September 9, 2004

The Apostle Peter’s Call to Defend the Hope Within Us

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 Baptist Church. This is a live program and we invite your participation. If you'd like to talk with Dr. White, call now at 602 -973 -4602 or toll free across the United States.

It's 1 -877 -753 -3341. And now with today's topic, here is James White.

What do you mean there's no British accent? I just saw a British man on the channel say there's no British accent. What's he talking about? I don't know. Well, good afternoon. No, I'm not going to do the whole thing that way.

Someday I will. I'm going to go to England next year. And so when I do that, we will come back and we will do the whole thing from England. How about we do that? We find some way and I'll call in and do the whole program.

The mortal short circuit.

The mortal short circuit. Well, that's okay. Welcome to the Dividing Line. Today is Thursday and that means early tomorrow morning I head for the airport and head to Toronto. And I think that's in Canada.

And we're going to be speaking up there. And then we come back. And, in fact, come back in time for Sunday morning service. I've been up since like, I don't know, 1230, my time in the morning. It's going to be tough to stay awake.

That's going to be a rough one. Anyway, but then two weeks from now we're going to be down in Texas for the Southern Founders, Southern Founders Conference meeting there in Texas. And I'm going to be speaking on more issues relating to justification.

Something tells me there's going to be some interesting discussions going on at that particular point in time. But I have begun to develop the proverbial stack of stuff. Yes, I think everyone who is involved in doing any type of program like this needs to have a stack of stuff.

Mine is of books primarily. I guess that's the difference between this and good old Rush Limbaugh. Mine is made up primarily of books. Starting off with a book that is recommended by N .T. Wright. And for some of you that just made it almost canonical.

Not comical, canonical. Listen very carefully, please. N .T. Wright says that this book is rooted in good scholarship. It's clear, punchy style makes it accessible to anyone. Tony Campolo also recommended it.

This book presents the holistic theology the church desperately needs. The radical call of Christ transformed the world comes through loud and clear. This is a must read for any who want to speak relevantly to our age.

It is recommended on certain Christian websites that sell books. And it is a Zondervan publication. And that used to mean something. It is a book from a British author. So I suppose I should read it in a British accent.

But I won't because you might not understand it. But, you know, I guess like so many books, if it says something true, and this seems to be something I see a lot in churches, if it says something true, then everything it says must be true.

There are two extremes here. You've got the people who will go, Oh, well, you know, he had a great insight on that point. Well, you know what? The Mormon prophet has great insights on a point once in a while.

You know, I hear people talking about, Well, I heard the Pope talking and he said something wonderful. I heard this guy on TVN speaking and he said something wonderful. So you've got the people on that side that as long as you say something nice, something true, then that must mean that everything you say is true.

Then on the other side, you've got the people, and they generally draw the circle so closely to themselves, they're the only ones that can stand in it. And they think that if you say anything that's even slightly wrong in their opinion, then everything you say must be wrong.

The truth is someplace in between. And I think the reason that books like this become as popular as they do is because, first of all, it is written well. It's very easy to read. It's not challenging in the sense of high-brow vocabulary.

It's got good stories. I know a lot of preachers that preach like this book reads. And we live in a day and time when people like that. But I was reading the book, and there were some things, and I went, Oh, that's an interesting insight.

But there was always just something that made me go, and then I started hitting some stuff, and I was like, Oh, no way. And then we get to the end. Remember, this is a Zondervan book. This is a book recommended by N .T. Wright.

This is a book you'll find recommended by people who are known for discerning things. And here on page 182 and 183, we finally get to the part about, the book is titled, by the way, The Lost Message of Jesus.

And it's talking about the cross, and we run into this. The fact is that the cross isn't a form of cosmic child abuse, a vengeful father punishing his son for an offense he has not even committed. Understandably, both people inside and outside the church have found this twisted version of events morally dubious and a huge barrier to faith.

Deeper than that, however, is that such a concept stands in total contradiction to the statement, God is love. If the cross is a personal act of violence perpetrated by God towards humankind, but born by his son, then it makes a mockery of Jesus' own teaching to love your enemies and to refuse to repay evil with evil.

