DescentBB

Mother Teresa was Catholic. End of a very sad story. I'm not sure just what judgment holds for someone who seems to have helped so many people, at least materially (certainly not spiritually), but it's obvious that she did not \"Enter by the narrow gate\" (Matt 7:13).

To find out whether God ever spoke to her (or whether she ever acted on it if he did), simply judge her deeds according to scripture. Judge her doctrine. As far as I'm concerned she was an exemplary Catholic, and that's it.

Sergeant Thorne wrote:Mother Teresa was Catholic. End of a very sad story. I'm not sure just what judgment holds for someone who seems to have helped so many people, at least materially (certainly not spiritually), but it's obvious that she did not "Enter by the narrow gate" (Matt 7:13).

I find it the height of arrogance to say just because someone is Catholic that they couldn't be saved. "judge not lest you be judged" while I'm not a Catholic myself I know several that are and I would say that by my conversations with them some were saved and some were not. but to judge someone's salvation based on generalized religion is wrong!!!

[Edit: Big thank-you to the moderator for splitting the topic.]

No, it's scriptural, and I'm not making generalized judgments. I'll give you a hint, if they are saved they'll leave the Catholic church. I think you need to learn more about Catholicism (get some material by \"Dave Hunt\"). And I'll be even more arrogant and say that maybe you need to work on your discernment regarding your friends. Are they just pious, or do they actually hold the faith of the New Testament? You know the Catholic church would seem to be the most correct church in America when it comes to not compromising on moral issues of our day, but its still evil when held up to the standard of scripture.

Sergeant Thorne wrote:I'll be even more arrogant and say that maybe you need to work on your discernment regarding your friends.

Don't tempt me with straight lines like this.

If a "Catholicism" thread opens I'll be happy to participate. For now I'll just leave it at the fact that you've got your theology of the "Narrow Gate" all wrong.

[Edited post-split]

split it off.

I want Thorne to show me where in Scriptures that it says a Catholic cannot be saved.

and Re Dave Hunt, this is the second time you've used him as a reference. you really dont want my opinion of Mr Hunt

split it off.

Cuda wrote:you really dont want my opinion of Mr Hunt

You're right, I really don't want your opinion, I want to know what the Bible says about the things he says.

You should listen to what he has to say about it anyway. He always uses a lot of references in his talks.

To show you why someone following the Catholic doctrine cannot be saved I would have to give you a run-down of the Catholic church and all of the scriptures they trample underfoot with their doctrine and traditions. By the way I have a brother-in-law that got saved and came out of the Catholic church because of it (before I knew him), though that's not my basis for saying this.

Catholics can be saved, just not under Catholicism. Catholicism is a gross departure from the gospel of Jesus Christ, they bring in worship of Mary (only a woman), praying to the saints (only men and women), and all sorts of other abominations. Like I said, you need to know more about what Catholicism is, and you need to know by the things they do, and the doctrines and traditions they hold to, not just by the things that they say. If the Lord is really working in their life, they are not going to stick with the doctrines of the Catholic church, and it is not at all arrogant to say so.

Why don't you take some time, study the Catholic church, their doctrines and traditions, and then tell me why, according to scripture, we should believe that Catholics can be saved! I think maybe Chuck Missler has some material on Catholicism as well. I can probably get you references to all sorts of material, unless you're just content to sit on your behind and believe that doctrine is not a restriction on salvation. It's kind of a big subject, and I can't do the work for you.

2 John 1 wrote:19 Whoever transgresses and does not abide in the doctrine of Christ does not have God. He who abides in the doctrine of Christ has both the Father and the Son.

Catholics do not abide in the doctrine of Christ, to put it as simply as possible.

ADMIN NOTE: in the future, don't start up an off-topic discussion and then yell \"split it off!\"; if it deserves its own thread, start a new thread quoting whatever you need to quote. Making me split it makes extra work for me, which means both of you (Thorne and Cuda) just disrespected me and my time. Not only that, but you just disrespected Foil by keeping up your discussion in his thread after he'd asked you not to. That's not cool.

