It is exactly because most Protestant churches refuse to carry out church discipline that I refuse to fellowship with these churches. And I have zero authority in these churches to carry out church discipline.

The Pope, on the other hand, has 100% power to carry out church discipline over the 1 BILLION Catholics.

And does he carry out church discipline? Does he even threaten it on those who divorce and even remarry?

Nope.

In fact, just last week Vice President Joe Biden, a huge supporter of abortion, was allowed partake of the mass in the presence of the Pope.

The truth, which no amount of talk about "good works" can deny, is that the Roman Catholic Church, as embodied in the Pope and bishops, do not care about true good works and morality of the church members (or even, in many cases, of Priests). It only cares about the good name of "The Church".

The Roman Catholic Church refuses to follow the command of the Apostle Paul in 1 Corinthians to excommunicate adulterers and all who live in open sin.

"when you dichotomize grace and works" - it is I that "dichotomizes" the two, it's the Apostle Paul in Romans 11. Your problem I think is with him.

The "works" that are opposed to "grace" are anything that a man does which contributes in any way to his righteousness in the eyes of God. Even if one claims those works are worked by God. Although you show that you do not believe they are 100% the work of God since you think they depend on our will.

There are good works which are truly good. But these come after a man is declared righteous and are a result of this declaration, being worked by the Spirit.

"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: it is the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast. For we are his workmanship, created in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained that we should walk in them." Ephesians 2:8-10

Note what this passage teaches: We are not saved by "works", but we still do good works - after we are "saved through faith".

In America you have openly wicked Protestants. So what standard are we to judge by? You cannot go by such a small perspective. Most people who travel the world will be able to tell you that you cannot use this as a standard of judgement over which is true, Protestantism or Catholicism. Because you have righteous Catholics and Protestants, just like you have wicked in both.

Secondly, with just a simple opening up of the pages of the Catholic Catechism, these "Catholics" who are openly immoral are self-excommunicates and have no salvation in them. Shame on the lack of discipline, but even you said shame on the over-excessive discipline of some protestant churches. There are some protestants who excommunicate if you do not hold the doctrines of Calvin! And they shun the person forever, call them lost and of the devil. You have Pharisees in the Protestant Church just like you have no good silly Priests in Catholicism, and vice versa.

Third, when you dichotomize grace and works, you are taking Paul to mean God's works and man remains completely inactive. This is really what you want us to accept? But the Scripture teaches that they overlap, and it is still God's grace. Man works because God chose him to work, and works in Him to work. But the will is still valid in the decisions to be holy. Otherwise you are saying we are computer programs with the press of a button, faith alone.

Finally, since God raises us to new life and works in us to do good, the good works we do are not our own, they are His. This is grace.

Also, you clearly do not understand the Protestant doctrine of salvation, which teaches that all who are truly justified will inevitably produce good works. And in true Protestant (not liberal) churches you see this in action, in that the members lead godly lives. Unlike Roman Catholicism, where, at least in the Western world, countless church members lead openly immoral lives - in fact, here in Ireland, which is almost 90% difficult, it is almost impossible to find an outwardly righteous Roman Catholic - they are almost all open drunkards, fornicators, adulterers, blasphemers. And the priests don't care or join in. And don't get me started on pedophilia and homosexuality of priests in Ireland and how "concerned" the Roman Catholic Church was to carry out "church discipline" (i.e. hide the truth and protect the wicked priests)...

"We trust 100% in God's grace to save us."
Only if you redefine "grace".

According to Scripture, Rom 11:
"And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work."

If your salvation consists in even 1% your own, the saints' or Mary's works (merits), then it is 0% grace according to Scripture.

For example, if you believe in any of the following, you believe in salvation by works and therefore by 0% grace:
* purgatory (where sins are paid by the suffering saints themselves)
* indulgences (where sins are paid by the merits/works of dead saints)

I hope you will consider the testimony of Scripture that salvation is fully accomplished by Christ and that we can add nothing to it but can only receive it by faith. I have done this and so has my wife and we have true peace and full assurance, and we are so thankful for this that we are offering our lives as sacrifices of thanks. I hope you will join us.