Wow. Talk about a complete twisting of the Christian doctrine of the atonement, a complete denial of biblical revelation. Just throw that baby right out the window at that point. And it wasn't really my point to, I mean, refuting this is not overly difficult.

There are entire books of the Bible that argue the points against this kind of stuff. But how does somebody say that this is rooted in good scholarship? How does Zondervan get away with publishing this?

And it's ironic. Before I got it, I knew that he denied the substitutionary atonement of Christ, the propitiatory death of Christ, and so on and so forth. And you know how I knew that? From the Amazon review, which is generally not really worth a lot.

Actually, I'll take that back. This was the official review, not the ones that people post on there, which are generally completely and totally irrelevant. But I knew it from looking at Amazon, not from looking at Christian websites.

So Zondervan puts it out, The Lost Message of Jesus. Steve, I don't know if it's Chalky or Chalk. It's C-H-A-L-K-E. He's British, and that explains a lot of it right there, because he's British. So nothing.

I don't, I, oh, let's roll with that, you know. Oh, goodness, that one, that was pretty bad. Next, this was amazing. I'm reading from the Christian Reformed Church website, Synod 2004. Grand Rapids, Michigan, June 16, 2004.

Synod concluded six hours of debate today by asking an advisory committee to revise its recommendations. Isn't that how all synods work? We asked a committee to revise its recommendations. About altering the Heidelberg Catechism's description of the Roman Catholic Mass.

Question and answer A to the Heidelberg Catechism calls the Mass a, quote, condemnable idolatry, end quote, because the Roman Catholic Church teaches that Christ is bodily present in the bread and wine and must be sacrificed daily by priests.

Let me just add my own commentary there. There's more to it than that. That's part of it, the concept of transubstantiation. But also the idea of the Mass as a perpetuatory sacrifice that perfects no one should be just as offensive and idolatrous in the minds of a believing Christian as anything else.

I continue reading from the website. A Christian Reformed Church study committee, I love this, met with Roman Catholic bishops to come to a better understanding of the official Roman Catholic teachings regarding Mass and the Eucharist.

I would love to know the identity of these bishops. Were they officially assigned by the Roman Catholic Church? Or were these American bishops, primarily? You know, that would be fascinating to find out.

I would love to know. I really, really would like to know who these individuals were, but the article does not say. Going back to quotation, based on these conversations, the advisory committee recommended adding a footnote to the Catechism to say that when the Mass is celebrated in accordance with official Roman Catholic teaching, tune in here, listen to this, they want to add a footnote to the Heidelberg Catechism to say that when the Mass is celebrated in accordance with official Roman Catholic teaching, it does not deny the one sacrifice of Christ, nor constitute idolatry.

The committee also recommended that Q &A 80 remain in the Catechism in smaller type as a warning to those who would obscure and distort Eucharistic teaching. Huh? What is that? Delegates debated at length over this recommendation.

Some opposed the format of the proposed changes. They suggested increasing the font, getting rid of the question and answer altogether, keeping the Catechism the way it is, or moving all or part of the question and answer into a footnote.

Et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. Wow. Well, I don't know what to say other than it's coming from all sides. And I can understand why this is happening here. Maybe these folks don't have any connection whatsoever to the whole area of Roman Catholic theology.

Maybe they just have really poor understandings of where Rome has been, where Rome is, the many different perspectives in Rome, et cetera, et cetera. And I guess I could understand it at that point. But to think that an entire denomination that bases itself upon the Heidelberg Catechism could totally misunderstand or not understand what Rome meant historically by that and the fact that it sort of introduces a little bit of a problem with regard to the concept of infallibility, if that's no longer what they mean.

I mean, if they'd like to come out and say, you know what, we once believed this, now we believe this, especially about something as core as the math, hey, great, you know, won't have to have any more debates with Roman Catholic apologists, at least on the infallibility of the church.

