Steve Ray

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 It's 602 9 7 3 4 6 0 2 or toll -free across the

United States. It's 1 8 7 7 7 5 3 3 3 4 1 And now with today's topic here is

James White Yes, indeed we're excited today on the dividing line because we are we are excited about a world

Premiere a world not just a United States Premiere not just a

Michigan Premiere not just a Troy Michigan premiere but a world premiere of a

DVD that is going to Rock our socks we can tell the world premiere of of guys who've been dead for I'm Sorry, but One of the first things

I saw in the apologetic section of my RSS this morning was

Steve Ray's announcement of the world premiere of apostolic fathers in a

Catholic Church in Troy, Michigan and It's just tickled me all day long. I We've never we've never done that have we the world premiere of the debate with John Shelby swung the world premiere of debate with John Dominic Ross and Well anything like that webcast around the world, but that's true

That's true See it doesn't when somebody says world from your world doesn't that mean that there it's opening in multiple

I don't know. I don't know but I heard Denzel was gonna be there So if Denzel is gonna be that's pretty big Denzel or Dansel I don't know, but I heard he was gonna be there

Well, you know the funny thing is the reason I think it struck me so funny is do the fact that Tiquid James Swan has been listening to Catholic answers live

I don't know why you know sometimes that worries me when people and for me They've been listening to Catholic answers live

But he's been listening to Catholic answers live and he keeps sending me these these little and and he knows how to do this

He keeps him nice and short so it's easy to fit him into the dividing line and not here here's 45 minutes you can listen to and Recently Steve Ray was on Catholic answers live discussing this very thing in fact

I think that it it's interesting to listen to how he is described by the host of the program who

I think and I asked Jim Swan this and as far as he could tell he thinks this is

Steve Woods daughter who's hosting it I'm not certain, but anyways listen to how she describes the upcoming segment

I'm very excited about our second hour our special guest is Steve Ray And we are going to be talking about the early church and especially the question was the early church

Catholic I know that many of you have Maybe wondered that before or you've been asked that or discussed that with one of your

Protestant friends neighbors brothers and sisters So this is gonna be a great topic We're gonna get a lot of good information across to you let you know about some good resources that can help you

Investigate the history of the early church a little bit more, and we're gonna be taking your questions We have

Steve Ray who's an expert on this topic to answer your questions And I know that your family members or your relatives your neighbors have asked you questions

About the Catholic faith and maybe particularly about the early church and what the early church believed and do those beliefs

Look closely like the beliefs that the Catholic Church holds today So Steve Ray is an expert on the early church so we can we can expect expert

Responses why are you looking so puzzled? I'm just kind of wondering if they Under if she's understanding the word

Catholic the early church being Catholic in the same Steve Ray understand world premiere

World premiere no, I don't think so. I don't think so no Go back to doing what you were doing there.

I'm gonna. I need a control I need to I need to have a control in here of your microphone I need to have a cutoff switch where I can hit here

And it shuts off well some you frequently have a funny look on your face in there, okay, so that's just the way it is okay, anyway, so we have an expert and I Had to admit it see is it this one here.

I think it's I hope it's this one here Yeah, I think this is here

Steve Ray describes his View of the early church and his as a

Baptist we hear a lot in this in fact one of The things mentioned on his blog is that he's giving away an audio

CD if you buy his DVD called from Baptist to Catholic the unintended journey and So it's interesting to listen to his description of what he was like as a

Baptist was Steve Ray a Knowledgeable Baptist was he a trained Baptist was he a Baptist who knew his faith his background things like that well

Let's let's let him sort of describe that for us. I'm very excited about our second hour our special guest

Yeah, okay, we heard that and I know you've been a very busy guy recently you are the producer and director of a

DVD series Called the footprints of God the story of salvation from Abraham to Augustine And I understand you've just released the next edition of the

DVD series so tell us about that Yes well what we did is we put together a DVD a documentary on the life of the early

Christians in the first and second century and I Told their story with a great passion

I have to say because these are the guys that made me Catholic and when I went back as a

Protestant and began to argue with the Catholic Church The first place

I went to argue is I said if I can prove that the first Christians were not Catholic Then I don't have to think about being

Catholic. I can be free of this Idea that so many of my friends were converting especially

Alcresta that if I could argue with him from the first centuries Well, then I could avoid being Catholic and maybe save him from his lunacy

Now let me just stop right there because that That does not even suggest itself to 99 % of Baptists and in fact you could go on say he knew nothing about what these people believed he had these wacky ideas about them and But it would never a

Baptist would argue 99 % of Baptists would argue with Alcresta when he converted the same way

I would have if Alcresta had talked to me I knew him before his conversion I would have first approached the person from the

Bible not from the early church That seemed really really odd, but listen to what he how he viewed the early church writers

When I went back and began to read the writings of the first early Christians from the first and second century

Especially I had my it just rattled my cage is the way I like to say it You see

I was I was raised in a Baptist family that taught me that the early church was basically

Protestant and it's thinking it's theology and it's life Now let me stop right there how many

Baptists in the audience put put your hands up how many Baptists in the audience? You sat around the kitchen table, and you were taught that the early church fathers were

Protestants Yeah, I don't see any hands up either Let's let's be honest large large if he's gonna make himself out to be a