"For by grace are ye saved through faith; and that not of yourselves: [it is] the gift of God: Not of works, lest any man should boast." Eph. 2:8-9

I think defining justification is key, and before I respond further I would like to ensure that I have understood you correctly (please bear with me - I have actually been doing several hours' reading in response to your last post, which is part of the reason it has taken me so long to reply).

I find your definition too ambiguous, so I will go with that of the Catechism of the Catholic Church, Par. 1992:

"[Justification] conforms us to the righteousness of God, who makes us inwardly just by the power of his mercy."

We Protestants understand justification to be God legally declaring us righteous because He has legally imputed the righteousness of Christ to our account - the "alien" righteousness of someone else outside us, as Luther said. It is distinct from making us righteous in ourselves by the power of the Holy Spirit, which we call sanctification.

Compared to this, you and Roman Catholicism understand justification to be the actual making holy of a person by the power of the Holy Spirit so that they actually produce good works. I.e. you argue that justification is not God legally DECLARING someone righteous, but God MAKING someone righteous by infusing them with righteousness.

Am I correct?

When some Catholics and Protestants say things such as that Benedict did not "push Vatican II," they often (at least in my experience) say this without actually having carefully read any of the *documents* of the Second Vatican Council. Unfortunately, this is true with even some Catholic and Protestant clergy.

Vatican II did not change any of the *definitive teachings* of the Catholic Church. For the major reason as to why many people have mistaken understandings of Vatican II (other than due to simply not having read the *actual documents* of the Council), see this recent address by the Pope: http://www.calledtocommunion.com/2013/02/pope-benedict-xvis-renunciation-of-the-petrine-office/#comment-46512

As for the next Pope possibly being more "liberal and pagan," I highly doubt that, in terms of his public teaching as Pope. The Catholic Church officially holds that the Holy Spirit protects the Pope from publicly teaching heresy (i.e. anything contradicting the definitive teachings of the Church, such as "liberal" or "pagan" thought).

This editorial by a female lay Catholic presents, in a forthright way, the Church's official view on "changing" its definitive teachings: http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/guest-voices/post/the-catholic-church-cant-change/2013/02/13/a0b1933a-75fe-11e2-95e4-6148e45d7adb_blog.html

To be clear, some *practices* and *disciplines* of the Church may change, such as celibacy for priests in the Latin rite of the Church. Eastern Catholic priests are already allowed to be married, and they are just as much a part of the worldwide Catholic Church as Latin-rite priests are.

However, the official, definitive *teachings* of the Church cannot change. There can be legitimate development in the *understanding* that the Church has of these teachings, but they cannot change.

We trust 100% in God's grace to save us.

But to be saved means not just getting to heaven, but also to be freed of sin. It would be misery to spend eternity as a slave to sin. That is, in fact, the definition of Hell.

So to be saved means two things:
1. To be forgiven of our sins
2. To be healed of sin and given a new life that is free from sin.

Christ's life, death, and resurrection not only atoned for our sin, but also poured out God's mercy on the world in the form of the Holy Spirit, which saves us from sin by changing our hearts so that we can love Him above all else.

God does indeed leave us free to reject this gift, but this great mercy is a free gift to all who don't reject it.

Paul's response to all of this is that a "man is justified by faith apart from the works of the law", which means that God's grace is so free to all who would seek him such that any conditions such as the mosaic law are not required. And "faith" for Paul is a conduit for regeneration. listen to Colossians 2:12 where Paul speaks about the circumcision of Christ, which is another way of speaking about justification (participation in the covenant), which is baptismal regeneration, which takes place through faith.

Thank you for your response. I can sense that you are extremely hostile towards Catholicism, as you also have disagreements with other reformed protestants. This makes for a very difficult discussion, as you have all kinds of presuppositions which are simply wrong, and you lack the years of study without a prejudice.

Each of the numbers here are the most important issues that you need to respond to. I would appreciate if you interacted with the argumentation, rather than just give what you believe.