But, you know, that's not quite what they've done. And amazing. Well, I just found out that Alexander the Coppersmith, also known as Paul Owen, has posted something on the ciphered controversy on reformedcatholicism .com.

I'm looking at it. On his blog, James White has recently taken it upon himself to expose the doctrinal errors of Dr. Mark Cipher. No, I never did that. Of course, Paul Owen couldn't represent anything accurately because his life depended upon it.

But this is interesting. Who teaches New Testament Studies at Southern Baptist Theological Seminary. I wonder if any of this is actually going to interact with anything that I said. That would be interesting to see.

Just looking at it, with being in doctrinal conflict with the teaching standards of the institution where he is employed. Actually, again, that's what the Southern Baptist statement said. I hadn't said that.

I pointed out the difference between what James Boyce said in his theology and what Cipher had said in the Act of the Passive Obedience to Christ. Again, I would not expect Owen to accurately represent that because he never accurately represents anything.

Whether it's Calvin or whoever, it's just the way it is. I privately, and rather harshly I'll admit, there's a history here that I won't bore people with. Yeah, the history is since 1996 I've gotten this kind of hate mail from Paul Owen.

He cannot show my responses to him that are of the same kind and same temperament as his. His have always been nasty and they remain that way. He rebuked me for his behavior and he then chose to publicly post my email comments on his blog as a publicity stunt to promote his image as a martyr.

No, actually it just simply tells people what Paul Owen is actually all about and where he's actually going and what he actually believes. Remember, this is the same fellow who believes that it would be better for you to be in a Roman Catholic church than a Baptist church.

He is a Presbyterian teaching in a PCUSA church, even though my understanding is he is a PCA. He is involved in a PCA church but teaches a PCUSA college. Anyway, I'm not going to allow the good name of a fine Christian scholar to be dragged through the mud any longer.

I am going to say some things here which very much need to be said. Hopefully some people will snap to their senses and see this doctrinal witch hunt for what it is. Anyone right now who's listening, who's read my blogs, already knows that Owen is being dishonest here and isn't bothering to deal with the issue.

So here's yet another person throwing their hat in the ring, and instead of clarifying the issue regarding the imputation of the righteousness of Christ, issues regarding the act of past obedience, we have all the personal stuff.

It's funny, I posted something yesterday rebuking folks who claim to be on my side. They obviously have some agenda against Southern Seminary, and I rebuked them. I called them the firebrands, and they didn't appreciate that by the way.

I got a rather nasty response back. Because once again, I've said from the beginning, this isn't about Mark Seifert or me. It has nothing to do with his name or mine. And all these people, like Paul Owen, who want to use this and just score some more points, I can say the sky is blue, and he'll find a way of insulting my intelligence for doing that.

They're just demonstrating that what I've said all along is true. These folks don't want to deal with the theological issue, they just want to make it all personal.

None of it's personal.

And I refuse to let it become personal. So anyways, Mark Seifert is not teaching anything controversial. So go read his statements. Act of impassive obedience. Unnecessary misleading. Imputation added to the forgiveness.

And certainly nothing which should raise any suspicions as to his orthodoxy as a Baptist in the Protestant tradition. Well, there you go. James White made charges on his blog which, were they proven true, could result in the dismissal of Mark Seifert from his teaching post.

Does anyone find anything in what I said on my blog about charges, accusations, or Mark Seifert's job? Anyone? Anyone in the listening audience out there? Someone want to put your hand up? Oh, no one?

That's because it's not there. That's right. I was dealing with someone's published book. That's right. I guess you're not supposed to deal with someone's published book. Something about the Theological Seminary does not tolerate doctrinal dissent from their recognized theological commitments.

We are talking here about actions which were taken which could have resulted in devastating consequences for Dr. Seifert and his family. Everyone listen to what's being said here. Don't review anyone's book.

If you're a scholar and you publish a book, you have immunity from anyone reviewing what you say. You can say anything you want. Paul Owen, he's come up with his own unique view of Galatians. As he has made sure that everyone knows, even though he's really written very few things and is not really widely known, he's come up with his own view and he's let everybody know, I am a scholar and therefore I have the right to put forth new ideas.