Baptist who had never read anything right now, okay fine. There are a lot of Baptists like that. Let's be honest there's lots of Baptists who are just Baptist because that's they are and For the vast majority of those kind of Baptist church history goes back 50 years they couldn't put

Irenaeus or Ignatius or Tertullian or Cyprian or Athanasius or Augustine within a thousand years of when they lived

I mean Martin Luther was a civil rights guy I mean they honestly the vast majority of Baptists who have never taken a church history class and are very happy just for their traditions

Don't have a clue about the early church and Generally wouldn't care about the early church you not to be sitting around telling people oh, well actually they were just a bunch of Protestants see you know and That I've never heard anything like that in my life

And it's the way it worshiped and it only got corrupted with Catholic stuff Later on in the centuries in the

Middle Ages. They are in the middle the end of the first century and that's when all Is it the

Middle Ages or at the end of the first century those are not the same Catholic garbage got in there and corrupted it all up and it screwed everything up, but the early church was pristine clean simple

Bible only Protestants Wow Okay, well Steve Ray says that's what he was taught.

Well. That's pretty. That's that's that's amazing Because I've never heard anybody say that so I'm not sure

I would love to Know who taught him and what church history classes he took and maybe you could address some book

You know drag me some books that that make that presentation because I'd like to see him. I've never seen that stuff myself

I've never heard that I mean, I've heard some wacky stuff presented by Baptists and and other non

Catholics about the early church but Nothing like that Don't remember hearing anything like that all

I wonder where that came from well anyway What we do learn is that Steve Ray? Had not actually read anything in the early church, and so we wonder what sources he then was reading

Let's let him finish describing his viewpoints. Well when I went back and began to read these guys I realized that I I had been taught wrong, so when we did this documentary

It's the seventh one in our series on the footprints of God With Ignatius press and when

I did this story. I'm going back to tell The life and the death the teachings and the liturgy and the whole

Spectrum of the first centuries with the very guys that I had grown to love I felt like they were my friends before my wife

And I even went over there to begin filming in Israel and Turkey and France and Italy Before we even arrived at all the places where they were buried and where they were born

I already felt like I knew them that they were my friends that I had spent time together with them in Discussion because I had read their writings

I had read about them So I tell their story with great passion Because these are the guys that made me

Catholic and opened my eyes to the beauty of the Catholic Church These are the guys that made me

Catholic okay, we're talking about the first two centuries Then we're gonna be talking about people who well for example

Never used any of Steve Ray's arguments about the assumption because there was never a word about it

So they never used his arguments the arguments that he presented that I've been reviewing In regards not a one of them for example ever used the

Bathsheba and Solomon argument not none of them Addressed any of the

Marian dogmas that he would he would hold today about the bodily assumption or the immaculate conception and in fact if You know

I haven't seen this DVD So I'm not sure who he covers But he'd be able to find people in that time period who would actually teach against the immaculate conception

I wonder if he addresses those issues, and maybe puts a Newman's you know spin on it acorn and tree

And don't have to worry about those particular things He also would not find anyone in this time period and and again if he's only talking about the first two centuries

If anyone goes the end of 200 then he's not gonna be talking about Cyprian people like that though Later in this broadcast he does mention

Cyprian and we'll talk about that, but but He's not gonna. He's not gonna be finding

Oh these folks talking about so many of the things that he is a Catholic Apologist talks about all the time there.

They're not gonna be saying that the Bishop of Rome is the soul and fallible leader of the church

He's gonna make some comments about that, but we'll we'll dig into that he he's not gonna find the word

Transubstantiation in their vocabulary, I mean there's all this stuff, and it makes you you know sort of go hmm

How is it that people who you can't demonstrate believed the key?

Distinctive dogmas that make Roman Catholicism Roman Catholicism today back then why are they how can they be the ones that make you?

Catholic Roman Catholic specifically which of course is an oxymoron

We all know we're talking about I wonder I wonder how that works hmm well anyway

Here is a Let's we've heard that one now. I was gonna close that one there, and we've heard the that one and yeah

That was a cool one, too No all right. Here's um. Let's get this one out of the way because it angers me the most

Um Everybody knows What one of my absolute pet peeves is and that's when

I hear people blaspheming God's truth blaspheming the

Doctrine of the Trinity by Paralleling this divine truth, which is based in and founded upon so much scripture from Old and New Testaments on such a wide variety of clear statements regarding the the eternality of Christ and his deity and the personality of the

Holy Spirit and and all of these things that are just so Plainly taught in Scripture that that you're forced by the whole testimony in Scripture to believe in the

Doctrine of Training so What do Roman Catholics do from Carl Keating on down they all blaspheme the

Doctrine of the Trinity they blaspheme the truth by paralleling this with their man -made doctrines and saying well the

Doctrine the Trinity was a development over time and So is the bodily assumption of Mary and the

Marian dogmas and blah blah blah blah blah things that are found nowhere in Scripture have no foundation were clearly not the teaching of the

Apostolic Church and Yet they want to try to parallel the two and that's unfortunately

Exactly what happens here Well Steve, let's talk a little bit about doctrine And I know this is a big problem for some people who look at the early church

And let's just take let's take church teaching on the Blessed Virgin Mary for instance in the early church