1) When reformed protestants look at the issue of justification, they are thinking of God's eternal plan to effectually call an individual through the gospel of the Christ crucified to the effect that the individual is gifted with "saving faith" (since this faith is rooted in God's eternal operation) and that this "faith" is the empty, non-working, non-meritorious, self-emptying, and God-Cross-glorifying means of instantaneously (and permanently) receiving the imputation of Christ's righteousness, understood not merely as the "remission of sin" or "pardon" but also the "life-long obedience of the 2nd Adam", in which he obeyed God from a pure heart. The problem with this is no so much in what it is trying to achieve as it's thinking that this is what St. Paul was thinking, and for that, the rest of the apostolic teaching. For starters, let's define justification. Justification is the act whereby a human being is brought into a right-relationship with God. Does this require the guilt of sin to be removed? Absolutely. Can I remain a slave to sin? Absolutely not! Protestants and Catholics agree with both the question and answer. Yet they go about explaining this very differently. For the protestant, one is simultaneously "justified" by the imputation of Christ's righteousness and spiritually re-created in the image of God so that they are inevitably going to chance, convert, and bear the fruits of righteousness. For the Catholic, since both one cannot be both enslaved to sin while forgiven, justification must consist in both the remission of sins and in the inner renewal of the person (which is really just what Protestants call repentance and conversion). For Catholics, this inner renewal is not perfection or the binding obligation to be morally perfect, rather it is a new disposition towards godliness. Moreover, for Catholics, this would be initial justification, because there are more conditions for eternal life other than "faith" (isolated from any other saving work of God).

For example, when Catholics cit Titus 3:7 "....he saved us, not by works of righteousness which we have done, but according to his mercy, through the washing of regeneration and the renewing of the Holy Spirit, that having been justified by His grace, we should become heirs of the hope of eternal life", they understand that justification consists in the "washing of regeneration" which is the remission of sin and the crucifixion of the old man together with the inner snctifying renewal of the inner man created by the grace of the Holy Spirit. For the Protestant, if justification was this "washing of regeneration" and the "renewing of the Holy Spirit", it would automatically mean that "works" are then a condition for God's grace. For the protestant, he must rely on outside definitions, which he isolates from the rest of Scripture, particularly from Romans/Galatians, and then inserts it back into Titus 3:7 just to isolate the whole meaning of justification from regeneration and sanctification ONCE AGAIN. Or, the protestant understands "washing of regeneration" as the union with the 2nd Adam through which we, after having been united, as receptors of His righteousness. Either way, it is exegetical non-sense.

For Paul, both the inner sanctification of the fallen creature and the complete remission of sin are rooted in God's grace. It is not as if the remission of sin alone is attributed to God's grace, and that any transformational work thereafter must be admixed with human works and God's grace. Rather, both the forgiveness of sin and the interior renewal are rooted ALONE in God's mercy and grace. For the protestant, he can only envision grace being properly sustained if "justification" is wholly distinct from transformational categories, and that it must remain sola the instantaneous and permanent imputation of Christ's righteousness (somehow together with his death). However, Paul does not see that such a thing is necessary just to sustain God's grace. No, both the initial forgiveness of sin (which is what Paul means by the imputation of righteousness- SEE Romans 4:6-11 and debate accordingly) and the simultaneous resurrection of fallen humanity are both wholly rooted in God's saving mercy and grace, and therefore to understand "justification" as these 2 saving events does not necessitate that the one with such understanding is thereby attributing "works" as a condition for eternal life, either together with or apart from God's grace.

2) Any human being who lives in sin will go to hell. Sorry for the simplicity, but this is just for the clarity. In Galatians 5, Paul teaches that if one (particularly those in Galatia) practicing sin or sows to his flesh, he will not inherit eternal life or the kingdom of God. This truth bears upon all people, whether they are within or without. Therefore, if it is true that the condition for going to hell is the practice of sin, then it must also mean that the condition for going to heaven is the practice of righteousness. Which, in fact, is exactly what St. Paul goes on to say. Only those who sow to the Spirit, which is to practice the fruits of the Spirit, which is to practice obedience to the commands of God, are those who enter the kingdom of God. The reformed protestants look at this and even still maintains that all that is necessary for salvation is the instantaneous imputation of Christ's righteousness and that any description or condition of obedience or works for entering the kingdom must fall under the category of necessary "evidence" or inevitable works "flowing from" the justification, which alone is the condition for entering the kingdom. Such logic is simply not right.