Heaven must be empty.

ok so your telling me that if a Practicing Catholic. believes that

1. Christ is the Son of God
2. That Christ was crucified and died for his sins
3. That Christ rose from the dead on the 3rd day

that there is no way he can be saved???

and what about Methodist's, or Presbyterian's or Baptist's or Lutheran's or Episcopailian's <sp?>

\"Judge not lest you be judged\"

do not judge a mans heart because you will be held to the same standard as you judge him.

Lothar wrote:ADMIN NOTE: in the future, don't start up an off-topic discussion and then yell "split it off!"; if it deserves its own thread, start a new thread quoting whatever you need to quote. Making me split it makes extra work for me, which means both of you (Thorne and Cuda) just disrespected me and my time. Not only that, but you just disrespected Foil by keeping up your discussion in his thread after he'd asked you not to. That's not cool.

I'd like to comment but I'd probably get banned

Sergeant Thorne wrote: I think you need to learn more about Catholicism (get some material by "Dave Hunt")

Utterly ridiculous. If you want to find out about Catholicism, one should seek out Catholic sources. Should I go to Stormfront's webpage to find out about Judaism?? And then you make a comment about discernment?

Risible on it's face.

Sergeant Thorne wrote:And I'll be even more arrogant and say that maybe you need to work on your discernment regarding your friends.

I'm Sure Christ would disagree with you, taking into account the people that he chose to be his closest associates

CUDA wrote: ok so your telling me that if a Practicing Catholic. believes that

1. Christ is the Son of God
2. That Christ was crucified and died for his sins
3. That Christ rose from the dead on the 3rd day

that there is no way he can be saved???

Of course not, God saved Martin Luther, didn't he? (this sarcasm requires a knowledge of the life of Martin Luther)

dissent with his foot in him mouth wrote:Utterly ridiculous. If you want to find out about Catholicism, one should seek out Catholic sources.

He uses major Catholic writings in his sources.

If the Pope is not going to heaven, the rest of us* can give up all hope.


*By us I mean you, because I know I’m going to the other place.

Sergeant Thorne wrote:...
Of course not, God saved Martin Luther, didn't he? ...

sometimes I think god saved his pennies until he could afford a ticket out of this place....

Sergeant Thorne wrote:Of course not, God saved Martin Luther, didn't he? (this sarcasm requires a knowledge of the life of Martin Luther)

Did he??? thats quite an assumption, your saying you knew Martin Luther's heart? now while I would agree that by what we know about his life that he probably was saved, only God knew his heart and can say for sure.

Sergeant Thorne wrote:

dissent with his foot in him mouth wrote:Utterly ridiculous. If you want to find out about Catholicism, one should seek out Catholic sources.

He uses major Catholic writings in his sources.

good luck with your research methodology. I'm sure it will get you far.

For those interested, here's a Catholic response the claims made in Dave Hunt's "A Woman Rides the Beast"
http://www.catholic.com/library/Hunting ... abylon.asp

The irony is that people like Sergeant Thorne are why I left the catholic church. Only, those people were also catholics.

\"I want to know God's thoughts; the rest are details.\" -A. Einstein

Thing here is that you can belong to any religion or denomination and not have a relationship with Jesus Christ. And if that's the case, you're hosed. (er.. if you die in that condition)

And If I could make a comment concerning about Mother Teresa (not like I haven't said more than my share. ) I spent some time in prayer about this and a couple of things came to mind. First that I need to apologize to Bet. I dind't need to go off on you and I AM sorry. .. . I could give a lot of reasons \"why\" but to quote myself, it's irrelevant. YOU are not the enemy.