The early church fathers might have talked about Mary the Bible talks about her too But it's this mammoth entity that we call the

Roman Catholic Church today that has hundreds of years later after the early church Defined doctrine such as the

Immaculate Consumption And I know a lot of our Protestant brothers and sisters have a problem with this saying this was not the early church

This was not the Bible the Catholic Church has invented all these things. What do we say to that? Well what I like to do is go back to two or three examples that I had to deal with as a

Baptist Because I used the word Trinity But yet I never found the word Trinity in the

Bible and some people say you know It's obvious the Trinity's in the Bible And I said is it really well the

Jehovah's Witnesses read that New Testament, and they don't come up with the Trinity There are the one one

Jesus only Pentecostals which are thousands of them now huge and growing and they go to the same

New Testament And they don't see the Trinity there and the Mormons don't see the Trinity there And there are many who the

Aryans in the first centuries went to the New Testament And they argued that Jesus was not God let me just stop right there.

I hope you hear that I Hope you hear the voice of Romanism here

This is the voice of Romanism the acidic voice of Romanism that tries to eat away

Any confidence that anyone could possibly have in the inspired and revealed

Word of God There it is Well look at all the heretics out there

That must mean the Bible's not clear on the subject Really listen we just the

Mormons don't see it. Yeah, the Mormons don't see it There's only one true God that is the most basic foundational revelation of the entirety of Scripture And they also don't believe that the when the

Pope says it either big whoopie ding dong What do you accomplish by getting rid of the perspicuity of Scripture other than enslaving people to your your

Roman Authority? amazing to hear that kind of Argumentation and that is the voice of Rome many other

Roman Catholic apologists are a little more subtle But there you hear it coming from the

Steve Ray isn't good. It's subtle so there you hear it coming out just Undercut the Bible undercut the clarity of Scripture undercut.

It's it's the purpose perspicuity of its testimony and There you have Rome so the word

Trinity is not there But yet we as Christians not only Catholics But Baptists and Lutherans and Presbyterians and the assemblies of God we all believe in the

Trinity Why if the words not there because the doctrine developed it started out very simple

We read in the Bible and and we were taught by the Apostles even before the New Testament was completed

That the Father was God that the Son was God and the Holy Spirit is

God now We have a problem the Bible says in the Old Testament that God is one There's only one

God and yet now we see three, but it's not three God It's three persons within the one

God and so the church had to struggle with these things over the first centuries And they had to develop the doctrine and in about the year 180 the word trios was first used

The Trinity the word three and so is the doctrine developed then we began to use the word

Trinity And well, and I stopped there just to go and why does this doctrine develop? What is the only foundation for true

Christian doctrinal development it is dealing with God's? revelation and that of course is the major difference between clear perspicuous teachings on the deity of Christ and the person of the

Holy Spirit and the Teaching of such things as the immaculate conception and the bodily assumption of Mary remember a couple weeks ago or last week

I think was I played the clip where the guy was calling in and talking about how the the

Perpetual virginity of Mary Had Gnostic overtones where Tim Staples the caller and and how

Jesus sort of just beamed out of Mary's womb and stuff like that Folks think about that think about that kind of wild -eyed speculation that no one can

Seriously look at you in the face and say yes, that's what the Apostles were teaching the Thessalonians and Compare that with the prologue of John and you'll see the massive

Grand -canyon -sized chasm that exists between the evidence for the doctrines of Trinity that people then

Struggle with because it's right there in Scripture and this stuff that's made up hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of years later primarily based upon Gnostic sources and Then pawned off as if it is somehow

Christian even Protestants hold to that teaching today Which was developed by the fathers of the

Catholic Church. Another one we could use is the canon of Scripture. Let's stop right there

Developed by the fathers of what church certainly not the Roman Catholic Church Certainly not the church of Steve Ray certainly the church of infallible

Popes and Cardinals and a magisterium in Rome And when you point that out well, but see that's all development to see

When you try to say wait a minute, where is this church in antiquity? The development hypothesis allows you to abandon the field of historical battle

You don't have to go back in history like I just what developed it just developed over time You know It just develops over time and that somehow is meant to provide you with the with foundation now

Now we go to the canon the New Testament wasn't even written in the early parts of that first century

Not until the last half of the second century where the books even written and then it took until almost what?

Last half the second century. What how late is this guy dating the New Testament?

That has to have been a miss misspeak on his part. It has to have been there. Nobody anymore puts him that late

He just must have misspoke 173 hundred and eighty ninety before the books were all collected finally into one

Collection that we call the New Testament Not quite especially since you have manuscripts being produced around time the

Council of Nicaea Did have the same New Testament we have today you have Athanasius 39th

Festal letter, which is about 40 years after The Council of Nicaea and so you're pushing it push it too far down the road here for what reason?

Well again just to try to make people subject to Rome's authority Sometimes don't we what's that?