3) We have to ask ourselves exactly what Paul was referring to when he was writing about the issue of justification. In the first place, we should recognize that Paul's arguments for justification are coming from the problem that the early Church experienced with Gentile conversions. If you deny this, then there really is no point in even moving forward in this debate. However, since, I believe, that the justification-contexts (Pauline) are contextually linked to this polemic of gentile conversion, than the book of Acts is a helpful guide and a practical example playing out the letters of Romans and Galatians.

If you read the book of Acts, very carefully all the way up to chapter 15, you will see that the Pharisees were not content to allow any Gentile into the community of the "saved", even if they repented, had faith, were baptized, and were exhibiting a morally virtuous life. When Paul and Barnabas made it to Antioch and Jerusalem, they were telling all the people about the great work of God among the gentiles which they had seen for the past YEAR. Therefore, within this year, the gentiles must have already "repented" (for this is clearly an apostolic condition for entering the Church) they must have already "believed" (which is another apostolic condition for entering the Church) they must have already been baptized (which is another apostolic condition for entering the Church), and they must have already been faithful practicing the doctrine of the apostles FOR A YEAR. And when the Pharisees hear about these gentile converts, WHO HAVE BEEN CONVERTED ALREADY FOR A YEAR (AT LEAST), they say "It is necessary that they must be circumcised and to keep the law of Moses" (Acts 15). In other words, the Jewish Pharisees did not care how much the Gentiles were morally virtuous and repentant over their past life, THEY WERE STILL NOT BENEFICIARIES OF THE COVENANT UNTIL THEY OBEY TO MOSAIC LAW (which would be all the outward laws of the covenant, without excluding the binding requirements of perfect obedience to the moral commands). Do you see what was happening? This is why Paul was so frustrated! He had seen massive conversions of gentiles! These people were saved out of paganism! They became blood-bought slaves to God! loving each other! serving each other!!! AND YET THE PHARISEES WOULD NOT CONSIDER THEM PART OF THE COVENANT!!! This is the context of Paul's argumentation for justification.

4) Therefore, for Paul, the forgiveness of sin and the sanctification of the Spirit were both sufficient graces for one's enjoyment of being part of the covenant with Abraham. This is what Paul means when he says justification. Now, before you go back into the text and start bringing out all the general legal meanings such as judgement before God, all mankind are condemned, etc,etc,etc,etc. Please do not think that I mean that justification is merely a covenantal community concept, such as what the New pespectives are coming out with. I do not agree with this. The New Perspectives on Paul has actually done alot of good, but they are still missing some major elements. Justification really does have to do with sin and guilt. Justification really does have to do with one's legal standing before God. But justification also has to do with one's participation in the covenant of Abraham, and this is where many reformed protestants have simply misunderstood Paul.

5) Justification in James has the same basic definition as in Paul, precisely because they both use Genesis 15:56 in their arguments. It would be very difficult to sustain an argument which attempts to distinguish the definitions of "righteousness" "justified" and "faith" in the James 2 and the epistles of Romans and Galatians. For goodness sake, they both quote Genesis 15:6, which contains the same words as dikasiosune and pistoeWs . The major problem with protestants is they cannot have justification happening twice, and therefore this poses a theological problem for them. It may be helpful to realize that the author of Hebrews believed that Abraham was justified before Genesis 15:6 when Abraham obeyed to come out of the land of Ur. Abraham already had "saving faith" in Genesis 12. Subsequently, Abraham's faith is accounted for righteousness in Genesis 15, and later on Abraham is justified by works on the mountain where he was willing to sacrifice Isaac. This simply means that justification is not a one-time thing! For Paul, his context is the initial entering into the covenant hopes and promises. In other words, Paul's justification is COVENANT ADMISSIONS. Whereas James is speaking about the general justification, which all jews would have been familiar (including Jesus), which is the judgement according to works. God will really and truly repay each one according to their works. This principle was never let go of in the redemptive historical shift of the covenants. Both Jesus and Paul believed that all people, elect and non-elect, will be under the judgement of God on the final day.