That's how he thinks. Here we have the idea, you can print anything you want and you are immune from review. That's what Paul Owen would have us to believe. In his rush to defend the gospel, I do not believe it has yet sunk into the head of James White just how serious an action he took in publicly making the charges he did.

Remember, we can't quote any of these charges because they're not there. That's an act of dishonesty on Paul Owen's part. White says this is not about people. That is just a problem. It is about people.

When you make charges which could get a person fired, that is about as personal as you can get. So far what we've learned is that if you're a scholar, you can write anything you want and if someone reviews it, they will call it a charge that you're accusing them of something.

So if you disagree, if you don't... Remember, Dr. Seifried's own book says he's contrasting his viewpoint with traditional Protestant understandings. So if you believe in traditional Protestant understandings and you respond to the identification of them as being misleading, unbiblical, sub-biblical, so on and so forth, you are the person attacking someone else.

If you're feeling lost about now, somewhat dizzy, just sit down, sip some water, you'll be feeling a little better later on because it is sort of like falling down the rabbit hole. Rationality has flown out the window and we just have to go on from there.

The Charge of “Heresy Hunting” and the Real Issue of Imputation

Here is the problem. There are people in the body of Christ whose ministries revolve around controversies and fresh opportunities to defend the gospel from the latest heresy. He's referring to apologists there.

The closer the heretic is to the heart of the evangelical community, the better. Notice, have I ever used the term heretic? Would someone like to... any hands? Anyone? Fine. Oh, that would require documentation.

And one thing we know, Dr. Owen does not need documentation. His own Ipsodixit is more than sufficient in any type of situation. The closer the heretic is... so who has used this term first? It seems Paul Owen.

That sounds like an elevation, don't you think? Don't you think that's a pretty nasty thing to say about somebody, especially when the person you're reviewing didn't use it? Well, anyway. The closer the heretic is to the heart of the evangelical community, the better, because that enables the heresy hunter to shout even louder since the danger to our doctrinal purity has now invaded the camp.

These sorts of people thrive. Sorts of people. I love being dehumanized, don't you? These sorts of people thrive off of pointing out how much error there is within the evangelical community. Turn on TBN.

Did I say TBN? I'm sorry. The network with the doctrinal name and it's on between 20 and 22 here in Phoenix. Because that feeds the hysteria of the masses who look to their doctrinal heroes armed with their apologetic pistols to gun down the person causing confusion.

Do we have any music like a do-do-do-do-do-do-do? We should have that. We really need to have that before this type of wonderful representation of what we're all about here.

Like what?

You know, from the Spaghetti Weapons. Just kidding. Spaghetti Weapons. Spaghetti Westerns.

Do-do-do-do-do.

Yeah, that one. You know, if you didn't laugh, you'd have to cry. I bet you it's around someplace. In fact, with the 4 ,000 wave files we have in the channel, I bet you we could track that one down. In fact, I bet you we'll have it by the end of the program, though it will be sort of irrelevant at that point.

Anyway, let's go back to the wonderful description here. People who function with this mentality simply do not appear to think much in terms of the real world. Their thoughts and lives reside within a bubble of apologetics and threats to the pure gospel.

They do not get caught up in personal issues because they simply do not think much about practical earthly issues, which involve personal things like ministries and careers. To my understanding, this man's not a minister in the church.

He's not ordained. He's talking about people who are. That's an amazing thing. It's a falsehood again, but Paul Owen is so focused upon himself that he doesn't seem to recognize falsehoods any longer.

This is the man that was just shredded in discussion on the NTR men board in regards to Calvin. He was outsided three to one, and he'd just get mad and stomp off and so on and so forth. He's so caught up in his own infallibility that he can sit here and say, Oh, these people, they don't think about personal things.

Oh, but wait a minute, they're actually involved in the church, in fact, in leadership in the church. White, of course, is not the first person to highlight Seyfried's views. Yes, good, but there is a difference.

