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The Shocking Beliefs of...

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  • #16
    Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
    They would be wrong, of course. A nice way to discover if someone believes in the Real Presence is to ask them if anyone who gnashes the communion wafer between their teeth and drinks the communion wine is gnashing the actual body of Christ between their teeth and drinking the actual blood of Christ when drinking the communion wine. If they deny this they're not teaching the Real Presence, whatever they might claim.
    After some more reading and consideration on this matter, I will have to correct myself, on what I wrote here. The doctrine of the Real Presence does not necessarily teach that we are gnashing Christ's body between our teeth. What it does teach is that when anyone (including unbelievers) takes the bread into their mouth they are taking the body of Christ into their mouth, but not so that when they chew the bread into smaller pieces they are also chewing the body of Christ into smaller pieces. If the former is affirmed then one would also have to affirm that Christ's body is divided into parts whenever two or more different local churches or parishes celebrates the eucharist, something which I don't think any Christian who subscribes to the Real Presence view would want to affirm.
    Last edited by JonathanL; 04-12-2015, 08:34 PM.

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    • #17
      Originally posted by hedrick View Post
      Most of these shocking teachings were characteristics of the time
      Be that as it may, yet despite Calvin being a man of his times, he had and knew the Scriptures, and in that light he ought to have trumped some of the teachings/views of the time:

      - Witchcraft was a capital crime. In one year, 14 alleged witches were sent to the stake on the charge that they persuaded satan to afflict Geneva with the plague.

      - Gambling, card-playing, frequenting taverns, dancing, indecent or irreligious songs, immodesty in dress were all prohibited.

      - The allowable color and quantity of clothing and the number of dishes permissible at a meal were specified by law.

      - A woman was jailed for arranging her hair to an “immoral height.”

      - Children were to be named after Old Testament characters. A rebellious father served four days in prison for insisting on naming his son Claude instead of Abraham.

      - In one case, a child was beheaded for striking his parents. (Following Old Testament Mosaic law, Calvin believed it was scriptural to execute rebellious children and those who commit adultery).

      I therefore maintain that Calvin, with a thoroughgoing knowledge of the Bible, ought to have known that such rule was not in accordance with the New Covenant law of Christ and/or Christian liberty. I would therefore have to side with Castellio when he remarked:

      "Can we imagine Christ ordering a man to be burned alive for advocating adult baptism? The Mosaic laws calling for the death of a heretic were superseded by the law of Christ, which is one of mercy not of despotism and terror.”

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      • #18
        2. Calvin believed that the Eucharist provides an undoubted assurance of salvation.
        Resembling the Roman Catholic view, Calvin stated that the sacrament of the Eucharist provided the “undoubted assurance of eternal life to our minds, but also secures the immortality of our flesh.” [6]
        This isn't so shocking, except in the context of history and Protestant theology. We are physical beings in a physical world. Communion is a physical thing that we do that reflects our spiritual state. Christ said "do this in remembrance of me" when telling people to do do communion. Perhaps it boosts their faith? I should rather see this in context and greater discussion.

        With regards to 6, Europe persecuted Jews as the killers of Christ centuries after His resurrection.

        7. Calvin believed that God did not create all humans on equal terms, but created some individuals for eternal damnation.

        If a God who knows you will be in sin (as is all of Mankind) creates you (and he created everyone) and you cannot turn from sin or have hope of salvation apart from Him (as is the teaching of Calvinism), and yet He does nothing (because only God can rescue a depraved soul and if He had, then there would be no rejecting God's grace thus clearly not given to the damned as is according to Calvinism), then how can this be shocking? I don't get how the fact that one is conceived damned and goes to hell at the hand of a God who brought him to a life of no eternal hope and judges him for it is anything but a natural consequence. The only answer I have found as to why is for His glory, and the short step to a dark and damning God is not so hard to see.
        I am become death...

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        • #19
          Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
          If the former is affirmed then one would also have to affirm that Christ's body is divided into parts whenever two or more different local churches or parishes celebrates the eucharist, something which I don't think any Christian who subscribes to the Real Presence view would want to affirm.
          They wouldn't have to conclude that any more than one who believes that multiple believers can be present with the Holy Spirit in different locations.
          "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

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          • #20
            Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
            They wouldn't have to conclude that any more than one who believes that multiple believers can be present with the Holy Spirit in different locations.
            Oh, I need to forward you the new memo. New godline for communion: all believes are in psychic link through the Holy Spirit, not unlike the borg.
            I am become death...

