Beckwith/George Ecumenical Dialogue

Webcasting around the world from the desert metropolis of Phoenix, Arizona. This is the dividing line

The Apostle Peter commanded Christians to be ready to give a defense for the hope that is within us Yet to give that answer with gentleness and reverence

Our host is dr. James white director of Alpha Omega ministries and an elder at the Phoenix reformed

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United States. It's one eight, seven Seven seven five three three three four one and now with today's topic.

Here is James wife And good morning. Welcome to the dividing line on a Tuesday morning we have busied out the lines because today we begin a series where I will be playing the entirety of the discussion between Timothy George and Frank Beckwith that took place up at Wheaton Just recently and I do so not because I want to be ever more popular

Because there are a few things will be less popular than having to address this particular subject but because the subject is in fact the gospel of Jesus Christ and unfortunately the clarity of that gospel the nature of that gospel was not promoted and Added to by this conversation, but was further muddled because of the ecumenical spirit of the conversation and I want to just dive right into it.

I'll be playing all of it stopping starting commenting as things are said and The very first minutes in fact,

I think it's less than 30 seconds is Where the train goes off the track and never gets back on it from that point?

But I'll be starting with the moderator Who asks a question of the gentleman?

And of course, they're sitting in nice fluffy chairs with flowers and it's you know, another one of those wonderful situations that I have no intention of ever being involved with myself, but Nor would they ever invite me to do so but be it as it may he asks a question about this concept of being an evangelical

Catholic and The first question went to Timothy George. And like I said, that's where the train went off the track.

Let's listen Well, let's begin by defining terms

Timothy How do you understand the designation?

Catholic evangelical Well first let me say it's great to be here and to be here with my friend

Frank Beckwith He and I have had this conversation before this is not the first time we've done it and maybe not the last time we'll do it

And we have a great respect for one another and friendship with one another and beyond that I think a sense of solidarity as brothers in Jesus Christ So there you go took about 30 seconds for the the groundwork to be laid and I want to make everyone understand and I remember

Timothy George part of the evangelicals and Catholics together He's he's you know, he's an ecumenist and so we are not at all shocked that he takes an ecumenical perspective

But we need to understand what this means I don't think you have to start off by saying

I'm glad to be here And I'm glad to have an opportunity to talk with the apostate going to hell

Frank Beckwith You don't have to do that. You don't have to judge the man's soul But once you make the statement he's just made what you have just said to everybody listening is

That anything else we discuss is not definitional of the

Christian faith We can talk about justification by faith until we're blue in the face. We can talk about imputation versus infusion

We can talk about all these things One thing they're never going to talk about is the death of Christ and the mass and transubstantiation atonement never comes up What does that mean that means it's not definitional it's something that we can know we can talk about and we can sit around and and in fact, he's he's going to be asked a question later on an

Opportunity a softball throw one of those floating fastballs over the middle of the plate that you can take right out of the park if you want to and His response is going to be to tell a story

About how they used to go over to this one

Roman Catholics apartment in New York City and sort of get buzzed on drinking and smoking and talking about Converting each other back and forth and it was just enough that if I had hair

I would have pulled it out That's what ecumenism does but that the point is to hear this

Once you've made the positive statement, hey, you know, we're just you know We're all part of the big

Christendom and we're all brothers and sisters in Christ and that means all this stuff

We're going to talk about well, you know, I I just have a different view. I have a different opinion

What that means is all those things he's gonna talk about when he does talk about well the sufficiency of Scripture Just becomes well my opinion is and you have this other opinion and when we talk about justification well, my opinion is and there's these other opinions and the result is the gospel becomes a matter of opinion and You know what?

A lot of folks don't want to hinge their eternity on somebody's stinking opinion and that's why they want a greater authority and So they turn to Rome and of course the

Roman Catholic apologist who's gonna be taking a much more strident and historical position than Frank Beckwith will and in fact,

I really I If someone knows of this I'd like to hear about it, but I wonder where the

Catholic apologists are in responding to Beckwith's anemic Catholicism Where are they?

Why won't they ever come out? I mean they some of them will come out about certain liberal bishops

But where are they? Why won't why won't they discuss these things I Maybe they're out there if there is let me know

I haven't heard any and I would think that just simply on the basis of fundamental consistency

You'd have to address some of these things but so right off the bat You don't have to start off the dialogue by saying and this man over here is lost or going to hell

But once you say what was just said you have just now pushed into the realm of it doesn't actually

Make a difference in eternity everything else you're gonna be talking about and You can sit there and say it's important till the cows come home

It's not important enough to change what the gospel is and how a man's made right before God is it?

evidently not and that of course is the very essence of The compromise the gospel that is ecumenism.

