Pope Francis’ Culture of Death is Looking a Lot Like Protestantism
“Dear Christian parents, will you save your children from this philosophical culture of death?”
The real difference between Catholicism and Protestantism is philosophical, and by no means a biblically based theological argument. If you want to discuss the difference in regard to orthodoxy for the serfs, there is no difference—both are progressive justification. Both propagate a need for the church to get people from salvation point A to salvation point B.
The functions of both camps are really determined by spiritual elitists who think they are above logic and all things material. Catholic philosopher kings tend to think knowledge beyond the material realm is within every being while Protestant philosopher kings believe all true knowledge is outside of the person.
Both appeal to Christ consciousness as the only immutable true form of goodness and truth. When it gets right down to it, you can barely slip a playing card between their definitions of faith.
Catholics seem to believe that the inner light gives everyone some potentiality for being good, while Protestants believe Christians can only see good and experience goodness that remains completely outside of them. They can experience it, but it is not a part of them. Man cannot be partially good enough to participate in his own salvation; it is a total work by God alone from beginning to end. Catholics believe that people can have enough goodness in them to participate in the finishing of their salvation.
In both cases, salvation is a process that needs the church to finish it. Catholics believe people can be made good enough to participate in the finishing while Protestants reject the idea that man can possess any goodness.
The point here is that they share a common belief that salvation is a process overseen by the church, and that affiliation with the church is efficacious to being saved.
Of late, and more and more, they also share a belief in Martin Luther’s doctrine of death. Both interpret all reality from the standpoint of the cross; i.e., “all wisdom is hidden in suffering.” Both see true discipleship as a complete emptying of self. Both see material as evil and only the invisible as good. Catholics believe inner goodness enables us to see ourselves as worthless, while Protestants believe faith enables us to see ourselves as worthless because we are worthless. Catholics believe good people will want to die to self and this material world, while Protestants believe we ought to die because we deserve nothing but death. But either way, it’s a culture of death.
Also, both believe that self-sacrifice shows forth the glory of the cross because all choices to sacrifice self are “living by the cross” or “walking according to the cross.” Self-denial and self-death demonstrate God’s cross-love and this is when the gospel is presented to people with power from on high. We hear this rhetoric in Protestant circles constantly.
So, what in the world inspired this post? Keep in mind that the following video is a Catholic production, and prepare yourself to be dumbfounded.
The same mentality can also be seen in Pope Francis’ collectivist views on economics and financial equality. Francis, who is loco popular with the Millennials, is leading a whole generation of our youth into socialist ideas. On the other side of the fence, the same. Collectivism gauges the total worth of people based on their ability to contribute to “the group” which is Platonic lingo for society at large.
Another aspect of death culture is the rising popularity of environmentalism among Catholic and Protestant youth. If you are a good Catholic, you know that your evil material body exhales carbon dioxide which pollutes the air, but the good trees absorb the carbon. If you are Protestant, you assume trees are better than humans because humans are totally depraved. In this video, it is suggested that we errantly worry more about ISIS killing people than saving trees.
The video was posted on my FaceBook page by a young Christian, and this was my response:
Well, wouldn’t worry about it too much. Apparently, shortly before the return of Christ there is plenty of earth left to destroy because God destroys it. I also find the notion that trees compensate for human pollution via breathing somewhat disturbing. It’s the idea that trees are important because they filter out the product of human living: trees good–humans bad. Fact is, what we exhale is only about 4% carbon. Also note the unqualified moral equivalency between those who kill people (ISIS) and those who cut down trees. lastly, if those who propagate this message really cared about the environment rather than their ulterior political motives, they would point to the science and example of Israel who have turned that desert terrain into a rich agriculture.
Dear Christian parents, will you save your children from this philosophical culture of death? This May, I will be teaching a series on Martin Luther’s Heidelberg Disputation on Blog Talk Radio. We will exegete this foundational document theses by theses. Let me also recommend our 2015 TANC conference where we delve into these issues as well.
paul
Why a Massive Return to the First Century Home Fellowship Model is Inevitable
Where there are true Christians, there is a love for the truth. Among true Christians, truth will prevail.
The problem with religious academia follows: it uses authority and caste to restrict free interpretation of the Bible and academic traditions fill the void. The first century church was fundamentally a laity movement. The apostles continually warned the saints against putting themselves under the authority of religious academia. Every Christian is sealed and indwelled by the mighty counselor, and as John wrote, “you have no need for anyone to teach you.”
John wasn’t excluding teachers as necessary helpers who have a valid gift, he was refuting the idea that the average Christian does not have direct, and plenary access to knowledge. The average Christian is charged with evaluating for themselves what they are being taught, and have been given the ability to do so. People are individually culpable before God.
In the institutional church, what we have is authority without representation. We are told what to believe, but these same academic authoritarians will not be representing us before God—there is only one representative, Christ. God told us to “hear ye Him.” The Hebrew writer stated that God has spoken to us in this last age by His Son—not religious experts.
In the final analysis, the big two that make up the institutional church, Protestantism and Catholicism, propagate a progressive justification and this is a matter of simple theological math. When true believers see the errant math coupled with the fruit, they will begin to look much closer at how “church” should be done.
Somehow, Westerners think of themselves as being above the kind of en masse cultural deception that we see in the East, but of course, this is a fallacy and denies the facts of history.
A massive return to home fellowships while rejecting all aspects of the institutional church is inevitable. The first century model reveals that a cooperative effort that aligns with ONE authority is possible when believers are truly born again and indwelled by the Holy Spirit. It’s a joint effort of one body under one head. It’s a priesthood of all believers, not believers under priesthood by proxy.
Institutions and their splendid temples convey authority, while true believers meet in homes because their very bodies are the temple of God. The very existence of purpose built institutional buildings denies the priesthood of believers—these buildings deny that the individual’s body is God’s temple. The same denies that true worship exists wherever that body functions and is not restricted by bricks and mortar or the dictates of mere men.
Christians will also recognize that you don’t need an institution to be organized. Institutions hinder the activation of organized gifts and sink monetary assets into useless infrastructure that only glorifies the authority of men. When the first century assembly of Christ turned the whole world upside down, what was the essence and location of their gargantuan institution? Where was the central headquarters, and how many seminaries did they have?
How will Protestantism survive this massive exodus that is already taking place? It’s presumption, but they will probably reunite with the Catholic Church which has always been honest about their salvation by institution from it’s very beginning. I believe this will lead to a very interesting political environment and perhaps a return to church states. It’s fairly obvious that the book of Revelation describes the mother of all church states operating in the latter days.
If the home fellowship movement then suffers a severe persecution at the hands of the institutional church, that would be history repeating itself in our day.
paul
Paul's Passing Thoughts 
leave a comment