Why? Well, we'll find out. People like Robert Gundry and John Piper have noted Seyfried's views. Interesting enough, why didn't he mention Gaffin noticing Seyfried's views? Hmm, that's interesting. Maybe this was taken from the fact that I pointed out these people had noted Seyfried's views.

Without making attempts to call into question his theological pedigree or his consistency with the doctrinal standards of the seminary where he teaches. Excuse me, once again, got the hand up here. Where did I do that?

Dr. Owen, could you document? Oh, I'm sorry. I'm sorry. To ask you to document something is to ask you to question your own fallibility. So Dr. Owen says I did it. I must have done it. Can't document it, but we don't need documentation.

White went beyond a mere critique and immediately began to ratchet up the tension by dramatically exposing the fact that a Baptist professor who teaches at the Bastion of Conservative Baptist Orthodoxy has denied the invitation of Christ.

It's a pillar of Protestant soteriology. Again, all of you who've read what I said are listening to this going, Wow, what planet did this guy just land from? I mean, this isn't even close. Doesn't he realize someone could go read those blogs and then realize that he's the one who's ratcheting everything up here, making this up as he's going along?

Anyone who reads the series of rambling essays on White's blog can see the tone for themselves. Yes, they can. That's the point, unfortunately, for someone here. He clearly expects gasps of horror from his readers as he astutely demonstrates how compromised Protestant Orthodoxy has become, even within the most respected halls of evangelical education.

Now, folks, in case you're wondering, that's meant to be exceptionally condescending because Paul Owen is the king of condescension and has been, well, like I said, since 1996. And so if you're wondering if you're reading that correctly, you read it correctly.

White has made several disparaging remarks on his blog. When I was devising a webcast about academia and scholars, yep, sure have, I've said that academia in its current state does not tend to see itself as subservient to the church, in service to the church, the people in the academy in general, seem to think that it's much more important to have the approbation of the world than it does of the church and of Christ.

And I've said that, and the number of examples of that are legion. Given the context of his remarks, it is hard not to get the impression he is accusing Dr. Seifert of being an ivory tower academic who is not engaged with practical issues relating to preaching and spreading the gospel.

Isn't that, hmm, isn't that what Owen just said about me? Yeah, I think that is. Let me kill that myth right now, which he just made up as he went by. Seminary professors at places like SBTS are very engaged in real ministry.

They deal with pastoral issues all the time, as they teach, eat, converse, pray, and counsel their students, some of whom are already pastors, and others of whom will eventually enter the pastorate. Anyone who thinks you can be a seminary professor at a place like SBTS without being connected to practical issues is clueless.

Practical issues relating to ministry come up all the time, in class and outside of class, in those settings, not to mention the fact that a typical seminary professor at a school like that is already involved in church ministry and probably had considerable ministry experience before getting hired.

Again, that's wonderful, and of course, while Dr. Owen ignores this, I teach at one of those seminaries too, and so I knew all about that, but my point was that I see a schizophrenia. I see a schizophrenia where you have what you teach in class and then what you teach at church.

And I've seen this at ETS, where you have the academy, the academy which is the wise guide of the benighted church. And it's that schizophrenia that really concerns me. Now, again, you won't find any of this in what I wrote in regards to the issue, because I wasn't talking about Dr. Seifried personally, because I didn't make it personal.

Paul Owen makes everything personal, and so that's why he reads it that way, but I hadn't, so if you're looking for those things, you want to look at those rambling things that we were just talking about.

He talks about, there's a further point, teaching is a ministry. Yep, I know. As these professors teach God's word to their students, they are doing ministry. They are contributing a whole lot more to the ministry of the body of Christ by equipping pastors and do professional apologists on the Internet who spend all their time finding some new evangelical heretic to attack in order to promote themselves.

We all see the personal slams here, which, of course, we recognize were not present in anything I said about Dr. Seifried, and the fact that I teach in the same context gets missed in this particular review.

So make no mistake about it. Mark Seifried is very involved in practical ministry, a point that I never actually brought up. He has no doubt forgotten more about defaying the gospel against the opponents that James White will ever grasp.