That's what the compromise the gospel It is ECT the gift of salvation all that stuff

Makes the gospel a matter of human opinion rather than divine revelation

That's why I can't go there. That's why I'll never go there and That's why when I see people going there who once said otherwise it is so Desperately sad and so I want to start with that affirmation and also thank

Wheaton College in the center and you Chris For helping us to focus some of these questions and discussions tonight now my background is

Weird. I am a Southern Baptist one of the most conservative hidebound denominations in America perhaps and I grew up in what sociologists of religion would call a kind of really

Sectarian group what we knew we were going to heaven We weren't sure about the Methodist and the Pentecostals and the

Catholics were beyond the pale to use a good Irish term however as a young fella

Coming into the church and reading the Bible. I had a desire to talk to other people And I would call the

Catholic priest on the telephone. I may have been eight or ten years old I don't remember and say to him, you know, what do you all believe?

Why aren't you coming to the Baptist Church? And he usually put up with me for a little while But that was kind of my introduction to ecumenism and I came to understand that there were people who had very different understandings of the

Christian faith than I did and why did they Hold these views and that was kind of the way

I got into all of this Now the question that you pose is what does it mean to be a

Catholic evangelical? That's how I would describe myself as a Catholic Evangelical well an evangelical is someone who stands within the continuity of the gospel

John Stott gave the best definition. I have ever heard to what is an evangelical He said evangelicals are gospel people and they're

Bible people now I don't know many Catholics who'd want to deny that they're gospel people and Bible people but there's a sense in which

Evangelicals understand those terms and live out those commitments in continuity with the

Protestant Reformation Let me just comment at that point there are a lot of people wondering these days when evangelical is and Given that the term has been abused and and stretched so far

That in my opinion it is it is pretty much useless any longer I mean if you no longer believe that the evangel is

Definable so that Rome's gospel can be identified as a false gospel and that's they can't do that Then why even talk about evangelicalism?

when when modalists non -trinitarians are evangelicals when people who

Don't think you should talk about repentance or faith or sin or or the wrath of God are evangelicals

What does the word mean anymore that really is the question now historically there was a gospel that defined

Evangelicalism and it was a biblical gospel but once you get into the squishy modern era where the

Evangel is much more of a feeling than it is a defined message of what

God has done in Jesus Christ. I I really wonder how useful the term is any longer, but at least historically and and especially within the context of the evangelical theological society as Dr.

Beckwith will bring up because he was once president of that There was an understanding of what an evangelical was

If you're new to this situation You're listening to the big bad meanie guy who brought the

Beckwith Reversion to public notice and So, I'm just one of those terrible horrible people and I'm you know, don't have a heart and all the rest that stuff

And called for Frank Beckwith to step down which he did and I think he did the right thing Even though he continues to say today

He doesn't really feel like he should have done that in the sense that He he did it because he didn't want to cause problems the

ETS But that he felt that he could continue in the ETS given the ETS his statement of faith

Well as I pointed out at the time I've only been to one ETS meeting. I presented a paper in 1998

I did not enjoy my time there the attitude of many not all but many that I saw there was one of non servanthood toward the church of academic hubris and academic pride and I I didn't enjoy that and I Obviously don't view the

Academy in the same way that many academics do But be that as it may

I was in the plenary session When dr.

Roger Nicole was asked as one of the founding members to answer a question from the audience

About why the statement of faith said the Bible and the Bible alone. That's what's in the statement of faith and Dr.

Nicole rather elderly man tall sort of bent over shuffled up to the microphone leaned over and simply said because we didn't want any

Roman Catholics in the organization and turned around went back to his seat and Everyone was taken aback

But it is a given it cannot be argued that as Roger Nicole testified at that time

That's the Evangelical Theological Society was set up for people other than Roman Catholics. It was for Evangelical scholars and so in their mind

Evangelical and Roman Catholic were not the same things and Timothy George gonna say well, you know Things have changed

You know the liberalism is waning in the sense that the mainline denominations are disappearing because they have no message

They have no hope they're just nothing but religious social clubs and and they're dinosaurs and they're vanishing away as is a good and proper thing

And and and and Rome has changed too Yeah, well,

I would agree Rome is changing There's there's no question in Rome is changing

What a a believing Roman Catholic believed 200 years ago and what a

Believing Roman Catholics believe today may be very similar But especially amongst the very leaders of the church.