Also, I remembered Paul. He complained about a \"thorn in the flesh\". While it's accepted that this wasn't a literal thorn, it assumed that it was something particularly troubling to him. (duh) and that God would NOT remove it. God was willing for Paul to suffer for whatever reason. That and this \"thing\" was has been debated forever, but that isn't the point. Paul finally contented himself to the situation (or resigned himself, that isn't exactly clear either.) This has been fairly common among the \"elite\" in church history (I mean believers in general there and not just the Roman Catholic church) Francis of Assisi, Jon of Ark, that gal that found the spring (I can't remember her name) just to name a few. It probably would be (again, I'm speculating here) appropriate to place Mother Teresa in the group. Perhaps this was her \"thorn in the side\"?
But ultimately, this is between God and her. I hesitate to make a definitive declaration here as it's not my place. I've not been given the authority nor the understanding. If you look at the fruits of her life, you will see some very good evidence.

while the Catholic Church Liturgy has some board line blasphemous practices, I hesitate to say ALL Catholics are going to hell. That kind of generalization is dangerous and simply not fair. A shepherd, when he separates his flock, does so one animal at a time. The sheep and the goats are done so and not one of us has been or ever will be given the position of Great Shepherd.

whew.. that was long.

This is the post I should have made earlier. Again, my most sincere apologies Bet.

Does anyone else find Thorne's argument funny for using a story book preserved and protected by the Catholic church for hundreds of years to bash Catholicism?

Kinda like the French thumbing their nose at Americans.

Don't get me started on the Jews, without them Thorne probably wouldn't even have his book, yet I guess they are all damned too.

What I find odd is that the assertion that Catholics can't be saved so often comes from protestants.

Now note, I am a protestant. VERY much a protestant. I have STRONG disagreements with Catholic doctrine. To try to pretend that I didn't would be insulting to both me AND them. But the central point that Martin Luther preached was \"The just shall live by Faith!\" It's what protestantism is all about!

Doctrine is important, but one of the most important doctrines that protestants believe is that salvation comes from having a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. It's a protestant doctrine that doctrine alone can NOT save you!

So the question becomes, do you have to have perfect doctrine in order to have a saving relationship with Jesus? IF this were true, then Jesus' own disciples were all lost souls for most of their lives. All through the three years they spent with Christ the disciples were squabbling over who was to be the greatest in the earthly kingdom Christ was going to set up when He kicked out the Romans. Even in the book of Acts we find Peter being corrected on a point of doctrine and having to learn new things about how Christ wants us to live. TWICE, on the SAME doctrine.

The disciples believed all KINDS of wrong things. God was still working with them, and continued to work with them until they died. That's what a relationship is all about.

So, if the disciples could believe that Christ was NOT going to die, and that He was going to conquer the Romans, and that non-Jews could not be saved, and many other false doctrines, and yet they could still be in a saving relationship with Christ, then I have to believe that a Catholic might believe in transubstantiation and praying to the saints and still be in a growing, but saving relationship with Christ.

If I understand it correctly, Catholic doctrine now admits that while salvation through the Catholic Church is \"normatively necessary\", it is not \"absolutely necessary\". But I think there is some controversy over this still. So really, it wouldn't surprise me to hear Catholics saying that Protestants can not be saved (Although I almost never do). It was certainly the position of their church for a LONG time, whether it is now or not.

But the reverse, Protestants claiming Catholics can't be saved, just baffles me. We do not require a papal bull or Church tradition to provide an \"exception\" for salvation. Our doctrine IS that salvation comes by Grace through Faith, and that pathway is open even to Catholics.

As a nonreligious person, I still know a lot of Catholics and Protestants. And, from my perhaps outside perspective, Protestants tend to be unfair. When it comes to things like praying to Mary, the saints, etc., perhaps this stuff is written down in some official Catholic document somewhere, so maybe the Protestants can make some sort of technical argument here, but I don't know any Catholics who actually do that. In fact, if anything, my experience with Catholics is that they are much more liberal than the Protestants these days. Catholics tend to have a much more realistic outlook on issues such as cosmology and biblical exegesis. None of the Catholics that I know think that Protestants are unsaved. In fact, my understanding is that the official, present day Catholic position is to not even try to save Jews, so, if the Jews are off limits, then I would imagine that surely Protestants are.

actually, one of my Wife's Catholic friend's son wanted to go to my Kids protestant church, she flipped out she was deathly afraid that he would lose his salvation if he did and forbid him. so the Catholics can be as misguided as Thorne is on these matters.