We forget about that sometimes don't we know where we got that from? We think that the first believers are all

Bible alone. You know, they carry their black leather Yeah, you know

I would recommend to anybody I Can't remember how many times

I remember the first time I ran into this about 1980 87 or so I ran into this

Roman Catholic. This is back in the old BBS days member Bolton board systems way back when the precursor to the internet and I ran into this

Roman Catholic that just made the statement that the new test the the church didn't even have a

Bible And I'm like what? Yeah, they all they had was oral tradition I'm like, um, do you remember something called the the

Old Testament? Well, yeah Big deal. No, I didn't have the

New Testament. I said well the New Testament is shorter than the Old Testament have you ever looked at a

Greek New Testament where the citations of the Old Testament are provided to you so that you can actually see them and and see how much the writings of the

New Testament draw from quote from and are based upon the Old Testament scriptures and They just sort of look at you blank like well

Fact is is that even the Bible? Developed over time. So then when we say, okay, we have the

Bible developed over time No, the Revelation ended when the last Apostle put the pen down the question of our

Recognition of what is inspired is a completely different issue The Bible wasn't developing the

Bible was exactly as it was when it was inspired and given Don't confuse the two issues stand now that doctrine develops there was no manual

Jesus didn't give us a theology handbook He gave us 12 men and a tradition and then over time

We have to take the puzzle pieces put them together and understand and define the doctrine and then we could do the same with Mary With salvation with not not remember what the original question was was about Mary There's where Mary pops back in but only after what?

Only after you attack the perspicuity of Scripture and its ability to communicate even the most basic of God's truths and That's supposed to be a defense of Mary and look

Rome has to do this There's no question when you're trying to smuggle stuff that the Apostles never taught

Into their mouths you have to attack Scripture because Scripture will always contradict you it'll always expose you and So you've got to attack

Scripture, and that's what he just did that is not a sufficient basis Why don't you go back to these very men you call your friends and show us where they taught these things why?

Because it has been recognized by anyone who knows anything about this subject They did not teach the things that modern

Roman Catholicism Teaches the only people in the second century who were talking about Mary in the way the doctrine of perpetual virginity of Mary does today were the

Gnostic heretics They were the only ones doing it because that's where the doctrine came from Purgatory with the church and all of it.

They all have their progression like a flower That's in a bud form and then slowly over the centuries the bud opens up to reveal the beautiful flower

Well there you go John Henry Cardinal Newman couldn't have said it any better himself It's better an acorn the tree the beautiful flower it opens up over centuries

That's a wonderful way of saying that I didn't teach any of these things. I can't give you any historical basis, but let's just talk about pretty flowers, and how they develop over time and Let's not worry about that the the parallel that I drew between the

Trinity and Mary has absolutely not the slightest shred of Meaningful substance to it just buy my

DVD and be happy just just be happy and be Roman so okay Then we did discover something else about a

Steve Ray's understanding of of his own beliefs when he was younger in this little clip now

Steve as you know my own family converted to Catholicism in large part because my dad as a

Presbyterian minister started reading the early church fathers And as he tells everyone today He started reading the early church fathers and looking at the

Catholic Church and kind of connecting dots and saying hmm It looks a lot like the early church did and so the reason that work that I'm talking to you today

Is is really because of reading me the stories of the early church fathers and again?

I just have to go really you know I read those same things And I go look at all the distinctive things that Rome has developed over time missing

I guess they just buy this well It was their implicitly type thing and and I I find all these differences of viewpoints, and I find that this particular writer

Clearly didn't have access to this part of the New Testament Or or maybe just didn't agree with it, and this this is a good writer over here, but this guy over here and Sadly I see some of the well all every single one of the best writers in the early church

Fell into the same trap that we all do we are all subject as I've given a number of talks on this over the years

Using Augustine as an example. You know here's one of the greatest theological thinkers of all time and yet his mature

Theology is self -contradictory why? because of the Conflicts that he went through in his own life and ministry and so when he is fighting the

Donatist controversy then he leans this direction and Let's face it some of the exegesis some of the interpretation offered especially since a lot of these guys couldn't handle the original languages themselves

Not overly good Imbalanced shall we say because of what they're fighting, but then later in his life

It's the plaguing controversy and so there's an imbalance the other direction and the problem is those two controversies ended up creating his doctrine of the church and his doctrine of grace, and you can't put the two of them together

He contradicts himself, but it's because of the conflicts He was in you look at Irenaeus and man some of the stuff that he says about Gnosticism Not only do you then find that some of his representations weren't overly accurate sometimes.

They were sometimes They weren't I mean he had different Kinds of information available to him and sometimes he had you know firsthand information from Gnostic teachers sometimes

It was second or third and and further research has sort of gotten in not really sure where an ace came up with that But even with that You find that some of his arguments as we'll see here in a little while in response to Gnosticism Well, no one would really use them today

They really wouldn't go there, and I wonder that's why I keep wondering what what version of the early church fathers these folks reading

Are they reading the expurgated? Cleaned up this makes it look like modern

Rome version someplace Why why aren't they running across all these controversy knows all these places where you look at the at the interpretation of a text you go?

That's That's that's really not overly good, and you just you just wonder about things like that It does does make me scratch my head my parents did but let's go back to the early church

And I know people have a lot of misconceptions a lot of our Protestant brothers and sisters about the early church

And the Catholic Church, and how the two are connected But some people even think that Jesus never intended to start a church and a lot of our

Protestant brothers and sisters have a problem with the idea of this organized church, so We do

Which which group okay? I thought her father Steve would and I think

I think I heard Steve would give the first Public talk after his conversion in January of 1991 in El Cajon, California.