It may be very very very different There is no question in my mind what the great

Popes of the medieval period believed in regards to Jews and heretics

Today What the Popes believe about that who knows there seems to be a great deal of inclusivism

Even universalism amongst many Roman Catholic leaders and theologians The myth of the unity of Rome is just that it is a myth

It is a lie It does not exist anyone who takes the time to go up to Boston College and listen to some theology professor

Oh, well, they don't define things. Well who does is the question and so Has Rome changed?

Yeah So, what does that mean? Well, that means that Rome's claim of infallibility is simply laughable.

I Mean if you can just redefine things so that she remains quote -unquote infallible while Radically altering the teachings that she's putting forth then she needs just come out and say, you know what?

We're not infallible We're just one group and you know, we greatly value the traditions we have but you know

We've we've rethought a lot of these things and and and we really sort of feel that That's a lot of these things are no longer, you know, we don't believe the same things we once did but that's the one act of honesty that only takes place behind closed doors and doesn't make it into official paper pronouncements and things like that and so Rome has changed

But What kind of Rome Catholicism are we dealing with it's it's such a chameleon you know when you want to bring people in you talk about you know, the infallibility of the church and in 2 ,000 years of tradition and blah blah blah but then when you get in you find out that that doesn't really mean anything in any functional way does it and that really sort of changes the the grounds of discussion and in particular with the doctrines of Justification by faith alone and the authority of Holy Scripture and we're going to talk about these undoubtedly in our discussion tonight

We'll come back to them. And so an evangelical is someone who stand now just notice the two things were mentioned the authority of Scripture Yep, so let's go turn

The authority claims of Rome and justification by faith alone Yep, both are very important that it would be accurate to say that's a major area of difference but what you're never gonna hear about and And of course when

I say never one little statement might prove me wrong But I have no recollection having listened to this just yesterday morning again

I have no recollection of the atonement and the cross and therefore the mass

Having been mentioned once in this entire dialogue and the dialogue is Let's see right at an hour and 43 minutes long

Not once and I would like to suggest one of the great failures of modern humanism and certainly one of the great failures of this dialogue

Is that that never once came up? And so you're seeing justification as if it's just this

Thing floating around out there It's not part and parcel of the fundamental difference

Between viewing the gospel as something the triune God Accomplishes in perfection for the glory of the triune

God and the sacramental man -centeredness of Roman Catholicism There is in ecumenical theology a dividing up of divine truth

So that you don't see the relationships between these great truths the only

Meaningful foundation of justification by faith alone the reason it must be justification by faith alone has to do with the reality of the perfection of the work of God in salvation and Specifically the perfection of the atoning work of Christ once for all one time.

That's a temporal adverb once for all not Represented over and over and over again never perfecting anyone

Never perfecting anyone that's where the problem is and So even though an interesting enough, it was

Frank Beckwith who will read this He will read the 11th Canon of the succession of the

Council of Trent Which says if anyone says that men are justified either by the sole imputation of the justice of Christ or by the sole remission of sins to the exclusion of the grace and the

Charity which is poured forth in their hearts by the Holy Ghost and Remains in them or also that the grace by which we are justified is only the goodwill of God.

Let him be anathema Now that just anathema ties New Testament Christianity it's right there in the

Council of Trent. There are few other statements that more plainly Bring out the non -christian character of Roman Catholicism than that.

Oh It can't just be the the righteousness of Christ Because see we redefine

Righteousness to include sanctification you grow in this righteousness and you add to it and it's it's just this synergism see and Yet that is the very message of Romans 3 and 4 and 5 and so on so forth

Beckwith will bring that out but why is that so important because of the concept of the

Union of the elect with Christ in his death and the all -sufficiency of his death

And the fact that it's never to be repeated Rome doesn't have that kind of an atonement upon which to base that and so you see it's all connected and Yet only parts of it will end up appearing in this discussion which leads to all the problems that obviously you then have ends within that tradition holding on to the gospel and Yet I have come to understand as a historian primarily that the

Reformation itself was a renewal movement Within the one holy Catholic and apostolic

Church This is how I think the Reformers understood what they were doing. They weren't sort of starting a whole new experiment in religion

They wanted to go back through the tradition of the church the history of the church to recover what they understood to be the purer

Not totally Incorrupt but purer and pristine foundations of Christian faith, which they found in the early church fathers to some extent

But pre eminently in the apostolic witness of the Holy Scriptures true true yet it also included paring away denying and demonstrating to be downright devilish

The innovations and additions and subtractions and corruptions of the scriptural truth

You can't leave that part out I know it's not ecumenically proper to do that but you can't leave that part out and so in that sense

I want to call myself a Catholic evangelical an evangelical who's rooted in the

Reformation the great principles of the Reformation But who through that prism is able to appropriate and to affirm and in fact to own as my own the

Catholic tradition of the church Frank when you returned to the

Catholic Church You didn't see the need to jettison your evangelical Identity, why is that?