Anyways, what about Seifried's views? They are plainly stated in his book, Christ Our Righteous, pages 173 through 177. Yes, they are, which are quoted on my blog. There is nothing here which should cause us to break out into a panic.

He plainly denies that justification involves an infusion of righteousness, which no one has questioned, so that God's declaration is based upon a moral transformation effected in us by the Spirit. We are righteous only because of Christ, whose righteousness saves us when we are joined to him by faith.

Seifried does not deny the truth that undergirds the doctrine of imputation, namely that we are justified by righteousness which is not properly our own. We are reckoned to be righteous only because of the righteousness of Christ.

When we are joined to him by faith, his righteousness becomes the basis upon which we are and will be vindicated in the divine tribunal. Well, to strip all the controversy, basically Seifried is uncomfortable with the direction that the doctrine of imputation has taken by some divines within Protestant orthodoxy.

And what were some of those divines? Anybody remember? This is what we talked about in the last program. You know, like the Westminster Confession of Faith, and James Boyce, and everybody who believes in imputation.

He writes,. What is Seifried saying here? To anyone who reads him without a cloud of suspicion. Of course, Dr. Owen couldn't read anything I've written without a cloud of suspicion. He is simply claiming, whether rightly or wrongly, that Calvin and Luther had a better grasp of the manner in which Christ's righteousness vindicates the believer.

Rather than viewing justification as something God gives to us when we believe in Christ, he sees justification as God's gift of Christ to us. God does not impute righteousness to us as though it were something additional to Christ given to us when we believe.

Rather, Christ's righteousness remains his own and it benefits us only because we are joined to him by faith. As Seifried puts it, it is in the crucified and risen Christ that the righteousness of God has been manifest, not in us.

It has not effused power within the world, but has its locus in Christ and the gospel which makes him known. That's all well and good, but the odd thing is, that's not what Dr. Seifried said in the SBTS statement.

And that's part of the whole problem, because it's not resulting in clarity, which is why we've done this whole thing to begin with. In Seifried's view, what became the traditional understanding of imputation had the effect of viewing justification as something that is focused upon us rather than Christ.

And I raise my hand saying, so Dr. Owen, do you actually believe that? I don't. Do you actually believe that that's what Westminster was saying, Dr. Owen, Presbyterian Dr. Owen? Is that what you believe?

That's not what I believe. Rather than speaking of Christ's righteousness being given to us, he feels we should simply speak of his righteousness saving us because of our union with him in Christ and in hope.

The triumph over sin and death is ours here and now. It is not ours. We possess it only in faith. That's not all he said. He specifically, as we looked at the quotes last time, said much more than that, which Owen is sort of skipping at this particular point here.

Wow, this goes on and on and on and on, doesn't it? Wow, look how long this thing is.

Five.

Let's see if there's anything really fun here that we can get into, because I still want to get to Dave Armstrong today, because Dave would be really unhappy if we didn't. I'll tell you what. In conclusion, James White's campaign against Mark Seyfried should be seen for what it is, a publicity stunt which serves to get himself attention.

That is a lie, and Dr. Owen knows it is a lie. We may or may not agree with all Seyfried's criticisms of Protestant scholastic soteriology. I love that in, no, we're skipping it. I love that in scholarly circles.

We may agree, we may disagree.

It's just this wonderful, lovely, you know, we don't know, one way or the other type stuff. We may or may not agree with all Seyfried's criticisms of Protestant scholastic soteriology, but this good man has certainly said nothing which places him outside of the mainstream of contemporary Reformational thinking, nor has he denied that what Protestant theology has attempted to secure through its doctrine of imputation, namely the vital truth that Christ and Christ alone is our righteousness.

That's wonderful, but you know what? Once again, I have to wonder if possibly Dr. Owen is the one here who does not understand the issue. That would be a new thought to him because, honestly, I do not believe that he's ever thought that there was something he could not fully and completely comprehend significantly better than I could.