I was in the audience that day and So if he's Presbyterian then he would it

I can at least hold him to the Westminster Confession at that point and the Westminster Confession has a very high doctrine of the church and so I Wonder what

Steve Ray's view of the church was was Jesus just trying to reform Judaism Or did he truly intend to start and establish a church here on earth?

You know what happened is that the church? That's a good question and the early church was always one it was a visible

Organized unity and the way I like to say is it was a visible organization that had an address

You knew where it was you knew where the headquarters were you knew what what this organization was?

But when the Reformation came they broke away from this visible unity this

Organization called the Catholic Church And they had to get rid of the idea of it being visible that it was an invisible thing now

It was just well because we can't agree on doctrine and we can't agree on practice and even morals

We must the unity we have must be some kind of a unseen invisible

Spiritual unity so the church must be an invisible kind of a unity together That really can't be seen

But Jesus didn't intend that to be the case when he started his church

He said twice and I know there's a lot of scholars that have tried to Find a way to cut these words out of the

Bible by saying they were inserted later Or they really didn't mean this but Jesus said I will build my church

He intended to build an Ecclesia a new community a church

And he even said to the his apostles that if a brother sins go to the brother if he doesn't listen take it to two

Or three, but if he doesn't listen to those two or three then take it to the church

And if he doesn't listen to the church the final court of appeal the final judge if he doesn't listen to the church

Even to the church then consider him as an outcast and a sinner and a tax collector

Jesus Intended to build a church he intended the church to have an address where you could know where it was and That you could take people to it if there was a sin someone sinned against you and when

I was in my conversion process Stephanie I realized that if I went to the first Baptist Church on Main Street And the

Christian brother from the first Methodist Church across the street sinned against me What where is the church that I could take that brother to?

My church has no authority over him his church has no authority over me because we're totally separate entities

So where is the church that Jesus was talking about the church that you could bring your problem to and find somebody who could?

Adjudicate or make a judgment about it, and that's what Jesus expected to have available now again if if Steve Ray was a at least a knowledgeable Baptist then he would recognize that first of all if he was a part of a

Just sort of plain old Baptist Church notice the difference Baptist BAB TIST is different than BAP TST so Baptist that's big problem of Baptist is that you you get your nose out join at one

Baptist Church and if you're down in Georgia and You're going to the the third

Baptist Church You can always go to the fourth Baptist And if you don't like it the fourth you can go the seventh

Baptist and they're all within a mile of each other anyway so in those situations Yeah There is very little effort upon certain realms of Baptist to for example

Have a biblical View of the officers of the church they they sort of have a monarchy

Which is a little bit like Rome they've got they've got a king and that's the pastor and then the deacons who think they're elders and They all fight it out most the time and that's not a biblical form.

Sorry. It's not Bible talks about elders in the plural and the Apostles established elders in the plural in the church

And that's why I believe those things and you need to have biblical form and plurality of elders certainly helps a lot of things and Then if they have a if you have a

Baptist view that goes back in history to things like the 1689 London Baptist Confession of Faith or even back to the

Congregationalists, you know people like that in England Then there will be a very high view of the church and there will be for example concern about holiness.

There will be discipline And you go well, what good is discipline? If you can just go to the church next door, that's why at our church.

We have a guarded table that is we We do honor the discipline of like -minded churches

And so you can't just go hopping from place to place and partake of the Lord's Supper now, of course,

I would immediately stop and go did anyone else notice the Amazing hypocrisy of this statement.

This is a man representing the modern Roman Catholic Church When did you last see the modern

Roman Catholic Church clean in house and do in discipline? Huh, how many

Roman Catholic leaders are there how many Roman Catholic scholars are there?

How many Roman Catholic? politicians are there Who flaunt the

Roman Catholic Church's teaching on almost every subject and what does

Rome do? But sit on her hands Excuse me for not being overly impressed

When you start talking about hey, we got one church to go to when your church doesn't do anything

This is the modern Roman Catholic Church. Can I say priest scandal? Can I say?

hundreds of millions of dollars paid out in hush money and damages

Excuse me, but it's not overly impressive When you sit there and go

I've you first Methodist first Baptist, you can't get anything done Well, excuse me, but when you stand up and start living by what you say you believe and we might you know

Give it a give it a second thought but right now, please That that's that just leaves me going.

Yeah, by the way It almost sounded like what he was saying there was we don't believe in the

Visible invisible distinction that we only believe in the invisible church. That's ridiculous. That's When you talk about well the church had an address, okay

Yeah, that's right The church does have an address and the church's addresses in the

New Testament were Ephesus and Philippi and Colossae and Rome not just Rome period end of discussion

There's a little bit of a difference there, right and so there's all sorts of references to the church in the

New Testament that is a local church and then the references to the Invisible the universal church, which is inclusive not only of all the

Saints on earth now but all those who have ever lived and maybe ever will live in some context, so Really hard to take that one really over the overly seriously at that particular point now two more to go one of the callers brought up Irenaeus and Well, just listen to what was said we're gonna go to Illinois now and talk with Sarah Sarah.

Welcome to Catholic answers live Hi, I'm Sarah. I was yeah, can you hear me?

Yes, we can. I Was I was wondering why do Why do

Protestants ignore the overwhelming evidence for Catholicism in the early church?