Well a couple of reasons now, I want you to be listening carefully as dr.

Beckwith speaks because One of the a chapter

I've already finished in a response to Frank Beckwith which will now be expanded on the basis of this dialogue

Because he said a number of things will be added to this The the question I have raised from the beginning in especially in reading

Return to Rome in listening to his appearances since his reversion to Roman Catholicism The question has always been in my mind

And he will make reference to I don't know if it's myself or just others who have obviously seen the same things

What was Frank Beckwith conversion experience like I Have never seen anything in What he has said and I have seen numerous indications to the contrary

I've never seen anything where he said I embraced the gospel of grace in distinction to the

Roman Catholic understanding of the gospel now when we have listened in the past to the conversation that took place between dr.

Beckwith and On the stand to reason program Gregory Kochel Plainly stated

That he was saved Though he was raised as Roman Catholic. He was saved out of Roman Catholicism He was saved by a gospel that was not preached in the

Roman Catholic Church Frank Beckwith. I've never heard him say that I've never heard him talk about a time where he said

I came to understand that what I had been taught in the Roman Catholic Church Was not the gospel.

I came to understand my sin my need for a sin -bearer that that there is no Representation of the one death of Christ that partially protect partially perfects me but but is a channel of grace and and and that I need a sacramental priesthood and and confession and penances and venial immortal sins and purgatory and indulgences and Mary and intercessory of intercession of saints and No, I I found out that that I there's only one way of salvation and it's it's in Jesus Christ and him alone and all

These other things not only detract from but they destroy that message of I never hear that What I hear is

I found, you know more Excitement and teaching and things in Protestant churches.

So I went there because I didn't find it in the Catholic Church and Yet when you

Examine his philosophy He is a Thomist. He's a natural theologian

He is very much in line With Roman Catholic ways of thinking at a fundamental and foundational level

My point is he paddled around the middle of the Tiber River for a long long time He eventually docked his boat back on the other side.

He never Crossed the Tiber River got out pulled his boat up on the shore

Tore the boat apart made it a pulpit from which he then called people to leave

Roman Catholicism never did that and he would admit that and My point of course is if you truly embrace the gospel of grace, you don't have any other choice if You actually think that that gospel is the means by which you have peace with God Then you have no choice but to call others who have been given another gospel out of the darkness of That man -centeredness and that's where the ecumenist says, oh, no, no, no, no, we don't need to do that We don't know

You know, I've got my opinions and I prefer this. I like this more and I simply say well, okay.

There you go That that's that's really what Identifies these things.

Let me say tell you a little bit about my background and by the way It's great to be here with with my friend Timothy as well as as Chris who

I met Several months ago when I was visiting at Notre Dame drove in and we had some coffee and a long

Conversation and wonderful to see both of you here I Was brought up Catholic.

I grew up in a Catholic family and as I As I became grew older I became more and more interested in knowing about the roots

Of my faith and one of the things I didn't find in the In least of the

Catholic parish and world that I lived in Was any sort of catechesis or understanding of the person of Christ and eventually

I began to read One of those good news for modern man New Testament's.

I don't know if you it's probably a bad translation, but for me I liked it because that stick figures in it

You know Paul and Silas are in prison and it's a stick figure prison as I began as I Became more and more interested in knowing more about my faith.

I drifted into Evangelical churches not because of a kind of anti Catholicism but more having to do with a desire

I had to follow Jesus and I drifted Into evangelical churches.

I just wanted to you know, the Catholic Church just wasn't doing because I just sort of drifted that way I Have just never heard any

I've no reason to believe that Frank Beckwith ever held that justification by faith alone is a hill to die on it is

Not what Rome teaches. It is a divinely revealed truth and That this somehow meant something to him along those lines as I read more and became more informed.