But I don't see any evidence here that he's actually dealing with the real issue, that he's looking at any of the citations that were provided by myself in regards, for example, to the active and passive obedience of Christ or anything like that.

I don't see any evidence of it, but you know what? We will take the time to finish up responding to that when we have a little bit more time on the program because I want to demonstrate that here's a man who is spreading confusion amongst people.

I believe that Paul Owen is a false teacher, and I'm tired of many years just simply letting his vitriol and his invective go. When people stand up to him and demonstrate that he's bluster, he runs, and I'm not going to let this kind of stuff go any longer.

I'm just not going to do it. He's misrepresenting me. He's misrepresenting the truth. He's misrepresenting this issue. And as I have consistently and in a documented fashion told people on both sides, this is not personal.

Owen wants to make it personal, and he can only do it in that way. And we see the personal elements in what he's saying. And though I've attempted to respond to it with some level of humor, the fact of the matter is that this article is filled with untruths, and I will document them, and of course he will run from it because that's what he does whenever you document his errors, is he runs from them.

He will say, you're too stupid to understand what I'm saying, I'm a brilliant scholar, you're not, but then he will run because he can't deal with those issues. So we'll definitely put up a documented response to Dr. Paul Owen of Montreat College, his statement.

So, anyways, are we ready to go here? We skipped the break.

And...

Here we... And yes, indeed, we go back to Dave Armstrong's appearance on Catholic Answers, Catholic Answers Live, where... By the way, Dave Armstrong's blog has been hilarious of late. Again, it's so much fun to be in a situation where no matter what you say, the other guy is just going to prove you right.

It's just been this explosion of stuff that just... It's just sort of funny as you go on. But this next call is quite interesting, because it deals with material, formal sufficiency, partum-partum, the Marian dogmas, all the rest of that stuff.

So it's rather useful. So let us go back in time to Dave Armstrong's appearance on Catholic Answers Live.

Material Sufficiency, the Trinity, and Marian Dogmas

7884, why we need more than the Bible, or do we? If you have questions, comments about this topic, do join us on that available telephone line. Line 2 is where we go next. Rosemary, calling from Ames, Iowa.

Hi, Rosemary.

Hi. My son is a senior in high school, and he's been talking to a couple of his friends whose fathers are pastors of Protestant churches. So I told him that I thought that it was true that all Catholic beliefs are either somehow implicitly or explicitly in the Bible, but my husband doesn't think that was totally correct.

So I'm just wondering what is the correct answer to that.

Well, that's a good description of what's called material sufficiency. So the Catholic believes that every doctrine we believe in can be found in Scripture, but it's not always explicit. So you can have indications of it, and you have to make deductions.

Even the Trinity is the same sort of thing in a certain sense, because you don't have one verse that says God is one God, exists in three persons, Father, Son, Holy Spirit, and they're all equal in glory and power.

Oh, wait a minute. Hey, we've got a web user here. I wonder if the web user is actually Dave Armstrong.

It says,.

When will Dr. White finally accept Armstrong's longstanding challenge to have a written debate? After all, Dr. White is a published author and shouldn't have problems engaging Armstrong in that forum.

Web user, when will Dave Armstrong accept our invitation to have a real debate, a live debate, where instead of just listening to him and letting him have his say by playing his stuff, we can actually have back and forth that does not involve the kind of dodging questions that you can do in the written format.

For example, the written format in books like Debating Calvinism, where people have complained that I would make one point, and I couldn't force Mr. Hunt to respond to that point, and that's the problem that we have here.

Mr. Armstrong writes forever. The problem is he likes to turn, for example, brief interchanges, or brief, on my part, interchanges, from years ago into alleged debates. He won't do those kind of debates, and that's the kind of debate that is going to be the most useful for everybody else.

That's the important part, you see. And unlike Mr. Armstrong, I don't just sit around writing for the Internet all day long. I have a lot of other things we need to be doing. So web user, whoever you are, whether you be maybe someone related to Mr. Armstrong or something like that, and for those of you who are listening by archive, we have a channel.