Like they might quote the early church fathers like like like Polly like Polly cut for example who

I think knew st. John the Apostles personally probably and but they

They don't they don't talk about them. They don't talk about the cast the

Catholic stuff and it's like and and it's like really plain and obvious But I'll tell you why

I didn't because I didn't know about them. We're being raised the Baptist We never talked about the fathers of the church.

We had the Bible and we said the fathers of the church aren't inspired Why should we care what they say?

Wait a minute Before he said that he had been taught Did all the writers early church were

Protestant Bible only folks and then we started reading them found out they weren't now

Didn't he just say we didn't talk about any of them But now he then he says two seconds after that.

We were told they were inspired. We're duh Isn't Rome saying there as are you saying

Rome's saying they're inspired? Of course not It's sort of hard to get straight answer. We have the Bible and it's inspired and that's what we'll pay attention to and study so my reason for not knowing about the early church or Understanding and believing that it was very

Catholic in its essence was because I never knew about it No one ever taught me about it.

And then many people even though they do learn they have they are so ingrained in their own

Traditions, it's like wearing a pair of glasses If you wear a blue pair of glasses the world looks blue And if you wear a red pair of glasses the world looks red

And if you wear a Baptist pair of glasses the world looks very Baptist And if you wear a

Catholic pair of glasses, which you by dogma must do so because Rome claims to be the final authority then all the early church fathers look like Roman Catholics and what happens is all of us have a tradition or a lens through which we see

Reality the Bible or history none of us are objective So when somebody looks at church history with Baptist glasses, so to speak like I'm referring to myself

When I read anything about the early church, I always interpreted it as a good

Baptist would we said, oh well They wait a minute. Did you read about it or didn't you read about it?

What were you told a week? I'm sorry, but we keep getting so many different stories as to what as a

Baptist He believed it's pretty hard to to accept any one of them They got just off the track here a little bit, you know

Or they were a little bit exaggerating over here or they really couldn't have meant this Because we know that that they were that these things were wrong

But you're absolutely right in my movie on the Apostolic Fathers. I make a big

Display, I have a big timeline on the wall and I show here's Jesus and he personally taught

John the Apostle and John the Apostle personally taught polycarp and Polycarp personally taught

Irenaeus and so Irenaeus is getting the true doctrine right through polycarp from John And that's very close.

And like you said Sarah, all of these guys were distinctly and profoundly Catholic But I didn't know that because nobody told me

Sarah thank you so much for that. Good question Distinctly and profoundly

Catholic Roman Catholic. No Catholic as the term they used it over against the

Gnostics or Novationists or whatever. Yeah different terms completely different meanings and you're you're pretty much deceiving folks if you don't mention those things, but just in passing if you will go to The website if you will go to my blog throw into the search engine the soon -to -be massively improved search engine with Context so that it'll be a search engine

Throw in there one word Bonacore b o n o c o r e

Bonacore and Actually, you can even do this in Google.

You can put in Bonacore plus Ignatius or Irenaeus and Are the the articles will come up?

there are numbers 138 and Let me see here

It's from it's from January 12 2005 if you want to just go with the date if you want to go there

You will you will find two articles that I wrote in response to Mark Bonacore who at the time anyways was with Well as a group that used to be associated with St.

Genesis and Sippo I'm not sure if I know St. Genesis isn't associated with it anymore I don't know if they fight with St.

Genesis now everybody fights as Janice, but anyways It's hard to keep track of who's who anymore on that side of the

Tiber But but it is a response to some comments that he made in regards to a very very interesting article

Let me just read a section of it here to you in Book two starting in chapter 20

Irenaeus begins arguing against the Gnostic use of various biblical passages to substantiate the sufferings of the twelfth

Aeon for example we read quote they endeavor for instance to demonstrate that Passion which they say happened in the case of the twelfth

Aeon From this fact the passion of the Savior was brought about by the twelfth Apostle and happened to the twelfth month

For they hold that he preached only for one year after his baptism end quote Like Harold camping in modern days the

Gnostics would latch on to anything in a text so as to make a connection with their teachings Irenaeus is seeking to debunk these parallels a difficult task since most the time such assertions have no meaning and Refuting a meaningless assertion can require it can require an immense amount of effort in the 21st chapter

It goes after the argument that the twelfth Apostle twelfth twelve apostles were a type of the eons

Typological argument is common amongst Gnostics it happens to be common in defending them biblical teachings about Mary in modern

Roman Catholicism as well And both usages lack meaningful exegetical grounding and then in chapter 22

Irenaeus seeks to debunk another argument The Gnostics have presented one that draws a parallel between Jesus baptism when he was 30 years old 2030 eons here is how the chapter begins quote

We are now quoting Irenaeus who you just heard Steve Ray say learned directly from polycarp who learned directly from the

Apostles There's only there's only one step from the Apostles to polycarp one step from polycarp to Irenaeus Alright keep that in mind.