I consider myself a Protestant and I considered myself a

Protestant Taste you know You know Once I was a

Republican and then I became a libertarian, you know But I could go back it depends That that is a constant theme that I have detected in in the writings and the discussions that have taken place since this quote -unquote reversion took place and that's

I Think it says a lot We're gonna take a break and continue in our analysis of the dialogue between Timothy George and Frank Beckwith Bible works 8 is here full of innovative and essential tools users will have a hundred and ninety plus Bible translations 35 original language text and morphology databases 29 lexical grammatical references and an abundance of additional resources

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Hello everyone. This is Rich Pierce In a day and age where the gospel is being twisted into a man -centered self -help program

The need for a no -nonsense presentation of the gospel has never been greater I am convinced that a great many go to church every

Sunday yet. They have never been confronted with their sin Alpha and Omega ministries is dedicated to presenting the gospel in a clear and concise manner making no excuses

Man is sinful and God is holy That sinful man is in need of a perfect Savior and Jesus Christ is that perfect Savior?

We are to come before the Holy God with an empty hand of faith in the Lord Jesus Christ Alpha and Omega takes that message to every group that we deal with while equipping the body of Christ as well

Support Alpha and Omega ministries and help us to reach even more with the pure message of God's glorious grace.

Thank you And we continue listening to the dialogue that took place just recently up in the

Wheaton area between Timothy George and Frank Beckwith, I don't want to get into too many too much of the history since we're just here to define things but as I As I became more and more

Involved in the evangelical world I went on and and and did my doctorate in philosophy and became eventually in 2006 the president of the

Evangelical Theological Society and during my presidency I resigned Soon after returning to the

Catholic Church but for me I Call myself an evangelical Catholic and by calling myself that I fully realize it's a controversial and contested claim

I know that there are going to be Catholics who contested in fact just the other day a blogger named

Gregorian right Catholic Said that I am still on the fence and to some people to claim to be an evangelical

Catholic is like Claiming to be both a White Sox fan and a Cubs fan at the same time

And then there are going to be some evangelicals who will say that I was a I've always been a closet papist naively ignorant of evangelicalism's history and its wide range of theological resources and That if I had just been permitted to have safe harbor under Friar's Bridge, I would not have ventured off to Tiber.

I Think that's sort of directed my direction or people like like me and I I do

Have lots of reasons to question. Dr. Beck with Theological knowledge of the far side of the

Tiber By his own statements by by his own confession in regards these issues

I mean in his book he talks about how he was never really Comfortable with the concept of sola scriptura.

Well, okay That doesn't necessarily make you a quote -unquote closet papist But it does demonstrate that on a very fundamental level a very fundamental level

That Frank Beckwith never really crossed the Tiber. He never took a stand on the far side and that's why he can treat this as an issue of of You know matters of taste, you know, you know,

I I've been here now I'm over here, but you know all along I've really, you know been focused on the same things all along Well, I think that says a lot now despite being flanked by both sorts of skeptics

I nevertheless will plow ahead and offer an account of what what I think it means to be an evangelical Catholic First what is an evangelical?

Well, it depends who you ask if you ask the editorial board of modern Reformation magazine Evangelicals are the theological heirs of Lutheran and reform scholastic isms in all its forms in a variety of denominations

This however, according to some would exclude most Pentecostal Wesleyan and Church of Christ bodies as well as some

Anglican Communions Now if you ask the executive committee of the Evangelical Theological Society In order to be a member you only need to believe two things that the

Bible alone in the Bible in its entirety is the Word of God written is therefore inerrant in all its autographs and God is a

Trinity Father Son and Holy Spirit each an uncreated person one in essence equal in power and glory now again

If words have meanings in historical contexts, then we know without a doubt

That the phrase the Bible alone in that brief. I would argue far too brief

Statement of faith is supposed to have a meaning Roger Nicole said it did and It's supposed to have a meaning that excludes

Roman Catholics and their view of authority. That's what he said Now you can say Roger Nicole was wrong.

You can say we don't need to interpret such things in a historical context We don't need to worry about the original author said whatever he wants to say

But that's the historical fact To keep in mind, but this at least theoretically one could according to this maintain membership in good standing while embracing a variety of ancient heresies

Nestorian is a monophysite ism Pelagian ism semi Pelagian ism As well as a dial of Christ eternal sonship but One cannot be a

Catholic and be part of ETS so apparently a semi Pelagian historian Could be a member of ETS, but not st.

Ignatius st. Athanasius st. Augustine st Anselm or Thomas a campus Now he's obviously right reading from Written notes that he prepared for these things.

