reading it next.  Have you had a chance to read that one, Ad Orientem?

Glad you enjoyed Ware's book. I have not read the one by Fr. Peter Gilquist (of blessed memory), though I have heard good things about it.

[Mountaineer]

Here is something to ponder on a lovely end-of-March weekend:

... Mountaineer

The Christian Message Speaks Beyond Philosophy

"What the Christian faith has to say is beyond all philosophy; it rests upon another presupposition, which no philosophy understands, the acknowledgment of which no man can require. This presupposition states clearly: God speaks in his Word. That the Holy Scriptures are not merely a collection of documents from the history of religions, rather that the living God speaks in them; that God in Jesus Christ speaks his word of redemption; that Jesus Christ is the Word of God become man. These are the propositions, which have no place in philosophy, propositions which are not accessible to reason and whose acknowledgement therefore cannot be demanded of anyone. A conscientious philosopher, who is duty bound, to put a question mark behind every assertion, and to express no proposition which he can not “reasonably”? substantiate, could at best come to the conviction, that we possess in the bible the charter of a unique religious life; and therefore to the thinking man it is an indication of a super-worldly reality; that Jesus Christ is an incomparable form of historic event [Weltgeschichte] and that a metaphysical mystery stands behind his person. A conscientious philosopher could say all of this. In doing so he would certainly place himself in contradiction to other philosophers; for of course, all those facts could be interpreted differently. But he could never go further. That we in the bible have not one revelation of God, not something which belongs in a general history of religions category of revelation, rather thee revelation, that we in the Bible have thee Word of God; this one can no longer express as philosopher. He has to be a believer to assert such things."

-Hermann Sasse, "What is the State?" 1932; trans. Matthew Harrison

[ns3]

I observed this morning that this is now the longest thread in the history of the forum.

[Ad Orientem]

I observed this morning that this is now the longest thread in the history of the forum.

And unbelievably, it has not (yet) been hijacked and turned into an Austrian vs MMT/R debate. Definitive proof of divine protection.

[Ad Orientem]

That's an interesting coincidence...

And yes, Lutherans do generally regard themselves as Protestants. Often they claim with some pride to be the first Protestants.

[Mountaineer]

Xan and Mountaineer:  A question just occurred to me - do Lutherans consider themselves "Protestants?" 

Probably a dumb question, but I honestly don't know the answer.

Desert,

Following is answer from an LCMS Pastor.

... Mountaineer

03 JANUARY 2009

Are Lutherans Protestants?
The question surely strikes most people as utterly nonsensical, for if Lutherans AREN'T Protestants, then who is? But it is a useful question for clarifying what is meant by "Protestant." And I'd suggest that - setting aside for the moment the Western Rite Orthodox - the simplest answer is this: Protestants are Western Christians who reject the claims of the Bishop of Rome to be the universal bishop of the Church, the divinely-appointed head of all Christians. If THAT is the definition, then, indeed Lutherans are Protestants, and we can wear the name without any sense of dishonor, for it does not imply in any way the revocation of our catholic heritage.

Sadly, though, in most folks ears I suspect that "Protestant" equates rather to something else, of which the Reformed (of whatever stripe) tend to be the epitome. Lutherans, to their eyes, seem to be but quasi-Reformed. Almost, but not quite there. Luther they pay homage to, but honestly believe that his conservative tendencies got in the way of a thorough-going Reformation and in fact ended up tragically and needlessly splintering the Reformation movement.

The key is always to ask how a person understands the term. Lutherans most certainly ARE Protestants vis a vis the papal claims. But we see that position of protest in no way as undercutting our commitment to a truly catholic heritage; rather, it is mandated BY that heritage. Dr. Secker relates how when Dr. Piepkorn heard of some Lutherans converting to Rome, he remarked that he would march to the gates of Rome and plant his banner. He was convinced, utterly convinced, that the key to fidelity to the catholic heritage was embracing the Lutheran Reformation. For here he found the faith of the Fathers and a catholicity whose supreme mark was adherence to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, the only Savior of sinners, as witnessed by the infallible Word of God, the Sacred Scriptures.

If anyone asks me if I'm a Protestant, I don't hesitate anymore to answer: "Indeed I am. But maybe a Protestant is something different than what you are thinking! For I am an original Protestant. That means, I am one who believes that Baptism is for infants and adults and through it the Blessed Trinity saves us; I am a Protestant who believes that in the Eucharist Christ gives me to eat and drink His most holy body and blood beneath the appearance of bread and wine; I am a Protestant who believes that the words of Christ's called servants release me from sin, forgive me, and open wide the gates of heaven; I am a Protestant who believes that the Eucharist is the beating heart of the Church's life; I am a Protestant who rejoices in the liturgy of the Mass and the Daily Office; I am a Protestant who acknowledges the Office of the Holy Ministry as divinely established and ordained for the salvation of our souls. Please don't call me 'high church' or 'hyper confessional.' Just call me Lutheran. For that's what I am."

POSTED BY WILLIAM WEEDON AT 7:52 PM

[Mountaineer]

Lutherans appear to have retained more Tradition than many other Protestant denominations, some of which seem to have thrown the baby out with the bathwater when they broke off from the Catholic church. 

By the way, here's a brief article describing a journey from Protestantism to Orthodoxy:

Some are offended, as though I were rejecting everything I’d been taught to believe as a good Protestant; others react with genuine, open curiosity, since the Orthodox Church is still relatively unknown to many Americans; still others react with dismay, convinced that I’ve traded in biblical, relationship-based Christianity for the rules and regulations of the Pharisees, the exotic “smells and bells”? of Orthodoxy’s “foreignness,”? and the off-base traditions of men that only serve to take a soul away from a true, unadulterated relationship with Jesus Christ.

http://journeytoorthodoxy.com/2010/09/0 ... -orthodox/

Desert,

That was an interesting article.  Here is another that describes a similar journey from Evangelicalism to Lutheranism and is helpful on summarizing some key differences between the two.

http://www.internetmonk.com/archive/40403

... Mountaineer