It's very important I've showed the number 30 fails them in every respect too few eons as they as they represent them being at one time found within The Pleroma and then again too many to correspond with that number

There are not therefore 30 eons nor the Savior come to be baptized when he was 30 years old for this reason that he might

Show forth the 30 silent eons of their system Otherwise, they must first of all separate and eject the

Savior himself from the Pleroma of all Moreover, they affirmed that he suffered in the twelfth month So that he continued to preach for one year after his baptism and they endeavored to establish this point out of the prophet for it

Is written to proclaim the acceptable year of the Lord and the day of retribution Being truly blind and as much they affirm that they have found out the mysteries of Bythos yet not

Understanding that which is called by Isaiah the acceptable year of the Lord nor the day of retribution For the prophet neither speaks concerning a day which includes the space of 12 hours nor of a year the length of which is 12 months

And quote so how's Irenaeus? Are you against this in section 2 of chapter 22? He seeks to address the meaning of the day of retribution and the acceptable day of the

Lord trying Tying this to the present day then in section 3 He argues that Jesus went up multiple times to the

Passover feast after his baptism this in Contradiction to the Gnostic claim that he misministered only one year now at this point

I need to reproduce Irenaeus's words, but we enter here into the section of dispute in section 4 we read quote

Being 30 years old when he came to be baptized and then possessing the full age of a master He came to Jerusalem So he might be properly acknowledged by all as a master if we did not seen

For he did not seem one thing while he was another and as those affirm who described him as being man only in appearance

But what he was that he also appeared to be being a master therefore He also possessed the age of a master not despising or evading any condition of humanity or setting aside in himself that law

Which he had appointed for the human race, but sanctifying every age by that period Corresponding to it which belonged to himself where he came to save all through means of himself all

I say Who through him are born to God infants and children and boys and use and old men he therefore passed through every age

Becoming an infant for infants thus sanctifying infants a child for children the sanctifying those who are of this age being at the same time made to them an example of piety righteousness and submission a

Youth for use becoming example to use and thus sanctifying them for the Lord So likewise he was an old man for old men

That he might be a perfect master for all not merely as respects the setting forth of the truth, but also as regards age

Sanctifying at the same time the aged also and becoming an example to them likewise Then at last he came on to death itself that he might be the firstborn from the dead that in all things he might have preeminence the prince of life existing before and going before all so When Irenaeus refers to Christ truly being human and truly having age he is arguing against the ancient heresy of docet ism

Which taught that Christ only seemed to have a physical body and then he boldly asserts That Christ went through all the ages of men so that he might sanctify them all producing echoes the recapitulation

Theory it seems to me and that includes that of an old man So in the fifth section he lays out what this means and listen carefully now if you've sort of gotten lost listen to what

Irenaeus Remember only two steps removed from the Apostles before the end of the second century.

He's writing this okay very close Listen to what he says they however that they may establish their false opinion regarding that which is written to proclaim the acceptable

Acceptable year of the Lord maintained that he preached for one year only and then suffered in the twelfth month and speaking thus they are forgetful

To their own disadvantage destroying his whole work and robbing him of that age Which is both more necessary and more honorable than any other that more advanced age

I mean during which also as a teacher he exiled he excelled all others For how could he have had disciples if he did not teach and how could he have taught unless he had reached the age of a?

master For when he came to be baptized he had not yet completed his 30th year But was beginning to be about 30 years of age for thus

Luke who has mentioned his years has expressed it now Jesus says it were being to be about beginning to be about 30 years old when he came to receive baptism and according to these

Men he preached only one year reckoning from his baptism on Completing his 30th year he suffered being in fact still a young man

And who had by no means attained to advanced age now that the first stage of early life embraces 30 years

And that this extends onwards to the 40th year everyone will admit But from the 40th and 50th year a man begins to decline towards old age

Which our Lord possessed while he still fulfilled the office of a teacher even as the gospel and all the elders testify

Those who were conversant listen to this those who were conversant in Asia with John the disciple of the

Lord affirming that John conveyed to them that Information and he remained among them up to the times of Trajan That's the

Emperor Trajan some of them moreover saw not only John but the other apostles also and Heard the very same account from them and bear testimony as to the validity of the statement

Whom then should we rather believe whether such men as these or Ptolemaeus?

Who never saw the apostles and who never even his dreams attained the slightest trace of an apostle?

and so What he's arguing is that Jesus was at least 50 years of age and that?

this tradition He knows he doesn't say the scripture here this tradition came from John Remember what what did

Steve Ray himself say John to Polycarp to Irenaeus? And so here he's saying

John taught and I he even cites other Apostles taught that Jesus was at least 50 years 50 years of age when he died this is the earliest example we have in the patristic writings of what is called a

Tradition going to the Apostles the first one and Nobody in the

Roman Catholic Communion believes it Not a one They all agree

That traditions corrupt the very first one mentioned and It's corrupt

So if it can't go two steps Not past the end of the second century and it's corrupt

Then how on earth is anyone to seriously believe that there is some

Tradition from the Apostles that has been passed down that was defined in the middle of the 20th century about the bodily assumption of Mary Or the immaculate conception or anything for that matter

To where it can become a dogma of the Christian faith Look him up yourself.