In fact, he's gonna answer one extremely important question That was asked of him. Well, he's gonna skip answering it, but he's gonna read something

In in that process, which is fine. Just just so you know, what was going on since we're not watching a video We're just listening to it but He started saying

Ignatius And didn't ever finish saying Ignatius, but I would assume that he means that And I I just have to challenge once again on basic honest historical grounds this

Constant claim on the part of Roman Catholics that everybody in the past of the Reformation is ours.

That's not True, it is a lie It is it is an untruth if someone that long ago such as Ignatius of Antioch Gave no evidence whatsoever of believing all sorts of things that you as a

Roman Catholic believe dogmatically You're the ones that use the dogmatic language you're the ones that use the anathema you're the ones that say if you don't believe this

You are anathema, and I know modern Roman Catholics. You'll just want to fluff that term up Just just think historically for a moment in 13th century

Spain if the religious leaders in a town

Declared you to be anathema. What was the inevitable result of that action? It's real simple.

It's called a stake and a fire. Oh But but but we didn't do that that the secular authorities did that Anytime I heard somebody saying that and trying to weasel out of what the anathema meant.

I just I Just want to go You're the same person that wants to sit there and say all 2 ,000 years of tradition.

We're the same church But then turn around and pull that stunt. I Does does honesty mean anything here?

It'd be nice Let's just deal with history as it really was But anyway,

I Leave the point for just a moment in any event There are as one would guess a variety of different definitions of evangelicalism

I do think that there's a core of What I think an evangelical is from these overlapping and sometimes contested

Understandings. I think there's a primacy of personal spiritual renewal and Reformation that includes conversion evangelism or preaching the good news of Jesus a commitment to basic Christian orthodoxy on the nature of God in Christ and a high view of Scripture as the infallible and and or inerrant

Word of God that provides to us accurate knowledge of the deity his kingdom and the plan of salvation Consequently if one thinks of evangelicalism is embracing these core characteristics

Then one can certainly be an evangelical Catholic I think I am an evangelical

Catholic because I believe in the evangel the gospel the good news as an evangelical Indeed as a

Christian. I have an obligation to propagate as well as live the good news of Jesus Christ in this and of course

The big question is and and since Timothy George's artist said hey brother Frank Can't really bring this up very much.

We can we can talk about certain elements of it. I suppose, but we can't say What was the gospel by which you were saved as an evangelical and what is the gospel now?

Are they the same gospel at least when Tim Staples? And I were on the Bible answer man broadcast long long long ago 13 plus years ago now

I managed to bring this out Tim you and I are staying outside of an abortion clinic and We both agree that what's going on in there is the murder of children and it's deplorable and God's judgment will come upon any nation that allows this disgusting activity

Someone walks up to us as we're standing outside that abortion clinic and They look at both of us and together they say to us together.

What must I do to be saved? Would you not agree that We are going to answer that question in a fundamentally contradictory fashion

And he agreed we would But the Tim Staples the world are not the ecumenical voices of Rome and Here you're hearing.

I believe in the evangelism. What is the evangelism? Is it a does it involve? the once -for -all

Sacrifice of Jesus. Oh, yes. Yes. Yes. We just represent it upon the altar. That's why

I made note of The Eucharistic conference that Was on EWTN.

I was over in a New Mexico and I I happened to have the television on and of course the

Cable channels are different in Santa Fe than they are here. And I didn't know where anything was and I just happened across a

Lengthy presentation of a Eucharistic conference going on in Washington DC and A woman was speaking and most what she was saying really didn't

Catch my attention at all because she was just sort of going on about this and on about that but then all of a sudden she

Made a statement and I recognized immediately where it came from she she talked about the gift of the priesthood and She spoke of the dignity of the priest and how when the priest speaks

God bows in obedience to the priest's command and I remembered very well a citation that I've used in a number of debates and I've never had any of my

Catholic opponents Deny this quote. Oh that that's not that's just so imbalanced that that's not represent they've never never even tried to interact with it and In fact in the priesthood debate father

Mitchell Pacwa Confirmed and affirmed what is said here, especially at the end of this quote and I'm going to go ahead

I know most of you know this but for people who are listening I Think you need to hear what this

Church claims about the priesthood and how this is so central to what is being discussed John O 'Brien the faith of millions

When the priest announces the tremendous words of consecration he reaches up into the heavens Brings Christ down from his throne and places him upon our altar to be offered up again as the victim for the sins of man

It is a power greater than that of saints and angels greater than that of seraphim and cherubim Indeed it is greater even than the power of the

Virgin Mary while the Blessed Virgin was the human agency by which Christ became incarnate a single time

The priest brings Christ down from heaven and renders him present on our altar as the eternal victim for the sins of man not once but a thousand times the priest speaks in low

Christ the eternal and omnipotent God bows his head in humble obedience to the priests command of What sublime dignity is the office of the

Christian priest who is thus privileged to act as the ambassador and vice -gerant of Christ on earth?