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            • #21
              Originally posted by Anastasia Dragule View Post
              Oh, I need to forward you the new memo. New godline for communion: all believes are in psychic link through the Holy Spirit, not unlike the borg.
              All believers don't necessarily walk lockstep when it comes to the non-essential doctrines, however, all believers share the new birth/regeneration wrought about by the Holy Spirit - and I find that those who are born-again are quite often of like-mind.

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              • #22
                Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
                They wouldn't have to conclude that any more than one who believes that multiple believers can be present with the Holy Spirit in different locations.


                I don't see how anyone could believe that they're gnashing the body of Christ into parts when they're gnashing the communion bread while simultaneously believing that celebrating the eucharist at different locations does not divide the body of Christ, atleast not without some major cognitive dissonance.

                Both viewpoints would be mistaken of course. I don't think there are Christian denominations that actually teach that Christ's body get divided into as many parts as you divide the bread into, just as I don't think there's any denomination holding to the Real Presence view that teaches that Christ's body is divided because people celebrates the eucharist at different locations. Since every Christian group that believes in the Real Presence also believes that the doctrine of the communication of attributes implies that the human nature of Christ shares in the divine attributes I think the reasonable thing to hold would be that the body of Christ is fully present at every location where the eucharist is being celebrated, but also that it is fully present not only in the communion bread as a whole, but also in every part of it that's broken of from the bread.

                I.e breaking the communion bread into two doesn't divide the body of Christ into two, instead it just means that you have two pieces of bread that are both the body of Christ in full. The same would apply to celebrating the eucharist in different locations of course.

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                • #23
                  The thing is, during the Middle Ages, one of the accusations people often made against Jews was that they desecrated the host by literally taking communion hosts and torturing them. Anti-semitic polemic drawings have survived to this day that show people physically torturing Jesus, and Jesus suffering. People actually believed this and used it as justification for pogroms against Jews.
                  "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

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                  • #24
                    Originally posted by KingsGambit View Post
                    The thing is, during the Middle Ages, one of the accusations people often made against Jews was that they desecrated the host by literally taking communion hosts and torturing them. Anti-semitic polemic drawings have survived to this day that show people physically torturing Jesus, and Jesus suffering. People actually believed this and used it as justification for pogroms against Jews.
                    Was this a belief of the clergy of the church, or was it something confined solely to the more uneducated masses?

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                    • #25
                      Originally posted by Chrawnus View Post
                      Was this a belief of the clergy of the church, or was it something confined solely to the more uneducated masses?
                      I don't know for sure. The clergy didn't seem to put a stop to it though.
                      "I am not angered that the Moral Majority boys campaign against abortion. I am angry when the same men who say, "Save OUR children" bellow "Build more and bigger bombers." That's right! Blast the children in other nations into eternity, or limbless misery as they lay crippled from "OUR" bombers! This does not jell." - Leonard Ravenhill

                      Comment


                      • #26
                        Originally posted by Scrawly View Post
                        All believers don't necessarily walk lockstep when it comes to the non-essential doctrines, however, all believers share the new birth/regeneration wrought about by the Holy Spirit - and I find that those who are born-again are quite often of like-mind.
                        You know I was kidding, right?

                        Also, I suppose you refer to those who are born-again as in the group of Christians for whom this is a big way of describing themselves or those of that spiritual state?
                        I am become death...

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                        • #27
                          Originally posted by Anastasia Dragule View Post
                          You know I was kidding, right?
                          Yes, but your joke was to make a point - that not all believers walk lockstep doctrinally, right?

                          Also, I suppose you refer to those who are born-again as in the group of Christians for whom this is a big way of describing themselves or those of that spiritual state?
                          Well, my point was that no one can even be a legitimate believer without experiencing the new birth - as our Lord said - "you must be born again". (John 3:3). This new birth is cross-denominational and is brought about by the power and indwelling of God's own Spirit in His elect - wherever they may be. Although, I don't go around proclaiming "I belong to the new birth group!" - we tend to be a bit more humble. *Chuckle*

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