I didn't read the whole thing. There's a whole lot more to look at there But there you've got him saying it. There's one more I want to get to I'm gonna have to rush on this one

But this one was was quite interesting as well listen this I wrote a book by the way Ron is it right

Ron yes I wrote a book I called upon this rock because when I was Learning about this early church, which

I called the ancient church I didn't want to call it Catholic or anything at first because I just viewed it as the ancient church

I started to do a study back then on the leadership and if there was a unity or if it was all just broken up into Patriarchates and even what we would call heretical groups because they some of them were

Nestorians and they argued about the nature of Christ and so on but what I found was is that even though there were the patriarchates of Jerusalem and Alexandria and Antioch and Constantinople and Rome which were the main ones all of them looked to Rome even from the very first centuries all of them looked to Rome for leadership and guidance and when the

Eastern churches were in heresy they always appealed to Rome which was the one church that had never had a heresy and even called upon Rome to be in charge of replacing bishops or Patriarchs when they were in heresy or when they were in rebellion against true doctrine now that is it by the way

Just just in passing one of the most simplistic Representations of church history that you will ever hear

Obviously just think for one moment if you have multiple Patriarchs in the

East but only one in the West and the ones in the East argue with each other

Then what are they each going to want to do in regards to Rome? Which was the seat of the

Empire until the Empire was moved over to Constantinople, but still Rome remained very important they're both going to want

Rome and Rome's support in their arguments for one another and So, of course, there's going to be appeals to Rome to get

Rome on one side or the other and that's what ended up in Creating a number of the most major theological problems of that time period especially in some

Instances we don't get into today about those myths and things like that when those when the papacy Like would flip -flop and stuff like that Even though there were different Patriarchates and groups among Christianity in that early centuries just like there are today

There are Melkite and there are Maronite rites and Greek Catholic rites And even though they have their own

Patriarchate and their own Many of them their own unique liturgies they are still all loyal to Rome and still recognize

Rome as the as the leader in a sense, so So even though there were those divisions in the early years they were still they looked to Rome as to their as as The head of the church as a source of unity to the point where Cyprian in 250

Right before he had his head cut off well before the New Testament was ever put together in North Africa He said that there is one chair of Peter and if you are not in that chair or in union with that chair of Peter Can you even believe that you are part of the church?

Now there there you have him giving one of the statements from Cyprian that is so often used

I quote from Carl Keating when he said Let's see here

Cyprian of Carthage writing about 256 asked what heretics dare to come to the very seat of Peter Whence apostolic faith is derived and whither no errors can come and quote you will you just heard

Steve Ray talking about the chair of Peter the it's called the cathedra Petri the seat of Peter and this is

Let me just read you again. This is from Aomin org slash sermo 131 that HTML a fairly lengthy article sermo is capitalized sermo 131

HTML I said Cyprian did indeed speak of the seat of Peter in Latin the cathedra Petri It was also very central to his view of church unity and authority

No one who broke unity with the cathedra Petri was truly in the church All this is quite true and beyond this

Cyprian spoke highly of the Roman Sea when defending Cornelius as a result of innovation a Schism in Rome he rebuked those who rejected

Cornelius his position as the bishop of Rome Despite this Cyprian sent a sharp rebuke to Cornelius when he gave audience to men who had been disposed deposed in North Africa But it is just here that we learn how important it is to study church history as a discipline

Not as a mere tool to be used in polemic debate. We can assume out of generosity that when mr

Keating wrote his book He actually believed that when Cyprian spoke of the cathedra Petri that Cyprian understood this phrase as a modern

Roman Catholic would That is he may well have assumed that the seat of Peter was understood by everyone back then to refer to the bishop of Rome However, all students of church history know differently

Cyprian and the North African Church as a whole for the span of centuries Believe the chair of Peter referred to all bishops in all churches across the world

Cyprian for example claimed to sit upon the cathedra Petri as did all bishops for example, he wrote in epistle 26

Our Lord whose precepts and admonitions we ought to observe Describing the honor of a bishop in the order of his church speaks in the gospel and says to Peter I say unto you

Thou art Peter and upon this rock I will build my church and the gates of hell shall not prevail against it now We'll give unto thee the keys the kingdom of heaven and whatsoever

Thou shalt buy on earth shall be bound in heaven whatsoever Thou shalt loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven thence through the changes of times and successions the ordering of bishops and the plan of the church flow onwards so the church is founded upon the bishops and Every act of the church is controlled by these same rulers.

That is plural and quote This fact is recognized by Roman Catholic historians.

Johannes Quaston Catholic patristic scholar commented in petrology volume 2 page 375 Thus he understands

Matthew 16 18 of the whole Episcopate the various members of which attached to one another by the laws of charity and concord

Thus render the church universal single -body end quote and a little later Quaston cites the word of an

African Synod led by Cyprian which said quote No one among us sets himself up as a bishop of bishops or by tyranny and terror forces his colleagues to compulsory obedience seeing that every bishop in the freedom of his liberty and power

Possesses the right to his own mind and can no more be judged by another than he himself can judge another

We must all await the judgment of the Lord Jesus Christ who singly and alone Has power both to appoint us to the government of his church and to judge our acts therein

Obviously out of time, but you can see there's much more when you delve into history to go deep into history is to cease

To follow people like Steve Ray who don't go deep into history. We'll see you next time in the dividing line

Crossroads We need The dividing line has been brought to you by Alpha and Omega Ministries If you'd like to contact us call us at six oh two nine seven three four six zero two or write us at p .o

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Org, that's a o -m -i -n dot o -r -g where you'll find a complete listing of James White's books tapes debates and tracks