He continues the essential ministry of Christ. He teaches the faithful with the authority of Christ He pardons the penitent sinner with the power of Christ He offers up again the same sacrifice of adoration and atonement which

Christ offered on Calvary No wonder that the name which spiritual writers are especially fond of applying the priest is that of altar

Christus For the priest is and should be another Christ and quote any

Religious body That would not with the anathema

Identify such Anti Christ blasphemy

For what it is Partakes the spirit of Antichrist that is blasphemous

You can you can get all the warm feelings for Roman Catholics in your heart you want it does not

Change the reality of the fact that those words are

Anti -christian they are Antichrist No apostle knew anything of such a concept

There is nothing in inspired scripture That even begins to hint at such an amazing assertion and note that very first phrase a very first sentence

When the priest announces the tremendous words of consecration he reaches up into the heavens

Brings Christ down from his throne and places him upon our altar to be offered up again as the victim for the sins of man

What does that do to this facile argument that the mass is but a

Representation of the one sacrifice of Christ it exposes it for the empty canard that it is but that is the heart of Roman Catholic sacramentalism and its view of the mass

This is the system that is being discussed here, you're not going to hear this quoted. Yeah, no of course not because That doesn't fit into the ecumenical mindset.

We don't we don't want to you know, that's that's that's that's tough stuff But that's what's being asserted.

That's what we're talking about here and We're talking about it. But unfortunately it didn't get talked about in the actual

Discussion means that in any journey that in my journey I must by his grace draw closer to Christ and undergo continual personal

Reformation and conversion so that I may be conformed to his image I must pick up my cross and follow him so that others may follow him as well apart from God's grip.

Does that include dr. Beckwith? You're suffering in purgatory Does that include dr.

Beckwith you're obtaining of indulgences remember when when Beckwith was on Catholic answers live and that woman called in and Asked him about praying to Mary and what did he say?

Well, I haven't prayed to Mary yet, and you could just hear the

You just knew that the people in that audience are in shock that does being an evangelical

Catholic dr. Beckwith Mean that you don't worry about indulgences Purgatory He's gonna be asked a tremendously important question later on we're not gonna get to it today.

Obviously, I'm not gonna rush through this We have to unpack these things.

We have to think about these things It's not gonna happen in the ecumenical dialogues, and I'm never gonna be invited to do it.

So We have to take our time. We have to think about these things, but he's gonna be asking incredibly important question

He's gonna be asked the question During that time when you're a

Protestant and you were not involved in the sacramental life the Roman Catholic Church and Given that Roman Catholicism identifies as a mortal sin not going to confession as a baptized

Catholic Were if you had died in that state would you have gone to heaven they see what this exposes is the difference between historic

Orthodox Roman Catholicism and its Consistent sacramentalism Because the answer would be no if you had asked any

Roman Catholic 200 years ago. The answer would have been no if you had asked innocent when he or Boniface when he he gave forth unum sanctum and and Identified what

Roman Catholic teaching is he would have said no If you had asked that the council fathers at the council, they would said no

But Frank Beckwith is is gonna say well sort of yes but see

Mortal sin involves knowing these things if you're ignorant, I was invincibly ignorant And so no, I you know that really wouldn't have happened to me

God knows my heart see and so you can get around these things and You can pick and choose

You know when John Paul came to Los Angeles back in the 80s came through Phoenix first they were out there passing on tracks

And then he went to Los Angeles while he was in Los Angeles. He spoke against what he called cafeteria style

Catholicism and you know, what's like in the cafeteria Some people take a little bit of everything some people are very choosy.

I'm on the choosy side, you know I don't end up with much on my plate in the cafeteria But you pick and choose by your predilection what you like You know you form your

Catholicism that fits you and you leave the other stuff off that Marian stuff He doesn't seem really like that stuff.

That is gonna come up. He's gonna say yeah, it's pretty tough You know, I I can really can't defend that stuff Wow, what must it be like I?

Really can't defend that stuff, but you know the church defined it So, you know really is that is that really consistent with your apologetic training, you know?