What will decide your eternal destiny is this: Do you trust alone in the righteousness of Christ to save you, or do you trust even for 1% in your own good works (perhaps wrought in you by God)? If the latter then you are on your way to hell and I implore you to reconsider.

For this reason, all the Pope's promotion of green energy is in vain - for he teaches men to trust not in Christ alone and therefore is leading them away from heaven.

"Never once did I pose the "age-old" accusation that the protestant dogma of sola fide does not lead to good works"
My apologies, indeed you did not do this. I am beginning to understand now that you are part of the new Roman Catholics who are attempting to breach the differences created by the Reformation (as opposed to the older Catholics who simply condemned the Reformation).

"Never once did I pose the "age-old" accusation that the protestant dogma of sola fide does not lead to good works"
You are right that I responded only to a small part of what you said (I picked what I considered most important). I think I have done this. However, please let me know (due to time constraints on my part) which part(s) of your response you consider most important and I will make an effort to respond.

It is interesting that you mention modern Reformed Baptists and others such as RC Sproul. Their doctrine of assurance is actually a serious deviation from the Reformation's doctrine of assurance (with which I agree). Assurance is part of justification by faith alone - justification is about how God declares to us IN OUR CONSCIENCE (i.e. assurance) that we are righteous in His sight. If you know the story of Luther, you will know that the Reformation began because of Luther's quest for assurance - which quest was successful in his discovery of justification by faith apart from works. The reason he never had assurance was because he looked to his works. For the same reason many Puritans and Reformed Baptists tragically also struggle with assurance.

Interestingly, the Council of Trent also condemned with anathema those who teach that assurance is a normal part of faith (again condemning a standard Reformation doctrine).

It sounds like the Reformed Baptist church was overly zealous in its excommunication. It reminds me of the Early post-apostolic church.

It is also a shame how if you are disciplined in one Reformed Baptist church you can simply run to another and be accepted there.

However, I am not Reformed Baptist. I belong to the Protestant Reformed Churches of America. There we have faithful discipline, and you cannot run from one PRC church to another to escape discipline. The difference is that these Reformed Baptist churches are in different denominations and do not accept each other's discipline.

This is where the RCC is different - you are all one denomination. But the truth is that the RCC leadership is not willing to attempt to enforce discipline for fornication, adultery, murder, etc because they know this would result in a large number of Catholics leaving the church - which they are not willing to do. They prefer numbers to faithfulness to Christ.

This is why the comparison with "baptist pastor child molestation" is false. Let me tell you, if my denomination covered up or refused to fully discipline a minister in our denomination who did such a wicked thing, I would leave that denomination. The difference is, the RC Church authorities had the official authority to excommunicate and discipline - and didn't. Instead, guilty priests were simply moved to different parishes and everything covered up.

"The Catholic Church, for centuries, was faithful in excommunicating these kinds of hypocrites and offenders. I would recommend reading the history of ecclesiastical discipline in the Church of the first 7 centuries before thinking that protestants are the only ones who have ever done this."

You show your lack of knowledge with regards to the true Protestants. The first 7 centuries of the Catholic Church is NOT the same as the Roman Catholic Church. The RCC developed out of the Early Church. The Reformation was a RETURN (which was why the Reformers continuously showed that they were returning to the teachings of the early church fathers) to the purity of the Early Church and a rejection of the many heresies adopted since the 7th century which eventually resulted in the "Catholic Church" becoming thoroughly apostate, necessitating the Reformation.

"James says that Abraham was justified at the moment of his willingness to sacrifice Isaac, in the historical moment, not when the Scripture was later written by Moses"

Before going any further, please define justification as it is used by James in this chapter (I have already defined what I understand by it).

" Faith, understood, as the "obedience of faith","
Faith, and the obedience of faith, are clearly two different things. It is like a car and the fumes of a car. To argue that "car" is really just "the fumes of the car" is obviously incorrect.