It's something defined by church as a dogma Something that defines the faith

Doesn't define the faith for him Cafeteria -style Catholicism ace there is nothing that any one of us can do to obtain a holy life or merit eternal fellowship with God And I'm a

Catholic for all the reasons with which many of you are familiar Catholicism commits me to an understanding of the church

Ecclesiology and the magisterium that is not shared obviously by evangelical Protestants, but I think on those issues concerning one's view of the good news of Jesus Christ and the

Obligation we have to preach it and to live it and to share it with others in that sense. I'm an evangelical Catholic Thank you

Frank along this line Christian identity and the core

I've heard some Protestants criticize the designation evangelical Catholic Since Catholics repudiate the doctrines of Scripture alone and Faith alone

Timothy, what would you say to them? Well to answer that question? I think we have to say why are we having this conversation in this year?

2009 Well, it's because things are different today than they were in 1949 when the

ETS That Frank served as president began back then

Evangelicals set themselves apart from primarily two different groups one were Protestant liberals

We knew we weren't liberals. We didn't want to be liberals. We were setting a different the other were what's Roman Catholicism now

I was born in 1950 So I didn't know any about that stuff that was going on But a lot has changed in both of those worlds since the late 40s for one thing

Protestant Liberalism is a withering religious reality in our culture today It's lost a lot of its oomph and Continues to do so and it's very difficult in a way to define evangelicalism anymore

Primarily over against that kind of decaying Ecclesiastical reality on the other hand there also have been changes in Roman Catholicism stemming primarily though not exclusively from Vatican Council to and This has brought evangelicals and Catholics together on lots of different fronts

One of them has to do with we'll talk about this later I'm sure social cultural issues, and I wrote an editorial some years ago for Christianity Today called ecumenism of the trenches

Because it seemed to be evangelicals and Catholics were meeting in the trenches of what some have called the culture wars

But having met there have really beginning to know one another and to ask well Do we have anything in common other than the fact that we're against abortion?

We're against this that and the other and in fact we found we are finding yes We do have more of the common than that and that's brought evangelicals and Catholics together

And I've been a part of a movement actually called evangelicals and Catholics together begun by Chuck Colson and the late lamented father

Richard John Newhouse and in that context just in passing

I believe I think The article that I wrote shortly after the first ECT statement came out is still in the

Roman Catholic section of the articles section on the website and Won't go into all of that, but there will be a lot of opportunity over the course of we're only

Fifteen and a half minutes into an hour 45 here, so obviously we're going a little while there will be

Opportunity to interact with the failure of the ECT movement the real grounds the

ECT movement Which I think he just in it in essence did identify And that is it was an ecumenism of the trenches it was since we're standing side -by -side facing these cultural foes it involved the fundamental reordering of The priorities of these evangelicals to where the evangel is no longer at the top of that list

The evangel can become something that we discuss something that we can allow a much wider definition of So that we can have this kind of alleged unity in fighting these common

Cultural foes we have talked about these two issues In fact we've issued about eight papers in all

One of the first ones we did was on the gift of salvation And it had to do with justification by faith alone and that particular group of scholars

Admittedly, it was not an official ecumenical group now keep that in mind

Oh, we had some real heavy hitters in there, but you know we really didn't actually represent anybody You know when

I if I criticize Roman Catholicism, and I quote a particular theologian well

That's not official Who do you think you are you're misrepresenting us? and yet When they want to look ecumenical then they can quote anybody they jolly well want to There there is often a double standard on that particular level we didn't have the sponsorship of any church.

We're just in Evangelical theologians and ten Catholic theologians, but the head we had some heavy hitters in our group on the evangelical side dr.

J .i. Packer on the Catholic side the late Cardinal Avery Dulles neither one of those were slouchy theologians and Together we poured over the text of Scripture And we were able to agree on a great deal not everything and one of the one of the things we were trying to do

Is to say where do we agree and where do we disagree and how do we delineate those definitions?

You know I sort of thought that that had been figured out a long long time ago At least

I thought it had been But unfortunately even as we listen to this ecumenical

Dialogue as we've pointed out the main issues the central issues the cross Atonement transubstantiation the mass things like that.

Oh those sticky subjects. They're all out there on the fringe They're not what defined the real

Issues well we will continue this dialogue and this discussion next time on the dividing line

Lord willing and health continues Anyways, that'll be on Thursday. We'll see you then The dividing line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega Ministries If you'd like to contact us call us at 602 -973 -4602 or write us at P .O.

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